We Keep On Hoping For The World To Change
 

We are all on hold, waiting for Technical Support from New York—the UN, to be exact. But we know what Technical Support will say, don’t we? The warranty has expired or, if it hasn’t expired, it just doesn’t cover whatever it is we are calling to complain about. Void where prohibited, not applicable in all states. But we keep on calling, and we keep being placed on hold. We have been doing that since 2002, but man, what a great hold- music. 

The guys in the Republic of Georgia were calling Technical Support. Hello, New York? Brussels? There was no response. In a blitz, the Russians had crossed to Barentu, I mean Gori.  Meanwhile, they kept pushing in while denying that they were; they declared a cease fire but won’t cease firing, and they give hints of regime change. There must be some sort of School for Invaders because all invaders sound alike.    

As an African, my view about the Russian-Georgian conflict is identical to the view most Americans have about African conflicts—deep and total indifference. But I am part of humanity so, naturally, I ask a Russian guy I know in LA, “why are you guys picking on Georgia?” If he was Georgian, I would just have replaced a word and asked the same question. The Russian says, and I am not paraphrasing, “Russia, we always have a problem with the South. It is always our southern border: Georgia, Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbajian…” Yeah, it is a good thing that Russia is not having conflicts with its imaginary neighbors to its north, I am thinking to myself. But I say nothing.  Because you can't argue with nationalism.  

My indifference is new and related to…what is this word I am looking for…oh, yes, aging. I recall that in the 1990s I was having a running feud with the American scholar Paul Henze about, of all things, Abkhazia, Russia’s next Georgian target. (You may read about this misdirected energy of youth here.) Isn’t it odd how problems just linger and linger, until they don’t: and the evolution of man is at such a stage that the resolution to problems is as likely to be from war at it is from negotiated settlements? 

La Lutta Continua? Really?
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Isaias Afwerki would argue that the resolutions never come from negotiations. In fact, that is exactly what the 40-year war veteran said, while addressing an overeager assembly of East African youth who were in Eritrea for the Youth Festival: 

Negotiate? Those who ask you to negotiate are monsters inviting you to a dance. You want to dance with a crocodile? Well, good luck to you. Remember, you didn’t set the rules, somebody else did. So if you believe in something, if you have a cause, you better fight for it. La lutta continua. 

This is odd because, in foreign affairs, the crowning achievements of PFDJ include the North-South Sudan Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) and the Center-East Sudan peace agreement, both of which are outcomes of negotiation. It was in response to “smart” Sudanese who were paying tribute to negotiation and compromise that Isaias gave his insights about crocodiles and his contempt for negotiations. 

Baba Isaias telling young Somalis, Ethiopians, Sudanese and Kenyans that they have to fight for what they believe in is just a political statement--a motivational speech. Because Baba Isaias Tigrigna yiki'il, Arabgna yiki'il, Engliz yiki'il. But when he says that Eritreans must struggle, sacrifice some more, tighten their belts up a few more notches for the right of Ethiopians, of all nationalities; for the right of Somalis, of every clan; for the right of Sudanese, of every tongue, to have a representative government that ensures equitable distribution of resources and opportunities, till the end of time, amen, because that is what the Eritrean Revolutions was all about....well, well, well.

The Good Old Days Of Pragamatism

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This is a stark contrast from the EPLF days. 

One of the more admirable qualities of the EPLF was that it was sensible, pragmatic, and allergic to grandiose plans. The EPLF felt that Eritrea had spent so much time liberating itself that, in the process, it has fallen behind and if it is to catch up, it must avoid, like the plague, grandiose, unproven, risky ventures. “We are not interested in that; even if we are, it is beyond our capabilities,” was the EPLF's favorite response to fanciful flights and conspiracies.    

Its chairman, a revolutionary, who had earned the right to talk like an angry revolutionary, used to talk like a statesman. Like an investment banker, actually.  

But the new unimproved EPLF, the PFDJ, finds this foolish insistence on pragmatism, and the temperate statements of its chairman so confining, so limiting, so constraining, so lacking in imagination, so, so, so, so Central Committee-ish. So 1980s! The PFDJ laughs at foolish considerations like opportunity costs, and reality checks. Give them any crazy idea and their response is: “We are interested in that. And even if we weren’t, we are so grand we have no choice but to do it.” 

Its chairman, a statesman, now talks like an angry revolutionary. Not just any revolutionary, but Africa’s answer to Che Guevarra, waving his own neo-Pan African flag. Did you know that he was there in Somalia when Siad Barre had a ceremonial burial of clannism? Yes, he was there in the Ogaden when the ONLF was at the zenith of its achievement.   

The Shockers & The Shocked

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And how do you feel about this, kubur hzbi Ertra? Well, we have no representatives holding town hall meetings and listening to our views; we have no parties competing; we have no clash of ideologies; we have no independent pollsters. So all we have are imperfect tools: anecdotes (“I was talking to a man who just came from Eritrea…”), universal human psychology, history, and gut instinct.   

And a little science. As in Newton’s Laws of Motion. And the first law tells us that an object will remain in a state of status-quo (either not moving, or moving at a uniform rate) unless it is disturbed by an external force. The question is: why do Eritreans, particularly Diaspora Eritreans (the external force), continue to accept sharply increasing levels of punishment from their own government without rising up?    

The answer is found in the medical field. Ever had a heavy mass of compact material drop on your toes?  Before that excruciating pain shoots through your body and has you jumping around like a headless chicken, there is that numbness, that moment when your brain says, “stand by for excruciating pain to shoot through.  T-10, T-9….”   

What is true for the body is true for the body politic. The Shocked had some event, or a series of events, that just numbed them. Maybe it was the civil war of 1980-81. Maybe it was the disappearance of comrades, the arrest of loved ones, the breakdown of rule of law, the stalling of nation-building, or witnessing things that must, for the sake of maintaining sanity, be erased or, at the very least, be not spoken off. Maybe it is watching something you spent a lifetime building, like a political party, being snatched by the Party Snatchers. 

The Shocked just need time to snap out of it.   While waiting for the inevitable pain, they just need a little break to distract themselves by things they have no business showing an interest in. Maybe it is the bubblegum music of Zeritu Kebede; maybe it is an old youtube video clip that they never thought they would see; maybe it is Obama Hype. Ah, there. Did you say "we are the change we have been waiting for."  What sweet cotton candy. Maybe it is admiring the garish Chinese architecture of the Olympics. There is always something. 

In time, they hope to be un-shocked, to ease themselves back in. But the PFDJ knows something they don’t know. Three things.
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First, the PFDJ runs like the country like it runs a political party, which it runs like a military organization. And the fundamental principle of military organizations is this: a cohesive, highly committed few are preferable to a barely-committed many. So, you want to drop out, fine, we will move without you. It knows that many of those who have dropped out now were telling earlier drop outs "good riddance and good luck" decades earlier. It is a confidence borne by history. You can always recruit and retain new True Believers, specially when you got the Levers of the State and you are selling an extraordinarily appealing ideology (neo-pan-Africanism: now under new management.)

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La lutta continua? My old buddy Elias Amare must be in Seventh Heaven. How often do you get your living idol (Isaias Afwerki) to quote your favorite dead idol (Amical Cabral)?  How immensely satisfying considering that Isaias never quotes anybody? Mission creep?  What mission creep?  Now that they have liberated Eritrea, Eritreans are going to liberate the Horn of Africa because this is what we fought for to begin with. 

Second, three words: Eri-TV on youtube. Here is more music, more sound, more sensory stimulation for your weary, shocked self. So, why come out of your coma, enjoy it, for as long as you can.

Third, the Shockers will add to the shock of the Shocked. Every other day, the Shockers come and tell us something we didn’t know--or we wished we didn’t know, or the exact opposite of what we really know---sending all back into deeper shock: 

La lutta continua. The liberation of the Horn of Africa may take a decade or two or three, you can’t hurry creation. Meanwhile, for the sake of everything that is good, we must suspend the constitution and sacrifice. Now, really, were you pressuring the EPLF to change its chairman when the EPLF was fighting to liberate Eritrea? So why do you want to pressure the PFDJ to change its chairman or have an election or a congress when it is in the midst of an even more arduous task of liberating the Horn of Africa. Is this really so hard to grasp?

Whether one agrees or disagrees with it, the PFDJ has a vision for what direction it wants to take Eritrea. It is a vision that is based on a few assumptions—that the neighborhood is dangerous and requires of Eritrea to have a large military footprint; that international powers have ominous designs in Eritrea and they have local agents who are eager and willing to enforce the evil designs; that the Eritrean people are trusting and naive and require a paternalistic party to provide Guided Capitalism, Guided Information, and Guided Democracy.  

The opposition’s alternative vision should be summed up in a few words. And it should be an alternative. How about two words— Eritrea First. Something that provides an alternative vision, and something that overcomes its perception--the perception that it has platforms for Kunama First, Afar First, My Co-Religionists First, My Hurt Feelings First, Peace First,  but rarely does one see Eritrea First. PFDJ has given nationalism such a bad name that to many reading this, "Eritrea First," which is only a call for prioritzation, will smack of chauvinism and border-line fascism. Keep the message simple, focus it on peace and progress. Tell me, "we fight for Eritrea where 9 year olds don't have names like "Erdna" and I am sold. 

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Parallel to that, the Opposition can take a reprieve from its own version of shocking the shell-shocked, like touring places it shouldn't and making statements it shouldn't, and generally refraining from sending the Shocked to a deep political coma. But I am not holding my breath.

Now, where is my hold music?  

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