The Case for Restoring the Pre-1974 Provinces in a Federal Framework to advance Peace, Progress and National Integration in Ethiopia

By Assefa Mehretu (Ph.D.)
Professor of Geography, Emeritus
Michigan State University
Presented at the 10th International Conference on African Development,
Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan, August 18-19, 2018


The impetus of this article on issues of boundary delineation in Ethiopia is the existential constitutional crisis created by the ethnic federalism based on tribal enclosures called “killil” in Amharic.
In this and other papers that I have published recently (ref. works cited below), I have expressed my opposition to killil. My main reason is that the boundary delineations are gerrymandered; and consequently, they do not meet basic democratic delineation standards of “impartiality, equality, representativeness, non-discrimination and transparency.”
The foregoing principles of delineation are supported by eminent international organizations. The list includes the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, The European Commission for Democracy through Law (the Venice Commission), the Commonwealth Secretariat, and the Electoral Institute of Southern Africa (ref. Lisa Handley cited below).
Political geographers and homeland administrators take the task of boundary delineation for political representation and administration very seriously. Thus, they use a variety of criteria to evaluate the territorial (community of interest) and functional (national integration) qualities of the principal administrative divisions (states or provinces) of the country.  They apply objective standards to evaluate the quality of political boundary delineations for the creation of electoral districts, states, or provinces.
I have selected seven such tests to evaluate the pre-1974 provincial delineations in Ethiopia and compare their outcomes with the outcomes on the same tests applied to the killil arrangement that replaced them after 1991:

1. Are the state or provincial boundaries historic and culturally stable with foundations in natural regions, communities of interest, or cartographic coordinates?
2. Are the states or provinces of comparative sizes in surface area with absence of extreme ranges?
3. Do the states or provinces reflect a reasonable share of the country’s demographic assets with population thresholds that can support basic cultural, social and development objectives?
4. Do the states or provinces reflect a reasonable distribution of the country’s natural resources in a manner that advances their environmental stewardship and sustainability?
5. Are the states or provinces accessible to other provinces and metropolitan hubs in the nation to afford dynamic interactive potential for movements of people, ideas, goods and services?
6. Do the states or provinces have significant communities of interest and cultural signifiers with hubs that serve as loci of cultural identity, pride, and celebration?
7. Do the states or provinces have reasonable “compact” morphology (without extreme deformities) to afford high levels of accessibility by their respective constituencies to the geographic centers of the states or provinces by equitable and effective modes of transportation and communication?

As a brief background, Ethiopia’s pre-1974 provincial delineations were formalized in the Post-WW II years when the central government established the Ethiopian Mapping and Geography Institute. This agency was supported by the United States Mapping Mission, which provided new aerial photographs and remote sensed images of all of Ethiopia.  The Mapping and Geography Institute, which later came under the Ministry of Land Reform, had cartographic and cadastral responsibilities for the internal and international boundaries of Ethiopia.
Among the outstanding personalities of the time that run the mapping agency and provided the intellectual support on boundary formations were Taye Retta, Mekbib Mamo, and Hailu Wolde Amanuel.  These individuals published their works on Ethiopia’s geography in The Ethiopian Geographical Journal.  The Institute also received active support from prominent and accomplished geographers like Professors Mesfin Wolde Mariam and Akalou W. Michael of Haile Selassie I University, Department of Geography (see ref. below).
Thus, the pre-1974 provincial delineations had a considerable intellectual and technical foundation for their formation compared to the 1991 random gerrymanders of the ethnic-based, killil, delineations that lacked serious research, transparency and documentation.
How then would the pre-1974 provinces and the current killils perform given the seven tests listed above?  Obviously, it is unrealistic to expect that any boundary delineation, natural or artificial, would fulfill all or any one of the tests listed above completely.  However, the tests against the rubrics offer standards by which we can compare alternative delineations like the pre-1974 provinces and the current killils.
In the following remarks, I will try to show how Ethiopia’s pre-1974 provinces fared against these tests as compared to the respective performance of killils on the same tests using a few comparative maps of provinces and killils (see below):

1. Almost all the pre-1974 provinces were historically and culturally stable with boundary delineations that were formed mostly by major river valleys or drainage basins (see map A). There were no known challenges to any of these boundary delineations, with the exception of Arsi which lost its western part to Shoa in the 1950s as the latter, with the locus of political power in Addis Ababa, was designed to afford contiguity with all of Ethiopia’s provinces except Begemder, Tigray and Eritrea.

Killils, on the other hand, claim to have followed ethnic lines of division (communities of interest), a claim which is impossible to achieve at the scale it was done.  Even if there were regions of relative linguistic homogeneity (communities of interest) in Ethiopia, there was so much mixing that has been going on for centuries that a tribal delineation on the ground at a scale it was done had to be an exercise in random gerrymandering with no natural or historical underpinning (compare maps A and B).

2. Almost all of the pre-1974 provinces were viable large areas whose boundaries remained relatively stable throughout the 1950s, 60s and 70s. There were fourteen provinces of which only one, Arsi, which lost territory to Shoa, could be considered relatively small.  Hararghe was the largest province in area but it did not have the comparative demographic power as the other provinces.  The other twelve provinces (excluding Eritrea) were generally large without excessive variability in territorial size between them.

The killil arrangement, on the other hand, allocated the bulk of Ethiopia’s landmass (minus Eritrea) to three killils, Oromo, Amhara and Southern Nations.  It also created some relatively small killils like Gambella and Benishangul and tucked them away into isolation on the Sudan border.
It also created the Afar and Somali killils in the most arid and drought-prone margins of Ethiopia (compare maps A and B; and C and D).

3. The pre-1974 provinces of Ethiopia enjoyed an equitable share of the country’s most populated plateau regions of the central highlands (see map A). This served to guarantee each province to afford population thresholds for basic government services like schools, hospitals, banks, etc. as well as commercial enterprises (industries, banks, etc.)

Almost all of the pre-1974 provinces (with the exception of Shoa and Arsi) were designed to integrate low-population-density regions at the border with Sudan, Kenya and Somalia with higher-population-density plateaus in the middle of the country (see map A).
On the contrary, killils allocated most of the population of the country to Oromo, Amhara and Southern Nations leaving killils like Gambella, Benishangul, Somali and Afar isolated in underpopulated and underserved margins of the country lacking viability and regional complementarity with the rest of the country (see map B).

4. All of the pre-1974 provinces provided an equitable share of Ethiopia’s natural resources including hydrographic, climatic and topographic assets in which all except Shoa and Arsi extended from the international boundaries with Sudan, Kenya and Somalia (low-lying, hot and arid regions), to the Central Ethiopian Plateaus (temperate and more moist regions). Shoa and Arsi also enjoyed these varied agro-climatic regions because of the Rift Valley and its escarpments.  As most provinces were within integrated watersheds, they were also suitable to allocate uniform responsibility for stewardship of land resources and environmental safeguards (see map A).

Killils, on the other hand, cut off Benishangul, Gambela, Afar and Somali from having access to highland hinterlands for cultural, agricultural and commercial complementarity, restricting them to mostly arid areas while allocating most of the central highlands and associated lowlands and their rich natural resources to three of the nine regions of Oromia, Amhara and Southern Nations (compare maps A and B; and C and D).  Furthermore, with killil boundaries claiming to follow tribal lines of division, they made massive truncations of the principal watersheds of Ethiopia putting their stewardship and environmental protections into multiple and diffuse killil administrations (see Map B).

5. The pre-1974 provinces were associated with high levels of contiguity and accessibility to each other; the central hubs within Shoa, major transport arteries that radiated from Addis Ababa, and the principal urban centers of the country. They also enjoyed access to the principal public and private urban functions like bank branches (see maps E and F) anchored in large towns like Nekemte, Debre Markos, Gondar, Mekele, Dessie, Arsi, Harar, Jimma, Yirgalem, Gore, etc., most of which enjoyed direct air and land transport access to the primate city of Addis Ababa.

Here again, the killil arrangement ruined the highly articulated system of spatial integration prior to 1974 with the creation of unwieldy disarticulated killils like Oromia, Amhara, Southern Nations, etc. with laws that negated Ethiopia’s time honored regional complementarities, and instead supported exclusionary, jingoistic and dangerous covenants of segregation that intimated (and in a few cases resulted in) ethnic cleansings.
At the same time, the killil provision denied access and complementarity to Benishangul, Gambela, Afar and Somali with known metropolitan markets and functions that they had depended on for hundreds of years (see maps E and F).

6. On cultural identity and communities of interest, while manifesting a healthy diversity of all of Ethiopia’s ethnic groups, the pre-1974 provinces were at the same time dominated by one of Ethiopia’s major linguistic groups (Amharas in Gojjam, Oromos in Wellega, Tigre’s in Tigray, Somalis in Harerghe, etc.). As their boundaries were mostly delineated by major rivers, they were not designed to dilute or weaken any of Ethiopia’s major linguistic groups and their communities of interest.  For instance, prior to 1974, Ethiopians proudly identified with the provinces from which they came. They called themselves the sons/daughters of Harar, Shoa, Sidamo or Wellega, etc.  Yet, their loyalty was always with Ethiopia, their country.

The pre-1974 provinces also manifested cultural hubs like Nekemte, Debre Markos, Gonder, Makele, Adwa, Asela, Adama, Harar, Dire Dawa, Yirgalem, Desse, Jimma, Gore, etc. These attractive and seductive hubs and others like them had made Ethiopians from any of the provinces feel at home and they had visited them freely for business, education, and pleasure.
In the pre-1974 provincial administrative order, people not only enjoyed the pride of spatial identity (community of interest – sons/daughters from my land; my river) but also the advantage of mobility (for national integration).
Political geography teaches that both territoriality (communities of interest) and functionality (national integration) are important virtues of administrative regions of any country that seeks to advance peace and progress for its people (for details on these concepts, ref. John Friedmann cited below).  The pre-1974 provinces did meet that test.
The killil system, on the other hand, by forcibly implementing region-based ethnic covenants, enabled ethno-nationalists to rationalize cases of violent ethnic cleansings. Consequently, the killil system ruined the “unity in diversity” ethos, the hallmark of Ethiopia’s exceptionality in Africa as a multicultural polity that has prevailed for centuries (ref. Clapham cited below).

7. Finally, on the criterion of territorial morphology, geographers classify territorial shapes of states or provinces into five categories: compact, fragmented, elongated, perforated, and protruded.

Compact morphology is considered the best of all types because territorial compactness is advantageous for both communal (local) as well as functional (national) objectives.  All the other morphological types are not ideal and pose difficulty for the administration of public as well private services.





የኢትዮጵያ የተፈጥሮ መልክአ-ምድርን ጠባይ ያዘሉ ዋና የአስተዳደር ክፍፍል ካርታዎች።

1. A 1974 በፊት የነበሩት አብዛኛውን በመልክአ-ምድራዊ መሰረት የተዋቀሩ ክፍለ ሃገራት።
2. B 1991 በኋላ ለጎሳ ስብስብ መለያያ የተዋቀሩ ሰው-ፈጠር ክልሎች።

A study of the pre-1974 Ethiopian provinces along this line shows a high degree of compactness (see map A) for almost all provinces with the exception of Hararghe.  With their relative compactness, the pre-1974 provinces offered their respective constituencies a high degree of integration and interaction with the geographic centers of their respective provincial hubs of government as well as commercial and social functions.
This quality of morphological compactness of the pre-1974 provinces is totally absent in the artificially gerrymandered morphology of killils.  For instance, Oromia has a classic case of a protruded, panhandled and boomerang morphology and an administrate region whose shape is without precedence.  Afar, Tigray and Somali killils can be characterized as being elongated.  The Southern Nations killil is characterized by a degree of deformity that it approaches the typology of perforation (compare maps A and B).
Based on the foregoing analyses, therefore, the pre-1974 provincial boundaries, unlike killils, fare well against the seven principles of delineation. In other words, there is a geographic rationale for restoring the pre-1974 provincial boundaries with reasonable modifications thereof, if necessary. Furthermore, a provincial federation system is much preferred to ethnic federalism for peace and development by many scholars in the field.
Geographers have dealt with the issue of delineation for a long time and they have indicated that delineation of tribal territories for political governance is a dangerous proposition.  I would like to quote Nuala C. Johnson (cited below), for her profound warning on this matter (the italics are mine):
“Confirming the link between specific people (e.g. Oromo or Amhara) and a place has been hotly disputed…as the cultural geography of places rarely represents an ethnically homogenous piece of land (e.g. Oromia or Amhara killils).  Consequently, the demarcation of national (tribal) territory has been fraught with difficulties which at times have resulted in the most violent territorial disputes.”
 For further readings refer to:

1. Clapham, C. 1988. Transformation and Continuity in Revolutionary Ethiopia. Cambridge University Press, p. 195.
2. Friedmann, J. 1988: Life space and economic space: Essays in Third World planning. Transaction Books.
3. Friedmann, J. and Weaver, C.C. 1979: Territory and Function: The Evolution of Regional Planning. The University of California Press.
4. Handley, Lisa. 2007. “Challenging the Norms of and Standards of Election Administration: Boundary Delimitation.” In Challenging the Norms and Standards of Election Administration. IFES and USAID, pp. 59-74.
5. Johnson, N.C. 2002. “The Renaissance of Nationalism.” In Johnston, R.J., Taylor, P.J. and Watts, M., editors, Geographies of Global Change: Remapping the World. Blackwell Publishing, pp. 130–42.
6. Mehretu, Assefa. 2011. “Delegitimizing Multicultural Collective Identity in Ethiopia: A Critical Reflection on Ethnic Federalism.” Horn of Africa, Volume XXIX, pp. 64-82.
7. Mehretu, Assefa. 2012. “Ethnic Federalism and its Potential to Dismember the Ethiopian State.” Progress in Development Studies, Volume 12, Nos. 2&3, pp. 113-133.
8. Mehretu, Assefa. 2017. “Delegitimization of the Collective Identity of Ethiopianism” International Journal of Ethiopian Studies, Volume XI, No. 1, pp. 45-70.
9. Wolde-Mariam, Mesfin. 1970. An Atlas of Ethiopia. Addis Ababa: Haile Selassie I University.
10. Wolde-Mariam, Mesfin. 1972. An Introductory Geography of Ethiopia. Addis Ababa: Haile Selassie I University.

The Erection of a statue to Haile Selassie is uncontitutional

The African Union (AU) has allowed the erection of a statue to Haile Sealssie in it's head quarters at Addis Ababa (FinFinne). The African Union has become an instrument of Ethiopia's internal policy, where the government in Addis Ababa uses the African Union to it's own ends. Haile Selassie was a brutal ruler in Ethiopia. Under Haile Selassie's rule millions of Ethiopianss were starved to death because Haile Selassie did not want to have a bad image, he did not appeal to the international community for help. Haile Selassie was at the same time throwing large party in his palace and was travelling all over the world for pelaseure with his children.

To Ethiopians, Haile Selassie was a bad ruler. He was overthrown in 1974 by a group of soldiers and was killed while in detention in 1975. The millitary government burreid Haile Selassie in a toilet pit in their offices and was reburried unceremoniously in 1993. Such a person who was disrespected by the citizens could NOT  be a model for African Unity. He was an opportunist and a cheat.The African Union Should not allow the erection of a statue to one of the most crue ruler in Ethiopia and Africa at large.

What would those kiled and starved by Haile Selassie say if thee were alive today? Tilahun Gizaw, Belay Zeleke, Girmame Neway, Mengistu Neway, Lij Eyasu , millions of Oromos and others who were made serfs, about a million people in Wollo where starved to death because of famine would turn in their graves if the erection of a statue to Haile Selassie takes place. Haile Selassie and The Ethiopian Orothodox Church brained washed Jamaicans to believe that Haile Selassie as a black Messiah or The Son of God. The Ras Tefferi movement is the result of the abuse of black youth by Haile Selassie and The Orthodox Christian Church in Ethiopia. We call The Ethiopian Orthodox Church to condemn Haile Selassie's actions regading the Black Diaspora to be followers of Ras Taffarian Movement, which is a fake cult movement, that has affected the lives of many Jamaican Youth.

We call Ethiopians to oppose any erection of a statue to the cheat and traitor Haile Selassie or Rather Teferi Makonnen. We post a relevant article about Haile Selassie. We believe Haile Selassie has done more damage to Ethiopia.


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The romantic rewriting of Haile Selassie’s legacy must stop

By Dr. Yohannes Woldemariam

Yohannes Woldemariam trawls through the history books to expose the truths of Haile Selassie’s 44-year reign over Ethiopia.

Emperor Haile Selassie, who ruled Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974, died in 1975, but he lives on through the romantic lyrics of the late Jamaican reggae star Bob Marley and Ethiopian pop star, Tewedros Kassahun, better known as Teddy Afro.
Yet there is a wide range of views of the man whose full official title was: “His Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie I, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, King of Kings and Elect of God.” Some remember him as a benevolent ruler who resisted Italian colonisation. For others, he is a god, yet others view him as a tyrant.
Marley’s portrayal of Selassie is strongly influenced by the Rastafarian belief that he is God incarnate, as allegedly “prophesied” by Marcus Garvey. On the other hand, Teddy Afro, an Ethiopian, is promoting his version of Ethiopianism (Ethiopiawinet).
The Kebra Nagast (also known as the Glory of Kings) is the ancient text from which Selassie’s mythology stems. It narrates the relationship between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba and their son Menelik I, who allegedly hid the Ark of the Covenant in Ethiopia. Like Menelik II (1889-1913), Haile Selassie, a distant relation, claimed descent from the Solomonic dynasty. Inspired by this ideology, Ethiopian kings and emperors have conquered lands and enslaved ethnic groups. In this sense, the Kebra Nagast can fairly be compared to the 19th century expansionist white American ideology of the Manifest Destiny.

Haile Selassie circa 1923

Those who have solely learned about Selassie through the music of reggae stars and Teddy Afro  may well have developed the impression that Selassie was a fatherly benevolent ruler and a champion of blacks. However, this portrayal of Selassie and his predecessor, Emperor Menelik II is grossly distorted. Clearly, even though the last Ethiopian monarch was overthrown in 1974, undercurrents of the Kebra Negast still reverberate in the discourse of Ethiopian nationalism. While the majority of the Ethiopian people do not subscribe to this belief system, some Ethiopians look for aspects of the Kebra Nagast narrative for Ethiopiawinet. Yet this mythology, or elements of it, creates huge divisions through its implicit expectation that Ethiopians accept this version of identity politics.

Rastafarian Representation of Selassie

For Rastafarians, Ethiopia is Zion and the Promised Land and in 1948 Selassie granted them land in the Rift Valley for a settlement in Shashemane. The settlement has never been big, with no more than a thousand Rastas at its peak and now about 400. There was never a mass exodus of Rastas to Ethiopia, and they never assimilated. They live in isolation much like the Amish in the United States.
The Rastafarian connection with Selassie is made with a tenuous understanding of Jamaican Pan Africanist Marcus Garvey’s famous prophecy: “Look to Africa, when a black king shall be crowned for the day of deliverance is near!” This reference to “Africa” was reinterpreted to mean Ethiopia and the link to “a black king” was the coronation of Selassie in 1930. The travel writer Bill Wiatrak claims that the Rasta movement originated in Ethiopia but it actually began in Jamaica through the misinterpretation of Garvey’s message.


 Garvey exhibited no admiration for Selassie. He condemned him as a “great coward” for fleeing Mussolini’s troops in 1935, when Italy invaded Ethiopia. He also criticised Selassie’s practice of slavery, which was not abolished in Ethiopia until 1942. In Garvey’s own words:

"It is preferable for the Abyssinian Negroes and the Negroes of the world to work for the restoration and freedom of the country without the assistance of Selassie, because at best he is but a slave master. The Negroes of the Western World whose forefathers suffered for three hundred years under the terrors of slavery ought to be able to appreciate what freedom means. Surely they cannot feel justified in supporting any system that would hold their brothers in slavery in another country whilst they are enjoying the benefits of freedom elsewhere. The Africans who are free can also appreciate the position of slaves in Abyssinia [Ethiopia]. What right has the Emperor to keep slaves when all the democratic sections of the world were free, when men had the right to live, to develop, to expand, to enjoy all the benefits of human liberty?"  (1937, p.741)

While few reggae aficionados realise the wide gulf between Selassie’s mythological representations in popular culture and the reality of his tyrannical reign, the perception that Selassie was a proud African and a champion for black people is not supported by the facts. He only reluctantly later embraced the Rastafarians because he understood their public relations value for his cult of personality. Some of his dedicated followers would be dismayed to learn that Selassie revered not his “own people” but the Ferenjochu (Europeans) and Americans, who were routinely invited to his lavish parties in his palace.
His overthrow in 1974 and subsequent death caused “a crisis of faith” in Jamaica among the followers of the Rastafarian faith. The religion does not accept the former emperor’s death and instead depicts it as a “disappearance” similar to the belief held by the Shiite branch of Islam when “the Hidden” Imam Hussayn was martyred in the seventh century. Bob Marley’s 1975 song called Jah Live seeks to refute the fact of Selassie’s death by insisting that a deity could not have died.

Teddy Afro and his Reverence for Ethiopian Monarchs

Teddy Afro stylistically mimics Bob Marley when singing the praises of Selassie and even of Menelik II who claimed to be a descendent of Menelik I. In his songs, Teddy Afro proclaims unity and love for all Ethiopians. It is worth asking how Ethiopian unity is served by his praise for these monarchs. If his objective is to promote a unified pan-Ethiopian nationalism, it seems to have backfired by provoking ethnic nationalism among the Oromo who do not share similar conceptions of these rulers ­– and rather view them as the reason for their oppression and suffering. A selective reading of history does little to build a strong national foundation.  Rather, a new social contract is desperately needed which respects the pluralism and diversity of the country.
Historical accounts of the reign of Menelik II show him as contemptuous of blackness, an expansionist, an enslaver and cruel. As a case in point, Eritreans made important, though little-acknowledged contributions to the Ethiopian victory over the Italian colonisers in Adwa in 1896 by gathering crucial intelligence on Italian war strategy. Emperor Menelik II returned the favour by savagely amputating the arms and legs of Eritrean war prisoners. Never mind that these poor Eritrean peasants were violently forced to fight under Italy, just as other European colonialists used Africans, Indians and other colonial subjects as cannon fodder for their wars of conquest everywhere. Nevertheless, Menelik II, the so-called “champion of a black victory,” decided to set free his Italian and Libyan war prisoners while mutilating the Eritreans.
In fact, Menelik II’s reconstructed image as a historical agent of black liberation does not fit recorded events. For instance, his state of mind was revealed through a comment to a Haitian dignitary that he did not consider himself to be a black man. Therefore, Teddy Afro’s celebration of Menelik as the “Tikur Sew” (“Black Man”) lacks historical basis. Invoking Selassie or Menelik II as Teddy Afro does polarises communities because it insults those who do not share this interpretation of history and the terrible legacy of these monarchs.

Haile Selassie as an international statesman

It should be noted that Haile Selassie’s global prominence was due to his position as a very loyal client of the West – much like the Shah of Iran and Mobutu of Zaire.  These clients maintained power through repression and the murder and silencing of true patriots. Unlike Selassie however, history accurately remembers Shah Reza Pahlavi and Mobutu Sese Seko as tyrants. Yet, efforts are underway to depict Selassie as a pan-Africanist and a visionary. Some have campaigned vigorously for his statue to be erected in front of the African Union building in Addis Ababa. Sadly, the African Union has acceded to the request.
Selassie often took undeserved credit for others’ contributions. One example was Lorenzo Taezaz, an Eritrean, who enhanced Selassie’s image during the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. While the emperor was in exile in Bath, England, Taezaz secretly slipped into Ethiopia and organised the Arbeghoch (patriots). He recruited 2,000 or so Eritreans who had fled Italian colonial rule to fight for Ethiopia from their refugee settlements in Kenya. He also smuggled weapons for the Arbegnoch. A famous speech delivered by Selassie, famed for developing his aura as statesman and defender of his people, at the League of Nations in 1936  is widely believed to have been written by Taezaz. The emperor eventually repaid Taezaz by demoting him from his position as Foreign Minister. He died soon after in 1947 in suspicious circumstances.

Selassie “demonised as a dictator”

Does Selassie deserve to be depicted as a dictator? The historical record provides a decisive answer.
First, it is well-established that he spent $35 million for celebrating his 80^th birthday during the Wollo famine. He travelled widely, visiting the United States many times, only stopping once in Jamaica in 1966.
Perhaps less well-known are Selassie’s crimes and his associates like Asserate Kassa in Eritrea. These are too numerous and ghastly for the scope of this piece. For further reading on this, I recommend Michela Wrong’s book titled I Didn’t Do it For You. How the World Betrayed a Small African Nation.
Similarly, the autocrat is remembered in Tigray for inviting the British Royal Air Force to bomb the region in 1943 to quell what came to be known as the first Woyane Rebellion. He consolidated his power by weakening the provinces after Italy’s defeat by the British in 1941.
He was also harsh towards those Ethiopian patriots who fought against the Italians while he fled to Britain. For example, Belay Zeleke, a national war hero was hung on his orders. Unfathomably, Teddy Afro recently praised both Selassie and Belay Zeleke during an appearance at the Millennium Hall in Addis with the Eritrea President Isaias and Ethiopia PM Abiy in the audience. It seems unconscionable to praise a murderous traitor and his victim, too.  The parable of Polish writer Ryszard Kapuscinski: The Emperor, Downfall of an Autocrat is an accurate depiction of the real Selassie.

Why bother with Selassie at this time?

The romantic rewriting of Selassie’s legacy, and the distorted history of other Ethiopian monarchs have significant relevance for current Ethiopian politics. Selassie’s legacy needs to be exposed in light of attempts by musicians, historical revisionists in the diaspora, foreign beneficiaries and politicians to control the narrative through false representations.
This cannot be dismissed as benign and harmless because of the role music plays in creating what the theorist of nationalism, Benedict Anderson, calls ‘imagined communities’ and its crucial role in political organising. Music heightens and releases endorphins creating a sense of belonging among people with shared sentiments that can lead to collective action. The misplaced form of black nationalism created by Rastafarians, in giving reverence to a man who never deserved it, is therefore harmful.
Still, I celebrate the addition of reggae to UNESCO’s ‘Intangible Cultural Heritage’ list while taking exception to the claim: “its contribution to international discourse on issues of injustice, resistance, love and humanity underscores the dynamics of the element as being at once cerebral, socio-political, sensual and spiritual.” The record of reggae is rather more nuanced and mixed, particularly in reference to the place given to Selassie.
It is often said that the victors or the powerful are the ones who write history. History is ill served when popular celebrities and musicians motivated by religion or some kind of hyper-nationalism misrepresent the past. This is offensive to the victims and divisive for communities who need genuine solidarity.

Dr. Yohannes Woldemariam is an academic attended high school in Ethiopia. He can be reached at: ywoldem@gmu.edu.

Can Ethiopia and Eritrea Keep the Peace, or Will History Repeat Itself? (Stratfor)

Highlights

• Despite clear signs that peace has benefited both countries' security and investment profiles, Ethiopia and Eritrea’s new agreement risks faltering amid ongoing trade difficulties and currency imbalances.
• Ethiopian investors will likely be shut out from owning property or opening up large businesses in Eritrea, which has shown no signs of moving toward a political liberalization since the detente.
• Continued animosity between Eritrea’s leadership and Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region could threaten the long-term prospects for the renewed relationship.

After a costly war in 1998 and two subsequent decades of animosity, Eritrea and Ethiopia formally agreed to settle their differences with a historic truce in September 2018. The former enemies have since basked in the peace, with their improved relations opening the door for increased trade and investment and new transport routes. But trade and security problems loom on the horizon — carrying the risk of once again souring relations between the Horn of Africa neighbors.

Peace and Prosperity 

If Ethiopia and Eritrea can manage to solve their lingering issues, both countries and their respective economies would clearly benefit from international investors taking an interest in the fast-growing region that has suddenly become more stable. Improving relations have already begun to unlock new investment opportunities for Ethiopia, in particular. The supply routes to Eritrea laid out in the peace deal have given the landlocked country — which has typically relied on Djibouti for about 95 percent of its imports and exports — a way to further diversify its ports around the Horn of Africa. And other countries have started to take notice, as evidenced by Italy's recent agreement to fund a feasibility study for a 724-kilometer (450-mile) railway that would run between the Eritrean port of Massawa and Ethiopia's capital, Addis Ababa.
However, while Eritrea has tried to use the new ties to bolster its international image, its reputation as a repressive state precedes it. The country's domestic operations have changed little since the signing of the detente. Despite hopes among Eritreans that the peace deal would spark internal reforms, Eritrea's opaque and authoritarian system of government — centered around the personality of its reclusive president, Isaias Afwerki — will likely stay intact for the foreseeable future, complicating foreign investment in the meantime. That said, while Eritrea might not reap direct financial gains in the near term, the deal with Ethiopia has provided it with a significant security boon by seemingly removing the menace of its much larger neighbor and spurring the removal of costly U.N. sanctions in November 2018.

A Tumultuous History

But despite the hopes created by a tentative era of Eritrean-Ethiopian harmony, wounds from their contentious history linger, threatening the prospect of lasting peace.
From the 1960s until the 1990s, Eritrea was under the rule of Ethiopia’s tyrannical Dergue regime after being annexed by Ethiopia’s monarchy in the years following World War II. Angered by Addis Ababa’s heavy-handed policies in its newest province, Afwerki and his Eritrean People’s Liberation Force (EPLF) led a long and ultimately successful insurgency with the help of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), an armed liberation movement from Ethiopia's northern Tigray region.
During the war, relations between the two liberation groups initially seemed strong. Yet the ideological differences between the TPLF movement (which ruled over Ethiopia up until 2017) and Afwerki's Marxist rebel organization (which continues to preside over Eritrea to this day) became apparent in the years following Eritrea's independence, once they were faced with the day-to-day of running their governments.
Eritrea also began taking advantage of the two countries' then-currency union, which had been intended to serve as the basis of their full economic integration. Asmara started selling Ethiopian goods abroad in U.S. dollars after buying them in their shared local currency. This created a foreign currency shortage in Ethiopia, much to the irritation of Addis Ababa. When Asmara introduced its new currency, the nakfa, in 1997, Ethiopia would not allow it to be traded it at an equal equivalency to its currency, the birr. Though seemingly inconsequential at the time, this currency spat marked the start of the deterioration in their relations, ultimately leading to the outbreak of war in 1998 and the two decades of hostility that followed.

New Deal, Same Problems

With the peace deal, crossings on their shared border have reopened, bringing signs that the countries' trade history is repeating, at least to some degree. Eritreans have been traveling to northern Ethiopian cities to buy fuel using Ethiopia's local currency — taking advantage of the border towns' lack of regulations. This has exacerbated the current foreign currency shortages in Ethiopia since it imports its fuel using U.S. dollars. Additionally, there have been reports that Eritreans are buying goods in these same towns by exchanging nakfas for birrs at an equal rate, even though black market prices show the nakfa is trading at 57 or 58 to the dollar, while a dollar trades for about 28 birrs.
The euphoria of the summer peace deal has masked the unfairness of some of the deals being conducted on the ground, although some Ethiopian economists have begun to raise concerns. And as the afterglow of the detente begins to fade, it’s likely that this currency problem will emerge as a bigger issue and require Addis Ababa to weigh in. While it's natural that the two sides would have some friction points given their competing economic interests, there are several factors that could exacerbate tensions if both sides do not seek to settle their differences using clearly established mechanisms.

For example, the reclusive Eritrean president is known to view his country as a vulnerable, insecure nation that could be taken over — either financially or by military force. Combined with the EPLF’s Marxist ideology, this means that Asmara will likely push back against any demand by Addis Ababa to allow Ethiopian investors to own property or open up large businesses in Eritrea. Asmara could also seek to fight back against a perceived wave of Ethiopian influence that will come in the form of soft power. (Many Eritreans watch Ethiopian films, listen to Ethiopian music and even prefer Ethiopian news.)

The Trouble With the Tigray

However, even if the two countries are able to address trade disagreements and quell Eritrea's fears of a takeover, Afwerki's contentious history with Ethiopia's Tigray elites remains a pain point. Afwerki has ruled Eritrea since independence in 1993 and was in power when relations between their countries were anything but peaceful. As a result, he still carries old wounds from the countries' tumultuous history, possibly making him more skeptical of lasting amity with Ethiopia — especially when it comes to the Tigray.
The TPLF was the dominant political and military force in Ethiopia after the defeat of the Dergue regime in the early 1990s. And until recently, the minority ethnic group had remained the preeminent force in the country.

However, even if the two countries are able to address trade disagreements and quell Eritrea's fears of a takeover, Afwerki's contentious history with Ethiopia's Tigray elites remains a pain point.

 

Afwerki made it clear that he was willing to conduct a peace agreement only after the arrival of current Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who has begun dismantling the TPLF's two-decade reign in Addis Ababa. But despite this tentative warming to Ethiopia's new leadership, there are signs that the conflict between the Tigray region of Ethiopia and Eritrea is far from over. Since Ahmed, who hails from the Oromo region, took power, the TPLF elites have retreated to the Tigray capital of Mekele where they remain firmly in control, stirring trouble right underneath Eritrea's border.
Afwerki reportedly still believes that the Tigrayans attempted to assassinate him in the early 1990s when an Ethiopian plane he was on nearly crashed — and a recent incident has only exacerbated the president's unease with his country's immediate Ethiopian neighbors.
In December 2018, Eritrea's energy minister, Brig. Gen. Sebhat Ephrem, narrowly survived an attack by unknown armed assailants at his home in Asmara. Shortly thereafter, Eritrean authorities unilaterally closed the border crossing with Ethiopia near the city of Zalambessa in the Tigray region. Neither country has issued an official statement explaining the circumstances of the attack, but rumors have circulated that the TPLF was actively plotting to instigate a coup or protests against Afwerki's government. And while there has been no evidence to support these claims, the border in Tigray remains closed, and a new border crossing in a different region has since been opened.
Should animosity between Eritrea’s leadership and the Tigray region along much of its border persist or worsen, there's a chance it could sour relations between the countries once again. That said, there are signs that the two sides are invested in maintaining improved relations, incentivized by the economic and security benefits of the new deal. But for the rapprochement to survive, they must address answers to outstanding questions in the economic and security realms in order to deepen the peace and prevent a setback as in 1998.

AP(አ ፖ ) comments:

Saudi Arabia, Egypt, UAE and USA are immposing Ethiopia-Eritrea Peace Deal on Ethiopia to safeguard their own interests.Eitrea is anti-Ethiopia and is preparing for war by using it's stooges in Ethiopia, who seem to be happy for TPLF to be removed. Eritrea is waging hate politics against Tigray. Eritrea was a district of Tigray and should be given to Tigray. TPLF has to prepare itself for war. It should overthrow Isayas Afeworki and bring him to justice. TPLF should reorganise and take control of the central power in Ethiopia after overthrowing Issayas Afeworki's regime. Other options of peace and development are a coverup to dismantle Ethiopia and create a stooge government in Addis Ababa that fulfills the interest of Egypt and Eritrea..