Ethiopian major problems and possible remedies
By Ture Hirbe, PhD | July 31, 2010
While living in democratic countries we envy the citizens of these countries to see them exercise their right to elect their officials at all levels of the government. For example, the USA possesses more than 500,000 elected offices. Other things being equal, the greater the number of offices subject to competitive election, the more democratic a political system becomes. We Ethiopians are dreaming for the day that we will be able to choose our leaders and officials without fear, harassment and intimidation. Definitely Elections are the defining institution of modern democracy. However, I believe that Elections alone may not solve all problems and protracted social conflicts in Ethiopia. Ethiopia is facing multifaceted and complicated problems which need complex approach to solve them. I would suggest three problems, which might need immediate attention.
Besides, an uncompromising political culture of 1970s is still intact in our society. Those political elites in power and the leaders of oppositions are all the product of the 1970s political movement, and they have a problem of listening and understanding the position of their opponents. For them the games are always to win or to lose. No win-win situation in their thinking. The opponents should be in anyways defeated. This kind of political culture is still intact in our society and we should have to openly debate on it and overcome this hurdle, if we really want to address our problems genuinely and solve them definitely. —- The writer can be reached at turehirbe@gmail.com Ethiomedia.com – An African-American news and views website. Copyright 2010 Ethiomedia.com. Email: editor@ethiomedia.com |