By Tecola W. Hagos

PART ONE:
REASSESSING OUR RECENT POLITICAL SITUATION

I. Introduction - Ethiopia and Ethiopians on the edge
The recent political development in Ethiopia is very confusing. That is the least I can say especially considering the ongoing enormous polarizing confrontation between an assorted numbers of parties that claim to champion the interest of the people of Ethiopia. I have no reason to believe that such parties have the interest of Ethiopia or Ethiopians at all. Their struggle seems to be purely a struggle for power. In that, they are not any different than our previous leaders. Thus, there is no reason for us to panic at the current confused state of affairs in Ethiopia. In fact, there seems to be a political undercurrent that may bring about some profound changes that transcend the ongoing skirmish for power. The change in Ethiopia could be identified as the people�s movement for genuine autonomy and liberation of the people of Ethiopia. True, Ethiopia�s political reality is quite paradoxical and very complex. 

I have been closely reading the many articles and commentaries of concerned Ethiopians and the press releases of the Opposition group as well as those of the Government of Meles Zenawi for the last five months. [Such fact may account for my absence in the ongoing discussion concerning recent events.] Let us not base our judgment or understanding of the current Ethiopian situation on such self-serving material. We must dig deeper and travel further (than we already have done) for answers and better understanding of our political and economic reality.

It is obvious that the Opposition group was not born just yesterday as some may have thought, but is a result of a tortured long history at least dating back to 1991. The conference held in Canada in 1991 by an assorted group of people, which group incidentally was the mirror image of the current Opposition�s membership, was aimed at countering or guiding the inevitable overthrow of the caretaker Ethiopian Government soon after Mengistu Hailemariam abandoned his own government under a scheme by Western nations (Canada included). We all are aware of the fact that political leaders from different political organizations registered as such under the new election laws of Ethiopia have been traveling over the years from Ethiopia to Europe and the United States invited exclusively by their political support groups from such internationally organized Ethiopians living abroad. 

The sad fact is that instead of using such long running opportunities to campaign for support from so called �hostile� groups from Oromo, Tygrai, Eritrea, Somalia et cetera, such opposition leaders simple reinforced the stereotyping of Ethiopians into ethnic enclaves by focusing their attention on an exclusive power base of immigrants that consists mainly of former officials (mostly people from Addis Ababa) and their supporters from the time of Haile Selassie and Mengistu Hailemariam. [Of course, the immigrant Ethiopian population includes refugees, students who could not return to Ethiopia after finishing their education, economic immigrants seeking better opportunities, political refugees et cetera.] A mature politician would have made it his goal to seek out those so-called �hostile� ethnic groups in order to ask their support to his leadership. Especially in time like the confused state of affair to be found post-2005 election, the opposition leaders should have gone out of their way to seek out those �hostile� ethnic based groups from Tygrie, Oromia. Somalia, Eritrea et cetera to bring them into the fold and to have their support in fighting Meles Zenawi and his brutal regime. It is up to the politicians and political leaders to seek the support of Ethiopians from whatever ethnic group and not the other way around. Most of the opposition leaders are well exposed to the system of political elections of western nations. I assume they are aware of the form of political campaign undertaken in western nations. Thus, it is inexcusable for any Ethiopian political leader seeking elected office to shun or discriminate against any ethnic group of Ethiopia in his or her campaign for support in Ethiopia or elsewhere in the world where there are Ethiopians in the Diaspora. 

The Opposition has committed several mistakes at the initial stages of its process of formation and consolidation including in the final composition of its membership. Some more mistakes were further committed by the Opposition, often embarrassing and silly, such as appointing Negede Gobeze to represent the opposition at the European Union Conference, or having Engineer Hailu Shawl making divisive statements that sounds like a threat to �all� Tygreans, et cetera. However, the Opposition leaders since then seem to have reevaluated some of their activities/errors and seem to have taken positive steps now cleaning up their acts. It is understandable that a mass organization with huge following would have difficulties in managing its members. Largely, such mistakes may be excused on the ground that the Opposition leaders are in most parts amateur politicians. 

Nevertheless, the Opposition is now engaged in some form of �enlightened� processes of peaceful struggle and is entering a phase that requires tremendous courage and political risk. I may not agree with the decision to boycott the parliamentary election process after undergoing the process of counting votes at a time when Meles Zenawi was very vulnerable to being deposed by his own party. However, this is not the right time to be critical of the leadership of the Opposition on such grounds of past errors. It is time to search out ways and means to be helpful to the Opposition in its chosen peaceful struggle. The course ahead is treacherous, even down right dangerous. I do not doubt that Meles Zenawi will resort to violence and murder to remain in power. I do not believe that the current move by some Tygreans to support Meles Zenawi as a reaction to the real or imagined threat by the leadership of Hailu Shawl and others is the right response. Rather people ought to think less in a linear way and see the problem as multifaceted and thus with several alternative solutions. Supporting Meles is not the right solution under any circumstance. The most constructive solution is to replace Meles Zenawi with a new leader and reinvigorate the EPRDF changing its leadership and adopting new and inclusive charter as a national political party, as I have suggested for years in several of my essays in the past. 

Nesanet le Ethiopia Radio�s Editorial comment of last Sunday, October 23, 2005, masterfully laid out several problems facing us (Ethiopians of all �types�) all who are struggling for freedom and political representation. The main ideas pointed out by Nesanet le Ethiopia deal with problems of articulation of issues, the polarizing participation of some individuals with past records of association at the leadership level in the opposition, and the need for solidarity of all Ethiopians behind a single cause to bring about democratic change in Ethiopia. I have listened to a number of commentaries and radio editorials over the years. And it is not without the benefit of past experience in such matters that I found the editorial comment of October 23 by Nesanet le Ethiopia Radio to be the best and the most articulated, thus greatly helpful to all Ethiopians struggling against an oppressive regime. Of course, the true virtue of such editorial is not limited to the inclusiveness of it message but also its improvement over divisive recriminations, ethnic slurs and attacks, narrow demagoguery that still pervade the chat Internet groups such as Ethioindex and others.

In books and numerous articles in the last twelve years, I have tried to bring to the attention of all Ethiopians the following extremely serious cracks in our political life: 
a) the danger of basing political movements on ethnicism, 
b) the destructive process to our unity as a people due to the singular and exclusive development of Addis Ababa and vicinity while the rest of Ethiopia is in total neglect, 
c) the distortion of Ethiopian history to aggrandize one particular ethnic group or area, 
d) the moral decay of Ethiopian urbanite population, 
e) the intolerablabuse of young Ethiopian girls and women at home and the Middle East, 
f) the compromising of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ethiopia et cetera. 

All of the above-enumerated items are manifestations or symptoms that indicate that we Ethiopians are in very serious trouble. Such issues are still with us and will not be solved by a single election. They require long-term commitment to social change and political stability. On the other hand, no one should gloss over certain detrimental developments that had taken place in the last thirty years. For example, there are no vast landholders or absentee landowners in Ethiopia. That is a remarkable change of circumstances in less than a century where most land, which used to be owned by absentee landowners and the Crown, is now owned (leased in perpetuity) by the farmers of Ethiopia. Of course, there ought to be further improvement in the land use and ownership laws and government policy toward individual ownership of land. Nevertheless, not that many countries in the rest of the world can boast such singular achievement by an oppressed people. Here is one positive item that we can build upon further developmental structures.

What did evolve in the period since 1991 was the inescapable process of the floating of the political scum left at the wake of the destruction of the brutal military dictatorship of Mengistu Hailemariam. What may not have been anticipated in such eventuality was how deep a political scum it turned out to be as we can see all around us now in the corrupt government of Meles Zenawi. Ethnic-politics was a recipe for failure even though it was the logical counter weight to the type of fascistic militaristic regime of Mengistu Hailemariam. At any rate, it was a political process that was so elementary and predictable only a corrupt and self-indulgent regime would have missed the clues of its inevitable demise. The ill-fated national election of May 15, 2005, which clearly established how much Meles Zenawi as a leader was despised even hated by Ethiopians, was simply a culmination of a long process of struggle of the people of Ethiopia against a treasonous leader. I have discussed fully the election and its significance in a couple of editorials and a lengthy article at that time. The overwhelming desire of the people of Ethiopia to change the leadership of the Ethiopian government is a fact, and must not be confused or watered down because of the role that is being played out by some ambitious or vengeful Opposition leaders. 

In the past, I had written extensively that the one danger to Ethiopia�s democratic progress and its continued existence as a nation/state was (and still is) the continued presence of Meles Zenawi as a leader of the EPRDF and head of the Government of Ethiopia. I had also emphasized the fact that Mengistu Hailemariam, the brutal murderer of tens of thousands of Ethiopians, and his close associates have no place in the future of Ethiopia. The irony of it all is that Mengistu Hailemariam has dared to resuscitate himself to a point that he is now enjoying some kind of comeback in Addis Ababa street vendor�s politics where T-shirts with his image, I am told, are �hot� selling stuff. Shame on you all those who think Mengistu is a viable leader. He is a thug, murderer, and a corrupt man who has yet to stand trial for the thousands of murders he committed including the murder of Emperor Haile Selassie I and the Patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. When it comes to the question of Mengistu Hailemariam and his supporters, what is at stake is no less than a fight between good and evil. In fact, even though I do not like to use the language of a moralist writing about political engagement and processes, it is inevitable for me to approach all political engagement from the perspective of a spiritual nation and use ethical lexicon. 

Ethiopia�s political process, specifically the process dealing with the changing of leaders, seems to be based on a very sophisticated process that we have not really fully recognized or understood as such for years. Typically, the process involves the violent replacement of an old leader by a new leader. In that process, what we are seeing is the tip of the iceberg. Under all the violence there is a subtle shift in political critical mass that allows the most courageous and the most creative group to bring out its champions to replace an aging or hated leader. The seizing of the moment is the most important aspect in the installing of a new leader. In fact, there are instances where individuals that are far more legitimate lost out because their supporters were a tad too late in announcing the enthronement of their prot�g�. The fact is that there was some other subtle process taking place in the palace and the king makers were fighting it out bringing about the political critical mass that would lead to the ascendance of one man as leader and the defeat of another. 

The same subtle process was at work during the fall of Haile Selassie and the ascendance of a series of Military leaders to leadership position, and again the same is true with the fall of Mengistu Hailemariam and the ascendance of Meles Zenawi to power. The one mistake that Ethiopia�s new leaders committed was the fact that they were daft in not being able to recognize that shift in political critical mass as the main cause to their ascendance to power and the fact that it is not necessarily their personal cunning or intelligence that took them to the top of the pyramid of power. 

Whosoever wants to lead Ethiopia must confront the fact that the people of Ethiopia are a people that have survived horrendous political abuse and economic deprivation for all of their lives on this earth. There is a hunger for justice, equity, and enlightened leadership. There is no place for old form of leadership of disfranchisement, ethnic based dominance, or leadership that promotes hate and ethnic conflict. In fact the process of conducting politics based on �a political party� system must be reexamined for it has now served its purpose for solidarity, and is starting to decay into a power source for ethnic conflict. If we need to see this assertion transcribed in terms of philosophical or ethical language it would be considered a process of dramatic moral ascendance of humanism and the retreat of immorality and civic decay. 

II. The 1995 Ethiopian Constitution

At the time of the drafting of the current Ethiopian Constitution, I have pointed out its sever defects. I opined that it will not work because it was a drafted not as a concrete expression of the aspirations of the people of Ethiopia, or as an instrument for the promotion a political and economic ideology in the interest of the Ethiopian People. It seems it was drafted with a narrow purpose: to insure the ascendance of an over ambitious single man to power and promote the interest of the United States. The problems that the 1995 Constitution failed to answer are coming to the forefront every day during this time of national crisis. I have identified a few herein below. I hold the Government of the United States as responsible in a major way for the compromised and totally unworkable Ethiopian Constitution of 1995. The drafting of that Constitution seems to have been the brain-child of former Haile Selassie I Law School professors who descended on a helpless Ethiopia in 1991 as buzzards do on seeing carrion. They penetrated the EPRDF structure quickly and salvaged their former students who were Mengistu�s top officials and gathered them around a treasonous Meles Zenawi and helped him consolidate his power at the cost to our national sovereignty and territorial integrity. 

We suffer because of the interference of such foreign government agents, and the disfranchisement of a number of highly qualified and patriotic Ethiopians who otherwise would have challenged the free hand such foreigners now have in the internal affairs of the �sovereign nation� of Ethiopia. A case in point, not one of those former law school professors objected to the session and landlocking of Ethiopia, for that was all along their agenda: the marginalization and destruction of a great black civilization�the only one that gave Western man a run for his money! What a farce and shameful opportunism by old HSIU expatriate professors and their bootlicking former students!

The 1995 Constitution has numerous defects which renders it useless in a time of crises where the very existence of the nation is at stake. The Constitution is a hotchpotch of cannibalized ideas on government structure; on human rights principles; on the separation, check, and balance of power; et cetera. It is claimed to have been influenced by Constitutional principles from Canada, Switzerland, India, United States et cetera. Those principles scavenged from different sources were not fully digested and incorporated into a viable system. The Constitution has failed to address important issues on several political bottlenecks that become obvious now, and which should have been anticipated if the Constitution were drafted by more capable hands than those of opportunist ex-Mengistu officials whose very existence solely hinges on serving political masters. For example, the recent formation of a government during a time of a political boycott, challenging the very reelection of the Representatives of the members of the EPRDF that formed the new government, could not be resolved through the provisions of the Constitution as is because the drafters have not anticipated such occurrence. Moreover, it is their clumsy formulation of the political structure with a compromised election procedure of indirect election of leaders that is compounding the political bottleneck we are now experiencing. Another fundamental flaw in that Constitution is the ambiguity created by poorly drafted provisions on the subject of recalling of Representatives, which had led to abuse and corruption. Taking such matter to court will not bring any satisfactory result either. The issue of judicial review, the very engine of a nation in cases of controversy between different branches of government or issues dealing with questions of political power, is never properly resolved by the Constitution since Representatives are given the power of adjudication as well. There is no point in trying to make sense of a constitutional procedure that is untenable.

The most challenge to the continued existence of Ethiopia as a viable nation is the creation of self-governing mini-states by the Constitution. Without the necessary political and economic developmental context and the availability of proper literature dealing with the numerous problems that arise with the establishment of such structures, such constitutionally mandated structure is leading Ethiopia to its destruction. The Constitution simply created numerous new areas of conflicts between the Central Government and the many States on allocations of territory, on funding and taxation, on the enforcement of federal statutory requirements et cetera. One cannot fail to see the amateurishness of the drafting of the Constitution by individuals, who were either embarrassingly incompetent as professionals or have compromised their responsibilities to the people of Ethiopia for their own selfish agenda. We are talking here about major problems. A number of people may think that to talk now about a constitution that has been in place since 1995 is far too late and quite confusing. A number of Ethiopians may even opt for such a constitution than no Constitution. Nevertheless, the issue of the constitution is not going to fade away�it is our nightmare that we need to confront. I have maintained all along these many years that we need to dump this Constitution and start from scratch. Maintaining such a corrupt document simply blind us from taking corrective steps by giving us false hopes of none existent security to be found in the supremacy and protection of a Constitution.

I do not consider the government or the people of the United States in general as keenly friendly to the state of Ethiopia or to the people of Ethiopia. Historical evidences and the current activities of Western nations such as Canada, Britain, France, Germany et cetera indicate to me that such nations indeed have played the roles of enemies than that of true friends of Ethiopia. Specially, the United States must be considered as a dangerous unprincipled partner. The United States Government projects to the world the image of a rogue nation that flaunts its wealth and power violating international law and custom on numerous occasions. The United States Government does most anything it wants to do such as instigating violence around the world, directly attacking sovereign nations with military force, murdering tens of thousands of non-combatants in several nations around the world et cetera in violation of specific provisions of the Charter of the United Nations, numerous Conventions, Declarations, Resolutions, and multilateral treaties. Why would any decent law abiding nation like Ethiopia want to associate with such a rogue and lawless government? 

III. The EPRDF as an Opposition Party
Although the constitutive members of the EPRDF, as individual liberation movements, had legitimate standing when such members fought against a brutal dictatorial regime starting in the late 1970s, they have now lost that essential ingredient of legitimacy because the organization has been severely compromised since its coming into power in 1991 by the manipulation and corrupt leadership of Meles Zenawi and his tiny group of associates. I do recognize the fact that in a new experimental process of replacing a traditional autocratic political structure by new form of representative political structures numerous errors occur. What I am writing here is that the deformation and corruption of the EPRDF in order to bolster the power of a single individual goes far beyond any acceptable degree of bungling by a new political organization and its leaders. The government of Mengistu Hailemariam, and the current as well as the past two governments of Meles Zenawi represent such corruptions, which cannot be rehabilitated. In general, other than the many roles of individual leaders, there is also the dynamic process inherent in all organized political movements and parties. This means there is always some tension within any political structure that may result in the destruction of the organization unless there are procedures in place to redirect and renovate such organizations in order to accommodate the positive goals and aspirations of its members. The EPRDF as a political organization is no exception to such universal or organic process. It too must evolve beyond its current form of the assemblage of ethnic based groups. It must purge the destructive and corrupting leaders, and allow new universal membership et cetera. 

The EPRDF must cleanse itself of individuals who have misguided the organization and also caused the movement severe corruption. It is only after undergoing such self transformation into a national party that it will be a true political organization representing the legitimate interest of Ethiopians with a guiding ideology with a clear political and economic agenda. We must acknowledge the fact that the member political organizations that constitute the EPRDF were legitimate organizations created by individuals fighting to stop the violence and the brutality unleashed by Mengistu against their respective ethnic population. In other words, it is such disfranchisement and violence directed against the many ethnic groups of the people of Ethiopia by a particular national leader, be it a monarch or a military dictator, that led to the formation of several of the liberation movements in Ethiopia. Of course, foreign governments that are historically hostile to Ethiopia have greatly contributed in formatting such rebellion groups. For example, the EPLF, TPLF, OLF et cetera [the Eritrean, Tygrean, and Oromo organizations respectively] movements are good examples of local rebellion shaped or greatly influenced by hostile foreign governments. 

The following are concrete steps that must be taken by the EPRDF and its constitutive members if they love Ethiopia and are committed to the welfare of the people of Ethiopia:
1. Eject Meles Zenawi and choose new leaders who are not closely associated with Meles Zenawi.
2. Reinstitute members who have been forced out of their membership in the constituting members of the EPRDF, and invite others who left on their own.
3. Rewrite the by-laws and charter of the FPRDF in order to make it a national political party.
4. Formulate a political agenda with a specific goal of building bridges of real working relationship with opposition parties.
5. Invite the opposition to form a transition government under a transition period charter similar to that of the previous Transitional Ethiopian Government Charter of 1991. 
6. Release all political prisoners.

The Opposition group must not see this process of transformation as a weakness and become emboldened escalating its attacks in order to knock out the EPRDF from the political arena; such premature move will only backfire and leaves the Opposition in far worse position. The EPRDF leaders are not cut from the same type of fabric as most commanders of Mengistu�s political organization were, and will not scatter into the four-winds at the approach of a handful of rag-tag rebellion fighters of less than fifty thousand against half-a-million fully armed military force. Most of the commanders and foot soldiers of the EPRDF were incorporated into the current Ethiopian military. In a confrontation, they are not the type of commanders and foot soldiers who will back down due to threats or even insurgency. The strategy of necessity dictates, as an accepted form of political maneuver, that the Opposition group must seek other forms of struggle other than direct military engagement in order to influence and reach a compromise with the leadership of the EPRDF, a compromise that will always put the interest of the Ethiopian people ahead of any political gain by a political group or a party. 

Of course, the obvious question is why would a leader intoxicated with power like Meles Zenawi, who is now enjoying near-to-absolute power, negotiate with anyone in order to rescind his power to groups who are bent on replacing him and destroy his political organization. Herein lays the subtlety of my suggestion that the opposition must be in a position to convince the leadership and members/supporters of the EPRDF of its willingness to play fairly in the political game of power politics with others once the current leaders are replaced by other leaders in the EPRDF. This form of approach has a domino effect on the rest of EPRDF membership and minor leaders who on the surface may show a united front but are a cauldron of strife and dissonance behind such fa�ade. Here is where the Opposition failed due to its inability to play real �politicks.� It has compromised the good hand it had on May 15, 2005. Rather than focusing on Meles Zenawi and isolating him from the EPRDF, the opposition and supporters focused on condemnation and threatening of Tygreans, Oromos et cetera as ethnic groups. The consequence was one monumental setback for the Opposition and for Ethiopia. Even individuals who used to be vehemently opposed to Meles Zenawi were forced to reconsider their positions since the Opposition leaders and their supporters seem to be threatening a mission to repeat the ethnic cleansing processes of Rwanda and Bosnia on Tygreans. Even veteran champions of the struggle for democratic Ethiopia, who are respected and well educated individuals in the �Amhara� communities, were writing against the small gestures of rational compromises and solutions to the political standoff between the Government of Meles Zenawi and the Opposition offered by Dr. Berhanu Nega, CUD�s President. 

It did not take long for the officials of the current Ethiopian Government to see holes in the political agenda of the Opposition. They recasted the whole opposition movement and struggle for democracy-for-Ethiopia as if it is an issue of ethnic politics of dominance and subjugation. Meles Zenawi has built his comeback on that fear and distrust. He has launched a program of agitation and instigation of Tygreans, Oromos, Somalis, et cetera as victims of �Amhara� domination and has painting the Opposition�s movement as nothing more than a movement or an effort by a handful of narrow minded chauvinists to regain political power at the cost of the national interest of a multiethnic political experiment. As I have indicated elsewhere, it is absolutely incumbent on the Opposition to counter such insidious propaganda and campaign launched by the current Ethiopian Government and its supporters that has succeeded to erode the tremendous support the Opposition had at not too a distant past. The opposition must not forget the fact that the EPRDF even with its corrupt leadership is still in command of the awesome power of a national government. Nesanet le Ethiopia Radio Editorial articulated that fact of the immediate danger of facing down a national military last Sunday better than I do here now. The bottom-line is that the Opposition is held like a hostage within the confines of a national border under a violent dictatorial regime. I am not writing such statements lightly in order to seed fear in the Opposition but to caution and suggest means to overcome such handicap of being a victim and yet survive the life-threatening operation of a brutal government. 

It is clear to me that the EPRDF needs new leadership to remain as a viable political party representing the legitimate political and economic interests of the millions of farmers and working people of Ethiopia from all ethnic groups. I see in EPRDF the future �Democratic Party � or �Labor Party� of Ethiopia. The EPRDF is not an elitist organization, but was a genuine creation by the children of people who were mostly disfranchised and marginalized for centuries. It is only recently that such homegrown rebels succeeded to participate in the political life of the nation as part of the student movement of the 1960s, as vanguards of the military take over of the 1970s before it was corrupted by Mengistu Hailemariam and Meison, and as rebellion movements against Mengistu�s brutal government. It is such facts of a genuine closeness to the peasants, small merchants, and labor force of �mainland� Ethiopia as opposed to the �hyphenated� population of Addis Ababa that is the most endearing aspect of the EPRDF organization. In order for the Organization to be truly representative of the people of Ethiopia, the rank and file of that organization and their military counterparts must change course and leaders. 

The members of the EPRDF must learn a crucial lesson from the fate of the supporters of Mengistu or that of Haile Selassie. The fact is that most officials who fled t after the overthrow of their respective governments suffered economically because they were not prepared for such eventuality by stashing money in foreign banks. Of course, a few had millions in foreign banks and saved themselves from becoming destitute including Mengistu. The same is going to happen if EPRDF continues its destructive relationship with Meles Zenawi and close associates who have safety nets elsewhere waiting to hold them up from hitting rock-bottom in case of political loss or reversal of fortune. Thus, it is wise for the rest of the members of the EPRDF who do not have any such golden-parachute or money stashed in some foreign bank waiting for them if their politics failed, to think about their future in Ethiopia. They need not participate in the type of anti democratic power-saving scheme of Meles Zenawi and his associates who are alienating the people of Ethiopia through their brutality and oppression. The presence of the current Ethiopian leaders is lending tremendous strength to the Opposition that will eventually crush an isolated and corrupted EPRDF if it continues to harbor and support a leader and his associates who are only looking out for their own personal interest. When the time is bad most of the leaders of the EPRDF will find a way of abandoning their blind followers and will not hesitate to leave the rest of the EPRDF members, as Mengistu abandoned all his loyal supporters to preserve his own life and selfish interest. All I am saying to the members of the EPRDF is that they better grow-up fast and save themselves and Ethiopia. And I urge them to start building bridges to connect with the Opposition in order to avert a catastrophic and unnecessary confrontation with the Opposition that may result with our destruction and a gain to our historic enemies. 

Let me conclude this section repeating a truism that had been stated over and over in more languages than I care to count: �The more things change, the more they remain the same.� The political history of Ethiopia of the last fifty years, which I have tried to simplify, is quite complex and must be appreciated as a great political puzzle. It is the paradox of political processes that we are witnessing now evolving into some form of aggregation of mortal political enemies into opposition parties even where we still may find irreconcilable differences within such large political camps. Maybe this is what is meant by political maturity where unlikely groups are coming together to pursue a common political goal. 

IV. The Opposition [CUD]
The Opposition has traveled quite a remarkable journey sine May 15, 2005. I must add that it is a memorable journey. It has taken the most difficult journey by deciding to boycott the new government formation of 2005 by not taking up its seats in the House of Representatives. This type of decision should not be taken lightly. A decision of that depth and significance shows great strength in the leaders of the Opposition, and also a degree of recklessness. The obvious willingness to suffer in the short term in order to promote the interest of all Ethiopians is another quality of leadership that is introduced into the political equation by the decision of the Opposition that will be greatly appreciated at a later date as well. This is not in anyway to downplay those opposition groups who were willing to take up their seat at the opening of the House of Representatives in October of 2005. There is merit in their actions too. 

The Opposition, however, is not exactly in a helpless situation. It commands the convoluted support of Addis Ababians; in fact, it has the support of no less than a couple of million people including former WPE members and the disbanded soldiers of Mengistu�s military forces, and some of whom with tremendous economic power. Addis Ababa is the one place in Ethiopia where over ninety percent of the nation�s wealth has been sunk into as investment, in the form of modern buildings, colleges, numerous educational institutions, hospitals, numerous factories, et cetera impoverishing the rest of Ethiopia. Residents of Addis Ababa have both economic and political power that could easily eclipse that of the EPRDF whose power base was supposed to be the rural Ethiopia. The overwhelming support of Addis Ababians of the Opposition in the current political bottleneck would tilt the political competition in favor of the Opposition.

The Achilles hill of the Opposition is its elitism and the past record of its important supporters. The greatest weakness of the Opposition is the identification of some of its member organizations former high government officials who served the bloody government of Mengistu Hailemariam or those leaders from Meison who were directly or indirectly responsible for the Red Terror of 1976 to 1978. It does not take a great moral teacher to see how far such association with Mengistu�s hit-men or instigators of the Red Terror has blunted the full force of the Opposition. In my criticism of the Opposition, I am not including individuals who may have served as high governmental officials but were not involved in any blood-letting. For example, technocrats in any regime are known opportunists and a few maybe motivated by the idea of service to people under any conditions. It is understandable that we must allow some degree of understanding and even welcome such individuals who nevertheless served the public under a brutal leader. At any rate people have to live and function as normally as possible even under the most brutal political leadership. We have numerous examples of honorable individuals who brought great peace and some degree of satisfaction to a beleaguered people under the most brutal leaders. Thus, my criticism is not aimed at every individual that lived and worked during Mengistu�s brutal regime, but is aimed at those few individuals who were actively engaged in formulating and carrying out the Red Terror and other brutal murders of Ethiopian citizens. 

Nevertheless, I suggest that we need not be too overly concerned about Mengistu�s executioners, nature itself is taking its own course�aging is taking out most such individuals. However, we must never forget the horrendous atrocities committed against the people of Ethiopia at such scale by a regime that was the worst in Ethiopia�s long history. This is why I am most encouraged to write about my concerns and about our Ethiopian political tragedy for our future generations. I see my generation as spent bullets; we cannot be re-cased and fired again. We need to concede gracefully our failure as political players and moral agents. We should try to help future Ethiopian leaders outside of our aging and compromised generation but from the ones that preceded us. 

The Opposition with the Rainbow organization as its vanguard is such vehicle for the consolidation of all of the �members� of the Opposition as a �republican� type political organization. The Opposition [CUD] is essentially an elitist organization that was the final stage created by Ethiopian intellectuals in a long torturous process that took place since the conference in Canada in 1991, a conference that was organized to counter the shifting of power from Shoa to Tygrei, as conceived to be the case by the Mehale Sefaries. Of course, some na�ve individuals who participated at such conference were manipulated into believing that the process of opposition to the coming into power of the EPRDF was a democratization effort not to allow another dictatorship after the fall of Mengistu. The fact of the matter is that the opposition movement has never shaded its core aim to counter the shifting of power on ethnic based motivation. It even transformed itself into a humanitarian structure as the Ethiopian Human Rights Council. I have no problem in a peaceful effort to rustle power from a group of individuals who have undermined their honorable sacrifices fighting a brutal military regime for over a decade by serving Meles Zenawi and upholding his treasonous political manipulations. The members of the EPRDF are their own problems and should look within and clean up their own mess before they attack the Opposition for their current political debacle.

Along the way in its political evolution, the Opposition must remove compromised individuals who were associated with Mengistu�s regime and other political organizations such as Meison, the EPRP and others. There can be nothing new or creative that such aging leaders and individuals, from our past, can bring to the political table except to act as the mythical Harpies ("snatchers") befouling and snatching food from our predecessors. The effort now must be directed at the creation of a political process that will be long lasting and democratic. I suppose that the leaders of the Opposition have national leadership interests and are not simply seeking offices as mayors and administrators of Addis Ababa and DebereZeit! Seeking national leadership positions require a wider vision of Ethiopia (and Ethiopianness) and behavior that corresponds with activities as national leaders and not behaving and talking like yemender cheka shums. 

V. The Ethiopian Orthodox Christian Church and Religious Institutions
I am focusing on the Ethiopian Orthodox Church not because of disrespect of other religions but because the Ethiopian Church is the very source of our core of morality and ethics no matter what religion we follow now. Ethiopia would not have been possible without this most ancient great Church. The religious tolerance we now enjoy, the great moral fabric of non-associative condemnation and punishment that we practiced for more than a millennium et cetera are all firmly based on the workings of that Church. However, it seems that our great Church Fathers seem to be drifting away abandoning us to corruption and self-destructive behavior. The Ethiopian Church Fathers have a historic responsibility to help maintain the integrity of the nation as they have done through out Ethiopia�s long history. They must not fall into the political trap of being fractured along ethnic lines. Already tremendous animosity between different factions or groups within this ancient Church is an open secret. The old schism, which was effectively neutralized by the great Convention of Boru Meda of 1878 that was presided by Emperor Yohannes IV and King Menilik, is now being resurrected. The fallout from such schism now underway, no doubt triggered by the appointment of a new Patriarch (while there is still a living Patriarch), is far more damaging to the continued existence of Ethiopia as a nation than the political struggle underway between the Opposition and the EPRDF. 

I plead my case with our great religious Fathers to adopt a unifying program of reconciliation. I have no doubt that the current Patriarch has added to the animosity and division in the Ethiopian Church. However, the ousted Patriarch and his supporters have not helped to minimize the damage from their skirmish with the current Patriarch. It is doubly tragic to witness that the seed of conflict is growing within the faithful pitting Gondereans with Shoans, Tygreans with Shoans, Gojjames with Gondereans et cetera. What a tragedy we are witnessing befalling a great Church especially at a time of great strife? The primary duty of our Church Fathers is to keep us whole so that we may not drift away from our ancient community and be prey to the many enemies that are surrounding us. For the sake of the continued existence of Ethiopia, our Church Fathers must come to some kind of truce and guide us during our time spiritual needs.

The deterioration of the moral and ethical content of our nation, especially the wide spread of prostitution and the trafficking in young Ethiopian girls and sending them into a life of prostitution and bondage, cry out for strong moral leadership by the Church. Our Church Fathers have no business soiling themselves in the type of dirty politics being played out currently by Ethiopian politicians. They ought to focus on providing spiritual and moral guidance to millions of Ethiopians, who are truly a lost generation, through such turbulent times of great trial. A nation losing its core ethical and moral gyroscope will soon find itself drifting off into oblivion. The great historian, Toynbee warned us that out of Twenty-one great world civilizations that were destroyed nineteen of them were destroyed from within due to moral decay and collapse of their social structure. 

At times, having witnessed the tremendous moral decay caused by prostitution and other dehumanizing social activities in Ethiopia�s urban centers and in general, I am tempted to write maybe we should all convert to Islam or Judaism seeing that our Church Fathers have failed to give us moral guidance and are engaged in their personal feud for power. My reasons are easily understandable. Despite their overt social and political oppressive systems, and at least on one important issue of communal survival, I see those religions providing great protection to their female population from being abused with immorality of prostitution, pornography, and trafficking. If it were not for their religion, the Arab World (Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf States, Iraq et cetera) would have been turned into a vast brothel to service Western occupation armies and tourists. Desperate situations force people to take extreme defensive measures. When it comes to questions of survival, I believe that a community that has lost control of its reproductive system and is not protecting its female members from abuse and degradation is on the way to extinction. 

Throughout human history, men have tried to control female sexuality, and at the same time they also have tried to stop the abuse and objectification by men of women. Men pursued such goals not for the selfish reason of exclusive sexual access and gratification, but for the most important of reasons�the survival of their communities. The single most important pillar of human society seems to me to be the role played by the female members of society, and anything that diminishes the autonomy and integrity of such important and integral part of society will end up destroying that society. Thus, in order to save us from certain destruction, I advocate for total ban of any form of prostitution or sexual relationships outside of marriage or for money in Ethiopia. 

Conclusion
We, Ethiopians are in the best of times to forge a new Ethiopian nation built on great pillars of principles of justice, equity, ethics, democracy, and learning. I am not minimizing the danger of disintegration and the collapse of civil society facing us at this juncture of our lives as individuals and as members of an ancient community. There is much for us to digest having lived and still living within such a dynamic process of change that is taking place as we speak. We must not understate the danger of trusting foreign governments, including those who pretend to be our friends, with our political and economic interests, the very soul of our national being.

No one man or group has the exclusive monopoly on knowing of what the truth is or is about in any event. That is one of the reasons why I found it necessary in Part Two of this essay to devote time on the philosophical question of what we mean by the �truth.� Let us be as much as possible circumspect about our views on political process and social structures. I know that I have the tendency to making generalized statements that some might even label as grandiose. I am sorry for that, but that is how my mind works, ever trying to see a pattern, a universalizable behavior, a larger significance in the most mundane individual acts. I also want it to be clearly understood that my repeated reference and criticism of Meles Zenawi is not due to a personal animosity, but rather it is because I see him as one very dynamic individual who has a singular polarizing effect on Ethiopian politics and a hindrance to democratic change. On the other hand, he seems to be a giant surrounded by midgets, and his capacity to survive all forms of political traps and challenges is no less than miraculous. He seems to lead the legendary �nine lives� of the cat. Maybe, he worships the Goddess Bubastis! 

Now seriously, what I want to hammer into all Ethiopian politicians, whether from the EPRDF or the Opposition, is the fact that they all are responsible as leaders to all of us and not just for some of us. There can be no Ethiopian to be considered as a step-child by any politician. There can be no privileged Ethiopian based on either ethnicity or social status or wealth. All aspiring political leaders must not forget the fact that they are responsible for all Ethiopians, I mean every single one of us no matter where we may be, or what religion we follow, or what social status we have, or what economic niche we occupy. END 

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Tecola W. Hagos
October 28, 2005

NEXT
PART TWO: PHILOSOPHY OF HUMAN RIGHTS 
- TRUTH AND VERIFICATION