-------- Original Message -------- Subject: Kilil Tigray - Twisting and
TurningDate: Sat, 15 Feb 2014 10:41:32 -0800 (PST) From: Bereket Kidane <
welela83_at_yahoo.com>
To:dehai_at_dehai.org <dehai_at_dehai.org>
Once again, Weyane was caught with its pants down. It had been trying to
confuse people by spreading rumours that the Sudanese were negotiating to
reconcile Ethiopia and Eritrea when in fact there was no such thing going
on. Nor is anything like that even remotely possible when sovereign
Eritrean territories continue to be illegally occupied. It had tried that
public relations gimmick once before. Only this time it substituted the
Sudanese for the Qataris, both good friends of Eritrea.
The Regional State of Tigray, a.k.a Kilil Tigray, seems to be twisting and
turning in the wind these days not knowing what to do. It is caught
between a rock and a hard place. It is in a very precarious position
within the Ethiopian State and feels insecure due to its minority status
numerically. It can no longer count on dominating the Ethiopian State
politically while disproportionately leveraging its resources. Its
political dominance of the Ethiopian State is coming to an end, possibly
with the next election. Uncle Sam seems to have realized that TPLF will
have to dilute its power and end its stranglehold of Ethiopian politics if
the country is going to have any chance of becoming a stable democracy.
Tigrayans make up one-twentieth of Ethiopia's population. It is no longer
practical for power to be concentrated in the hands of one small ethnic
group, especially in a country that practices ethnic federalism, without
causing deep resentment and becoming a sure-fire recipe for future disaster.
Tigrayans feel threatened by the impending dilution of their power and find
themselves without good choices.
They have already destroyed their relationship with Eritrea. The 1998-2001
border war was a pretext for erasing Eritrea's sovereignty and making it a
satellite state of Ethiopia, thereby ingratiating the ruling Tigrayan
elites to the Amhara by reclaiming Assab for Ethiopia. The full scale
invasion of Eritrea was going to have the added benefit of establishing the
TPLF's ultimate dream of setting-up Greater Tigray, the holy grail of
Weyane since its 1976 manifesto. To that end, TPLF gambled everything it
had on the outcome of the full scale invasion of Eritrea only to end up
losing all of the contested territory in court and become thoroughly
despised by both the Ethiopian and Eritrean people.
Tigray's ultimate dream is not a secret. It would love to be able to
invoke article 21 of the Ethiopian constitution and become an independent
state but with what resources? An independent Tigray would be economically
bereft. It is not an economically viable entity. Hence, the existential
crisis. It feels very insecure of its position within the Ethiopian State
but at the same time it is unable to split and go its own way.
Weyane officials have recently taken to emphasizing Tigray's linguistic
ties to Eritrea in an outreach effort but it is proving futile. In fact,
Eritreans are repulsed by it. They bought themselves the enmity of the
Eritrean people for many years to come when they tried to push Tigray's
borders into Eritrea. A good place for them to start would be by
respecting Eritrea's sovereignty, vacating sovereign Eritrean territories
and demarcating the blood-soaked international line.
Received on Sat Feb 15 2014 - 20:51:26 EST