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By Obadiah Maliafia
It was a great relief for all African democratic forces when the Ethiopian military coup of Saturday, June 22 was crushed by the government of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed. It all began in a rather disturbing way with the badbadination of Amhara's regional president, Ambachew Mekonnen, at a security meeting with key officials in the city of Bahir Dar. Almost simultaneously, in Addis Ababa, Chief of Staff Se'are Mekonnen was shot dead by his order. The alleged brain, Brigadier General Asamnew Tsige, had apparently intended to launch simultaneous attacks on leading political and military leaders across the country to bring down the government.
Released in full military fatigue, Prime Minister Abiy gathered all Ethiopians to unite against the forces of evil. The flags were stolen at half mast while Internet access was temporarily closed. More than 250 arrests were made. Monday, June 24, was declared the day of national mourning, while the victims received a dignified burial of the state.
These events underscore the Carthaginian peace that haunted Ethiopia for decades as a dark ghost that would not go away. A few years ago, while attending an AU summit, I met old friends at an upscale cafe in Addis. In the course of our conversation, I asked whether it was still predictable for Ethiopia to have a constitutional monarchy as it exists in England, Belgium, Norway, Spain or the Netherlands. You might hear a pin fall. My friends were from the old Amhara aristocracy. Their silence said a lot.
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Ethiopia is an ancient society apparently trapped in the Middle Ages until recently. It still remains to fully compose with modernity. Emperor Haile Selbadie reigned as absolute monarch – Negus Negusa – from 1930 until his ousting by a coup of the military state in 1974. Despite his weaknesses, he was a modernizer who invested in education and infrastructure; a pan-Africanist champion who fought for the liberation of our continent and the dignity of blacks around the world. But he was also a medieval despot who inflexibly believed in the divine right of kings. During his almost sixty-year reign, he left the feudal lords almost to themselves while his country was ravaged by famine. And that's why, when the revolution came, it was so brutal and so violent.
Ethiopia is the second most populous country in Africa, with a population of 100 million and some 80 tribes. The dominant groups are: Oromo (34.4%), Amhara (27%), Somalis (6.2%), Tigrinya (6.1%), Sidama (4%), Gurage 2.5% and Welaita (2.3%). For centuries, the ruling elite was mainly descended from the upper-middle-aged, light-skinned, northern Amharans. The Amhara language remains the national lingua franca. The violent revolution that toppled the monarchy in 1974 led to mbadive ethnic cleansing of the ruling Amhara elite.
The overthrow of Mengistu Derg's military-Stalinist dictatorship in 1987 ushered in a new era of hope. Meles Zenawi and the Tiger Peoples 'Liberation Front, TPLF, in coalition with the Ethiopian Peoples' Revolutionary Democratic Front, EPRDF, have implemented modernization programs that are paving the way for the country. But Meles was also an authoritarian. He waged a fierce war on the border with his former comrade, Isaias Afeworki, in neighboring Eritrea. Its development programs nevertheless earned it enormous respect. He was truly in mourning when he pbaded away in 2012. I had the honor of meeting his successor, Hailemariam Desalegn; State man with gentle manners, far from the image of the repressive autocrat projected by some media groups.
The road to modernization in Ethiopia has been fraught with difficulties. The 1994 constitution abolished the centralized unitary state and replaced it with a confederation of nine regions defined by ethnicity rather than by citizenship.
The regions reserve the constitutional right to declare their independence from the rest of the country, if they wish. Ethnic federalism has strengthened the power struggle between the Big Three – Tigrinya, Amhara and Oromo. Although the ruling party, the EPRDF, is a coalition of four parties, the Tigrinya minority has always shot the ball to the detriment of others. Ethiopia reminds me in many ways of Russia, with which it shares the orthodox faith and a tradition of leadership imbued with what the Marxist political philosopher Perry Anderson calls "the lineages of the absolutist state". Some ethnic leaders bitterly complained that the hegemony of the relatively small political elite of Tigrinya had occurred at the expense of the larger groups, including the Oromo and Amhara. In recent years, ethnic militias have grown in strength and daring. In June, Prime Minister Abiy narrowly escaped a grenade attack that killed two members of his entourage. In October, soldiers mutinied to pay their pay and invaded the Prime Minister's office. It was only his skilful management of a potentially explosive situation that saved him.
All regions jealously protect encroachments on their territories and their prerogatives. In 2015, when the federal government wanted to expand some Addis Ababa projects to the neighboring territory of Oromo, there was, surprisingly, some rather wild screams among the Oromian people. Across the country, demands for human rights, freedoms and representation in the federal center are strong. The reflex reaction of successive governments has been more and more a repression and a more brutal force, aggravating the situation.
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