In a space of a month, the people of Tunisia and Egypt, routed out their dictators and are working on dismantling the apparatus of dictatorship that have kept them in bondage for years. In Tunisia, it was the self-immolation of a desperate college-graduate- fruit- vendor that became the spark for a popular uprising against a regime that was corrupt and oppressive. Egypt got its inspiration from Tunisia, and within days, a mass demonstration was organized by a youthful social-networking sophisticates to voice their pent-up anger at the repressive regime. Reverberations of this non-violent mass movement against tyranny are already being felt in Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Libya and Yemen. King Abdullah of Jordan, heeding the examples of Tunisia and Egypt, had tried to preempt the gradually rising tide of a popular uprising by dangling some concessions. He made some cosmetic changes in the hierarchy of his government and cursory attempts to remedy the high inflationary prices of staple foods.
President Ali Abdullah Saleh of Yemen already troubled by, intransigent tribes in the north (the Houthis) who are challenging the dictates of the central government, a secessionist movement in the south, the mushrooming of Al-Qaida cells all over the country, and by an economy in chaos, has been trying to protect and maintain his position by appeasing the protesters. He had promised not to run for re-election nor bequeath the throne to his son Ahmed. In both countries none of those last minute promises of reforms were enough for the protesters. The protesters are adamant on their demands for a complete change of government. They had had enough of promises that were never kept. In Bahrain and Libya the autocrats are taking a firm stand against the protesters. A number of peaceful protesters were murdered by the police and security agents of the repressive autocracy. So far both regimes seem willing to shoot protesters. In Libya, Khadafy’s air force has been strafing unarmed demonstrators from helicopters. The death toll in both countries is mounting by the day.
Now that the long time dictators of Egypt and Tunisia are dislodged from their entrenchments, it’ll be interesting to see if the people’s demand for a representative government will be fulfilled. In Tunisia signs of discontent with the care-taker government have already been manifesting itself because the transitional government still harbors elements of the old regime. People are suspicious of the ad hoc government, made up of some members of the old regime, and wondering if it would clear out and set the stage for the establishment of a new representative government. Egypt is facing the same dilemma: will the military as the temporary custodian government allow a contested election and hand over power to the winner or will they usurp power and turn the country into a military dictatorship? Time will tell what the fates of the Egyptians and Tunisians will be. The world is watching with great interest and hopefulness.
Even though it is early to know if the Egyptians and Tunisians will realize their aspirations for an elected government that is responsible and responsive to their interests, their phenomenal popular movements have been an inspiration to many in the world, especially those living under dictatorships. People in Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan, Libya and Yemen saw via satellite-TV, courtesy of Aljazeera and others, the genesis of a movement that is non-violent, disciplined, courageous, and determined to bring down the dictator and his regime. The Algerians, Bahrainis, Jordanians, Libyans, and Yemenis have observed and learnt and are now inspired to try replicating the glorious uprisings that swept away the dictators in Tunisia and Egypt. They are already out in the streets taking the first step of an arduous journey to lift off their backs the boots of the dictators that have been weighing down on them for decades.
The question is: can Algerians, Bahrainis, Jordanians, Libyans, Yemenis and others under dictatorships elsewhere, for example, Ethiopia and Iran, replicate the successes attained in Egypt and Tunisia? A simple reply is: yes. A society that values freedom and is determined to fight for its protection will inevitably triumph. History is fraught with instances where the oppressed rose up against an oppressive system of government and prevailed. For example, the oppressed were victorious in the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution, and the Chinese Revolution. Those were revolutions that were violent, class-based (an oppressed class wanting to replace an oppressive class), and utopian (trying to form an ideal society). In other instances, the oppressed formed movements that were non-violent, comprised of broad coalitions, interested not in transforming the whole society into an ideal but to replace an irresponsible, corrupt and cruel government that does not represent them. The list of non-violent uprisings is long, but, narrowing it down to the ones not in the long past, Poland, Philippines, Czechoslovakia, Serbia and Ukraine come into mind. Those were the successful ones, but there were failures ones too in places such as Belarus, Burma, China, and Iran. The failures are not doomed to exist under perpetual dictatorship. They just have to maintain their courage and sharpen their tools of organization for the next confrontation. Those who are determined to be free cannot be dominated forever. With persistence of courage and immaculate organization they will be able to break the shackles of tyranny.
The conditions that lead a society to rebel against its government are invariably the same everywhere. In a society where the government is detached from its people and where its officials see the positions they hold as a means to enrich themselves, these are likely to arouse resentment in its people. A government that does not uphold the universal values of liberty and equality will likely lose legitimacy in the eyes of its people. When a government regulates what people read or write, bans the right to assemble, detains without legal process and tortures, and forces people to obey arbitrary rules and laws, all these are abuses of human rights that will eventually wear out the tolerance of the citizen and lead to rebellion. History shows that a government that does not believe that people are sovereign, that they have the right to choose a government that represents them and which is accountable to them, will inevitably be swept into oblivion. And if the right of the people to equality, equal opportunity and equal before the law, is denied, then the people will seek opportunities to bring down that government. In short, a government that treats its people as subjects with no rights can only rule by intimidation of imprisonment, torture and murder. Past and present uprisings reveal, in general, that what finally drives people to a spontaneous rebellion, the last straw, is an economy that is in shambles. If the state of the economy is so bad that prices of essential foods are sky- high, unemployment is above par, health and social services are inadequate, schools are under- funded, these in aggregate are the tinderbox that will ignite a huge protest.
Certain factors have to be in place for a non-violent mass protest to succeed. Take the recent mass protest in Egypt; two key factors, in my opinion, lead to the achievement of their goal of removing the dictator: courage and organization.
Fear is a powerful emotion that renders individuals to submission. And a dictator is proficient at instilling fear in the people he rules over. The dictator does not have the consent of the people to rule, he relies on the use of terror to intimidate people into submission. The dictator thrives on power. He rules with absolute power and with zero-tolerance for those who question that power. That’s why the first thing he assails when he seizes power is human rights. He strips people of their basic rights thus depriving a fundamental right such as freedom. The right to question his authority or legitimacy and the right to protest against his arbitrary laws and rules are taken away in order to preserve his power. The goal of the dictator is to have a fearful and obedient society where his rule is not challenged. To that end he builds institutions to ensure that the citizen toes the line and recalcitrance meted with punishment.
Courage is the antithesis of fear. Courage is to stand up to the dictator. It is to let him know, in no uncertain terms, that his torture chambers and execution squads will not deter the exercise of basic rights that all human beings are entitled to. Courage is to expose his corruption, cruelty, hypocrisy, lies and prevarications. So, to stand up to a dictator basically means to not be what he expects you to be. You do the opposite of what he demands. In short, you protest. Never legitimize his rule over you. That’s courage.
Once courage is mustered, then it’s time to face the dictator. It’s imperative to be thoroughly organized before and during confrontation with the dictator. The strength of the movement is directly proportional to the number of people participating in it. The more people are mobilized the more potent the protest becomes. The Egyptian uprising had hundreds of thousands of people out in the streets. By ingenuity of stealth they were able to mobilize a large number of people despite being in a repressive police state. They did it by taking advantage of all kinds of communication tools to reach people. In the beginning the protest was organized through the medium of Face book, twitter and mobile phone. The goal was to get a significant number of people out in the streets. We know now that the organizers had expectations of a few hundreds of people to show up and were surprised at the huge turnout. As the protest march established itself in the streets unhindered, it gradually gained momentum as more people from all walks of life joined in. So, key to success of a protest is number and diversity. The more people there are from different political groups, religions, ethnicity, interest groups, etc, in other words, a coalition of diverse groups united in purpose, the stronger and impregnable the movement becomes. A source of a dictator’s power emanates from the disunity of the people he rules over. The more fragmented the society is, the easier it is for him to control. On the other hand, the power of the people derives from their number and unity.
Organization of a protest against a dictator entails a whole lot of strategies and tactics that I won’t go into in this article. Suffice to say that there is a gamut of literature on non-violent social uprisings to consult and glean useful instructions from. It is said that ‘Itpor’, the youthful non-violent Serbian movement against Milosevic, was inspired by Gene Sharp’s book ‘From dictatorship to democracy’. The book also was used in many other non-violent movements all over the world including Tunisia and Egypt. Gene Sharp’s book not only instructs how to organize a non-violent protest but also how to defy the dictator throughout his rule. I urge Ethiopians to familiarize themselves with as much literature on non-violent protests as possible. And, of course, we should also observe very closely and analyze all the current non-violent uprisings unfurling in North Africa and the Middle East. To be knowledgeable is to be forearmed.
Toppling and dismantling a dictatorship is a journey. Along the journey there will be many hurdles to clear. Dispelling fear of the dictator is the first leg of the journey. Once fear is conquered, then it is only a matter of waging a disciplined and sustained defiance.
