This is a commentary on Amanuel Hidrat’s article 

In his essays, Yosief Gebrehiwet has revisited the “Eritrean subculture” that evolved during the long period of Eritrea’s armed struggle for autonomy.  According to Yosief, the current economic and political limbo in Eritrea has a lot to do with the cultural and political value system [“Ghedli mentality”] that was incubated during the liberation struggle.  He characterizes the “war-era” subculture as something that was strongly anchored on absolute secrecy, extreme and often “unnecessary” human sacrifice, intolerance to diverse views, a highly centralized and non transparent leadership and a rigid socialist culture.  He tried to evaluate the current political crisis from a backdrop of the “bunker mentality” that prevailed during the armed struggle. 

His essays received mixed reviews from Eritrean readers.  Some condemned him for being too abrasive and offhanded.  He was labeled as a renegade that has no respect for the sentiments that many Eritreans hold for the liberation or “Ghedli” era so sacrosanctly.  The fact that Yosief attempted to write so ‘cynically’ and exponentially about that era was construed by many as an insult to the tens of thousands of Eritreans that were martyred during the liberation struggle.  On the other hand, many admired him for his courage to inject  new perspectives into the mind set of Eritreans regarding the history of the Ghedli era by putting his own reputation and even “personal” safety on line.

Unsurprisingly much of what Amanuel Hidrat has written to rebuke Yosief’s thesis has a lot to do with historical sentiments and political affiliations and/or nostalgia rather than with logical constructs.

1. To start with, Amanuel titled his article “The Peril of ignoring the success of Ghedli”.  From the onset the title was misleading and biased.   Yosief did not ignore the “success of Ghedli”.  He was just reflecting on it.  In here, Amanuel has stepped on a common logical fallacy known as Straw man.   Amanuel dwelled on a caricatured or extreme version of Yosief’s argument, instead of the actual argument that was made by putting words into Yosief’s mouth. 

2. Amanuel’s main point of departure in refuting Yosief’s essays was what he described as “what we have observed by our own eye.”  It is not clear what the word “we” refers to.  Nevertheless, the litmus test in his argumentation seems to be “popular opinion”.  He states that an idea or claim that is not “consistent with our background information and how well they fit with that real observed information” is not plausible. When scholars argue a point their main intention is not to “fit” into observed information of others. So Amanuel is basing his argument on a fallacy known as argumentum ad populum.  What he termed as “our observation” could be very popular but not necessarily true and as such cannot be used to refute an argument.   Using appeals based purely on the number of people who hold a particular belief is a logical pitfall. 

3. Amanuel attempts to challenge Yosief’s assertion that the Eritrean Liberation Front, otherwise known as “jebha”, was a sectarian movement. But he fails to counter argue this point convincingly.  Instead, he comes up with a very simplistic and naïve analogy of a doctor who renders an unsatisfactory diagnosis for a patient’s sickness.  Amanuel alludes to several not so well defined “philosophical approaches” that helps him determine whether an argument is plausible or not.  This “magic wand” approach seems to make his analysis not only impotent but hilarious.  Wikipedia defines sectarianism as “ bigotry, discrimination, prejudice or hatred arising from attaching importance to perceived differences between subdivisions within a group, such as between different denomination of a religion or the  factions  of a  political movement”  In his essays, Yosief has pointed out that the ELF had the attributes of a sectarian movement.  The task here is, therefore, to show how this assertion is false.  We don’t see such a presentation in Amanuel’s rebuttal.   The only thing that one can infer from Amanuel’s analysis is that he was a former member of the ELF and that he is deeply hurt by Yosief ‘bold’ statement about his organization.
   
4. Some of Yosief’s arguments on issues relating to “Eritrean identity” could be a bit extreme.  But Amanuel’s approach to show that Yosief’s arguments are fallacious is very inconsequential.  For example, on the issue of identity, Amanuel writes, “But also let us see his four core beliefs separately as we have seen collectively, if any at all, appeals to the Eritrean people’s consciousness.”  The inference here is that an idea is plausible if it appeals to the Eritrean people’s consciousness.  This kind of argument is Argumentum ad populum (argument or appeal to the public).   This is the fallacy of trying to prove something by showing that the public agrees with you.   There are many instances in history where the public was wrong on a wide spectrum of issues.  That is why argument by appeal to the public renders many an argument fallacious.  
   5. Somewhere in his essay, Amanuel Hidrat states that he has shown in his previous article entitled “the evolvement of Eritrean nationalism and Eritrean Nationhood” that “there were political oppression, social injustice, and economic disparity by the Ethiopian rulers.” and that he had “also laid down that the Eritrean revolution have met the three basic intertwined qualifiers (ideological, psychological, and historical) required to raise an army struggle.”   Case closed.  Well, what he stated in his article is a common platitude.  Secondly, even if we are to consider Amanuel as an authority on the subject, it will be hard on us to take seriously an argument based on “appeal to authority.” The situation is that Amanuel has laid down for us certain propositions in his essays and we readers should say “amen”.    Unfortunately serious argumentation does not happen that way.  
      6.  Amanuel makes a policy statement on public debate by writing, “Certainly, Public debate is a form to clarify issues, to educate the public, and help citizen to make choices and … informed decisions.” This may well be so,  but in order for the public to benefit from public discourse, such debates should adhere to commonly used  conventions of argumentations in order to avoid the confusion of ideas and issues. 
         7. On numerous occasions Amanuel has characterized Yosief as someone who is bent on discrediting the History of Ghedli, and as a person with some sinister motive to rewrite the history of Ghedli in a twisted manner.   This approach really devaluates Amanuel’s write-up although I contend that he has a lot of solid data and experience to work on.  When a writer resorts to Argumentum ad hominem (argument directed at the person) he/she is making the  error of attacking the character or motives of a person who has stated an idea, rather than the idea itself. The most obvious example of this fallacy is when one debater maligns the character of another debater. I don’t believe that Yosief is a contemptuous Eritrean.  And we would be well served if Amanuel and Yosief start off a civil debate in which all of us could pitch in to have a more settled and seasoned understanding of our culture, history and most of all of the Ghedli Era.
            
         8. Finally, I like to commend both Amanuel and Yosief for spending their valuable time to carry over their ideas to the Eritrean public.   And prolific writers like Yosief should be encouraged and not maligned to write on issues relating to Eritrea.  The culture of free discourse in Eritrean society is yet to be developed.  It has been my observation and experience that the attitude of “if you are not with me then you must be against me” is pervading most Eritrean debates.  That is why we see a lot of outcry when some body tries to traverse out of the Eritrean “comfort zone”.  Secondly, we fully recognize that there are thousands of Eritreans living in the Diaspora who had been active participants in the armed struggle.  I think it is time for such veterans to be less defensive of their past and start entertaining some pragmatic ideas however unpatriotic such ideas may sound.    History is a continuum of social progress.  What worked at a certain era may be a hindrance to progress in another era.  So, we need not be caught up in historical reminiscences and nostalgia and block reform,  change and new perspectives.  We need to get out of our box and start over with a revived spirit in order to help our people make a robust stride towards peace, prosperity and social harmony. Let’s swallow our pride and move on.