Eritrean Regime’s Draconian Rule and Its Survival Strategies

A conventional way of describing totalitarianism is to present a list of characteristics common to Italian Fascism, German National Socialism, and Soviet Bolshevism.   But how capacious should that portmanteau be?  Dictatorship is a perverted political order.  It does not uphold charitable human norms and values.  As a result it is always met by either decisive or passive resistance from all peace loving people.  Dictatorship has a corrosive nature.  Its launch pad springs it to a collision course against the people it oppresses.  But it is a phenomenon that has become a reality and one that pervades peace and tranquility in many countries.

Those of you, who believe in the theology of “Conditional Immortality”, may be of the conviction  that the prevalence of dictatorship in Eritrea and elsewhere is analogous to the parallelism between good and evil. You may say “dictatorship is evil, but it will someday come to an end.  After all, according to natural law and morality, good always prevails over evil”.  The problem with this thought process is we do not know how much evil has to occur before the forces of “good” start to kick in to destroy evil. It is just as Bob Dylan has sung,

“How many deaths will it take till we know,
that too many people have died?"

How can we be assured that “good will prevail over evil in Eritrea as we passively continue to witness evil’s unchallenged dominion over the lives of our people. Our people have been going through a graduated continuum of horror for two decades and counting?   Well, if we are simply a product of chance we can't be certain that we will see good prevailing over evil.  So, if we believe that we are created by an infinite personal God then it is logical to assume that the infinite will always prevail over evil which is finite. We may think that evil is like a really bad storm, it may have its day but it will pass.  But considering the facts on the ground in Eritrea, the forces of “the good” have not started to make a dent into the pre-eminence of evil, evil being in the context of this essay, the prevailing draconian rule crippling our country.

So, the next question to ask is what are the survival strategies of the regime in Eritrea that seem to serve it so well for it  to continue oppressing the people uncurbed and unchallenged?

Like many other totalitarian regimes, the Eritrean regime uses social engineering as its primary tool of survival.  Through this tool the regime has tight corked its existence by creating a country where the very building blocks of opposition are lacking and it has no merchant or land-owning class, independent unions and press.  Most Intellectuals are regime-loyal bureaucrats, not dissidents, and strict restrictions on the activities of youth and students have cowed them into submission.

Secondly, the regime pushes an ideology.   At the core of the regime’s ideology is nationalism with a xenophobic slant.  Arthur M. Hill describes totalitarian ideology as “A revolutionary, exclusive, and apocalyptical ideology that announces the destruction of the old order—corrupt and compromised—and the birth of a radically new, purified, and muscular age.  Anti liberal, anticonservative, and anti pluralist, totalitarian ideology creates myths, catechisms, cults, festivities, and rituals designed to commemorate the destiny of the elect.” In its own unique ways the regime in Eritrea has exhibited all of the above characteristics with impunity.   It also uses persistent propaganda campaigns against Ethiopia, the United States and other western powers to create its own legitimacy. As the regime inculcates its ideology it also strives for tighter controls on information.

The regime has also established a party structure that seems to be indelible and beyond reproach.  The ruling PFDJ party gains recruits and fellow believers by taking on a mass character and relies heavily on liberation era feats and gallantry and on the charisma and cult personality of Mr. Isayas at its head claiming omniscience and infallibility, and demanding the unconditional personal devotion of the people.

The regime also deliberately duplicates offices and personnel are continually shuffled, so as to ensure chronic collegial rivalry and dependence often put in check by the mediation of Mr. Isayas as the one true leader. The dysfunctional legal system also serves as as a legitimizing sham rather than a curb to the untrammeled use of Mr. Isayas’ executive power putting the Eritrean mass between a rock and a hard surface.   
The regime has also instituted bureaucratic economic collectivism to orchestrate productive forces to its predatory, autarchic and militaristic goals.  By doing so, it has removed the most potentially active population segment from the socio-political scene of the country by marooning it to indefinite military service and slave labor camps.

 The regime employs monopolistic control of the mass media, "professional" organizations, and public art, and with it the formulation of a cliché-ridden language designed to impede ambivalence, nuance, and complexity.  To many gullible Eritreans the misinformation disseminated through TV Ere and other electronic and print media have become authoritative sources of information on Eritrea that are often swallowed as daily doses of encouragement for nationalist bravado and continued blind loyalty to the regime.  
 
The regime is engaged on a continual mobilization of the whole population through war, ceaseless campaigns, "struggles," or purges.  Mr. Isayas is often portrayed as one with a mercurial will power and the people are  urged to follow his footsteps to  constantly produce miracles, by combating  backsliding.  The average citizen is coerced into believing that there is nothing more honorable than to be a crucificial lamb for “Eritrea” as if “ Eritrea” is a  myth that has to swim  in  a pool made up of its people’s tears.

The regime relies heavily on the pervasive use of terror to isolate, intimidate, and regiment all whom  it deems menacing. Charged with this task are the secret police whose tentacles are spread worldwide to even cover Eritreans in the Diaspora under the inscrutable radar screen of the regime’s reign of terror.
 
 The regime also uses concentration camps as the laboratory of its totalitarian domination. The experiment it conducts aims to discover the conditions under which human subjects become fully docile and pliable.  In addition a slave labor system exists side by side to break the spirits of a specified target population which unfortunately happens to be the Eritrean youth. This is no different than the practice of  Nazi Germany which targeted Jews as the  principal objective enemies or the  Soviet Union who targeted the  Cossacks , the kulaks, the  Crimean Tartars the  Chechens, and  the Ingush.  Pol Pot's Cambodian Communist Party had a similar penchant for mass extermination, as did the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) under Mao.  The Eritrean regimes have upgraded its learning curve on totalitarian practices and genres by drawing on the experiences of all the totalitarian regimes mentioned above.   

Last but not least the Eritrean regime also uses perks and rewards to co-opt military and political elites. Members of this class are placed in better economic and social standings.  They also occupy the most desirable jobs working for the regime.
 
There are some among the Eritrean people who talk of almost an “eschatological” end of the regime.  They entertain such notions based on the mass exodus of youth and numerous defections of the regime’s key military and civil personnel, national soccer teams and etc.  At times, the regime seems to be disintegrating on its own volition.  But pledging our hopes on such isolated instances are misleading at least and defeatist at most. The truth of the matter is that totalitarian governments do not just disappear without putting up a good fight.  The survival of Gadafi of Libya is a case in point.  The Eritrean people need to take their opposition to the regime to new heights.  Wishful thinking and speculation are not going to cut it.  There are a few opposition groups that are genuinely trying to muster some strength to oust the regime.  These groups need to carefully analyze the survival strategies of the regime and try to dissipate the effectiveness of the strategies the regime is hanging on to survive.  The opposition groups should also start to think strategically in order to weaken the regime effectively by involving the people in the opposition effort.  The solution rests on the people.  

Although we should be encouraged by several developments in the opposition camp, our worst fear is to see the   the draconian regime perpetuating its rule for some length of time into the future.  The accelerated awareness of the people of North Africa, and the tightening of the rope around the regime’s neck by the UN and United States government could contribute to augment our people desire and determination to struggle for peace and democracy. But our worst fear is that the regime will continue to make irreversible damage to our people’s morale and national well being before the time comes for it to go.  The opposition camp should realize that time is of the essence.  It should gather its acts together and launch an effective offensive against the regime before the country is thrown into total disarray.  We do not need to look far away to see how difficult it is to bring a country together after it has fallen into a state of anarchy. It suffices to see what has been happening in Somalia since Siad Barre left it high and dry.  We Eritreans should not allow this to happen to our country.  Sooner or later, the Eritrean regime’s survival strategies will outlive their usefulness.  And when the time of reckoning comes, we need an organized force that will step in to fill in the vacuum to work in earnest to liberate our people from tyranny.   The quest for such a victory starts now. 

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