The �Warsai-Yeka�alo Initiative� is the Eritrean Marshall Plan.  It is the GI Bill; it is the Montgomery bill.  It is the Perkins Grant.   It is the equivalent of the small business administration: it is a low-interest, seed-money granting, micro finance awarding, mega-proposal.  It does everything; it is so good, it is like the legendary trap that can even catch �I-��E.

The �Warsai-Yeka�alo Initiative� is the slavery initiative.  It is a proposal promoted by the government for the sole purpose of providing free labor to the PFDJ�s business conglomerate, Red Sea.  So says Adhanom Gebremariam, the person who coined the phrase.  To many of us, the phrase has such a ring of truth to it we have begun to use it without appropriation. 

So, which one is it?  If you are a middle-of-the-roader, why this is a perfect chance for you to give us the very thoughtful �it is somewhere-in-between� stuff.  You are probably right but this article is about use of deceptive languages.

Here�s why the analogy with the Marshall Plan, the GI Bill, is deceptive: the Marshall Plan and the GI Bill were NOT compulsory.  Marshall did not go to a Europe devastated by war and force his will upon them; they begged for it and he engineered it.   Similarly, the �GI� bill is a benefit that an American serviceman is eligible for but is NOT forced to participate in.  The two key words here are: free will.

There is no free will in the �Warsai-Yeka�alo Initiative.�  Like everything in Eritrea, the initiative in mandatory. That is the PFDJ legacy: call it the "G-1 Bill". A warsai or a yeka�alo cannot say, �thanks, I have the means to support myself; spare your money for someone else.�  A warsai or a yeka�alo cannot say that he has to go tend to his family farm, his family business or that, now that he has fulfilled his/her obligation to the country, he wishes to leave the country for some R&R, for education.     S/He, a young adult, has absolutely no say in what to do with his/her life.   Like the planned economies of the failed communist experiments, the state will assess the aptitude of the youth and then assign them to work or learn under which ever ministry it deems fit.

Whether you are for or against this initiative has nothing to do with whether you are pro- or against-PFDJ.  Your decision depends on whether you place higher priority on liberty or security.  The Warsai-Yekaalo Initiative is a manifestation of total security without any liberty.  Morally, but not literally speaking, how much a stretch is there from �no freedom� to �slavery?�  The issue is not compensation or training or jobs.  The real reason for equating the initiative with �slavery� is because the parents have no say over the future of their children.  The State (the benevolent slave owner) gets ownership of the kids for periods still undetermined.   

Characteristically, the initiative has such resonance with Eritreans who are, at heart, unreformed communists and authoritarians.   To them, liberty, choice, freedom are all HinQaQe QebeTbeT that are untimely.  It is not the right time to have political pluralism, free press, elections, demonstrations or anything that �destabilizes� (read: allows people to express themselves.)  What we need is �stability�: (allow the government whatever is �necessary� for the good of the country, as measured, of course, by the government.) 

There are some Eritreans who point to the World Bank and the IMF as an authority when it comes to legitimizing the �Warsai-Yeka�alo Project.�  The Project is the kind of African White Elephant that the bankers like: ambitious, huge and vague; one where the timeline is constantly extended.   Poor Africa is littered with the carcasses of World Bank/IMF funded projects; it was a matter of time before Eritrea was hit.

The question is: why doesn�t the government make participation in Warsai-Yeka�alo Initiative optional?  A Warsai who was asked to fill out a form which included a question: �What services do you want from the government?� responded: ���| q��kD� � short for �the only service I want is for the government to keep its eyes off me.�   Leave me alone; let me be.  How would making the program voluntary take away from the merits of this ambitious project? Why?

The answer takes you to Adhanom: because the project has less to do with the future of this generation than it does with the future of the political party.  The last thing the PFDJ wants is tens of thousands of well-armed, unemployed or underemployed people.  Adhanom should know: he is one of the people who refused to be enslaved and now lives in exile, separated from his family and friends, isolated from a country he helped to liberate, reading the occasional lecture on patriotism from nameless chicken-hawks. 

Chicken Hawks

�Chicken-hawks� is a phrase reserved for American intellectuals who are fond of sprinkling their writings with �nuke-em-give-em-hell� machismo but, it turns out, none of them served their country during the Vietnam War when they had a chance to nuke �em and give�em hell.  They din�t do it; they just like to write about it.  They are chicken; but they strut like hawks.

Eritrea has its fair of chickens, its fair share of hawks.  For a while, all of us were comfortable with our roles.  The chicken knew he was a chicken and the hawk knew he was a hawk. But now we have the new breed: the chicken hawks.  Spout off a couple of slogans, write a few checks, dance until you get dizzy at a festival and, voila, you join the elite club of hawks.  If you are a hawk (war, medals, merit) and you cross the line, then your feathers are clipped off instantaneously and a bonifide chicken calls you chicken. 

Actually, the chicken hawks have adopted many of the languages of the members of the American right-wing extremist from the low middle class.  The most telling part is their hyper nationalism   flirting with fascism, fixated with idolatry.  The American version of this species adornes his property with huge American and Confederate flags, an �America: Love It or Leave It,� a sneering attitude towards immigrants, a belief of manifest destiny, a fixation with guns and uniforms.  You know the Eritrean version; the royal version refers to itself in the third person.  

The Beauty of Clothed Truth

You can see why the dissenters would be outraged but I don�t know why the pro-PFDJ folks keep registering their outrage at, what?  Let�s see: I can be pissed as hell at the government that my father is arrested, for nearly a year now, without charge.  Someone else can be seething mad that his loved one is in a dungeon for a decade.   What, pray tell, upsets you, Angry Without A Cause (AWAC.) T hat your government was able to arrest people without charge for ONLY ten years?  That websites like Awate and Asmarino exist?  Then why do you read them? Why don�t you just dismiss them?  If you all they write is lies and you have figured it all out, why can�t you assume that other readers are just as smart you, will figure it out and dismiss it all.  And, if so, what will be the �harm� to your beloved government? 

Beg to differ but the Eritrean cyberspace does not have an overabundant commodity of lies.  It does have too much humorlessness.    I can�t remember the last time I�ve read anything remotely funny. There is so much solemn and grave air and too much outrage at everything.  Like the one written at Shaebia.org by AWAC.   Around the time of the Berlin Letter, I wrote a piece satirizing a letter from Isaias to the G-13.   Shortly thereafter, �Warsai Eritrawi� wrote a funny piece (remember when he was funny?) satirizing a letter from me to Isaias.  We laughed and we all lived happily ever after.  I mention this because some people, including AWAC thinks it is a real letter and is popping veins over it.  My good man, take it easy; find something else to be outraged about.  If you get so worked up over this, what will you do when your comrades start scanning a doctored imaged of your photo:-)

Wrong Number

Last week, a kid wrote a little note, taped it to a baby bassinet, left it outside a door, rang a doorbell and ran.  He did this to four or five house.  People opened their doors, read the note, which cried for help, and publicized the event.   The kid slapped his thighs silly, laughed in delirium: gotcha! 

The weeks before, and in the weeks ahead, the people will receive a note, taped to a baby bassinet, left outside their door.  The doorbell will ring.  And they won�t answer.  Maybe they will answer and ignore the message.   The sender will collapse, demoralized, helpless, alone.

Comrades, take all appeals as genuine�allowing for the occasional practical joker.  You wouldn�t disconnect your phone just because you occasionally get a few crank calls, would you?