Category: Articles
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Praise and Criticize
Praise and Criticize:“The Eritrean Accord: Harmonized Constitution” First and foremost, I congratulate Mejlis Ibrahim Mukhtar for taking the initiative of amending the Eritrean constitution using a mixture of the 1952 Eritrean Federal constitution and the ratified 1997 Eritrean constitution in his I for one am on record for advocating the use of the ratified 1997…
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The Fear Of The Other Side
Things are going downhill and it seems as if we are going to walk on steep cliffs. I wish this will not happen. Opposition movements are multiple with a range of political formulas. Yet we have witnessed the emergence of new ones and perhaps more will be coming in the future. One cluster here and…
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Internal factors in the issue of land, equity and Language
Recently there have been a number of articles written about the problems of land, equity and Arabic in Eritrea. Most of the writers have blamed Eritrea’s dictator for the problems, thus referring only to an external factor. However, I believe that there are also internal factors involved, and if we want to solve…
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My Understanding Of A National Conference
A national conference that measures up to its name should reflect the compatibility of that with the composition of its participants, the goals and tasks set, the results achieved and the mechanism and means adopted. Reality is so complex to squeeze and fit into a rigid pattern or criteria set ahead. Thus allowance should be…
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EraEro Guards: Files Awaiting Extermination
The most shocking feature, in the interview with Eyob Bahta Habtemariam, EraEro prison guard, is the story of his colleagues and himself being open air detainees. This double sided situation is not created from void; it is the offspring of the regime’s relation with its cohorts. The EraEro issue, beside its portrayal of how zealots…
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Eritreans On The Run: Trends, Profiles & Destinations
According to the UNHCR, there were 15. 2 million refugees1 and more than 922,000 individual claims for asylum or refugee status registered worldwide in 2009. Eighty percent of all world refugees are hosted in developing countries of which the major refugee hosting countries are Pakistan (1.7 million), Iran (1.1 million) and Syria (1,05…
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Is Giving The Kebessa Eritrean Population A Black Eye A Solution?
Commentary on Aklilu Zere’s series of articles By G. Ande Aklilu Zere is no doubt a dubiously “clever” writer with a stinging pen but readers may still learn something from his narratives. The major problem I have with his works is that he makes a lot of insidious and insensitive remarks that suggest that he…
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Who Is To Blame?
Are some of the issues that are recently raised in a number of articles a tip of an iceberg, or they are tiny ripples in a cup that will ultimately vanish? Are they objective manifestations of a grim reality that some of us didn’t notice? Are they subjective issues which exist only in the minds…
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Promoting National Unity And Co-existence In Eritrea
Promoting National Unity, Cultural And Religious Co-existence In Eritrea Nowadays, the Eritrean arena is full of political contradictions that reflect the historical, cultural, religious, social and other accumulated issues that express the sum of the Eritrean situation. It represents all of the country’s factions and communities that are destined to live in one…
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Hgi Endaba: The Laws of our Ancestors
Megedi ArbiAa: Part I In the small but highly diversified ethnic and cultural make up of the Eritrean population, there is something called Hgi Endaba which literally means the laws and or customs inherited from our ancestors. In the Christian/ Tygrina/highland population category, the word “Mother Land” is rarely used when referring to our…
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The World Cup And National Anthem: A Matter of Perspective
I love to watch the World Cup. Who doesn’t? It is entertaining. It is dazzling. It is emotional, riveting and almost all of the time, highly exciting. Above all, it is a good pastime. What I hate about the World Cup however is the singing of the National anthem when ever two teams are about…
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Reflections On The Eritrean Youth
What comes to our mind when the term youth is raised? Where does the position of the Eritrean youth lie when it comes to meet the general characteristics and uniqueness of a particular age group? What is the position of the youths from the existing opposition camp? I tried to present modest highlights about the…
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Dilemma of the Decade: Betting On the Eritrean Opposition
“There is no such thing as a Good Opinion or A Bad Opinion if we stand for free speech” We all have heard numerous times this triangle of hate kind of a story involving three players. The Eritrean regime, the opposition and the real or imagined “enemies” of the Eritrean regime ranging…
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What Type Of Unity?
Eritrea‘s current geographical borders, and the people within that Domain, had not emerged through a natural process of development to form a nation state. Like most African states, Eritrea is an outcome of a colonial scramble in search of raw materials and new markets which the then developing economies of the West required; the colonialists…
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Realisation One’s Wrong Deed Is A Virtue
Really an astonishing and a historical revelation was made by the Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in one of his last election campaigns. He definitely has a strong ethnic, cultural and (until recently) political ties with the kebesa community in Eritrea that no one can deny. Thus, no reasonable person can accuse him of trying to…
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“Majority Rule” and “Minority Rights”
I have great respect for Semere Tesfai for boldly articulating his views. There are crucial points that he and I are in complete concurrence, in particular his analysis of not resorting to group rights to solve Eritrea’s problems; that is the main crux of his analysis. I believe the solution still remains a state that…
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In Search Of Two Chickens And…A Latteria
This installment is about two chickens and a latteria; about ‘they may have come through us but they are neither for us nor of us’; and most importantly why we the opposition need two eggs and why omelet is bad for your health, civic health that is. KY: The opposition is unable to attract supporters.…
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Pilgrimage to Gamla Stan: Reflections from Stockholm
Last week I was in Stockholm, invited together with three colleagues from Ethiopia, Sudan and Somalia to address a conference on ‘Democratisation in the Horn of Africa: Processes and Results,’ that was arranged by the ‘Network for Peace in the Horn of Africa,’ an entity that is based there. What moved me emotionally most, and…
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Education not Incarceration: Build Schools not Prisons
Education is central to Eritrean culture. During the 30 year revolutionary struggle Eritrean nationalists made a conscious effort to formally educate the villages they sought refuge in. Amongst a chaotic backdrop of air raids and gunfire, mobile workshops and literacy programs were run to empower local women, children and potential fighters (Rena, 2007; Pool, 1997). In the hearts and minds of nationalists, a literate population was seen…
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Spirit of Unquestioned Domination Should be Defeated
“Look in the mirror, and don’t be tempted to equate transient domination witheither intrinsic superiority or prospects for extended survival.”(Stephen Jay Gould, September 1941-May 2002) As Eritrean communities and citizens, it is very difficult for us to see the mistaken assumptions we have when it comes to people who are different from ourselves. How…