Category: Articles
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No, The Sky Is Not Falling, It’s Just That Not All That Glitters Is Gold!
By Berhane M Tekeste When a covert, exclusionary, and discriminatory activity is busted, it triggers suspicion and mistrust by nature and necessity. And where there is suspicion and mistrust, say all you want, not all that glitters is gold! In an open letter addressed to the president of the EU on the eve of the…
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Brussels Conference: Will It Add Value To The Democratic Struggle?
It has been more than 10 years since different Eritrean opposition groups officially united under the umbrella of what was then called ENA and now EDA. Many Eritreans hoped for better and were optimistic about the future of Eritrea. Due to the absence of clear vision, strategic plan and lack of access to information about…
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The Brussels Conference: A Democratic Right
The coming days a conference will be held in the Belgian capital Brussels on the policies of the United States (US) and European Union (EU) towards The Horn of Africa in general and our country Eritrea in particular. In this article, I will refer to this Brussels Conference 2009 as (BC-2009). The purpose of this…
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Watchdog Journalism And Vigilant Society
A group of freedom fighters that we thought of as lambs turned out to be as beasts of prey. I am writing this piece in reaction to what our respected sister Selam Kidane published under the title of, “No The Sky Isn’t Falling … But Foxy Loxy Does Exist”. My focus will be on the…
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Cabbages And Kings And Why The Sea Is Boiling Hot – VIII
This is a continuation of the response made to comments in earlier postings either on the Awate website or by personal mail. Affirmative Action and opinions on official languages were dealt with Part VI and a special piece on languages on Part VII. Once again I am obliged to dwell on the language issue…
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Cabbages and Kings and Why the Sea is Boiling Hot – VII
“The time has come,” the Walrus said – “To talk of many things:Of shoes and ships and sealing wax – Of cabbages and kingsAnd why the sea is boiling hot – And whether pigs have wings”Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll A few of my readers had expressed they were looking forward for a…
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Cabbages and Kings and Why the Sea is Boiling Hot – VI
“The time has come,” the Walrus said – “To talk of many things:Of shoes and ships and sealing wax – Of cabbages and kingsAnd why the sea is boiling hot – And whether pigs have wings”Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll The time has come to pause and consider readers’ reactions so far…
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Cabbages and Kings: Why the Sea is Boiling Hot (V)
After reviewing historical developments which influenced the divergent mindsets in Eritrea, part IV dealt with the lack of a collective mindset at the eve of independence and the attempt by the PLF regime to impose its values on the public and create the “New Eritrean”. It was concluded that a positive collective mindset is a…
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Cabbages and Kings: Why the Sea is Boiling Hot (V)
In the previous parts I attempted to review the historical background that brought divergent mindsets within the Eritrean polity. Here we are at the verge of the end of phase one of our independence, and we find ourselves at odds with each other on outlooks and expectations as regards basic issues such as form of…
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Ramadan Reflections (Part 4 & 5)
What follow are the last two portions (4 & 5) of the five part series that Omar Jabir wrote during the month of Ramadan. The series appeared on Alnahda1.8.com during the months of August and September, 2009; Awate.com has translated all five parts to English believing it would serve a wider audience. Notes that appear in brackets…
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Quotes Of The Month
A diplomat willing to serve as Israel’s ambassador to Eritrea is yet to be found! “They spend their lives living in places like Rome, Paris, Buenos Aires and Beijing. They spend their days shaking hands and smiling, and their evenings drinking wine with influential folk from all walks of life. They eat regularly at…
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Eritrea: Mismanagement Of Land & Human Resources
The main difference between developed and developing countries is in the way they are managed. Any progress on the national or individual level depends on this field of knowledge—management. Since it held power, the regime has managed Eritrean affairs in the worst manner, and this is due to the system applied (sectarian) that recruits incompetent…
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Arabic In Eritrea : Its History and Its Reality (III)
Arabic language: the Popular Front [PFDJ] confirms that the Arabic language in Eritrea [was] imposed by the English and [it is] the language of Rashayidah. Is it possible to reach this level of ignorance of history, or it is a determination to be fraudulent and deny rights because of political blindness and mental deafness…
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Governing Eritrea: A Battle Of Two Conflicting Ideas
I abhor violence. But I do not believe on peaceful resistance at any cost, especially if there is no space in which to wage a peaceful resistance. Nor do I believe that we have to be pacifists to follow the principles of nonviolence. We are the people who are denied of our rights to freely…
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Eritrean Opposition: All Are Secular (II)
And I say that [in the title], because, if anyone reads the Charter of the Eritrean Democratic Alliance, he will discover that all the organizations that signed it, whether Islamists, nationality-based or otherwise, are in fact secular because the Charter confirms the separation of religion from the state, and that citizenship is the basis of…
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“I Want To Be A Sailor…”
This short essay was written sometime in 2004. If what we knew were the only guideposts for reality, the innocent knowledge before knowing the ugly truths and other side of the coin would be it. That other side hosts the grotesque, the depressing, the confusing, the deleterious… “In Middle Ages—‘MaEkelay Zemen’—people used to believe…
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The Cruellest Decade: in Ten
The decade 2000-2010 hosted milestone events in Eritrea’s recent past; yet mostly disappointing. Coming on the heels of the optimism, pride and peace of 1990s, the decade 2000s, without question, has been a turbulent time for Eritrea and Eritreans. It is more reminiscent of our bloody past than the neighbourly decade. From ‘Salsay Werar’ in…
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A Forest Without A Tree
The ongoing mind to mind fight has to land somewhere with a fruit. The issue of land, as some writers used to depict, is neither complex nor a tricky. Land to the legitimate owner, empirically, is a just step that should be fulfilled accordingly. In Eritrea, the one time dignified and respectful citizens, endowed with…
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Whom does Eritrea love? Amanuel Asrat or Yohannes Tiquabo
Generals and tyrants love to dance to the loud tunes of cowardice, oozing betrayal, in that circular formation of followers, until their heads loudly spin with inequity, with madness while wail, yes primal wail of utter silence descends and falls on the hills of ‘Eira-Iro.’ This installment is not so much about ‘romanticizing Amanuel Asrat’…
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The Kind Citizen and ‘Zemen’
I am launching a column in this venerable website, Awate.com. The column’s name is ‘the kind citizen.’ I choose this name because that is my vision for Eritrea, a nation of kind citizens. Citizens who pride in their histories and identities, who know and exercise their rights and duties (mainly rights in these times) and…