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The “Democracy” project is anti-democratic

Eritrea Media Watch

Eritrea: What Has Democracy Got to Do with It? (The Democracy Project)

Disparate as these two groups may seem, what is important to us is their commonality: both are so obsessed with the hereafter – with life after Isaias – that they pay little attention to the here and now – how to get rid of the regime and deliver the people from the existential threat they are living under. Both are so preoccupied with preparations for the takeover that the task of regime change is relegated to the bottom of their wish list. We can then see the religious turn the “cause” has taken, as it has always been in the ghedli era. What happens on the ground, as any religious zealot would tell you, is only as good as it prepares one for the hereafter; aside from that, on its own, it has little value. Similarly, what is happening on the ground in Eritrea now has little relevance to these groups if they cannot use it for purposes of the hereafter. As in any religious cause, the “Eritrea” that these groups are trying to save can only exist by deferring it indefinitely. So, in the final end, it is not exactly democracy that they are beholden to, but the fact that the democracy project keeps deferring the realization of the “cause” – that is, the collapse of the Isaias regime – for fear that if it happens right now it might not deliver what they want.

Unfiltered Notes: MLK’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”

“In those days the church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society.”

How can Eritrean society be transformed if diapora Eritreans choose to curse the very freedoms they enjoy in the West by aligning themselves with a regime whose key trademarks are vicious cruelty against its own people and absolute denial of freedom to all? Repeating “meKete” like a zombie is being a mere thermometer, going with the flow, parroting things just to be part of the crowd. Where is the courage in that? The courage is in being the thermostat, and to stop blaming victims and glorifying criminals.

Democracy is a Verb

The overall question that I am supposed to address in my brief presentation is: What is the role of the Youth in the struggle to democratize a given country (in this case Eritrea) under a brutal dictatorship?

The role of the youth succinctly put is to be a positive agent of change. Not any change but positive change. To the point: the youth has to be an agent of democratization in the context of a circumstance when a nation is “living” under a brutal dictatorship.

I want from the very beginning to make it clear that I am talking about democratization and not dealing with the narrow but critical issue of simply getting rid of the brutal tyrant de jour.

The UNSC’s Sanctions on Eritrea Revisited

Strangely enough, some in the opposition are captivated by this tricky prospective lifting of the sanctions that so much so they opted to oppose the arms embargo sanction (more of this later). It does not make sense to me. I believe we have to cross the bridge of liberty first, instead of unnecessarily wracking our brains of what will transpire in a post PFDJ. If we are fortunate enough to arrive at our destination of freedom, then we tackle the lifting of the arms embargo sanctions from our back, when such mundane issues stare us straight in the face. For now, the lifting of the arms embargo sanction, sometime in the future, should be the least of our worries, since we do not even know how the PFDJ will behave when the time of reckoning arrives. For all I know, the PFDJ, when cornered and consistent with its past behavior, may shamefacedly comply with all the UNSC’s directives and requirements; in the final analysis, all its bravados and boastings may amount to nothing.

Eritrea: Embracing Unity in Diversity - Islamic Leader's Perspective

Ownership of sanctions indeed (Part. I

I believe the enablers know that on the basis of the current balance of forces, the Ethiopian army could easily overrun their feeble defenses. This is so because they know they don’t have an army that is willing to fight for them and against the woyane. After all no shoot to kill policy has succeeded in stopping thousands of their solders from fleeing to the avowed enemy for dear life. No arms can compensate for the fact that the people who carry the arms are unwilling to use them in defense of the regime. The arms embargo will simply add another twist to the already existing farce of the army defending the country from the woyanes.

A new year, a new treaty, but the same old problems?

Secondly, on 24 December, Eritrea was sanctioned by the UN Security Council and its EU members – a decision that highlighted that the European Commission is out of line with its own members as well as the international community. This very small country is the world's second-largest source of asylum-seekers, most of whom head for the EU. Reporters Without Borders ranks its press as the world's least free, Human Rights Watch calls it an “open-air prison”, others have called it “the North Korea of Africa”, and few (if any) EU member states still co-operate with it. Yet, in 2009, the Commission initialled a €120 million programme for the next three years and the then development commissioner, Louis Michel, received its dictatorial president, Isaias Afwerki, as warmly as any other statesman. This when MEPs were being refused visas.

Sanctions Watch: Arms Embargo on Eritrea (What It Means to Own the Sanctions)

There are those Eritreans who argue that since the sanctions are made to punish the Asmara regime for what it did in Djibouti and Somalia and not for the horrendous humanitarian crimes it has been committing against its own people, we shouldn’t accept it. Here is how G. Ande puts his objection, “If we read through the resolution carefully, the sanctions have not been designed to address the crucial problems facing the Eritrean people …” (Will the Targeted Sanctions Hit or Miss the Bull’s Eye) It is like arguing that since a baseball bat is designed to hit a ball and not to knock down a man, you should never use it to defend yourself from a violent intruder. Instead of this inanity, prior to “owning” the sanctions, the only question we need to ask about it is: Whatever the sanction is designed for, will it do the job we assign it to do? Will it prick the bubble of nationalist frenzy enshrouding Eritrea and bring it down to earth? If it can do that job, we ought to grab it and milk it for all it is worth.

Will the Targeted Sanctions Hit or Miss the Bull's Eye?

So, the question remains, “Will the targeted sanctions hit or miss the bull‘s eye“? I wouldn’t say that the sanctions are insignificant. If they may not hit the bull’s eyes, they will at least provide Eritreans with more talking points. But the fact remains that we have a very elusive and determined bull that will stick to his guns to the last breath and one that will not yield to this much publicized sanctions. So, my own opinion is that the targeted sanctions will not hit the bull’s eye. They will only be a recent addition to the long list of reasons why the regime thinks it is not the right time for it to introduce democratic governance in the country. And the “the targeted sanctions” imposed by the UNSC will be runner up to “Undemarcated Border” in the long and stale list that the regime has developed during the last two decades for refusing to maket a smooth transistion to democratic governance.

Eritrea Sanction: A New Horizon in Eritrea’s Political Landscape

It also appears that President Isaias and his government miscalculated the ability of his African counterparts at effecting such a feat, possibly counting on the fragmented regional alliances and perhaps also his expertise at divisively influencing regional players into mistrust and away from a mutually beneficial goal. He failed miserably. Not only was Uganda able to exert considerable effort in pushing the draft resolution, it had support from IGAD (the regional economic alliance) and eventually the full backing of the Africa Union as a whole, and this during the presidency of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi, a staunch ally who would go on to oppose the resolution at the SC.

At a wider global level both China and Russia, known for their inclinations to not support sanctions, did not oppose the Eritrea sanction when either of them could have used their veto to stop it from going any further (China chose to abstain whilst Russia voted for the sanction). This is perhaps the clearest sign of the International Community’s frustrations at the Isaias Afewerki’s relentless disregard for the efforts to engage Eritrea and enabling it to play a positive role in the region.