Ethiopia in Trouble Because of Ethnic Rivalries

Henry Srebrnik, [Charlottetown, PEI] Guardian

This past year, Ethiopia, the second most populous nation in Africa after Nigeria, has been convulsed by protests in which hundreds of people have been killed.

This worries western powers. American military and intelligence services work closely with the Ethiopians to combat terrorist threats across the region, especially in Somalia, and few if any countries in Africa receive as much Western aid.

Ethiopia had been seen as an economic success story. Addis Ababa became the showpiece of the country’s transformation, with a Chinese-built light rail system, luxury hotels, fancy restaurants and wine bars packed with millionaires. The narrative for Ethiopia was that of a successful nation with double-digit growth.

Much of this was due to the efforts of the late Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, who was, writes British scholar Alex de Waal, executive director of the World Peace Foundation in his 2015 book The Real Politics of the Horn of Africa, “a master player of the diplomatic game, and he managed both to charm the international community and to use it for Ethiopia’s benefit.”

But he died in 2012 and it may all now come crashing down, thanks to ethnic rivalries – so often the bane of African states. His successor, Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, is eroding the institutions of government and reversing state-building.

The trouble started in November 2015 when members of Ethiopia’s largest ethnic group, the Oromo, began protesting government land policies. The protests were initially over a plan to expand the boundaries of Addis Ababa into the Oromia region.

In July 2016 Ethiopia’s second largest ethnic group, the Amhara, joined in, and the protests hardened into calls to overthrow the governing Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, which is led by the Tigrayans, a small ethnic minority.

Though only about six percent of the population, they dominate the military, the intelligence services, commerce and politics.

Since the protesters hail from Ethiopia’s two largest ethnic groups, with a combined population of more than 62 million out of the country’s 100 million, this is no small matter.

Demonstrations by hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians chanted anti-government slogans. Sugar factories, textile mills, and foreign-owned flower farms were burned down.

The government in early October took the drastic step of imposing a six-month state of emergency. Human rights groups called the response ruthless and witnesses said that police officers have shot and killed hundreds of unarmed demonstrators.

Thousands of Oromos have been jailed without trial on suspicion of supporting the Oromo Liberation Front, a secessionist group. Hundreds of bloggers, journalists and opposition figures have been detained.

“Limitations on independent media, jamming of television and radio signals, and recent blocking of social media all point to a government afraid to allow its citizens access to independent information,” Felix Horne of Human Rights Watch indicated in August, as unrest spread.

The government’s control of the country is so complete that not a single opposition politician sits in the 547-seat parliament. After a widely criticized election in May 2015, the regime won the last seat the opposition had held.

Opposition party members point to continuing efforts to intimidate those who challenged the result. Three of their members have been killed since the vote.

“It’s a tough time for Ethiopia,” asserted Yilkal Getnet, chairman of one opposition party, Semayawi. Added Beyene Petros, chairman of another opposition group, Medrek, “These are non-ambiguous acts of reprisal.”

Yet Washington, making it clear that security trumps its other concerns in the Horn of Africa, described the government as being “democratically elected.”