On the eighteenth day of the ninth month of the first millennium�Sounds like a beginning of a false prophecy, a Nostradamus, but sadly it is not.  On the dawn of this day, the reckless man who has taken Eritrea hostage and has pronounced himself The Law, President Isaias Afwerki, arrested twelve veterans of Eritrea�s armed struggle.  He arrested all the available and unrepentant Reformers, many of whom include founders of Eritrea�s armed struggle, after months of deliberation.  This calculation was based on the belief that (1) those who are his fans will cheer and understand anything he does, even if he summarily executes people; (2) those who are his cautious supporters and whose opinions matter won�t say anything and (3) those who are his persistent critics will say something but their opinions won�t matter, anyway.   Due to the Reckless Man�s refusal to sit down and talk with the Reformers, due to his total control of the state media, the private Eritrean press was the only channel between Eritrean citizens and the Reformers.  And so, for good measure, he shut them down as well.   Then he employed the government media to tell us that September 18 was just another day.  Actually, September 18 will be remembered as the turning point in Eritrean history.

A man who has done many similar and worse things in the past forty years is excused for believing that he will get away with this, as well.   After all, when the curtain fell, none of us can really say that we were surprised: the farce had been in production for at least nine months.   This is in no small part due to the corrosion of the Eritrean character.  After decades of strife and civil war, after decades of unremitting but subtle �Our Great Irreplaceable Leader� misinformation, some Eritreans have been conditioned to believe that Eritrea is, without The Man, a fragile union of people who hate each other so much that their unity will fall apart.  This thesis, which has been relentlessly pushed for four decades, has convinced many Eritreans that all disagreements, even peaceful ones, are bad and threaten Eritrea and, thus, any threat to Isaias is a threat to Eritrean stability and progress.  

There are many Eritreans who are offended when the label �dictator� is applied to Isaias.  But if someone talks like a dictator, thinks like a dictator, acts like a dictator, what should one be called?  A future democrat?   Some concede that he is a dictator but he is benevolent dictator and given Eritrea�s �objective realities�, that is all we are entitled to ask for.  Surprisingly, this condescending view of Eritrea�s �mature society� does not come from 19^th century European colonialists but Eritreans who lost immediate family members in the Armed Struggle.   Others come across as above- it alls, chastising people for concentrating too much on Isaias and �personalizing issues.�  An elephant is in the china shop, stomping all over and we, the shop-owners, are staring at the elephant and the unimpressed are lecturing us �What Are You Looking At?  There is nothing to look at here, go about your business.�  They accuse us of spending too much time talking about the elephant without talking about how beautiful the china is, how there are thieves and murderers outside the shop.  If and when they talk about the elephant, it is only to point out how he, once upon a time, transported the china and on and on.

These few folks, who are our brothers and sisters in our Eritrean family, have chosen to be deceived and are insisting that we be deceived as well.    But what they don�t want to face now, they will face at some time: a conscience that shrieks at the crimes witnessed and crimes condoned.  

Power At Any Price

The arrest of the Reformers can be explained several ways.  There are probably infinite shades of variations and combinations but the two extreme positions are: 

(1)     They have done nothing illegal.   But they are no longer willing to condone the acts of Isaias, whose manner of governance they had condoned and encouraged due to too much trust but they are no longer willing and they want a change in the manner the government operates to ensure that there are appropriate checks and balances to his rule.    This was a first and direct challenge to his unbridled power and, to prevent precedence, they had to be stopped. 

(2)     They did something illegal, seriously illegal.  Crimes approaching treason that placed the security of the nation in serious jeopardy in the midst of war. Nobody is above the law, even veterans and founders of the armed struggle and so they have to face the consequences of their deed.  That the president was willing to arrest even long-term comrades and close friends shows that he is incorruptible totally committed to the rule of law. 

There are many ways to determine the validity of both arguments and any other argument made.  One approach is a peer review methodology�where the colleagues of the Reformers, the members of the National Assembly and the Central Council, make the judgment.  Using this criteria, the supporters of the President are saying �it is 60 members of the Central Council vs 15� or �134 National Assembly members vs 15�. (*134 because one was victimized by the �Special Court�)  The problem with this argument is that even assuming that the other government officials were not under any career-enhancing and career-ending pressures from the President�s office (a big assumption), then all that �vote� proves is that there wasn�t enough support for the petition initiated by the Reformers.  It doesn�t prove that they wanted them jailed or worse.  

Another approach, actually, the definitive one given the gravity of the issues raised, would be to address the issue in a court of law where officers whose oath is to uphold the law (judges, lawyers, juries) determine the outcome.  The problem here is that if one believes the recently fired Justice Teame Beyene (and we do), then the third branch of the government is not independent and suffers from excessive interference from the President�s Office, thereby making it a de facto extension of the President�s Office.

The third approach, is that of public opinion where ordinary people�some informed, some ill informed; some logical, some emotional�reach their conclusions.  Public opinion is the basis of democratic governments but it is not entirely scientific because the messenger filters the message.   In a situation where the President�s Office doesn�t just dominate but runs the government media, the message given (�the people asked�.�, �the people demanded�.�) is not only self-serving and farcical but the source, as with all government owned media, is not there to serve the public�s right to information but to advance the government�s agenda.     This is why it was critical for the government to shut down the private Eritrean press.  Only in a country with no laws can a government that has no published budgets and audited financial statements and whose conglomerate pays no taxes can shut down the press for not filing financial reports. It is a naked display of  �Power At Any Price.�

Connect the Dot coms 

Unfortunately for the President�s Office, this is not the 70�s.  There is this nasty little thing called the Internet and e-mail, which makes it virtually impossible to control information.  (It is not that they didn�t try: Eritrea was the last nation on earth to introduce the Internet to its population.)  There are now more than ten Eritrean websites whose degree of independence is subject to debate but one thing for sure is: on any given day, except for the government�s website (Shaebia.org), all of them manage to include articles that are supportive of the Reformers and the causes they espoused.

In an interview with Al-Hayat, President Isaias invited us, the Eritrea public, to judge for ourselves.  He made that invitation repeatedly.  Let the people judge.  Let the people judge.  We are part of the people and we accept the challenge.  We would like to invite our readers to consider all communications (Open Letters, interviews, public speeches) delivered by the Reformers and the President�s Office since January 2001.   Some are displayed on the homepage of Awate.com.   But this is no time for one-upmanship: we invite our sister website Asmarino.com to display on its pages, in an organized manner, every interview given by any member of the Reform or Presidential group to the now-defunct private press.  We invite Messelna.com to translate (or provide excerpts) of the interviews conducted by Al-Hayat and Al-sherq Al-awset.  We invite Dehai.org to translate and transcribe the audio stream of Mr. Yemane Gebreab�s speech delivered at the Washington festival as well as Mr. Alamin Mohammed Seid�s interview with Hadas Ertra and his address at the festival in Toronto.  We invite Eritreans who attended any session given by any Isaiasist government official over the last 9 months, including the one given by Eritrea�s UNMEE liaison,  to file a report on what s/he heard.  We invite Eritrea1.org to translate the most recent open letter written by the Reformers. 

Any objective person looking at all these documents will conclude beyond a reasonable doubt that:

�        There was one group that wanted debate; another that wanted to stifle debate
�        There was one group that wanted to diffuse; the other wanted to escalate; 
�        There was one group that wanted to democratize; the other wanted to control;
�        There was one group that wanted change; another that abhorred change;
�        There was one group that wanted transparency; another that craved secrecy;
�        There was one group that wanted an open court; another a special court;
�        There was one group that wanted mediation; another that discouraged it.  

You do not have to be a historian familiar with the nuances of the �History of the Armed Struggle� to reach a conclusion.  You do not have to be a political scientist, a sociologist or a psychiatrist or a linguist.  All you need to do is to be able to read: the evidence is so-lopsided that you cannot help but reach the conclusion that the president has taken a conscious and deliberate decision to slow down Eritrea�s quest for democracy and justice by silencing its loudest and most influential proponents to serve as an example to future Reformists.    

Maximum Mud

If the case is so clear-cut, how does the Isaias expect to succeed?  By employing various  tried-and-proven methods: Maximum Mud, Distractions & Confusion.

By maximum mud, we mean the approach of �throw anything and see what sticks.�  In this game, only volume counts: the more you throw, the more your chance of having something stick.  Some of these mud piles are launched from official sources; others are done through second and third sources.

Let�s begin with the unofficial ones.  These attacks are hurled by PFDJ members with the encouragement (or without the discouragement) of the senior cadres.  Which is to say: the senior officials of PFDJ do absolutely nothing to discourage those further down the hierarchy from engaging in this sport.  The furthest down the hierarchy, the lowest on the food chain, is the pen-name brandishing Internet warrior species who has absolutely no moral code and will spread ANY rumor.  Since January 2001, when the President�s � Discussion Paper� surfaced, there have been rumors and innuendos about the Reformers being corrupt, old malcontents, incompetent idiots, regionalists and traitors.   All the while, the President and his aides pretend to be above-it-all, calm, patient, etc, welcoming of dialogue about this tiny �political hiccup� while their foot soldiers do their dirty deed adding fuel to the fire.  

This is then slowly escalated to semi-official pronouncements by mid-level managers who are maybe speaking �off the record� and �just my opinion� stuff.   All the while, they measure the resistance: they push when they can and they swerve when they can�t.  The �Regionalist� attack just wasn�t selling, so they dropped it a little bit.   They still have a full menu of �corrupt�, �incompetent� and �traitors.�

The incompetent accusation is hard to defend because it can always come back to haunt you: if they are so incompetent, what does that say about the man who is constantly rotating them from one ministry to another? Besides, you can�t imprison people for being incompetent, you can only fire them.   But you can say they are �corrupt� and you can say they are �traitors�.  Or, you can say they are corrupt AND traitors.

If you say they are corrupt, then someone is likely to ask, �How is it that they all are, just by coincidence, corrupt right after they signed a petition?  Were they always corrupt or did they just get corrupted?  Who else is corrupt but is still employed because s/he passed a loyalty test?�  Besides, a corrupt person is jailed for 5 to 7 years and people who challenge Isaias get life to death.  So, what is left?

The answer is simple: treason.  They signed the petition because they knew that their treachery was discovered and they wanted to save their neck and �abscond responsibility.��  All of them?  Yes, all except those who asked for forgiveness and those who are not in the country.  But if they were guilty of treason DURING the war, and the war has been over for over 14 months, why are they being arrested now?  Is that how a nation deals with traitors?

PFDJ As A House Of Worship

Well, they have a plan for that.  It is called distraction and confusion and a convenient reference to a reptile, the Chameleon.  It works with two segments of the population: those that believe that Isaias, because of his years of service to the country is entitled to more goodwill and those who have willingly surrendered their capacity to think rationally.  This is not because they want reward from the government; or, as commonly held, special privileges.  It is actually even sadder than that.    As any person of faith knows, thinking which requires effort sometimes may lead to doubt and confusion.  Allowing someone else to do all the thinking for you or to defer the solution of inexplicable mysteries to a Higher Being is comforting.  It allows one to re-live childhood and to live without doubt.  A number of Eritreans are quite comfortable with this arrangement and they have given the president and his aides not just the Power of Attorney but also the Power of Parenting. They proudly say (because they think this proves that they have no religious bias) that PFDJ (meaning the president) is their church.    They have rearranged their value system so that integrity, virtue, decency, free will have been relegated to the bottom tier, way below discipline and unquestioning loyalty to the President and thus, in their mind, the country. Order and I shall follow.

It is this warped thinking that get people to say outrageous things where people are constantly asked to do the impossible:  prove a negative.  For example: they say: �of course nobody can prove that Sherifo is corrupt.  People who take bribes don�t give receipts.  And so, the fact that there is no proof anywhere is convincing proof that he is corrupt.�   For example: they say, �of course meetings nowadays can be conducted electronically so just because you were not there physically, doesn�t prove that you didn�t attend the meeting via long-distance.�  Using this logic, one can say that the two people who �accused� Dr. Bereket Habteselassie of attending the �secret meeting in New York� attended the meeting themselves. Why not?  There is no proof that they did not.

About Meetings

This is a distraction that was worthy of Shaebia.org.  A �secret meeting� in New York (so secret that the Government, with all its resource, took a month to discover it and then, just by coincidence, announced it when the headline was all about the dawn arrest of the Reformers) was disclosed by the government website.  Allegedly, at this meeting, all sorts of clandestine operations were planned including the decision to reach out to a group of �remnants� that are supported by the TPLF.  Then, two of these �remnants� condemned the arrest of the Reformers, which proves that they were in cahoots.

This would be hilarious if it wasn�t so tragic.  First of all, shouldn�t the question be: why is it that in a nation whose freedom was bought by the blood of thousands of its children, and one that we are told has a ratified constitution that guarantees people�s right to assembly, why are people plotting �secret cells?�  Are we back to the Haraka movement?  Secondly, anyone who has read any interview by any of the Reformers or anyone who has talked to them knows that they were all, to a person, die-hard ShaEbia who could not think outside the old paradigm of �Jebha vs Shaebia.�  In fact, it is this boxed thinking that had given many PFDJ hardliners reason to celebrate that the Reformers are the �true ShaEbia� and to taunt us for aligning with the �remnants.�   Third, on the condemnation of the Reformers� arrest and the call for their release, if the Pope calls for that, will he too be accused of being in cahoots with the Alliance and thus with TPLF?  Fourth, New York is not Mekele or Gonder so how is it the Eritrean Government�s business on how Eritreans choose to spend their time in accordance with the laws of their adopted country?

We are disappointed that Dr. Bereket and Paulos fell for the trap of establishing an alibi for their whereabouts.   The trap here is that the PFDJ has convinced many that only PFDJ-approved meetings are legal and authentic and everything else�even professional, scientific, students, workers�have the potential to be illegal and divisive unless they are �guided� by the ever-wise PFDJ.  

Eritreans need more, not fewer, meetings�especially the kinds that don�t have the presence of recognizable political parties.  It is bad enough that Eritreans in Eritrea don�t have this right, but it is outrageous that Eritreans who live in foreign land whose host countries� laws allow them to meet are supposed to meet the restrictive requirements of Eritrea.  Why do Eritreans of all diverse background have no problem meeting in cyberspace but are reluctant to meet face-to-face? Our position is: we support the meeting and organizing of any group that meets for the express purpose of promoting democracy, justice and Eritrean values.

A Note of Appreciation:

On this occasion, we thank Human Rights Watch for taking the case of the arrest of the reform movement leaders. Though we know that there are hundreds of people languishing in PFDJ jails for too long without due process and there are many people missing, we hope the high profile arrest of reform leaders will open the eyes of the world to the injustice that Eritreans were enduring for years. We urge HRW to request for a visit to the jailed leaders. Among them are veterans exhausted by the long years of struggle, which they waged for Eritrea and suffer from bad health conditions. Many before them have died in PFDJ jails because of lack of medical attention. We are worried and we don�t wish to see any of them suffer of neglect.

The recent reaction of the European Union and the USA is very welcome.  Few months ago, the Ambassadors of those countries in Eritrea have registered their worries to the Eritrean government. Apparently, they were counting on a positive action by the government to solve the many problems that it created with its insensible practices. We believe that the Ambassadors� hope had some naivet� in it: the regime in Eritrea is now a declared dictatorship.

The Ambassadors of the friendly nations come form societies that have an established democratic culture. They encouraged the PFDJ to engage in a dialogue and pursue a proper process of conflict resolution. Four months dawn the road, the dictatorship disappointed them just like it has been disappointing many of us for years.

New appointments and shuffling Department directors to book cooking exercises by the Eritrean regime to solicit European and American funds could not work. Aspirations for the role of the regions Policeman could not be sold at any diplomatic circle anymore. Scaring tactics for both internal and external consumption are exposed. Development funds meant for Eritreans and donated by friendly countries and charitable donors must be overlooked by civil societies and not by the PFDJ machine that doesn�t recognize the existence of the word �Transparency�.

We are glad that the friendly countries finally decided to befriend the Eritreans instead of the Eritrean dictatorship. We are sure that they are following the heart beat of the agonizing nation. When the people speak, they inform and make others listen. Eritreans are encouraged to speak so that all the world can hear.

We hail the European and American Ambassadors for closing the tap that used to feed the PFDJ subjugation machine. No dictatorship should be able to solicit funds in the name of a people it continually dehumanizes. The PFDJ despises Eritreans. That is natural of any dictatorship.

We at awate.com criticized the government very assertively yet we never branded it a dictatorship in the hope that it will not be pushed to the extreme. Today, we declare that it has passed the dictatorship tests with flying colors.

Now Is The Time   

On September 18, a coup was committed to consolidate the president�s power indefinitely.  Surrounded by adoring yes men and having fired, arrested, demonized and bankrupted all those who could have challenged his power through historical and sentimental claims to power (the Reformers) intellectual challenge (scholars and students) and a watchdog reporting (the independent media) Isaias intends to have a Party Congress and a national election that will ensure his coronization to a president with imperial powers. By now, it is readily apparent to all but those endowed with bottomless goodwill that the Eritrean Government is nothing more than a playground for Isaias Afwerki whose first and only interest seems to be to hold on to power by any means necessary or unnecessary.  The president has failed his party and his party is failing our country.  

It is very important that the menace in Eritrea be faced in unison by cooperating with all Eritrean national forces. It is time for a broad coalition of all Eritrean forces against tyranny, injustice and instability. Eritrean ailments caused and exasperated by the PFDJ should be solved once and for all.

We are very appreciative for the maturity that all traditional opposition forces have shown in regards to the EPLF reform movement. They distanced themselves from the classical rhetoric of Eritrean politics. If not, they would have condemned all PFDJ camp wholesale and said, �what is the difference between the Reform movement leaders and the clique ruling Eritrean today?� Historically, nothing. Yet, the opposition forces took a giant step and identified their enemy: the dictatorship. We believe the mature stand of the opposition should be appreciated.

Now, more than ever, is the time for all Eritreans who have more than a passing interest in Eritrea to organize, to form associations and to link and to establish a common ground.      Now is the time that a fraction of the goodwill we had extended him and his party be allocated to other organizations, associations, groups and individuals who have an alternative vision.  Now is the time for the supporters of the Reformers to reciprocate the goodwill and support extended by all freedom loving Eritreans.  Now is the time to tell Isaias: �You may have silenced them; but we can still hear their voice.�   Now is the time for the opposition to rise up to the challenge and reach out to Eritreans who need something to believe in.  Now is the time for all patriotic Eritreans to redouble their commitment to their country and not abandon the democratization process. Now is the time to inform every human rights organization, every media outlet, and every foreign government with influence of the injustice of our un-elected government.  Now is the time to stand up and be counted: if we don�t, the brief window of relative freedom Eritrea saw with alternative voices of the Reformers and the feisty press and the assertive university students will have been in vain.  And if we fail them, there will be no new wave of Reformers: our citizens will learn that praising the president is patriotic worthy of promotion; criticizing him gently is political worthy of firing and criticizing him harshly is treason.    Now is the time for people to understand that the slogan of  �One People One Heart�, pioneered by heartless people, has a disclaimer that reads �One People, One Heart, No Mouth.�   

In short, unless we act now and collectively, our country will be the playground for the tyrant and his yes-men for a long time to come.   Eritreans have paid too much to allow Eritrea to become another African basket case.