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Seeye Abraha,
Ethiopia’s National Treasure, speaks Truth to Power: An outline
of Seeye’s New Thinking.
By
Tedros Kiros, PhD
January 7, 2007
A pensive mind
seasoned by the gallantry of war and the maturity bestowed by time
sits at STARBUCKS cafe surrounded by a group of adoring friends
giving him the company and comfort that he lacked while he was
wallowing in an Ethiopian prison, for six hard years.
The thinker in despair, the fearless military hero who
rocked the Ethio- Eritrean Terrain, sat alone, weighing it all,
and speaking to time, through the language of memory.
That was Seeye
Abraha, medium height, cool, with bright fierce eyes destined to
see truth and compel the brave tongue to speak truth to power.
When I first met
him in Cambridge, I was star struck for a long while. Unable to
speak, but willing to listen to this frail body, hardened by time,
I sat speechless. Suddenly the mighty soldier thinker made it
easy, as words began flowing out of him with a characteristic
lucidity, befitting a statesman of good breeding.
With a measured
tone, given only to gifted orators, he said, “ I have known you
in spirit for a long time, and even read some of your articles in
the Ethiopian reporter…and I so much want to know the learned
members of my country..”
Thus begun my
acquaintance with Seeye, and I had the honor of spending five days
with him in Washington D. C, and then attended a conference where
he gave a tantalizing speech framed by thought and propelled by
measured passion.
He spoke at the
Hilton Hotel in Crystal city- to a civilized crowd of 2000 people.
Ladies and
gentlemen, he said,
“ I developed
my country’s leading party, the EPRDF, the very party that I
founded has now criminalized me. I was imprisoned, but thanks to
my loving people, who protested and wrote on my behalf, I am now
free. I will not rest, however, until all those political
prisoners who are languishing in prison are released, as there are
hundreds of them. The regime falsely calls them hoodlums and
criminals. I call them political prisoners, indeed, they are
prisoners of conscience”.
He raised his
passioned voice and added,
“ Please do not
forget these prisoners.”
Thus began the
two half-hour long oration, stimulating from beginning to end.
He recounted the brutal fact that although he is formally
free, the regime is keeping him under a radar screen, his house is
patrolled twenty four hours a day, his moves are monitored with
frightening precision, all those who meets are afterwards
interrogated, his former friends, including those thousands of
soldiers who secretly love the military genius, refuse to exchange
a syllable with him. His
former employees were fired when they refused to testify against
him when he was falsely accused of corruption.
The details of
his everyday life as he described them to various individuals in
the last four days reminded me of George Orwell’s, 1984,
particularly Winston, the main character that the regime
criminalized and kept in check through meticulous observation, and
through the minute observation, sought to inhibit his movements,
his dreams and his ideals. Mr.’
Seeye is also subjected to the same harsh reality. Formally free,
Mr. Seeye remains the object of the gaze of power. His freedom is
incomplete, and he is now determined to covert that abstract
freedom into real freedom in concert with the Ethiopian people.
The speech provided Mr. Seeye’s outline of New Thinking.
Before he plunged
to turn the pages of the outline of New Thinking, he asked his
brother, Mr. Daniel Yohannes, a famous ex-President of US Bank-
the sixth biggest Bank in the US, with a quiet and dignified
demneour to stand to an admiring crowd, and thanked him for
supporting his family during and after the demeaning years of
imprisonment. He made a point to let the audience know that he is
now penniless but chose the routes of dignity and service to
country, while working with Mr.Meles Zenawi, Mr. Zenawi turned
against him. Mr. Meles Zenawi and Mr. Seeye Abraha were two
brilliant students at the University as well comrade in arms
during the peaceful years of the tyrannical regime.
The New Thinking
refuses to say no to power, no to docility, and yes to political
action disciplined by thought and fired by injustice.
We Ethiopians need New Thinking, he declared to an aroused
audience. New Thinking
seeks to draw from the values of classical Ethiopian personality:
respect for tradition, tenacity, resistance and cultural pride.
The new politics of cynicism, he argued, must be replaced by a new
politics of engagement and hope. I am very proud he declared, to
seek to set new standards of political excellence with dignity and
integrity, a politics that resists oppression by risking once
life. Whereas the regime sought to him as an example of what might
happen to those who dare to speak truth to power, he takes great
pride in resisting oppressive power through reasoned courage, and
setting standards of political excellence.
Mr. Seeye says
yes to life with dignity and no to prosperity with corruption.
The new politics of cynicism, which is producing youth who
do not dream, and dissenters who are imprisoned for their
convictions, ought to give way to a new national party, which will
sculpt citizens with dreams and the right to live them.
He declared that
his freedom is not complete. He
said, “I am formally free but concretely unfree. But I am
committed to convert this freedom into a real one, with you
Ethiopians. Together we can forge a new Ethiopia from the mosaic
of its ethnicities and nationalities.”
Furthermore, he said, the New National party should use
ethnicity positively. He
advised that Ethnicity should not divide the Ethiopian nation. .
When propelled by a clean heart, ethnicity can unite us.
Central to that unity is the idea of a united Ethiopia
composed of individuals with rights, the rights to dream, to
dissent and to speak truth to power.
The regime
preaches that it is democratic, republican and federalist. The
regime is not any of these. The idea of federalism is used not to
check power by power by dividing power into the legislative,
executive and judicial branches, in the great spirit of the
American founding fathers. Rather,
the executive branch dominates the other two branches in order to
centralize power into its bosom, and thus obliterates the inner
core of democracy, and plants the seeds of tyranny.
Furthermore, the
contemporary regime is increasingly becoming tyrannical and its
citizens are gradually becoming docile. For Mr. Seeye, docility is
contributing to contemporary Ethiopia’s political malaise. He
contended however that a new political landscape could dawn if the
following conditions are met.
Ethiopians must
reject the politics of division and cleanse their hearts and begin
afresh and learn new political virtues of listening to one another
with respect and vigilance. Respect, vigilance, listening
attentively must be practiced as new habits. A reasoned dialogue
free of domination must address differences and visions.
That Ethiopians
should busily participate in the civic spheres and develop
organizing structures where abstract freedom could become real
freedom that controls the excesses of the highly centralized
state, which governs by intimidating and controlling political
space through the instrument of a sham federalism.
Tolerance is the
ultimate medium through which we learn how to live with our
differences, and mechachal (Tolerance) must be the goal of
dialogue. We should learn the difficult art of learning from
others by listening attentively and respectfully. Intolerance is
precisely what is destructively contributing to our disunity and
to the benefit of those who are governing us by dividing us.
The new national
party is a party of unity through tolerance.
He said, “ A divided house is useless.” The crowd broke
into laughter, when he said, “ I am sure you are in utter
disbelief that these words of peace are coming from a military
leader used to settling differences through the gun. But you must
believe that I can also settle differences through reasoned
dialogue”, and that is how the military genius spoke as a
potential statesman, and a seasoned politician.
The crowd loved
the change. He told
them further that he is a changed man, a man who will continue to
learn from his mistakes. As he put, “ I will never say I will
not make mistakes. I have participated in mistaken decisions that
the party that I founded made. I will make mistakes again and
continue to grow from them” This new tone appeared to be unusual
to an Ethiopian audience, who has never heard a notable leader
admitting mistake and willing to correct them every time mistakes
are made. This too is a brilliant feature of the new party of the
future. He
assured the crowd that his stance on Eritrea separates the duty of
respecting the Eritrean people from the oppressive regime that
must be changed by force if necessary. He contended that the war
against Eritrea, which he commanded masterfully was aborted half
way, but the regime in power stood on his way. Had he been
permitted to finish the job, Ethiopia and Eritrea could have been
spared of two oppressors, two poverties, and new wars He was
prevented from finishing the job militarily by removing the
oppressor, and the job was half done, and Ethiopians are now
paying the price; similarly he firmly denounced the regime for its
involvement in Somalia as a political suicide.
He is committed to the combat of terrorism by other means,
short of an entrenched stay, which is endangering Ethiopian lives.
He cried in his heart when he saw dead Ethiopian bodied being
dragged on the streets of Somalia.
Mr. Seeye, reiterated that the ultimate solution to the
Eritrean question is a lasting blend of firmness and diplomacy,
aiming at ending the poverty of the people of these two nations.
He called this solution a win-win situation as opposed to a
zero- sum game.
The speech turned
toward an articulation of his goal, which he ably summarized into
the following points.
(1) He will
continue struggling for the release of all political prisoners,
including his brother, Assefa Abraha.
(2) He will
appeal to the regime to change its ways and revise its national
agenda by opening the public sphere and encouraging dissent and
allowing contestations and debates with a formidable national
party.
(3) That his
politics of forgiveness allows working with the prevailing regime,
including its leader for the sake of national unity.
He harbors no bitterness, and is willing to work with all
those leaders who love the Ethiopian people.
(4) The party of
the future should use the idea of ethnicity positively as a source
national strength and not the death of the Ethiopian nation
through the venom of using ethnicity destructively.
He ended the speech by stressing that engaging the regime
on any level is like walking on a sharp blade, but that he is
prepared to die for a noble cause and that the new politics of
excellence demands courage mixed with strategic thinking.
He advised the Ethiopian Diaspora to use its freedom and
use the media and pressure the regime to change its ways by
developing a new strategy of putting a united front organized
under a national party. This
vision cannot take place if Ethiopians are divided and boxed in
ethnic group busily fighting one another, he said.
He further advised that Ethiopians must use their classical
virtue of tenacity to resist and fight oppression.
These dangerous
times, which could lead to undesired results, must give to the
politics of engagement and hope cemented on principled resistance.
He announced his plan to continue speaking truth to power
by risking his life, if need be.
He appealed to learned Ethiopians and Eriritreans to forge
new unity and solve their problems through reasoned dialogue, the
centerpiece of his New Thinking.
After the speech
was over with a standing crowd, attention was then turned to
attend sixteen questions by engaged citizens.
The questions
demanded answers to concerns revolving around
(1) asking forgiveness (2) The mistakes of TPLF (3)
Peaceful struggle (4) the question of the rights of nationalities
(5) Supporting EPRDF (6) Federalism (7) Algiers Agreement
(8) Languages (9) The Tigreans
(10) The rule of Law (11)
Eritrea (12) Non- violent struggle (13) The Eritrean question and
peaceful solutions (14) National party
(15) New democracy or a repeat of the same (16) Individuals
and nationalities. He addressed them fully.
Most of the
questions were addressed by the speech but I will highlight brief
responses to answered questions and longer answers to newer ones.
(1)
I have made mistakes, and I may make mistakes again. I made these
mistakes as an Ethiopian, which is his own measured way of
apologizing to the nation.
(2)
Tigray is part of Ethiopia and that the pains of
Tigreans ought to be looked at the pains of Ethiopians, and that
the new politics of engagement should expand our horizons and not
limit them. We must begin to suffer with any nationality of the
Ethiopian nation. Their pains and triumphs belong to us all. We
must learn the arduous task of empathy and compassion.
(3)
The
question of peaceful solution, foreign to most of us, has not been
fully studied. We must study this method carefully and use it as a
tactic of resisting oppression and minimizing human death through
violent struggle.
(4)
The
respect of ethnicities is not racist; it is a nuanced way of
respecting Ethiopians as members of different language groups and
ways of living. Individiduls did not choose to be born to
ethnicities, but once they are so born, then we must respect their
ways. Tolerance of differences is the answer to the question of
ethnic rights. Ultimately,
there is no Ethiopian who is not blended with the Oromos who are
spread across the spread of the nation, and that this fact demands
our respect. Thus the
demand of the Oromos is not propelled by racism but ground on the
fact that we are blended with the Oromo people.
(5)
Supporting
or not supporting EPRDF is an expression of a political right, and
not a matter of victimization by the propaganda of the party.
(6)
Federalism
as used by the current regime is a tool of controlling political
space by dividing Ethiopia into ethnic spheres. Indeed, this
particular use is manifestly a destructive use of ethnicity as an
instrument of division that contributes to the centralization of
power in the hands of the powers to be.
(7)
I
have taken a firm stance against the Algiers agreement as a grave
mistake.
(8)
Yes,
EPRDF has divided the nation by using ethnicity destructively.
Whether or not the Oromos should speak Latin will be discussed in
the future by the Ethiopian people under the atmosphere of freedom
and via reasoned dialogue, free of domination.
(9)
Tigreans
are Ethiopians too. They should not be attacked for their
ethnicity. Nor should Tigreans be denuded of their right to
support other groups, other than TPLF. They are individuals first
and members of ethnic groups second. Not all Tigreans are
supporters of the existing regime by virtue of their being
Tigrean, They have the right to choose Kinijit as the party of
their hearts.
(10)
The rule of law is a sham at the moment. The very laws that the
regime crafted are the same that the regime is violating.
The idea of respect for the rule of law has to penetrate
our national consciousness. We yet have to create a society
governed by law.
(11) I had no
intention of taking over the Eritrean nation. The strategy on the
behalf of both the Ethiopian and Eritrean people was to topple an
oppressive regime that is disturbing the peace, and negotiating a
reasoned solution impossible.
(12)
Hawzen was a tragedy for all Ethiopians.
(13)
Yes. The Eritrean question can be solved by a
reasoned dialogue, which would benefit all parties. Both nations
can gain from a peaceful solution that would allow Ethiopian to
use the sea outlets and Eritrea to acquire a trading partner, a
market for its goods. These
arrangement and mutually beneficial.
(14)
There
are Ethiopians willing and capable of building a new national
party out of the mosaic of its rich ethnicities and nationalities.
(15)
The new
democracy will have to blend the best features of what we have
built and an insertion of the totally new that united Ethiopians
can forge.
(16)
The
rights of the individual and the rights of nationalities are part
of a single democracy and we are lacking in both, and when we can,
we must satisfy both conditions.
These are highly
condensed versions of full answers to excellent questions asked by
a critically engaged and peacefully inclined audience, which gave
the brilliant thinker its undivided attention, and thus ended a
remarkable conference on a beautiful night in Crystal city,
Virginia, on January 5, 2008.
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