Perspective - PART III: The Search for Alternative Mechanisms

PART III
Reviewing the Damaging Effects of Ethiopian Diaspora Politics on the
Wider Community and its Future Initiatives:
The Search for Alternative Mechanisms –
A Response to Readers’ Comments and Questions
07 April, 2009 | Maru Gubena

The title below, “Can Democracy take Root in a Country where Family, Group
Orientation and Regionalism are entrenched and Political Culture is lacking?” is
a sub-topic of a larger paper titled “Reviewing the Damaging Effects of Ethiopian
Diaspora Politics on the Wider Community and its Future Initiatives: The Search
for Alternative Mechanisms,” of which the first and second parts have already
been published on various Ethiopian and friends of Ethiopia websites some weeks
ago. It is in fact the final part of the larger paper, and was meant to be discussed
and posted later, so I am clearly aware that some of you among my readers may
be surprised, and see this short presentation as “putting the cart before the horse,”
since I am posting this short text before writing up and publishing all of the related
sub-topics. Yes, while admitting the applicability of the saying “putting the cart
before the horse,” I would, however, say that this is not without a reason – a
reason that somehow compelled me to produce this brief summary. More clearly,
the reason for me to skip the two other important sub-topics for the moment and
give a short review of the final sub-title is that, though many readers’ comments
were based on emotions and far remote from the socio-cultural and political
realities facing Ethiopia and its people today, a substantial number of the
comments expressed and questions raised focused exclusively on issues related to
this subject matter – the absence of a mature political culture in Ethiopian society.

As I mentioned in the second part of the larger article, soon after posting part one
(and again, after the second part was posted), I received e-mails from readers
with the most encouraging words and statements, a few of them exceptionally
powerful and penetrating, to the point of awakening my long hidden feelings and
painful memories.

But I also have received a

good number of e-mails

from those who consider

themselves as “proud

Ethiopians and proud of

their culture,” and who

see our culture, not just

as something “great,

unique and special” that

deserves the love and

respect of all of us, but

also as something

“sacrosanct.”

As a result, these “proud” Ethiopian compatriots appeared to be convinced, at least
according to their e-mail messages, that our Ethiopian culture has little or nothing
to do with the never-ending, increasing internal feuds and conflicts, including the
long standing political repression and economic impoverishment that have
continued to plague Ethiopians for decades and beyond. I also have the impression
from the comments in the e-mails received that I, Maru Gubena, as someone who
belongs to the generation of those who have voiced and demanded so relentlessly,
tirelessly and selflessly for respect of the rule of law, for basic freedom and
democracy in our country and for an equal distribution of Ethiopia’s economic
resources and socio-political position, was personally responsible for the bloody
upheavals of the 1974 Ethiopian revolution and its subsequent repercussions,
including Ethiopia’s endless predicaments and sufferings. Additionally, the authors
of these e-mails argued that, instead of simply supporting individual leaders of
opposition political parties morally, financially and wholeheartedly so as to shorten
the lifespan of Meles Zenawi’s regime, I was unnecessarily attacking our
Ethiopian culture, which they consider to be sacrosanct and untouchable.

My response to such comments and charges is brief and simple. Even though the
analysis, understandings and perspectives of Ethiopians about our culture may
differ, in my entire lifetime I have never personally met or seen a single Ethiopian
who is not proud of his or her country, people and culture. It is also my view that
looking more closely, constructively and critically at Ethiopia’s culture and its
multifaceted components, and its ability to accommodate different points of view,
including the mindsets of Ethiopians in all our diversity, does not make a person
different from others, including those “proud Ethiopians.” In fact, someone with a
profound interest and the capacity to critically and constructively examine,
articulate and link Ethiopia’s unhealed, painfully widening wounds and scars –
wounds and scars that are to be found on the faces and other parts of the bodies
of almost all Ethiopians of my generation – to our culturally molded attitudes and
perceptions can and should probably be seen as more involved in and concerned
about the persisting predicaments and sufferings of his or her country and people
than those “proud and true children of Ethiopia,” and in fact deserves the
appreciation of socially, culturally and politically conscious Ethiopians. It is
additionally useful and even healthy, at least in my view, to ask some serious,
burning questions and examine them in a more mature and balanced way, if
possible in a historical context, so as to understand why our problems persist,
never coming to an end. In this I am grateful to all of those who have taken the
time to send their comments and questions.

Having said this, let me

now consider my topic

for today. Also, in an

attempt to respond to the

questions put to me by

my readers and to help

trigger some interest for

discussion with Ethiopian

compatriots and friends

of Ethiopia, I will do my

best to raise a number of

questions that I deem to

be relevant in relation to

the relentless issues that

are under discussion.

Can Democracy take Root in a Country where Family, Group
Orientation and Regionalism are entrenched and Political Culture is
lacking?

The history of the nation state called Ethiopia, as we have been taught, is not only
long but also complex, unique, and for some of us, enormously difficult to
understand, unless one is willing to make lengthy and tremendously arduous
efforts. The same is true for the history of the process of state formation of
Ethiopia itself – how it came about. It is probably this process of state formation
that has been a persistent source of protracted disputes and sporadic clashes
between certain sections, small or large, of Ethiopia society. As was true for the
process of state formation and the shaping face of Ethiopia, the basis for political
leadership in Ethiopia has never been dependent upon the choices of the people; it
has always been determined by the will and desire of those with more power and
personal influence, as well as support from the well-known members of their
extended family and the groups, networks and region(s) to which the supposed
individual ruler or rulers belong, who with great conviction believe that they
themselves are the “Elect of God,” assigned to rule the land and its people, due
either to their personal skills and wisdom or to their heredity. More essentially,
except for a few individuals closely linked to certain rulers or socio-political
positions, Ethiopians in general have had little or nothing to say about those who
rule them, or about what was and is good or bad for them and their country. It is
evident that the active participation of Ethiopians in both traditional and recent
politics has been limited to a singing and dancing role in the coronation ceremonies
of their rulers, and to defending, not just their country from foreign enemies and
invaders, but also their kings or emperors from their personal internal opponents
and from other interest groups. Consequently, Ethiopians have never had the
opportunity either to face or to test the fruits of being ruled under a democratically
structured political system, democratically elected leadership and the rule of law,
or to learn the precise meaning of the terms, “basic individual freedoms,” or “the
rule of law and democracy,” with their multi-faceted components.

Also, as the experience of the past four or more decades has shown, and because
Ethiopia has not, or to a very limited degree, been open to learning from the
cultural and political processes in other nations, the development process of
Ethiopian society has been determined only by the needs and aspirations of
successive rulers, who have emphasized our superiority. As a consequence, in
general terms the majority of Ethiopians, if not almost the entire population, are
extremely proud of the history and culture of their country and of those who
shaped the Ethiopian culture and molded the attitudes and behaviours of
Ethiopians. For these reasons Ethiopians today tend to remain, at least internally,
solidly attached to their convictions: proud of their culture and their previous
rulers. The direct and indirect result is that the contemporary Ethiopian society,
both individually and collectively, is not fascinated by or even interested in the
creativity and dynamism of modern socio-political cultures and the technological
advancements of other nations. Our society is not flexible and or open enough to
adopt the most indispensable political elements, systems and technological
advancements of other countries, even when these could in fact be conducive to
modifying or perhaps even transforming certain dysfunctional cultural elements
and individual attitudes and behaviours – advancements that could help to decrease
our glaring poverty and shameful health conditions, that could extend the life
expectancy of our people; lead to economic improvement and development of
various fields and sectors; and more importantly, help to forge an effective
common bond that would expand or create the badly needed peace and tranquility
within Ethiopian society.

In conclusion, it would not be wrong to say that these dysfunctional, detrimental
cultural elements, attitudes and behaviours have unquestionably remained, forming
a permanent and immovable bottleneck to forging an effective common bond
among Ethiopians, to the cultivation of a modern organizational and political
culture, to a relatively democratic system, and to the establishment and expansion
of civil society in the land of Ethiopia.

The most difficult and still more painful question, which most of us prefer not to
discuss or even to hear about, is then: can democracy, with its many essential
components, take root in a country where modern political culture is entirely
absent or non-existent; whose people themselves appear to be historically and
culturally oriented to family and group, regionalist and undemocratic, with little or
no love for Ethiopia as a nation state, and who, paradoxically enough, choose to
remain in conflict and animosity with each other above forging bonds, working
and living side by side in peace and harmony with others who also belong to the
land of Ethiopia?

For the reasons indicated above, including a further response to the questions and
comments of readers, and because others who have not yet responded may
disagree, I imagine, with my statements here or in previously posted articles, I
pose the following additional questions in the hope that many, if not all, of you will
be ready – and have the courage – to respond, so that I and others can understand
and learn from your views and assessments.

To start with: where should we search for the sources of our deep-seated and
unrelenting resentment, vindictiveness, endless internal feuds and conflicts, and
our persistent predicaments and sufferings, either political or economic, if not
within our culture and the complete absence of common bonds among us as a
nation, both at home and in the Diaspora? Otherwise how do we explain the
complex, interlinked and never-ending tragedies and the acute and prolonged crisis
of trust and confidence from which we suffer painfully, and which are
responsible for making our country and its people a permanent beggar nation?
What other factors and role players might be responsible for prolonging the
regimes of our succession of repressive rulers, and for making these cruel, greedy
leaders almost exclusively dependent upon outsiders and outside forces, rather
than on their own people, whom they rule with the barrel of a gun, in the complete
absence of a modern, mature political culture? What could the explanation be? No
one could argue that Ethiopia lacks the necessary natural resources to feed its
people and enrich itself, so how has Ethiopia come to be such a famine- and
conflict-prone nation, often suffering horrendous and costly devastation? Aren’t
all these tragedies the direct and indirect results of our culturally molded
mentalities and habits – our inability to live and work together peacefully, as
responsible citizens?

Further, what reasons lie behind the consistent choices of some members of our
Diaspora community to single-handedly visit various departments of European and
US ministries and to produce fruitless letters directed at western Parliamentarians
and US Senators, rather than to visit or write to them using a collective voice? If
not from our culture, where did we acquire these seemingly irremovable habits,
with the addiction to “going it alone” when it comes to the well being of our
people and to many of the issues of our country? Why on earth, if not due to our
cultural perceptions, rigidly molded attitudes and behaviours, are we, as members
of the Ethiopian Diaspora community, unable to organize ourselves under a single
roof and turn our divided but most skillful, highly educated and experienced
community members into a peaceful force for diplomacy, a productive warehouse
to help educate ourselves as a community in areas including communications and
the meaning and functions of democracy; to help enrich our community with
knowledge and organizational culture; and to wage convincing, wisely envisioned
and crafted diplomatic wars against the repressive and successive regimes and
systems that have been and are still dragging our country and its people backward?

How come we don’t get mad at ourselves, don’t get jealous and confront
ourselves with loaded questions about the fact that many countries, including
Pakistan, Nepal, Kenya and Zimbabwe – which have experienced more or less the
same upheavals as our country – have nevertheless eventually been able, after
countless bitter and sometimes treacherous discussions, confrontations and
diplomatic and physical wars, to settle the dust of their potentially dangerous
differences and conflicts, accepting each other and each others’ viewpoints and
policies, to work together and live side by side?

Also, isn’t it because we do not have our own Diaspora House that all of the
indispensible, essential documents, recorded video and audio related to Ethiopia’s
historical and current events are to be found, not in one library or at least in an
organized list, identifying resources to be found in community organizations or
community libraries, but rather, scattered across the private living rooms of
individual Ethiopian Diaspora community members? Why is it that we, as an
Ethiopian Diaspora community, do not own our own relatively mature, cultured
community media outlets, such as radio, professionally organized magazines,
newspapers, websites, and other related means of communications capable of
embracing of all segments and views of our community? How can we explain the
fact that each of us within the Ethiopian Diaspora is exclusively dependent upon
individually owned, generally unprofessionally organized communications media,
including websites whose owners often, if not always, behave like lovers,
exclusively committed to a few individuals who contribute articles? Does it make
sense for active community members and article contributors to be dependent on
the goodwill, health, time – and individual judgment, whether socially or politically
motivated – of media outlet owners for the publication of book reviews, articles,
announcements and advertisements?

Even though I am clearly aware that every individual in a given community can’t
be and need not be involved in the political activities of their country, nevertheless
I wonder how we are to explain the fact that fewer than one in a thousand, or
perhaps two thousand, among the Diaspora community are doing more than
talking randomly, and are instead thinking and writing in an organized way about
issues related to the problems facing our country and its people? Should we really
believe the unsubstantiated assumptions stated by some individuals, who say that
these huge numbers of Ethiopian compatriots, those who are not involved and not
thoughtfully discussing Ethiopian politics and the related problems, “don’t care
and don’t really love their country?”

Finally, I actually wonder – perhaps with other readers – about the views of my
“proud” Ethiopian compatriots. How would they respond to the questions raised
above?

Having put my efforts and energy together in an attempt, not just to review the
historical and cardinal foundation of Ethiopian leadership, including its family,
group and regionalist nature, but also to respond as realistically and constructively
as I could to statements made and questions raised by the readers of my recently
published parts one and two of this article, and having raised a number of essential
and mind-provoking questions in an attempt to expand the debates and discussions
that have already been initiated, I will now turn my attention to alternative
directions and mechanisms and do my best to provide ideas on organizational
processes and discourses that I hope can help to mend bridges among us, and to
revive and strengthen the bonds that previously existed among our forefathers.

Coming soon: The Search for Alternative directions and Mechanisms:
Concluding Remarks

Dear readers: the remaining section of the entire paper (“Reviewing the Damaging
Effects of Ethiopian Diaspora Politics on the Wider Community and its Future
Initiatives: The Search for Alternative Mechanisms”) is coming soon, and will be
titled “The Search for Alternative directions and Mechanisms: Concluding
Remarks.” Initially this was to be published together with the text above (part
three), but for smooth reading and because I attach a high value to the alternatives
and remarks it contains, I thought it would be wiser and even more readable to
publish them separately. For me this final section is a must-read text, the
backbone of the entire paper, and I hope not only that the alternatives suggested
and concluding remarks will receive broad attention, but also that they will lead to
a fruitful discussion. In addition to briefly reviewing the body of the entire paper
and the reasons behind the persistent reluctance of Ethiopian Diaspora political
movements, their interest groups and supporters to pay attention to the repeatedly
made proposals to establish a single, united and respected Ethiopian Diaspora
House – an institution that functions professionally and embraces all of the
segments of the Ethiopian Diaspora community – this section will provide bold
and unambiguous alternatives to the current course of Ethiopian Diaspora politics
and our political groupings In its closing remarks, the paper envisages a gloomy
future, with a painfully disappointing conclusion for who have even minimal
expectations for concrete results from Diaspora politics, if the current course
continues. The paper ends with a forceful but bleak statement:

“…Without having the required confidence in each other, we will not be able to
work closely together, and without working hand in glove, all the efforts we have
been and are making from time to time, whether individually or in small groups,
will be fruitless, and will even produce more tension, anxiety, frustration and pain
within the Ethiopian Diaspora community and for the people of Ethiopia at large.
And we, as the Ethiopian Diaspora community, will continue to mature within our
own family and group circles and will die as scattered and as hostile to each other
as we are today, exactly as a sizable number of the “White Russian Refugees” of
1920 and 1940, who, due to their failure to agree and to work together against the
Bolsheviks who seized power during the October Russian Revolution of 1917,
melted almost without a trace into the beautiful western mountains, into peaceful
and relaxing rural landscapes and wealthy capitalist societies, to the point where
no one today would notice either their origin or culture….”

Maru Gubena
Readers who wish to contact the author can reach me at info@pada.nl

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