Old Normal Meets New Reality…

 … I wish the MOI and the ministry of Foreign affairs had reconstructed their investigative report they read on Eri TV yesterday… 007 eat your heart out!… the six month long ‘investigation’ has the makings of an amazing plot that would dull any Hollywood action movie by comparison and my friends at my favourite hang out (paltalk) had their jaws all the way to the floor… the investigative prowess of the government of Eritrea was applauded all evening… and the four people were tried and found guilty there and then! Some were even passing death sentences… Vienna convention….Shemena convention!!! What Vienna convention?… these are criminals!…. This is a question of national security and we don’t allow any rights to people that we think the Eritrean government thinks have jeopardised our national security… these people are no better than the G15 are they? We didn’t allow the G15 any rights did we?? So why on earth are we expected to allow these foreigners the rights that we didn’t afford 15 of our own?? YPFDJ logic at its best. All Ambassador Wedi Gerahtu has to do now is convert that into a diplomatic spell, and voila he can drive past the M25 and adorn Mekete dance floors and extort 2% to his heart’s (coffers) content! And everyone will live happily ever after (including everyone who owns a dual nationality and has sworn allegiance to the Queen, whose government has contested the fact that Wedi Gerahtu’s government  have simply decided to treat the Brits like they treat Eritreans!)…

Incidentally, who cut out the poor woman (our answer to the perennial Bond woman) that featured in Thomas Mountains retelling of the story?... her story reminded me of a joke that a friend told me a while back… a man walking on the beaches of Masawwa (that all happening place!)… saw this incompetent swimmer who was about to sink and was flailing about wildly screaming  for help after each gasp of anguished breath… the man, moved by the whole thing rescues the swimmer who clearly over estimated his ability and ventured where he shouldn’t have… once rescued the rescued turns to the rescuer with a stern warning and it is only at that point that the rescuer realises that it is non other than Wedi Afworki (typical really!... who else would swim that far out into the sea like this!)… any way Wedi Afom warns the rescuer to not tell anyone about this or he would have him killed… alarmed at what he has just done the man begs IA to promise not to tell any one that he was gullible enough to rescue him…or four million people out there would kill him mercilessly!! … this is probably why the woman was left out of the story! The MOI feared the YPFDJ will demand that she is made into a saint and the rest of the public would be looking for her with other intentions! very thoughtful of the Acting Junior minister … don’t you recon?

But we have all been here before… haven’t we… in 2001/2002 the government tried to conduct trial by state media and the result has been EraEro… the problem for the Eritrean government now though is…that they can’t simply heap accusations on people like this and expect the world to let them get away with it… in the cold light of day… away from the hue of PFDJ halo and if people allowed themselves to think through this logically… the issue at the heart of the matter isn’t really what these people were up to the issue that has become a diplomatic scandal is the fact that they have been denied consular access and that is the new reality that makes the old normal of making people disappear and conduct trial by state media problematic to say the least… unfortunately for the GOE and its array of confused ‘ministries’… this is not 2001 and these are not the G15…this today is the post sanctions era… it is the era when the days of human rights activists telling it as it is was considered far fetched… this is Eritrea’s new normal…the government of Eritrea cannot parade the 2% paying, foreign passport holding milk fed diasporans as an emblem to its universal appeal to Eritreans (too many scrawny bodies floated on the Mediterranean and dispelled that myth)… no longer will it hold countries around the region hostage by feeding the wrath of war in the region…it can not rely on fellow dictators feeding and protecting it either… this is our new normal… this is today! The GOE is best advised to play by the rules or face the consequence… in today’s Independent the FCO spokesman is quoted as saying: ‘…we have now begun to implement a series of measures in response to the Eritrean government’s denial of consular access. We have a range of additional measures and will take further steps as necessary’

…perhaps Menia Afwerki should invite Tommy boy and the lady who walked on the red sea on her way back from church for an interview…

Selam