When the metaphors of bald men and combs are all brushed out and the senselessness meter is re-calibrated, the analysis of “what went wrong?” centers, as it always does, on our leaders, Isaias Afwerki and Meles Zenawi.  And rightfully so: because the citizens, being some of the most unassertive, are mere appendages, footnotes in the chapters of our sad saga.  So what makes this men tick? Megalomania, jealousy, and rigidity.   

1.     Megalomania: I Am The State

The series of letters from Isaias Afwerki to the UN answer at least one mystery: who is responsible for all the rude and incoherent letters carrying “Ministry of Foreign Affairs” stationery that occasionally appear in the government media?  Two examples:

“It is only astonishing to see the United States, which lacks moral and legal high grounds on human rights and the respect for religions, make an attempt to become the self-appointed adjudicator.” – Foreign Ministry Issues Statement, September 15, 2004

“Such an agency [the CIA] which operates by employing double standards and continues to step over the rights of peoples does not have any moral or legal grounds to meddle with the issue of religious rights in Eritrea.” – A Statement by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, October 5, 2005

A lot of legal, moral monopolizing going on. Now compare the above “Ministry of Foreign Affairs” letters with the couple that Isaias Afwerki wrote:

“Allow me to underline that you cannot claim the legal, political, moral or humanitarian high ground on matters of law, the rule of law and humanitarian issues." – President Isaias letter to Secretary General Kofi Anan, October 24, 2005

“Its unwillingness to enforce the rule of law and to ensure respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of a UN member State has compromised its credibility as well as its legal and moral authority.” – President Isaias Afwerki’s letter to (rotating) Security Council President, Mihnea Loan Motoc, October 28, 2005.

Hmmm.  I know what you are thinking: you don’t have the legal and moral authority to make this allegation.  All I can say to that is, please accept, dear reader, the highest assurance of my office.  No wonder the office of Minister of Foreign Affairs in Eritrea is still vacant since August.  Who needs it?

Now, let’s cross the Mereb where we find Meles Zenawi, a man in charge of a nation of tens of millions, a nation with relatively impressive diplomatic history (think Aklilu Habtewold, Lorenzo Tazaz) finds himself criticized by an EU commissioner for the, ah, imperfections of his last election.  Ethiopia has to write a response to the critical report.  This report was written by

(a)    Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin

(b)   Vice Foreign Minister what’s-his-name

(c)    Chair of Ethiopia’s election commission

(d)   Secretary of the ruling coalition party EPRDF

(e)     None of the above

Incredibly, the response was written by the Prime Minister himself.  And not a stoic, restrained letter but a bitchy, 15-page letter that calls the EU representative a “self-appointed colonial viceroy” who has a condescending view towards “the natives.”  Regardless of the merits of the EU reps complaints, “merely discussing the ideas, let alone accepting them, becomes unthinkable”, simply because they originated from her. All that was missing were the screaming red fonts; otherwise it was prose straight from Deki Alula.com.    

So here what we have is two leaders who absolutely equate themselves with the nation, the only difference is that Meles plays the game better than our generalissimo.

II. The Pampered & The Proud

Ever heard of The Smothers Brothers?  They were two comedians from the 1960s who had a TV variety show.  One of their memorable lines was that one brother would complain of the other, “Mother liked you best!”  Big laughs.

We have our own Smothers Brothers but all we’ve been getting is not laughs but bloods and tears.  They don’t say “mother likes you best”; they say “the international community pampers you most!”  They just take turns saying it.

I don’t remember how many “the international community is pampering Eritrea” Ethiopian speeches and articles I subjected myself to between 1998-2000 when Ethiopia expected the UN Security Council to pass a resolution saying, “Eritrea is an aggressor and it should get out of the territories it occupies now or expect _____” but I am sure they numbered in the hundreds.  For good measure, the foreign minister’s favorite speech was to create a comparison between what the League of Nations did to Haile Selasse’s Ethiopia in the 1930s with what the UN is doing to Ethiopia during the period.    Since 2002, there has been a reversal of roles with Eritrea never missing an opportunity to tell the international community how destructive their pampering of Ethiopia is and, for good measure, there is always a comparison between what the UN did in 1952 when it delivered Eritrea to Ethiopia with what it is doing (or failing to do) now.

What is common in both cases is that Isaias and Meles spend more time to get the EU and the US to hate their enemy than they do to win their affection. This is because both suffer from one of the deadliest sins: PRIDE.   And much of their conflict is based on the need to deny the other any: for Meles, one of the primary motivations for past, present, future wars with Eritrea is to inflict maximum humiliation on Isaias Afwerki.  All his past references to Assab without Ethiopia being nothing more than a watering hole for camels, or that with Eritreans one must always carry a stick, or even the "color of their eyes” comment were meant to inflict total humiliation. 

Isaias is more circumspect in making a distinction between the Weyane regime and the people of Tigray or Ethiopia—he allows his drones to demolish that distinction by insulting not just Weyane but the whole people of Tigray—but he too is motivated by a need to humiliate Meles: that Ethiopia is a beggar nation, that Ethiopia is about to disintegrate, that Weyane couldn’t survive without international assistance, that Weyane is the student whereas he is the teacher.

My sense is that Isaias’s insistence that Badme Town (a place he derided and accused the Ethiopians for exaggerating its importance when it was re-occupied and its fate was uncertain) be returned to Eritrea now is not because of principle or immediate benefit but because he wants to inflict as much damage to the pride of Meles Zenawi as possible whose birthplace, after all, is not too far from the place.  It is for these reasons that Badme is morphing into our own Alamo.  And Meles’s “talk to me because you have no choice” is meant to inflict as much damage as possible to the pride of Isaias Afwerki and his self-image as a commander of an invincible army.  

So the second obstacle here is pride and a drive to humiliate the other.

III. Rigidity

Rigid people like to flatter themselves by claiming that they are “principled”—which in almost every case is a matter of refusing to consider possibilities that exist outside the confines of the box.   Politics and rigidity are a deadly combination; statesmanship requires flexibility.

Two examples for Meles.  First, his decision to escalate the war of 1998 and his insistence on the “rule of law not rule of the jungle”, that his decision to opt for war was “a matter or principle” because “aggression must be reversed” was a classic case of rigidity.  Faced with similar challenge, Yemen’s Ali Saleh was infinitely wiser and refused to take the bait.   Later, we were told it wasn’t him; it was his TPLF hard-core dissidents.  Ok, let’s take the case of post-dissident TPLF: the recent election. There were, oh, about half-dozen creative solutions that democracies throughout the world use when they find out that the voters have sent them mixed signals. Unity governments, election re-runs, compromise candidates, etcetera.   Recent examples of creative problem-solving include those of India and Germany.  But Meles, of course, picked the one that is the most rigid.

A little digression here.  Two of the three most depressing interviews I heard were the ones the BBC had with Meles Zenawi and Hailu Shawel, the leader of the Ethiopian opposition, CUD, shortly after the May election.  Meles was at the top of his rigidity and condescension: had I not been so nice, I wouldn’t treat this as a political problem, but a legal problem and charge them with treason (he is now); I will have a committee that will look into the killing of the protestors, but only when I feel like it;  maybe I will agree to having a re-run of the election, maybe I won’t.  This was followed by Hailu Shawel who had this unfortunate facial expression that looks like he is lying even when maybe he is telling the truth.  But the nadir of the Hailu's interview was when he told the interviewer that he didn’t leave the Derg earlier because he had family considerations.  Hardly a profile in courage.  Every time I see these guys I keep pinching myself: Ethiopia has a population of 77 million and these are the two stepping forward to lead it?

And rigidity and Isaias? It is an abundance, a garden of rigidity.  The third most depressing interview was the one Isaias had with the BBC, a couple of years ago when he, asked about the fate of the political prisoners and journalists, actually laughed.   They are not journalists, he said, they are spies!! There was a time when the EPLF briefly experimented with “mit’EtsSaf”—flexibility—but no more.  Do the two American embassy employees imprisoned since 2001—Ali Alamin and Kiflom Gebremichael—pose a security threat? Not at all.  Why are they in jail?  Rigidity.   Do the independent journalists now in jail—Joshua, Yousuf, Zemenfes, Dawit, Saleh, Saidia, Amanuel, Medhanie, Mathewos, Hamed, others—really pose a threat? Why are they in jail? Rigidity.   The very old—like Kekia—and the long-serving veterans of Eritrea’s independence—will they organize a coup if they are released?  Why are they in jail? Why they are not allowed to read?  Why do they not have visitation rights? Rigidity.   

The skill-set that these two leaders bring to the table—dogmatic insistence that what looks impossible is actually possible—served them very well as guerilla leaders when they were facing overwhelming odds.  Those skills are worse than useless now; they are detrimental to the nation because they are ill-equipped to possess a key leadership trait: cost-benefit analysis.  They say that if you are a hammer everything looks like nails.  If you are a guerrilla leader, you have little patience for statesmanship: what you thrive in is confrontation.  Che Guevarra would have been a terrible president.

What is lacking in both nations is statesmanship: the ability to navigate through problems, the art of making principled deals, the willingness to compromise, the vision to see around corners.  Of course, the irony is that in Africa, to be a statesman, you first have to be a guerilla leader.  And not many are willing to do that. And thus, our vicious cycle.

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