An enemy that tells one where her/his shortcoming is and how to improve the problem is a friend and not an enemy.  Also, an enemy that emptily threatens one is not an enemy but a rewarder by reason of not carrying out the threat.  In fact, an enemy that jumps with a warning or without to destroy and conquer a country is a real enemy.  Many nations have been accused of serious violations by the UN and had to learn, find alternatives and comply by putting the violation in order.  By so doing those nations avoided falling into the continuous surveillance of the UN.  With exception of a very few leaders, most of the courageous ones do not waste time to understand their violations, take corrective measures and comply with the UN requirements.  Those leaders who fail to comply, unless they are favored ones, their non-compliance are considered invitations for a showdown with those nations who believe in might is right and seek to impose their additional terms along with their scaring political tools or threat that reads “all options are on the table.”

Those courageous leaders who see other countries experiencing hardship under the UN’s sanctions learn from the observed mistakes of others and get to know to become better leaders and their countries better products of the lessons learned from consequences of others’ non-compliance.  It is much easier to comply with what the UN demands without wasting time before those who claim to be the mouthpiece of the international community draft their tougher warnings and drop leaflets of their resorting to urgent military measures or action.  Once a country is put on notice of non-compliance, nothing tires out the UN from adding more lines of tough measures to the already listed out.  Although such UN warnings may constitute an ultimatum with conditional declaration of a military action, all the warned nations are seen to shrug off the UN’s warnings and encourage their people to carry on their daily lives peacefully with respect and dignity.

For those fair and caring leaders, while shrugging off the warnings of the UN they seek to bend the rules in an attempt to comply rather be confrontational and declare self-suicidal phrase like “no peace, no war” to cause “no peace” and political confusions to their people.  Indeed, the opponents of “no peace, no war” self-imposed conditions know that if a country does not bleed from the self-imposed “no peace” it is because the country is already dead and does not have any blood left to bleed.  Knowing this fact, it is better for a leader considered to be unfriendly to veto nations to become less confrontational and ask for a roadmap to achieve the required compliance.  That is why no country likes to be served with threats of “all options are on the table.”  The threat of “all options are on the table” has never been the UN’s floor statement because under the UN’s Article 2, Section 4, no any member nation is allowed to threat another member country.  However, the Western powers are seen to put blames on un-favored countries with a threat of “all options are on the table.”  To avoid being served with a notice of non-compliance, many leaders had to learn from those that not only bled excessively under the UN’s sanctions but also had to have a great deal of trouble with the UNSC veto nations.  If a leader is to gain support by reflection has to have a nice way to engage with the UN bodies.  However, those leaders who are in love with trouble making only appear to stand on their ground for some time, but ultimately their countries and their people have to pay for their leader’s confrontational attitude and refusal to put things in order.

What are the signs that Isayas is a favored leader?

The veto nations of the UNSC, specifically the USA, UK and France, are behind all stringent and harsh UN sanctions.  In some cases the imposed stringent sanctions resulted in the un-favored countries being invaded to impose a regime change.  Most of the sanctioned countries seek to comply immediately or promise step by step compliance and never try to breach the terms of the imposed sanctions.  Some other sanctioned nations seek to improve their relationship with the veto nations and iron out their difference to get leniency through amendments of the imposed sanctions.  However, the situation with Isayas is different in that he pushes to attract disapproval of the UN to show the world is against him and on the side of the Ethiopians.  Thus, he deliberately chooses non-compliance to give life to the phrase of “no peace, no war” as if Eritrea is a victim of the UN sanction imposed on it by the Western veto nations.  The deliberate non-compliance is serving to worsen the sufferings of the Eritrean people without any link to holding the USA, EU, UK and the UN responsible for the sufferings of the Eritrean people under the phrase “no peace, no war.”  It sounds like the tyrant’s fantasy is telling him that his leadership failure is connected to the UN’s inability to impose border solution, when indeed the UN sanction has no connection to the self-imposed “no peace” in the absence of wars of attrition and new wars with the neighboring countries.

Unlike what the tyrant claims, the UN views that Isayas deserves to be punished on the ground that he is involved in crimes against humanity, grave human rights abuses, and violations of individual rights by unjustly denying access to water and food as well as confiscating all monies in the bank and enslaving the Eritrean children.  Additionally, the tyrant’s refusal to fully comply with the UN’s list of requirements is placing double burden on the Eritrean people in that the harsh tyranny is getting worse to justify the self-imposed “no peace, no war.”  Still more, the tyrant’s refusal to cooperate with the UN enforcing bodies is giving his enemies grounds to distort further the already damaged image of him and the country.  Sympathizing countries within the UNSC repeatedly tried to give the tyrant more space to defend himself through engagement but, so far, has failed to reach the height that enable him to see a light at the end of the tunnel.  The tyrant is also making it impossible for those who favor him with seeing a light at the end of the tunnel due to his refusal to let in the UN’s investigative body and that is becoming a huge disabled train at the end of the tunnel blocking him from seeing the light.  To most UN members the tyrant’s refusal to take advantage of the space given to clear his name from the accusation is something intentional because he proved that he could get such clearance, if really needed, from the USA.  In evidence of this fact, despite the claim that the USA is against the tyrant, it was the USA that rushed to save the tyrant when the COIE (Commission of Inquiry on Human Rights in Eritrea) was about to tie the ICC rope around his neck.

The tyrant by his nature is cagey and secretive, unprincipled and unfair who prefers to dominate as well as hard to comply with rules and regulations.  If indeed the tyrant commands his head of reasoning he could have provided viable reasons for refusing to cooperate with the UN and found solution to all his problems.  Due to the tyrant’s refusal to let in the UN instigators he has opted for the UN’s control over him like a dog on a leash.  But why would one choose to be on leash and hold the whole nation hostage of self-imposed “no peace, no war.”  May be the tyrant has good knowledge that the UNSC is not serious.  Not serious because the UN is not as tough as it is against the Sudanese leader, Syria, Iran and North Korea.

It is proven that it is not easy to absolve one from an accusation of wrongdoing or crime when a decaying corpse of a victim is found in his place.  So also it is unthinkable to see a false blame empowering one’s enemy into blackmailing.  The unacceptable fact here is that the tyrant is involved in scapegoating business that requires him to take the blame of others for money, such as the blame of financing and supporting AlShabab of Somalia.  Other possibility is that the tyrant may also be getting money and favoritism in that his political party (PFDJ) and its linked youth organization (YPFDJ) are allowed to function freely in the West and the Arab Gulf countries.  Even the western news media led by Voice of America are heard to favor Isayas to the extent of out favoring Ethiopia.

The Fine Print that Prompted the Tyrant’s “No Peace, No War”

When there is no a threat of wars and wars of attrition any longer, it is time to return to normal life and normal daily activities.  However, some ended wars may not let some leaders to come clean to start a new beginning.  Those leaders, who do not let the storms of the ended war to pass, not only get stuck in their self-imposed “no peace, no war” but also disempower themselves once they unleash a tornado of fears and confusions on their side of the border.

From the phrase of “no peace, no war” there must not be any fear of war.  In order for the two countries at war to bounce back from failure to achieve peace both should give a space for peace and build a door to cooperation in reconstruction areas in order to reinforce the reached peace agreement.  However, the Ethiopians say the cause of the “no peace” on the Eritrean side was not related to the ended border war.  Although the Eritrean “no peace” is an internal problem, the Ethiopians claim that they never were wrong about Isayas from the start and that they knew well that his mindset could be used to bring about leadership failure in Eritrea.

To take advantage of Isayas’s mindset, the Ethiopians decided to play their second-best card in the first round with an expectation that their first-best card would be played in the second round.  The cards played became effective as and when the Ethiopians announced on November 24, 2004 that they accepted the decision of EEBC (Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission) subject to their preconditions of five-point peace proposal.  In checking the proposal, what caught Isayas’s attention was the fine print of the five-point document.  The fine print read “In order for the two countries and the people living on either side of the border to commit themselves to the binding EEBC ruling, the parliaments of the two countries will further debate and ratify the reached agreements.”

The fine print of the Ethiopian proposal took the tyrant back to square one requiring him to stop scowling at the repeated calls for the implementation of the 1997 constitution and allow election in order for the parliament on behalf of the Eritrean people to ratify the EEBC ruling.  Thus, the fine print put half of the unresolved border problem to be blamed on the absence of a parliament that represents the Eritrea people.

The EEBC ruling has imposed “no war” leaving each country to have its choice of internal peace.  As such, the EEBC if not abandoned can be delayed by reason of not having in place the required representatives of the people, who are delegated to ratify the ruling, which ruling is bowing before the tyrant’s adamancy to allowing election.  Thus, the problem of “no peace, no war” is considered to be a cry of the Eritrean people who are complaining that the root cause of “no peace” in Eritrea is tyranny for otherwise the “no war” cannot result in “no peace.”

The fine print is believed to be a message to Isayas “no to think outside the box or the first square [over my dead body the constitution to be implemented].”  The no-thinking outside the box or the first square will necessitate resolving rule of law problem in Eritrea and resolving that problem is a key to all other problems.  Also, without resolving the problem in square one there cannot be a solution to the border problems with all the neighboring countries.  The no-solution to the problems in square one is resulting in militarization of the country.  The militarization of the country is sucking the tyrant into the politics of abusing power, confiscating even the penny in the pockets of the people and widening the sources of impoverishment of the nation – is that what the tyrant is calling “no peace.”

What is needed is to first admit that the present situation of “no peace” was a home-made problem rather than blaming the “past war” on the present “no peace.”  At the different level of the worsening conditions in Eritrea, the people witnessed that the non-recognition of the tyrant that “the border war” ended in Eritrea resulted in him believing that the “no peace” had connection with the past ended border wars.  For the people, the “no peace” is a cover up of the tyrant’s weakness.  Thus, the phase “no peace, no war” reflects the tyrant’s incompetence to solve the “no peace” in the country.  The shortest path to “peace” is the path of having a competent leadership, if “peace” is the choice of the tyrant.  Should the choice of the tyrant be “peace,” there must not be a room for “no peace.”  For the Eritrean people, the phrase “no peace, no war” is just a missed understanding of the intention behind the tyrant’s refusal to implement the constitution.  Now that the people know, they have the right to question whether the tyrant understands the cause of “no peace” problem in Eritrea and whether he has the needed skills to resolve it.  Yes, the tyrant has to step up to solve the “no peace” problem or step down allowing the elected people to clean his messes.

The shortest distance to “peace” is to admit that our “no peace” problem has no connection with the past or ended war.  If there is no war of attrition, it signifies peace at the border area.  If the border areas are at peace, then the areas beyond the border areas must be in absolute peace.  Therefore, it is a great mystery to claim “no peace” unless there is something in the making to force the future generation to flee and to cause total destructions to the infrastructure and economy of the country.  The people had several trials to say they haven’t learned yet.  As benefactors of their thirty (30) years struggle, like they liberated the land they have to rise to liberate the people of the land.  They are, indeed, once again challenged to use their liberating force so as to equate in rights and dignity the liberated people to the liberators, which can only be done by implementing the constitution and holding elections.

Speaking in terms of either step up or step down, on the occasion of the liberation day let the focus be on correcting what needs to be corrected by looking first at how other countries celebrate their independence/liberation day.  Yes, the liberation day must be celebrated by honoring all those who fought and made this great day possible.  Yes, let the liberation day be given a special celebration by letting all the political prisoners back to their families to celebrate the day in their special way with their sweet words of thanks to the liberators once again.  Yes, that way the liberators will gain more respect.

In celebration of the independence/liberation day

Mamino