Fetsum Abraham: What a legacy and what may our future be
Fetsum Abraham: What a legacy and what may our future be We suffered tremendously for the last 55 years from the long fight for independence and the surprising home breaded absolute dictatorship. The world’s perception of
Fetsum Abraham: What a legacy and what may our future be
We suffered tremendously for the last 55 years from the long fight for independence and the surprising home breaded absolute dictatorship. The world’s perception of our people’s determination for independence was challenged by the dictatorship that reduced us to this point of desperation. Assessing the development concerning our situation in my solitude this rainy day in a café provokes me to entertain the following realities:
You see, one becomes one by accident but shapes one’s outlook of life by option: You may not have willingly picked to be an Eritrean but you choose to become a healer or a menace; a freedom fighter or a dictator! After all, spirituality generates selflessness that manifests itself by fearlessness but egoism generates selfishness that only does it by fear. You become Mandela or Afwerki by choice. Nothing can be more tragic than a person building one’s concept of existence on extreme individuality in this impermanent life for whatever goes up must touchdown because of gravity and extreme arrogance shall diffuse as a matter of divinity. Duality testifies that the selfish perishes; the brutal breaks apart, the vicious collapses, the down to earth radiates, the oppressed resurrects and the omnipotent bites the dust at the tail end of it.
As you know time offers a destructive person the opportunity to do something productive to society but does not give one a second chance to compensate for the effects of insensitivity and self deception after the limit is exhausted; the person’s life does. President Isaias Afwerki chose his concept of life that he lived with extremely sadistic individualism. His ego was out of control. He kept on exasperating the tragic situation of our people going as far as demolishing their homes without compensation and denying a deceased loyal Eritrean a graveyard at home. He lived his life through the power of the fist in the society that gave him maximum love, obedience and trust in golden platter.
The fact remains that there are always side effects associated with all thoughts and actions. People cannot get away with their deeds. They do pay their Karma, an abstract quantifier of the consequences of human moral positions on dualities of life, particularly the good and the evil: the price tag behind every human action. An alcoholic pays in terms of sickness, a rapist serves time, betrayal produces guilt, and the cost of wrong speech and intention is disappointment. We face karma for what we think and do, as we harvest what we plant. We see the results of our actions sooner or later before we die. We are finally witnessing the Karmic consequence of Isias Afwerki where everything in his megalomaniac empire has broken apart beyond repair.
Afwerkism destroyed our society producing death, poverty, exodus, slavery, incarceration, ignorance and despair and is now causing his demise. The dictator put himself in this tight position with no exit. The pendulum has now shifted to the other side of town. He is leaving a resentful legacy behind in the lonely journey where there is no way out of justice except suicide; the question is how the situation of his officials will be.
Although the regime may continue to survive until we produce a strategy by which we can transit the country to democracy it has become globally obvious through the UN effort, the massive demonstrations in Diaspora and the deafening quietness of our people at home that it is no longer welcome to run the society. The country had been an isolated island internationally but the system has now become an island in the middle of defiant people in the motherland: no one can defuse this explosion.
Inside the country, the president may do something crazy at his current terrible state of mind because he knows that all dictators were caught alone in their hideout at the end of the show. Whatever he does, however, can no longer serve his interest. The situation in Asmara should certainly be tense and the relationship between the higher officials suspicious and confusing. They know the regime has collapsed as long as the international community and the people are concerned, with no room for self-deception. They cannot humanly avoid thinking of running away in this do or die situation. The time has come for them to think for their individual safety more than ever in the past. They may even kill each other or kill him in this time sensitive life threatening situation.
Outside the country, one wonders what may be going on in the minds of the diplomats such as Girma Asmerom, Araya Desta and the Eritrean Ambassadors around the world. They know the end has arrived and that they can easily and safely abandon the indefensible system but if not at this critical moment where the world has proven him guilty of crime against humanity, when may be it? Who are they representing today in the face of our people’s extraordinary collective reaction to the UN activities in Geneva? Do they understand that they are today clearly against the people by universal consensus more that ever perceived in the past? Do they not understand that the Eritrean people will lawfully challenge whoever is caught within the system wherever the hideout may be? If they don’t sprint today for tomorrow’s amnesty through guilty-with-explanation plea what may they expect from the people when it is over?
As for the elements of the resistance, I say congratulations for getting close to freedom. I thank the relentless efforts of our people that actualized these historical events. It is not over yet, but here is an opportunity for a clean mind to serve society with perseverance and consistency in this fight between the egoist and the spiritualist. The process of our independence required genuine unity to succeed and that of our freedom and democracy requires unconditional strategic unity of all forces to thrive. Strategic transitional passage is the only effective way of unifying different ideas towards democracy; the rest is dictatorship. We need to concentrate on this now to reach the end of the tunnel as soon as possible because it is the only factor standing between our democratic dream and the international community.
