Donald Levine's "Wax and Seal"
By Daniel Haile
April 28, 2006
Is it because they find the situation better than they expected? Or is it because of their willingness to be manipulated with half-truths by the tyrant, Mr. Meles Zenawi, and his cronies? Or is it the result of a red carpet treatment and business connections that the government uses for its diplomatic offensive against its opponents? I can name names of the few opportunists involved, but that is not necessary since those individuals are well known to many Ethiopians.
I exclude Professor Levine from the bunch alluded to above simply because he is too intelligent, decent and principled to be categorized with the lot. First of all I want to thank the good professor for his continued engagement and his constructive initiative to broker a peaceful dialogue between the leaders of CUDP and EPDRF. He also deserves credit for his humanitarian visit of the prisoners and his sympathy for their cause.
On the other hand, it is disappointing to note the professor’s attempt to bend well known facts to suit his purpose. From his mixed messages, it is not clear to what extent his fudging of the facts is motivated by his need to encourage dialogue between the opposition and the prime minister or by his misreading of the actual political events that occurred.
Facts or Fiction
I understand that an arbiter who wants to reconcile two feuding parties can’t afford to antagonize either one by sticking just to the facts. The trouble is, in the process, Prof. Levine leans backward to invent opposition sins and give credit to the regime where it does not deserve. Such seems Professor Levine’s dilemma in his observation of the election outcomes. He blames CUDP for its refusal to join the parliament, while at the same time giving undeserved credit to the prime minister for his non-existing magnanimity. He laments about the culture of secrecy and violence and shares the blame to both parties.
To be sure there were some tactical mistakes the CUDP leadership may have committed, but none of them are the mistakes Professor Levine dwells on. Clearly, on the eve of the election and thereafter, there are indications that CUDP threw caution for safety and security out of the window and seemed to forget exactly who the Prime Minister and EPDRF were. They ignored the fact that the prime minister and his associates were guerrilla leaders nurtured by a lethal mix of Marxist, Enver Hoxxa, Moist and Stalinist violent doctrines. As it turned out, CUDP leaders may have wrongly assumed the prime minister would accept a fair and square defeat at the ballot box and peacefully turn over political power to the winning opposition.
Culture of Secrecy and Violence
One of Professor Levine’s criticisms of the CUDP leaders concerned what he called the Ethiopian culture of secrecy. That is clearly an unfair and unfounded claim because that was exactly what the CUDP leadership wanted to do away with in the first place. As a result of this policy CUDP began campaigning in the open with no hidden secrets or agenda and officially declared the beginning of a new policy of openness. Their telephone conversations, offices, meetings, documents, literature and campaigns were deliberately put out in the open in order to shatter what they called the destructive culture of secrecy. This openness was a significant improvement that CUD wanted to introduce into Ethiopian political discourse.
Perhaps the biggest cultural change that CUDP tried to usher in was a policy of non-violent political campaign. It even went to the extent of rejecting political alliance with groups on the basis of their adherence to armed struggle. This too was a break from the traditional norm, where most political power transitions in Ethiopian history, including the prime minister’s assumption to power, came through the barrel of the gun.
Sadly, at least for the moment, neither the pledge of non-violence nor the disavowal of secrecy saved the CUDP leaders from the violence they tried to escape. However peaceful they declared themselves to be, their members paid dearly for their noble belief. Many innocent and peaceful CUDP members and supporters were shot dead, hundreds went into exile, many lost limb and livelihood, and others including the leaders still languish in jail. In all these cases, the CUDP leadership refused to reply violence with violence and chose to be shot, tortured and go to jail instead.
Red Terror II
We continue to blame former President Mengistu Hailemariam for his blood-thirsty and cruel murders forgetting that his cadres and officials, including himself, were hunted and shot down daily by the revenge seeking opposition. Imagine what Prime Minister Meles Zenawi would have been capable of doing had fire been returned with fire by the opposition as in the days of Mengistu Hailemariam.
The massive crackdown unleashed against innocent citizens that many people compared to the infamous Red Terror speaks volumes about the violent nature of the prime minister and his regime. Innocent people were killed, tortured and beaten for no reason whatsoever, and tens of thousands were detained in horrible conditions. Addis Ababa was rocked with all night raids and gun fire; dead bodies littered the streets; hospitals and morgues were filled up with the wounded and dead, parents were charged up to $1500 for the cost of bullets used to kill their children, and forced to sign documents that stated CUDP killed their loved ones. There is no doubt that had the opposition resorted to retaliation the regime would have made the Mengistu Red Terror or even the Rwanda massacre look like child’s play by comparison.
The violence of the regime didn’t begin after the elections. Even during the political debates and right after the election in May 2005, CUDP leaders and supporters were shot at, harassed, intimidated, chased across town and some of them were kept under an undeclared house arrest.
On the other hand, Professor Levine seems to imply that CUDP somehow had a hand in the massive violence unleashed by the ruling party. In view of its refreshing break from bad traditional habits of violence and secrecy, the CUDP leadership should have been applauded for its political maturity and steadfastness. Sadly, Professor Levine fails to give credit where it is due. He rather goes out of his way to tell us about brutal Ethiopian rulers in the Era of Princes when the lynching of Blacks was routine in America, even Europe had its own dictators, and kings and queens ruled by divine rights.
Professor Levine conveniently forgets that those eras were different from the global village of the 21st century that we live in today where respect for civil and human rights is enshrined in international charters and conventions and the violations of civil liberties are not left to the whims of dictators. Rogue tyrants can’t just mow down peaceful citizens with impunity. He would have done well to just look around and see what happened or is happening to recent dictators such as Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Augusto Pinochet of Chile, John Koroma of Sierra Leone, Charles Tayor of Liberia, and the Rwanda murderers, who massacred their citizens in cold blood.
We could even ignore the above oversight as minor, had it not been for Professor Levine’s insinuation that the CUDP leaders refused to join the parliament, while overlooking the fact that the Prime Minister put one roadblock after another each time CUDP came closer to joining the parliament.
Roadblocks to Parliament
Each time CUDP lowered their threshold for negotiation, the prime minister rejected their offer for reconciliation. One last attempt to join the parliament was when CUDP asked the prime minister to set up just a simple joint commission for negotiation, which as usual the prime minister rejected outright. It was the same thing with the 8 preconditions the European Union and the United States presented to both parties as a basis for negotiation, which once again CUDP accepted and the prime minister rejected. The list of roadblocks the prime minister put up to prevent CUDP from joining the parliament is legendary.
One should recall that when the prime minister met with Drs Berhanu Nega and Beyene Petros, in August 2005, two months before the November massacre, he arrogantly told them that their parties had just four options to choose from - to go into exile; - to join an armed group and fight for political power; - join the parliament and sit lie dummies; or
- go to prison. This was followed by a chaange of the parliamentary rules in which 51% votes would be required to propose an agenda on the House floor. Then he made it a rule for security guards to kick out anyone the Speaker of the House deemed undesirable. Next, he removed the national budget out of parliamentary debate, stripped the Addis Ababa municipality of its police force, and took away its major revenue sources and transferred them to the federal government. Could any self-respecting politician accept such draconian conditions to join the parliament? And keep in mind that the CUDP leaders are supposed to be self-respecting and proud Ethiopians who sought to join the parliament to serve the people who voted for them, not to be abused as doormats.
It is surprising that even with all these conditions, the CUDP leadership still tried to coax the prime minister to set up a joint commission to discuss their grievances as a condition of their joining the parliament.
The bad faith negotiation on the part of the prime minister was clear from the beginning when he began to talk about INTERHAMWE and the Rwanda genocide for no good reason. Or when, one day after the election, he declared a two-month state of emergency on the city of Addis Ababa and took personal command of all security and military powers. All these actions should have made it clear to Professor Levine that the prime minister had way before the elections decided that the election exercise was a face saving ploy used to fool only the donor community.
We don’t begrudge Professor Levine, but are very surprised at how, like several other Americans and Europeans, this intelligent and astute professor allowed himself to be manipulated with lies and half-truths. We have no doubt that as the lies and trickery of the regime come to be recognized for what they truly are, and as the regime of prime minister Meles Zenawi stumbles from one political disaster to the next, more people of goodwill like Professor Levine will learn about the true nature of the regime and come to appreciate the gravity of the plight of the opposition parties and the people of Ethiopia.
Daniel Haile can be reached at temma456@aol.com
ETHIOMEDIA.COM - ETHIOPIA'S PREMIER NEWS AND VIEWS WEBSITE
© COPYRIGHT 20001-2006ETHIOMEDIA.COM. EMAIL: webmaster@ethiomedia.com
Is it because they find the situation better than they expected? Or is it because of their willingness to be manipulated with half-truths by the tyrant, Mr. Meles Zenawi, and his cronies? Or is it the result of a red carpet treatment and business connections that the government uses for its diplomatic offensive against its opponents? I can name names of the few opportunists involved, but that is not necessary since those individuals are well known to many Ethiopians.
I exclude Professor Levine from the bunch alluded to above simply because he is too intelligent, decent and principled to be categorized with the lot. First of all I want to thank the good professor for his continued engagement and his constructive initiative to broker a peaceful dialogue between the leaders of CUDP and EPDRF. He also deserves credit for his humanitarian visit of the prisoners and his sympathy for their cause.
On the other hand, it is disappointing to note the professor’s attempt to bend well known facts to suit his purpose. From his mixed messages, it is not clear to what extent his fudging of the facts is motivated by his need to encourage dialogue between the opposition and the prime minister or by his misreading of the actual political events that occurred.
Facts or Fiction
I understand that an arbiter who wants to reconcile two feuding parties can’t afford to antagonize either one by sticking just to the facts. The trouble is, in the process, Prof. Levine leans backward to invent opposition sins and give credit to the regime where it does not deserve. Such seems Professor Levine’s dilemma in his observation of the election outcomes. He blames CUDP for its refusal to join the parliament, while at the same time giving undeserved credit to the prime minister for his non-existing magnanimity. He laments about the culture of secrecy and violence and shares the blame to both parties.
To be sure there were some tactical mistakes the CUDP leadership may have committed, but none of them are the mistakes Professor Levine dwells on. Clearly, on the eve of the election and thereafter, there are indications that CUDP threw caution for safety and security out of the window and seemed to forget exactly who the Prime Minister and EPDRF were. They ignored the fact that the prime minister and his associates were guerrilla leaders nurtured by a lethal mix of Marxist, Enver Hoxxa, Moist and Stalinist violent doctrines. As it turned out, CUDP leaders may have wrongly assumed the prime minister would accept a fair and square defeat at the ballot box and peacefully turn over political power to the winning opposition. Culture of Secrecy and Violence
One of Professor Levine’s criticisms of the CUDP leaders concerned what he called the Ethiopian culture of secrecy. That is clearly an unfair and unfounded claim because that was exactly what the CUDP leadership wanted to do away with in the first place. As a result of this policy CUDP began campaigning in the open with no hidden secrets or agenda and officially declared the beginning of a new policy of openness. Their telephone conversations, offices, meetings, documents, literature and campaigns were deliberately put out in the open in order to shatter what they called the destructive culture of secrecy. This openness was a significant improvement that CUD wanted to introduce into Ethiopian political discourse.
Perhaps the biggest cultural change that CUDP tried to usher in was a policy of non-violent political campaign. It even went to the extent of rejecting political alliance with groups on the basis of their adherence to armed struggle. This too was a break from the traditional norm, where most political power transitions in Ethiopian history, including the prime minister’s assumption to power, came through the barrel of the gun.
Sadly, at least for the moment, neither the pledge of non-violence nor the disavowal of secrecy saved the CUDP leaders from the violence they tried to escape. However peaceful they declared themselves to be, their members paid dearly for their noble belief. Many innocent and peaceful CUDP members and supporters were shot dead, hundreds went into exile, many lost limb and livelihood, and others including the leaders still languish in jail. In all these cases, the CUDP leadership refused to reply violence with violence and chose to be shot, tortured and go to jail instead.
Red Terror II
We continue to blame former President Mengistu Hailemariam for his blood-thirsty and cruel murders forgetting that his cadres and officials, including himself, were hunted and shot down daily by the revenge seeking opposition. Imagine what Prime Minister Meles Zenawi would have been capable of doing had fire been returned with fire by the opposition as in the days of Mengistu Hailemariam.
The massive crackdown unleashed against innocent citizens that many people compared to the infamous Red Terror speaks volumes about the violent nature of the prime minister and his regime. Innocent people were killed, tortured and beaten for no reason whatsoever, and tens of thousands were detained in horrible conditions. Addis Ababa was rocked with all night raids and gun fire; dead bodies littered the streets; hospitals and morgues were filled up with the wounded and dead, parents were charged up to $1500 for the cost of bullets used to kill their children, and forced to sign documents that stated CUDP killed their loved ones. There is no doubt that had the opposition resorted to retaliation the regime would have made the Mengistu Red Terror or even the Rwanda massacre look like child’s play by comparison.
The violence of the regime didn’t begin after the elections. Even during the political debates and right after the election in May 2005, CUDP leaders and supporters were shot at, harassed, intimidated, chased across town and some of them were kept under an undeclared house arrest.
On the other hand, Professor Levine seems to imply that CUDP somehow had a hand in the massive violence unleashed by the ruling party. In view of its refreshing break from bad traditional habits of violence and secrecy, the CUDP leadership should have been applauded for its political maturity and steadfastness. Sadly, Professor Levine fails to give credit where it is due. He rather goes out of his way to tell us about brutal Ethiopian rulers in the Era of Princes when the lynching of Blacks was routine in America, even Europe had its own dictators, and kings and queens ruled by divine rights.
Professor Levine conveniently forgets that those eras were different from the global village of the 21st century that we live in today where respect for civil and human rights is enshrined in international charters and conventions and the violations of civil liberties are not left to the whims of dictators. Rogue tyrants can’t just mow down peaceful citizens with impunity. He would have done well to just look around and see what happened or is happening to recent dictators such as Slobodan Milosevic of Yugoslavia, Saddam Hussein of Iraq, Augusto Pinochet of Chile, John Koroma of Sierra Leone, Charles Tayor of Liberia, and the Rwanda murderers, who massacred their citizens in cold blood.
We could even ignore the above oversight as minor, had it not been for Professor Levine’s insinuation that the CUDP leaders refused to join the parliament, while overlooking the fact that the Prime Minister put one roadblock after another each time CUDP came closer to joining the parliament.
Roadblocks to Parliament
Each time CUDP lowered their threshold for negotiation, the prime minister rejected their offer for reconciliation. One last attempt to join the parliament was when CUDP asked the prime minister to set up just a simple joint commission for negotiation, which as usual the prime minister rejected outright. It was the same thing with the 8 preconditions the European Union and the United States presented to both parties as a basis for negotiation, which once again CUDP accepted and the prime minister rejected. The list of roadblocks the prime minister put up to prevent CUDP from joining the parliament is legendary.
One should recall that when the prime minister met with Drs Berhanu Nega and Beyene Petros, in August 2005, two months before the November massacre, he arrogantly told them that their parties had just four options to choose from - to go into exile; - to join an armed group and fight for political power; - join the parliament and sit lie dummies; or - go to prison. This was followed by a chaange of the parliamentary rules in which 51% votes would be required to propose an agenda on the House floor. Then he made it a rule for security guards to kick out anyone the Speaker of the House deemed undesirable. Next, he removed the national budget out of parliamentary debate, stripped the Addis Ababa municipality of its police force, and took away its major revenue sources and transferred them to the federal government. Could any self-respecting politician accept such draconian conditions to join the parliament? And keep in mind that the CUDP leaders are supposed to be self-respecting and proud Ethiopians who sought to join the parliament to serve the people who voted for them, not to be abused as doormats.
It is surprising that even with all these conditions, the CUDP leadership still tried to coax the prime minister to set up a joint commission to discuss their grievances as a condition of their joining the parliament.
The bad faith negotiation on the part of the prime minister was clear from the beginning when he began to talk about INTERHAMWE and the Rwanda genocide for no good reason. Or when, one day after the election, he declared a two-month state of emergency on the city of Addis Ababa and took personal command of all security and military powers. All these actions should have made it clear to Professor Levine that the prime minister had way before the elections decided that the election exercise was a face saving ploy used to fool only the donor community.
We don’t begrudge Professor Levine, but are very surprised at how, like several other Americans and Europeans, this intelligent and astute professor allowed himself to be manipulated with lies and half-truths. We have no doubt that as the lies and trickery of the regime come to be recognized for what they truly are, and as the regime of prime minister Meles Zenawi stumbles from one political disaster to the next, more people of goodwill like Professor Levine will learn about the true nature of the regime and come to appreciate the gravity of the plight of the opposition parties and the people of Ethiopia.
Daniel Haile can be reached at temma456@aol.com
ETHIOMEDIA.COM - ETHIOPIA'S PREMIER NEWS AND VIEWS WEBSITE
© COPYRIGHT 20001-2006ETHIOMEDIA.COM. EMAIL: webmaster@ethiomedia.com
