On first September last year, Taher Indoul posted here an article about the father of the Eritrean Revolution, Hamid Idris Awate. The awate team has correctly described his article as “invaluable contribution”, and indeed it was an invaluable piece of writing that did the man justice on his day, the greatest day of the Eritrean people and nation. Nevertheless, how much ink the present and future generations may scribe on paper, Awate will remain a legend that has to be told and retold to the Eritrean people, generation after generation . This article is a humble attempt to shed light on the social and class backgrounds of the man and refute some of the sick minded, sectarian and regional oriented allegations against him, waged by the founders of Shaebia for their own political ends, documented in the infamous “Hafeshawi politikawi timherti ne tegadelti” of the early seventies. It is also an attempt to establish the obvious link between the sick-minded, divisive rhetoric of the cracker in the early days of Shaebia, depicting Awate as a man that he was not, to the same sick mind and the same sick logic of defamation that is operational wreaking havoc today, uncontrolled under the guise of a national government in our country. Events and end-results from the main splinter group that ended up to be called Shaebia, have clearly showed that the splintering was not in any way an attempt to build on the existing revolutionary accomplishment, to right the wrong, to remedy the faulty, to renew the old, to develop the lagging behind, and to make the Eritrean revolution true representative of Eritrea’s constituent diversities. It was to replace an organization by another, a culture and revolutionary history by another and symbols by others, as if the Eritrean diversities were mutually exclusive. In particular, the attempt to defame Awate and diminish his image as the father of the Eritrean Armed Struggle was primarily aimed against the ELF as a political organization and not least against a particular segment of the Eritrean people that made the ELF, Awate as a social and political phenomenon, and Awate’s heroic role in the Eritrean national struggle, possible. The attempt was first to render symbols of the target group void, their national antecedences questionable, and their heroic sacrifices evil; all to take to pieces later. It was to pave the way for the present culture of intolerance, injustices, and social engineering for the purpose of Wedinization and Tigrengazation of the Eritrean social and cultural diversities.
Defamation
Long ago before the present defamation campaign against the Armed Struggle Heroes - the so-called Reformers, and the ELF veterans (labeled fifth columnists), Hamid Idris Awate in his grave had been subjected to protracted crusade of defamation and character assassination by the sectarian and divisive elements in charge of political education of “selfi-natsanet” on the remote hills of Sahil (See: Hafeshawi plitikawi temhrti ni tegadelti). He was labeled Shifta, feudalist, and tribal chief, illiterate and ill mannered who was not aware of what he was doing. Some people attribute the crusade to the troubled soul of PIA in the process of transformation from Abyssinianism to Eritreanism, the labor of rebirth from the culture of selfi-Andnet to the culture of Selfi-Natsenet, to the haunting soul and heritage of Atsey Johannes and Alula Abba Negga that never accepts the righteousness of a Muslim be it as a leader or even as an equal partner. Others attribute it to the high school Asmarino Wedini student attitude that believes his own opinions and sentiments always “Scientific” (Ane scientific eye yezerebeka zelekhu). Some other good-hearted people may have evaluated it as the product of ignorance about the culture and history of the various components of Eritrean society and luck of respect and tolerance of cultures other than of ones own, if he has any. Still some other people attribute it to attempts of putting in action the newly parrot memorized and admired slogans of the cultural revolution of Mao Tse Tung, destroying prevailing social or material value and engineer the society anew. However, in reality the human soul is very complicated to study and a combination of the above in varying degrees could be the driving force behind the slander crusade carried out against Awate and his selfless pioneers of the Eritrean Revolution by the founders of the EPLF. Whatsoever, the main rationale behind it, it looks as if the Alamana group were to detach themselves from all the values Awate stood for and discredit him and the society that produced and embraced him and his revolution. It was a process of setting groundwork for the future policy of exclusion and alienation. After independence Awate was deprived of the designation of “Father of the Eritrean Revolution” and denied even a symbolic statue or a street name in Asmara. Yet, I am convinced that it is high time for all Eritrean nationalists to free themselves from the hate charged sectarian campaigns and to evaluate and weigh up the history and role of Awate and other veterans with a sane exploring mind within the framework of their societies and taking into consideration the challenges they had faced in that particular time. I think, to understand why Awate was the man who did what he did, we have to dwell a little while to explore his background and the society in which he was born and grew up.
Awate the People’s Hero
It is invincible stipulation for a people or a nation to have national symbols that denote them as a people or a nation. Pride on national heroes, be they real or myths are building blocks for national unity and national consensus. Some individuals may perhaps perform some implausible exertions and are accredited as brave and daring, but still people do not alleviate all brave individuals to the scale of heroes, for the reason that People are either neutral and the particular brave actions have nothing to do with their lives and their values, or they do not concur with it. Conversely, Heroes are those extremely brave men who coddle in extremely precarious tasks in defiance of the strong, either to protect the weak, to uphold certain popular moral values, to do justice to the browbeaten and the outdone. They become heroes when their actions come in conformity with the legitimate interests of the people. When such heroes stand for the sake of national sovereignty and honor of their people and country are alleviated as national heroes, therefore, all independent fighters and martyrs are national heroes. However, the hero who dares to take the challenge first, the hero that initiates and leads the task of defying the strong is the father of all the heroes, the father of the revolution. Unchallenged by no one, Hamid Idris Awate is the father of the Eritrean Revolution. Heroes are the defenders of society’s high values; they are promoters of popular values highly cherished by society. Consequently, Heroes are those venturesome individuals whose actions and thoughts society concur with and admire. Hamid Idris Awate, was the hero that defended the highest value cherished by the Eritrean people - national sovereignty.
Awate as a phenomenon
Awate was not an isolated phenomenon from the history, social structure and economic realities of the society that produced him or the transformations the Eritrean society as a whole was going through at the time. Awate was the product of a necessity in the primordial local level in the forties, in the Northern Eastern Sahil. His role in his region as the defender of people, their lives, their means of economic production and their values further equipped and qualified the man to play a decisive national role when the necessity arose and the time has come in early sixties. In this article I intend to look at Awate as a social phenomenon, a social necessity in the process of the Eritrean nation formation, that is society in transformation. I am of the opinion that analyzing the story of the Hero from this prospective will fill the gabs in Taher Indole´s article and deepen the understanding of our history.
History
Historians state that Amara Dungus, a Belew horseman, born in the area between the Gash and Barka rivers (in Eritrea), moved north to Sinnar (in the Sudan), built an alliance with the Abdallab and founded the Fung Kingdom. Soon Dungus incorporated Eastren Sudan and the North Eastren Sahil (Western Eritrea) into his Kingdom. The social organization of the Kingdom was based on a class system known as the Tigre (serfs) and Shemagele (nobles). The different provinces of the kingdom had enjoyed some degree of autonomy provided they paid their taxes in time. The center in Sinnar provided the viceroys in the provinces with huge copper drums and horned helmets and soldiers.
The viceroy of the Sultan of Sinnar in North Eastern Sahil had a title of Diglel and he and his Nabtab clan warriors ruled the region from their capital Daga in the Barka valley, not far from Agordat. Their political organization could generally be described as aristocratic. Characterized by, a sharp division between aristocratic and serf casts, obligations and rights defined by customary laws and inherited status. It was considered a taboo for a Nabtab male to touch an udder (milking) or a plow through all his life. It was also an abomination for Nabtab women to grind grains or even touch the cooking put. The sole obligation of the Nabtab was to protect and defend their subjects, the Tigre, mainly the various Beni Amer clans, Kunama, Nara and other inhabitants of the North Eastern Sahil. In return the serfs had the obligation of paying taxes, provide the Nabtab with food and all household services. In the mid seventies I had the opportunity to stay few days in Daga. It was a stunning scene; only amazingly gorgeous horses of different breeds grazing on the great meadows around the village. No cattle, no sheep, no goats, no mules or donkeys. “A Nabtab masters nothing but using his horse and sword” as stated by one of their elders.
At the waning and final demise of the Fung kingdom in Sinnar the different constituencies and the viceroys gradually assumed a considerable independence from the center. Diglel and the Nabtab Clan became the supreme masters of Barka-Gash/Settit and larger parts of Eastern Sudan of today. Fortunately or unfortunately perhaps, the Italians occupation forces fragmented this nation slotting in North Eastren Sahil to their newly founded colony, Eritrea. The Italians policy of direct and indirect rule at the beginning worked to conserve the rural class structure and social organization to use the nobility to safeguard their interests. Nevertheless, Such a method was difficult to apply because the nobility had practically lost the main responsibilities, obligations and rights, from where their power emanated. The Diglel had lost the opportunity of defending the serfs and the taxation rights over the population. Security and defense afforded by the Italians rendered the Nabtab role in society redundant and practically nonfunctional. Thus as far as the serf is concerned, the traditional office of the nobility in the differing social and economic circumstances was becoming obsolete; Simply “no obligations no rights”. Accordingly, The power of Diglel and the Nabtab was gradually diluted towards the end of the Italian colonialism.
Seyedna Mustafa wad Hassen
The Italian rule even if appreciated for the stipulation of peace, effective security, law and order, as foreign as it was, could not fill the vacuity of social structures and organizations occupied by the nobility. When leadership becomes a societal need and requisite, leaders are produced. Seyedna Mustafa wad Hassen wad Humed Fikak, a serf from the Beni Amer-Faidab Clan, emerged in defiance of the dwindling power of Diglel Jelani and later of Diglel Al Hussein, as the uncontested highly respected spiritual and social leader in the area. The celebrity of Mustafa wad Hassen was extended beyond the region. Daily, hundreds of admirers, advocates and believers flocked to his place from as far as Central Sudan, the Eritrean Plateau and beyond from the Saho/Affar land in Southern Sahil. Slaves and serfs who had left the disgraced Daga to Ad Seyedna Mustafa were economically empowered from the alms and gifts of cattle and cash given to Seyedna. Mustafa wad Hassen was known to be wealth distributor, taking it from the affluent and giving it to the pitiable while he himself lived on camel milk and a single ragged piece of cloth covering his body. Many young slaves and serfs were also intellectually and spiritually empowered by enrolling them in the Quranic Schools sponsored by wad Hassen. To the present date many loyal old people embroider and amplify Mustafa’s “miracles”, spiritual wholesomeness and social benevolence in a fairy tales-like super human mythical stories. The role of Seyedna Mustafa as an agent of Tigre (serfs) emancipation and symbol of their resistance had great sound implication to the subsequent inevitable episodes of struggle for a national identity. After the death of Seyedna Mustafa his son Shiekh Alamin assumed his father’s role. (Incidentally, “Isat chebel weldet-The fire that ended up as ashes”, a certain Alamin Shiekh Saleh of the PFDJ who allegedly under the instructions of his demigod PIA targeted the Quranic Schools in Barka, is said to be the grandson of Seyedna Mustafa).
The Societal Necessity that made Awate
At the end of World War II, people could gather firearms at ease from battlefields, could inexpensively procure it from fleeing Italian soldiers, or arms dealers, or steal it or buy it from stores of advancing British-Sudanese army. Security, law and order became a scarce commodity. The Italians gone, the Nabtab toothless, the British either ineffective or unwilling, the long entrenched serfdom tradition with preconceived notion against firearms, made the North Eastern Sahil in general and Nomadic Pastoralists in particular victims of lawlessness and squirrel of hungry neighbors. They became the victims of Shiftas from all corners. Their wealth of high milk yielding capacity, beautiful, gorgeous and attractive Barka cattle “Begayit” brought its owners curse and abomination rather than bless.
The region because of its livestock wealth had become a target for the greed of the Hadendewa, the Habesh and others. To add insults to injury, in later stages of that era and due to the unanimous rallying of the region behind Eritrean nationalist political parties, was targeted by both the Unionists and Ethiopia. Jordan Gebre-Medhin in his book, -Peasants and Nationalism in Eritrea- (1989, P: 157) has stated: “By then the …lowland serfs had become easy prey for the Unionist shifta. Tekle sereke had made Elaberet and the surrounding area a zone under his command, looting shops and raiding cattle freely. In Ailet and FilFil regions Hagos Temnewo and his notorious shifta band terrorized the lowland population as well. In other areas like Keren, the shifta band led by Tekle Wolde Gabriel raped women with impunity”. However, no historian can tell events as those who themselves had suffered the fatalities. Therefore, in the absence of written literature and documentation of their own the pastoral oral tradition accounts and popular poems is the only source that can depict the situation in that epoch. Some songs from the forties and fifties that expressed the anguish of the victims go as follows:
Intdenek wou intdenek,
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
Intdenek mdr mesa diba,
Seba bayit halla min Haliba,
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
Intenekel wou intenekel,
Jna bayit halla wa kawekel,
Ee nqabl bela ldanegel,
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
Intdenek mdr mesa diba,
saba bayit hella min Haliba,
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
Shiffta Gebre, wou shifta Gebre,
shiffta qyer rena la aTal Tabbe,
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
Intdenek mdr mesa diba
saba bayit hella min Haliba
Intdenek mdr mesa diba.
The right to self-defense is a universally recognized right. Self-defense is morally right, ethically legitimate, politically legal and economically justified. To the individual it is an obligation to one self, to family, to village, to region, to nation, to country and to people. The people of the North Eastern Sahel (Eritrean lowlands) had known this fact. As it is mentioned above, the Italians gone, the Nabtab toothless, the British either ineffective or unwilling, a security vacuum were created that must be filled. Society needed security and defense of its economic and social interests. It was time the emancipated serfs shoulder the responsibility of their own defense. The phenomenon that erroneously peptized as shifta cannot be described but self-defense. Hamid Awate, Ali BunTaz, Faid Tinga Lungi and the others in North Eastren Sahel, who took up arms in the forties and fifties, were people’s militias. It was a societal necessity, and natural instinct for self-preservation.
The Role of Spiritual Authority
Seyedna Mustafa and Awate
“La Ummet bedet wela nway demmeta Syedna- the nation has perished and the livestock plundered”, the elders addressed Syedna Mustafa wad Hassen, the uncontested spiritual authority of North Eastern Sahel Nation at the time. “We became victims of the Hadendewa from the north, the Habesh from the south, and the Kunama within our region”. Immediately Syedna Mustafa called for many famous ex-Italian and other brave young people and gave them his blessings to protect the people and property. This was what gave birth to the organized armed people’s defense militias in the North Eastern Sahel led by Awate, BunTaz and others. After some time Faid Tinga Longi and Hamid Awate came to terms for the sake of a united defense in the region and Faid went to Seyedna Mustafa for blessing and embracing Islam. Within a short time the united people’s defense militias taught the bandits and aggressors a lesson of how to respect the region and its people.
When some peace was restored in the area in mid forties (1945-1946) and due to British promises to keep law and order and protect the lives and properties of people, these leaders made peace and settled on their respective villages to live a peaceful civilian life. However, the notorious Unionists intensified their politically motivated attacks towards the end of the forties and therefore “Ali BunTaz regrouped and became a leader, fighting the advance made by Unionist Shifta. As the war dragged he chose as his target not only kebessa shifta but also all Christians, including those living in the lowlands” (Trevaskis 70-71,105). Nevertheless, Awate never deteriorated himself to uncalculated sentimental actions and “Awate and Longhi joined their forces to become the most effective peoples` militia against Unionist Shifta raids from the Kebessa region. ……Idris Hamid Awate and his band, as well as other similar groups, operated in most cases in their own regions. Unlike the Kebbessa Shifta, they were poorly armed and had virtually no external support. To defend their villages, they first had to capture arms and ammunition from the British and then use them against the shifta. Idris Hamid Awate`s raids on the Eritrean police in July 1948 was a case in point” (J. Gebre-Medhin, 1989: 156-158). After the federation act there was a short lived peace, “But by 1956 it was clear to these fighters that Ethiopia was challenging every gain the serfs had made in the past decades. As a result Awate resumed his social banditry in 1956” (Ibid: 163)
Awate and ELF
When the great moment arrived, when the call was made, history was repeated. At sixty years of age, the man was the man; proud and brave as he was a hero, always at the service of his people, never kneels to the aggressors, fears no one but Allah and respects no authority but that of his sheikh, Seyedna Mustafa wad Hassen. The chair also was the chair; the always-burning fires of Mustafa wad Hassan Quranic schools, the spiritual chair that rose to glorify and lead the emancipation of the oppressed serfs. But this time the man who sits on the chair was the grandson, Mohamed Sheikh Dawoud, one of the first fedayeen, one of the first martyrs. He was the only man, who could convince Awate, “By the name of Allah and my blessing to you, you are the man that can challenge the enemy and save the nation, Eritrea is crying for your action; this is all mine and my family’s property”. The Eritrean mountains reverberated the shot that was fired by the hero at Adal; The Eritrean people ululated and followed the father of the revolution. No one could stop the baboor (Train) but some may try to highjack it.
Conclusion
Two main lessons, if we want to live together in Eritrea, should be corrected by all and recorded in our national history fittingly. No matter how bitter it may be in some throats. First, the role of Islam and Islamic institutions in Eritrea has always been positive, nationalistic and unity oriented. Islamic culture and Islamic institutions have never posed disharmony and disunity in Eritrean society. In a matter of fact it was the custodian and guardian of Eritrean nationalism. The unjustified fear and rhetoric that Moslems and their Islamic institutions may pose a risk to Eritrean national unity and national harmony is a naked lie that emanates from a self-interest divisive, sectarian anti-nationalistic, chauvinism. Second, The Eritrean culture and heritage is the total sum of the three regions that were prior to the Italian advent and the formation of Eritrean territory. Those who try to suppress and marginalize a section of it for their own political ends are doing a great damage to Eritrean unity and harmony and endangering the hard won sovereignty of the nation. At the end of the day no segment or region would benefit from this and the great loser would be the whole Eritrean people. Each of our component regions has had their national history, culture and national symbols and all Eritreans should be proud of all that at the same time, they are not mutually exclusive. Awate had been a national symbol of resistance and self-defense to the North Eastern Sahel before the revolution in 1961. He became a national symbol for the whole nation and peoples after the revolution.
As we have demonstrated above Awate’s military activities was in and out according to the need of his people. He never used excess force or used banditry for self-interests. He was The Man who listens to the heartbeat of his people and answers their call for salvation. In 1960 the call for action by Awate did not come from his immediate surrounding only, but from all the Eritrean people for national salvation. He was the hero that had spent his life defending his people and when the call had come he heroically answered it. It has to be remembered that there were several attempts to do what he has done in Mount Adal but there was no one in his size and caliber that could have had carried out the gigantic action successfully. The Eritrean people could neither had waited for intellectuals with their revolutionary theories nor for a drop-out from the Haile Sellasie I University to wage the revolution against Ethiopian occupation. The so-called intellectuals and urban people either had lacked the nerve, the acceptance from the people or the will to do it. With all the respect and admiration to Weldeab Weldemariam (and Ibrahim Sultan), who thirty years later baptized the father of the Eritrean Revolution, and his role that has been limited to the political activities in the Asmara Labour Union and later in the Cairo Radio, Tigrenga Programe, could not have done it and he did not do it. Leaders are products of societies’ needs and aspirations. Awate was a natural product of a people who aspired for freedom and emancipation. He was not a detached individual from his society who for some reasons opposed the Ethiopian throne.
