Eritrea: the Politics of Festival

Eritrea: the Politics of Festival


So now, Oedipus, our King, most powerful
In all men’s eyes, we’re here as suppliants,
All begging you to find some help for us,
Either by listening to a heavenly voice,
Or learning from some other human being.

Oedipus the King


In one of the big festivals thrown by the regime at Godena Harnet, a merchant’s wife spent the night dancing and listening to an open-air music sponsored by the government until the late hours, but not without a disappointment. The stench of the crowd, she said, “was unbearable.” The citizen’s complaint, though true, was unfair, and directed against the unwashed humanity in Asmera, whose water per capita consumption is probably among the lowest in the world. As far as she was concerned, the organizers of the festival, that is, the government, were blameless.

“Wegah tibel leyti” was a culture of partying and drinking introduced to the public by the EPLF, after its victorious arrival in the formerly Derg occupied regions. It has since left its imprint on the people of the urban areas and Eritreans all over the Diaspora. It was a ritual that helped the EPLF organization maintains a subservient army with little time for either individual reflection or any other activities. Understandably, the EPLF did not have to rely entirely on the infamous security apparatus in order to insure the massive participation of people. Collaboration from the ghebar, in other words, the citizen, was not absent. Due to the long war, the public, which has been denied a state of ordinary life and some recreation, was eager to join any festivity crowd.

Emboldened with its success in the domestic realm, the regime’s policy was to simply strengthen its satellite mass organization in Europe and North America. The fact that the quickly growing refugee and immigrant population, amongst whom were many thousands who quickly chose exile than life under the new rebel regime, did not deter EPLF’s mobilization project. Illiterate and completely strangers to the culture of the host nations and reluctant to cut their attachment to the country they left, the refugees and immigrants were isolated, confused and malleable to the propaganda, blackmail and exorbitant tax of the new regime. What occurred in one particular town in Italy is good indicator.

Pilgrimage to Bologna

The economic boom in post-war Italy and its concomitant cultural influence on people of its former colony were strong pull factors for migration. Women who mostly worked as maidservants were the large percentage of the population group. Mostly unlettered and with poor knowledge of the labor laws in Italy and homesick, the lot of these women was only servitude and despair. For example, in order to send a letter to their dependents back home in Eritrea, they had to use the precious time of their day-off sitting in the bars, hoping to procure the help of their male brethren. Humble and desperate, they have no problem of disclosing their private live to a complete stranger.

This miserable condition was a small burden when compared with what awaited them once they were recruited into the Fronts’ organizations. In exchange for belonging to the political community, and the political platform that seemingly espoused women’s liberation, they “voluntarily” made pledges and other membership fees to representatives of the insurgents. It did not end there.  In the late 70s, the enterprising operatives of the Fronts went after their jewels, which the victims had kept for years in lieu of a bank account.

To this group of victims were added, as indicated above, countless refugees who left Eritrea during the military defeat of the Fronts by the Derg in 1978 subsequently arrived in Italy and the rest of Europe in increasing numbers. This displaced people comprised mostly young males desperate for place of refugee and employment. Predictably, they joined the already “invisible” people before them. Italy tolerates refugees, but does not provide any welfare benefits. Refugees therefore quickly left for West Germany, Holland and the Scandinavian countries, which have a remarkable history of providing financial, housing and job opportunities.

Hospitable though the countries were, the migrants found the climate cold, the culture strange and the people polite, but distant and difficult to socialize with. The solution was to head back to Italy, the country they hastily abandoned not a few years back for a longer vacation. The means for the trip and the resources for the extended vacation were surprisingly secured in a brief period. The political entrepreneurs of the EPLF were quick to realize this seasonal migration of the former refugees, who were no more “poor, or meek.” They established a place of pilgrimage for these refugees, who were largely living on the periphery of their host countries, but have now deep pockets to exploit. Why was Bologna chosen as the venue? Information on this subject is scarce, but the fact that Bologna was a “red” city with many left leaning Italian communists and its central location in Europe cannot be ignored.

Although Bologna was at the top of the hierarchy of the festival sites, there were also many cities all over Europe that served the same purposes of mobilization and acquisition for the Eritrean Fronts. In North America, Washington D.C. rivaled Bologna in all its aspects. What were the former refugees and immigrants, who later turned citizens of their respective countries, feted with? The weekends begin with an all night dance, accompanied with mostly loud music emanating from the then electronic instruments in fashion then, followed by the inappropriately termed “seminar” or lecture of the political bosses of the EPLF politburo.

The public is often forced to listen to the one side lecture of the political bosses with little space for cognition. In essence, the talk is as dissonant as the jarring music performed the night before. This relentless onslaught on the minds of the attendees is followed by either speech from delegates of Women’s or the Youth’s association, forcing some of the pilgrims to escape for some long-delayed social visits in the cities. Though the gap between the promised festive atmosphere and the reality was evidently strong, the habit of this pilgrimage has survived the two decades since the independence of the country. What explains this propensity for “festivals” in celebration of a funereal-like landscape of Eritrea?

Chorus of Sorrow

Eritrea is often compared with Sparta of the classical Greek history by a few foreign romantics and journalists who briefly stayed in the country. The military ethos and the alleged egalitarian spirit in the country evoke to some the condition in ancient Sparta, we are told.  Strange as it may sound, they were not able to identify these features in contemporary totalitarian systems. The folly of imagining communities is that it completely contradicts the abysmal failure in Eritrea in which the very social fabric is now increasingly under threat.

The wail of the widowed wives, the sad spectacle of the bereaved mothers from the numerous wars initiated by the regime, the fate of thousands who were made to disappear and summarily executed in undisclosed locations have now become so commonplace that it had caused a political fatigue among the public. The notoriety of being a pariah state that Eritrea is lately known for certainly evolved from the abrasive nature of the political system of the old years. Hence, Eritrea had earned the reputation of producing the largest number of refugees per capita.

Dangerous as it is, the daring and less vulnerable Eritreans, who made it to the Sudan and later headed to the “promised” land of Israel, were kept for ransom, and some were murdered for their organs in Sinai. Some of the “proud” citizens of the new Eritrea, who are the heirs of the Kindness Caves in the Sahel [1], were turned into troglodytes-like creatures before being put death in the barren hills of the Sinai. The old slave trade across the Nile and the Red Sea, horrendous as it was, was less evil than what transpired in the Sinai in the hands of some of the Bedouins. If nothing else, this would have called forth for an Eritrean mass wailing like the one in Sophocles’ play. Kind, remorseful, and afflicted by the sorrow that visited his people, the king gouged his eyes out. The people of Thebes and their king were victims of fate beyond their agency, as the gods of the classic age were often whimsical and cruel.

This city, however, has not been mentioned in juxtaposition with Eritrea. The fact that foreign scholars, journalists and politicians have not done so is regrettable, but the onus is on the people of the land. As in Oedipus the King, the public in Eritrea has yet to declare the country as a place of mourning, and head to the gates of the palace of Isaias to do a supplication, which allegedly saved them from Ethiopia, our region’s “Sphinx.” Like the priest and others in the chorus quoted above who openly spoke the truth by advising him either to listen to other wise men or the gods, the people in Eritrea should have done the same many years ago. Regrettably, a great number of them remained trapped in festivities. Even the culture of mourning, and the custom of wearing black dress, which has defiantly observed during the Derg era [2] is now eroded. Under the current regime, mothers are expected to “ululate” for their dead kin.

Festival as a necessity

Power outages and brownouts are common in most cities in Eritrea, but in the few days around the major government holidays, nothing seems to be cheap. Incessant and loud music or cacophony for the delicate people blares from the flatbed trucks cruising towards the main square. Here, a massive crowd is treated to a series of theater performances of propaganda nature, whose purpose is mostly the denigration of the enemies of the day. In its shoddiness, it resembles the events of the communist nations, except for the absence of the working class. If there are dissenters, or people who think they have a better thing to do, the state closes the bars and coffee houses. This policy is not applied solely to the festival or parade area, which many governments do, but also to the large majority of businesses, and stall owners too.

Eritrea remains in this frenzy with its citizens at home and in the Diaspora inextricably immersed in the culture of political festivals, putting it in complete disjunction with the vivid strife in the country. The adoption of the new Western calendar helped the regime to arbitrarily choose celebration, and commemorative days of its making. This state of affairs has left the followers of the Eritrean Tewahdo and the Catholic Church of the G’eez Rite, who follow the G’eez calendar in a quandary. Their traditional influence on the religious peasantry gradually eroded, they have little power to put up a fight. The civic society is likewise in a pathetic situation.

The hegemony of the culture of festivals orchestrated by the regime is so contagious that not even the opposition is able to avoid it. They have their own little festivals with rituals not different from the regime’s. The opposition is often accused of having been unable to come forward with a political platform easily recognizable from the regime, but is yet to be criticized in the cultural sphere. This has made the contest for political power very turbid. In order to cleanse itself from such desensitizing “festival” culture, the solution to the public is not the convening of separate little “festivals” as proposed and practiced by some in the opposition. The need for exorcism from the festivals has not yet been so urgent.

“Celebration and commemoration are central to political projects of various ideological hues. Without loyal members, that is, citizens as subjects, who identify with its project, a state will be at a comparative disadvantage in international relations and competitions,” stressed Berezin, in his excellent article about Fascist Italy. [3] Where they differ he stated furthermore is, “ the democratic state has four identifiable ways of articulating the relation between ruler, and ruled: first, the franchise…second, local association-the legal right to gather, third, public discourse, that is, freedom of speech and press; and lastly, through extra-parliamentary forms of political behavior such as strikes and social protest.” [4]

All or most of these are resoundingly absent in dictatorships. The 1984 famine in Ethiopia and the huge festivities in commemoration of the founding of the communist party of Ethiopia can be cited as an example. While the Derg was condemned for the lavish expenditure and the time given to the occasion, the regime in Eritrea is yet to be censured. This has contributed to the sense of bravado by the regime, which does not forget to tout the huge number of Eritrean tourists showing for its holidays every year. The prevalent soft approach is, therefore, harmful. In its extreme form, the “festival” ritual in totalitarian Eritrea is even worse than the one in Mengistu’s Ethiopia, as it is pervasive and entangles all its polity.

Here is a puzzle though. The same type of people who devoutly and fetish-like celebrate the state holidays in Eritrea rarely observe the national or patriotic holidays of their host countries such as the July Fourth day in the United States. Their hypocrisy has no comparison. Mebembe pressed, “Ceremonies and festivities constitute the preeminent means by which the commandment speak, and the way in which it dramatizes its magnificence and prodigality.” [5] No country in the continent may equal the thoroughness, and zeal in the state of Eritrea executes the various festivities.

It is not; however, the “simplification” which Mebembe used to explain the power relationship in the post-colony, where “each robbed the other of their vitality and has left them impotent.” [6] The sole robber is the government in the Eritrean situation. The government, true to its totalitarian nature, would not tolerate the seemingly harmless acts of “simplification” experienced elsewhere as argued by the Cameroonian writer. The post-colony of Eritrea is exceptional.

Italy of the colonial era has left in Eritrea its building architecture in Asmera and the culture of passegiata. In a dubious way, the “festival” state that manifested itself under Mussolini has also resurrected sixty years later in the Horn of Africa. The masses in Eritrea has no or little public space to mind their own businesses, unlike the post-colonial African nations, which despite their corruption, and brutality have not penetrated the ordinary life of their citizens.

In light of this fact, some scholars on Africa prefer to define most African states as “shadow” states. Mebembe’s theory of state orchestrated festivities and rituals in Cameroon and other African nations are, therefore, untenable in Eritrea. In comparison with many of its sister countries, the reach of the apparatus of the state of Eritrea is both wide and deep. Thanks to its huge conscript army and coercion capacity, almost all towns, villages and even remote and arid pastoral camps in the country are in its complete grip. The least public space obtained through “neglect” that their fellow African brethren obtained has been denied to them.

The power elite in Eritrea have entangled itself in many rituals of the culture not excluding weddings and burial ceremonies. In the tents (or das in Tigrigna), the flag of Eritrea occupies the strategic place, and it also accompanies some burial ceremonies for people who were not even in the military profession. The rituals of the churches as the use of lit candles or tuaf in Easter, and other occasions had been appropriated by the state for the commemoration of the Martyr’s Day. The front deliberately blurred the domain of the secular and religion, similar to the practice of the Fascist State in Italy. The borrowing of words such gedli, from gadla (hagiography,) mesua’ti (sacrifice) and yikealo (omnipotent,) was also shrewdly deployed to touch the largely conservative peasants population. What was restricted to the churches’ lexicography has now dominated the cultural landscape of the country. The fate of the family institution is not different.

The deception of the state has no bounds; while denigrating the Eritrean fathers for their role in the unification with Ethiopia in the recent past, it has systematically been encouraging the cult of the mothers for nationalism purposes. As if in mockery of the metaphor used during the Federation period, the “daughter”, that is Eritrea that had reunited with its “mother” Ethiopia, became a staunch nationalist later, goes the narrative. The same “daughter” that grew to motherhood turned nationalist by disavowing the “mother”, historicize some Eritrean scholars. In truth, neither the daughters nor the mothers had anything to do with both the Federation with Ethiopia and separation. It was mostly a men affair. The fact that the fronts adopted women’s question does not negate this assertion: it was made for political expediency. That the fate of women and their rights was casually dropped ever since independence is a proof.

The task of the adulation of the mother has been joined by people such as Meshesh, a popular singer in Tigrigna in Eritrea, whose lyrics are full of praise for its “exceptional” genes that allegedly produced countless “heroes.” Meshesh glorifies the mothers for having produced innumerable nationalist “heroes”, completely forgetting the state’s habitual practice of snatching the youth from their embrace, and the in the process drying their wombs. The myth of the nationalist Eritrean mother is equally shared by the opposition and some writers in the websites.

Modernists are often puzzled by the trance-like behavior of people who attend traditional spirit-dances in Africa. While the spirit dances may be harmless, the “spirit-dance” with the state of Eritrea is both asphyxiating and enslaving. If the regime has crammed the calendar with festivals and holidays with little time for cognition and break, the masses are equally culpable for participating and elevating the events as a trope.

The lack of outrage in proportion to the horror experience by the people in Eritrea at home, and abroad in the Mediterranean Sea, the deserts of Libya, and Sinai will remain a scandal and a stain for generation. What can explain this strange behavior? It will be a good material for psychologists, and mass trauma specialists. The reasons may be complex, but the fact that the victims share the same festival rituals with the state –  that is, the predatory state – may go a long way in explaining the predicament. This state of affairs is so strange that it has left many decent Eritreans numb and helpless for loss of words. The horror obtained in these times is, however, nothing different from the human sacrifice made to the gods of diverse civilizations such as the Aztec, Incas etc., except for this: the human sacrifice in Eritrea was uniquely made at the altar of nationalism.

Reference Notes

[1] Keneally, T. Towards Asmara. P. 116.
[2] Dawit, W. Red Tears.
[3] Berezin, M. The Festival State: Celebration and Commemoration in Fascist Italy. Journal of Modern European History.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Mebembe, A. Provisional Notes on the Postcolony, Africa 62, (1), 1992
[6] Ibid.

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