What Does Democratization of 'Ethiopia' Mean?

By: Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis

[ Posted On: 2008-08-27 ]

Many people allover the world have become familiar with articles, reports, news and essays, features and analyses focusing on the tyrannical practices of Meles Zenawi, the Tigray Monophysitic Abyssinian dictator of 'Ethiopia'. And many have recently noticed voices coming from various places to ask the 'democratization' of 'Ethiopia'. Apparently, there is nothing wrong with the democratization of a tyrannical regime anytime anywhere.

Before assessing the procedures and the processes through which 'Ethiopia' can change and become a democratic place, one has to understand the tyrannical nature of the institution, and the oppressive practices carried out throughout the territory in question.

What is tyranny? What is dictatorship?

If we refer to common dictionaries, we will meet different variants of definitions, like (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tyranny):

1: oppressive power !every form of tyranny over the mind of man — Thomas Jefferson>; especially : oppressive power exerted by government

2 a: a government in which absolute power is vested in a single ruler; especially : one characteristic of an ancient Greek city-state

b: the office, authority, and administration of a tyrant

3: a rigorous condition imposed by some outside agency or force

4: a tyrannical act

Similarly (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/dictatorship):

1: the office of dictator

2: autocratic rule, control, or leadership

3 a: a form of government in which absolute power is concentrated in a dictator or a small clique

b: a government organization or group in which absolute power is so concentrated

c: a despotic state

What is Democracy?

If we thus know what 'tyranny' and 'dictatorship' are, before analyzing ways of possible democratization processes, we have to examine what democracy is. If we refer to the online encyclopedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy), we find the following definition:

"Democracy is a system of government by which political sovereignty is retained by the people and exercised directly by citizens. In modern times it has also been used to refer to a constitutional republic where the people have a voice through their elected representatives. It is derived from the Greek ([dimokratia] (help•info)), "popular government" which was coined from ????? (de-mos), "people" and ?????? (kratos), "rule, strength" in the middle of the 5th century BC to denote the political systems then existing in some Greek city-states, notably Athens".

This directly suggests political sovereignty retained by a people. The same definition we find in classical dictionaries that enumerate the different variants and (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/democracy) nuances of the word:

1 a: government by the people; especially: rule of the majority b: a government in which the supreme power is vested in the people and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually involving periodically held free elections

2: a political unit that has a democratic government

3 capitalized : the principles and policies of the Democratic party in the United States

4: the common people especially when constituting the source of political authority

5: the absence of hereditary or arbitrary class distinctions or privileges

In fact, all socio-political situations are relevant to human societies, and they consequently hinge on forms of relationship and organization that prevail among settled or not peoples. Lack of political sovereignty means tyranny for a people.

What the use of the term 'democracy' undisputedly implies in Ancient Greek is national sovereignty. Democratic organization of a people or nation cannot exist without freedom from external threats and coercion. When democratic Athens was invaded by oligarchic, monarchical Sparta, there was no national sovereignty, and consequently there was no 'democracy'.

Democracy cannot exist without national sovereignty. And within the 'Ethiopian' Tyranny, there are sovereign and non-sovereign nations.

Sovereign and Non-Sovereign Nations within the 'Ethiopian' Tyranny

Comparative examination of the situations that prevail among different peoples included within the 'Ethiopian' tyranny demonstrates severe policies of differentiation that irrevocably define the nature itself of the tyrannical regime.

Historically, culturally, religiously, socio-behaviorally and linguistically different peoples, like the Amharas and the Oromos, are treated in gravely different – and therefore discriminatory – ways. More specifically,

1. the former are allowed to diffuse the version of their 'history' which incorporates the assimilation and the extinction of the latter, whereas

2. the latter are not allowed to develop the rudiments of their historical tradition, culture and identity, particularly any detail that would oppose the previous version, which by force became official dogma of the state.

In a great study published within the series of the Rand Corporation monographs (entitled 'The Ethiopian Prospective Case'), Sandra F. Joireman and Thomas S. Szayna establish a direct and immediate link between the Amhara – Tigray territorial expansion and the imposition of their myth as state dogma of the Ethiopian tyrannical state:

"The Amhara and Tigray fill the top two places of the stratification map for three historical reasons: nobility, mobility, and Christianity. Both groups trace their ancestry back to the Abyssinian Empire of the 12th century AD.16 Their joint cultural myth extends back even further, dating the origin of these peoples to the meeting between King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (an Abyssinian). Mobility also explains the dominance of the Amhara and Tigray peoples. In the 19th and 20th centuries the two groups moved out of their traditional lands in the northern highlands of Ethiopia and took over a large portion of the fertile coffee lands in the south". http://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1188/MR1188.ch5.pdf

This leads us to the most crucial dimension of the 'Ethiopian' tyranny; with the rise of the federal structure (1991), the existence and the different identity of several nations have been naturally accepted – at least nominally: Oromo, Ogaden, Afar, Tigray, Amhara. A province with a different name and different administrative language means a different nation.

However, contrarily to the aforementioned, nations in the southern and the western parts of the country have been totally depersonalized: the Sidamas, the Kaffas, the Shekachos, the Kambaatas, the Wolayitas, the Hadiyas and the Gedeos have been regrouped in an improper administrative division. In the same way the Anuak and Nuer nations have been compacted in the Gambella province, and the Shinashas, the Gumuz, and the Berta have been compressed in Benishangul province.

The measure serves a double tyrannical objective:

1. deprive all these nations from the status given to the others (Oromo, Ogaden, Afar, Tigray, Amhara), and

2. promote the language of the 'Ethiopian' tyranny: Amharic.

One would normally expect representatives of the aforementioned depersonalized nations (Sidamas, Kaffas, Shekachos, Kambaatas, Wolayitas, Hadiyas, Gedeos, Anuak, Nuer, Shinashas, Gumuz, Berta) to fervently demand for themselves what the Oromos, the Ogadenis, the Afars, the Tigrays, and the Amharas have already been geranted; but the appointed renegades – puppets of the 'Ethiopian' tyranny (like the Sidama nation's most criminal traitor, Shiferaw Sugute; see: http://www.sidama.org/southern_ethiopia_regional_puppe.htm) have been appointed in their positions in the provincial administrations in order to exclusively promote their respective nations' extermination and extinction.

This consists in a clear demonstration of the complicity of the locally appointed traitors, who cannot claim to any sort of delegation of power.

Lack of National Sovereignty: the Nature of the 'Ethiopian' Tyranny

The 'Ethiopian' tyranny conclusively consists in an oppressive power exerted by Amhara / Tigray governments that have prolonged the occupation of foreign lands and nations, annexed and subjugated over the span of ca. 150 years.

Analyzing the "rigorous condition imposed by some outside agency or force", i.e. the invaders of the annexed lands and the subjugated peoples, we find out that the lack of political sovereignty in the case of 'Ethiopia' consists in sheer lack of national sovereignty.

In classical definitions of the term, we find the explicit declaration of the source of the national sovereignty. In an online legal dictionary, we read the following:

"The union and exercise of all human power possessed in a state; it is a combination of all power; it is the power to do everything in a state without accountability; to make laws, to execute and to apply them: to impose and collect taxes, and, levy, contributions; to make war or peace; to form treaties of alliance or of commerce with foreign nations, and the like. Story on the Const. Sec. 207.

2. Abstractedly, sovereignty resides in the body of the nation and belongs to the people. But these powers are generally exercised by delegation.

3. When analysed, sovereignty is naturally divided into three great powers; namely, the legislative, the executive, and the judiciary; the first is the power to make new laws, and to correct and repeal the old; the second is the power to execute the laws both at home and abroad; and the last is the power to apply the laws to particular facts; to judge the disputes which arise among the citizens, and to punish crimes.

4. Strictly speaking, in our republican forms of government, the absolute sovereignty of the nation is in the people of the nation; (q.v.) and the residuary sovereignty of each state, not granted to any of its public functionaries, is in the people of the state. (q.v.) 2 Dall. 471; and vide, generally, 2 Dall. 433, 455; 3 Dall. 93; 1 Story, Const. Sec. 208; 1 Toull. n. 20 Merl. Repert. h.t." (http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/National+sovereignty)

What paragraph 2 clearly states in the aforementioned definition is the need for each nation of 'Ethiopia' to separately organize elections so that they chose their national delegates who will organize a democratic society that reflects the needs and the visions of each different nation.

Democratization of 'Ethiopia'

Democratic rule within the context of a nation signifies national sovereignty; exercising sovereignty implies national independence, and rejection of hegemony.

This shows what can be the only way to achieve democratization in 'Ethiopia': split of the tyrannical country and dissolution of the Amhara / Tigray hegemony. Anyone who opposes this as the only possible democratization for 'Ethiopia' is a crypto-Nazi, totalitarian and hypocrite, a common Amhara / Tigray chauvinist, coward enough to openly admit it.

Any person demanding unity for (in) 'Ethiopia' intends to perpetuate Amhara / Tigray Abyssinian hegemony under the false name of 'Ethiopia'.

In fact, all the supporters of unity for (in) 'Ethiopia' are Hitler's Children in Africa: Kinijit, Ginbot-7 and their lackeys. They know very well that they shamelessly diffuse lies because democracy does not exist without sovereignty, and sovereignty automatically imposes rejection of hegemony. We will analyze the Amhara Abyssinian hegemony – and its racist nature – in several forthcoming articles, but here we have to conclude, highlighting how illusory it is for anyone to assume – let alone believe – that Ethiopia, the World History's Most Execrable Shame, can survive.

The Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples heralded the Death of Ethiopia. No one can save the Amhara Hell; and no one will!

Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard

About The Author: Dr. Muhammad Shamsaddin Megalommatis - is Orientalist, Assyriologist, Egyptologist, Iranologist, Islamologist, Historian and Political Scientist. Dr. Megalommatis, 51, is the author of 12 books, dozens of scholarly articles, hundreds of encyclopedia entries, and thousands of articles. He speaks, reads and writes more than 15, modern and ancient, languages.

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