Banking on Journalists is guaranteed to fail

BY ABRAHA DERSO

Outrageous articles like that by David Hirst (The Guardian, 18 May 1999), famous for his repeated massacre of truth, are guaranteed to spur into action even those who normally never put pen to paper to write to newspaper editors.  David Hirst had long become a mouthpiece for Isaias Afeworki's futile propaganda. It is an open secret among Ethiopians and his latest ramblings came as no surprise. That a respectable Newspaper like The Guardian should continue to offer him the platform to air his perverse views does, however, fill them with a sense of bewilderment and make them question the paper's position on the issue of the Ethio-Eritrean dispute. Maybe David Hirst has a contract to submit a guaranteed number of articles to The Guardian each year. But surely it is the editor's responsibility not to accept "damaged goods". Such scrutiny is rightly demanded by readers and the lack of editorial control may lead people to conclude that The Guardian either concurs with David Hirst's deliberate distortion of truth, and has thus, (wittingly or unwittingly) become a vehicle of Eritrean propaganda, or that the editorial staff truly continue to be ignorant of the root cause of the dispute between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Either position would be deplorable for a paper of The Guardian's standing. A week is a long time in politics, former British prime Minster Harold Wilson is credited as saying. A year certainly is, and it feels like eternity since the Ethio-Eritrea dispute started in May 1998. So a brief reminder of the genesis of the dispute may be in order.

After the EPRDF forces finally defeated the military dictatorship of Mengistu Hailemariam in May 1991, Ethiopians, who were thoroughly fed up of years of internecine wars, cut their annual military budget from some 1.3 billion to a mere 240 million dollars. They set out on a concerted development programme to improve the conditions of life of their people. In the mean time Eritrea, which formally separated from Ethiopia following a referendum in 1993, continued to build up its armaments and instituted compulsory military training for all its youth. Then it went into battle with Yemen, then with the Sudan followed by a brief skirmish with Djibouti.

Little were Ethiopians to know that these were mere dress rehearsals for a bigger project until Isaias Afeworki sent in, Mussolini style, three mechanised brigades into Badme in May 1998 and occupied it by force. Journalists like David Hirst cheered him from the sidelines as his army terrorised the local Ethiopian citizens and deliberately bombed school  children and other civilians further afield in Mekelle and Adigrat. He further sent in his army to grab more lands along the borders, in such places as  Zalanbessa and Alitena, hoping for a stronger negotiating position with " a weak and divided Ethiopia ". He calculated very badly. To the dismay of Isaias Afeworki and his clique this unbridled aggression only helped Ethiopians became more united than at any time in their history. No amount of wishful thinking on the part of Isaias Afeworki, or his soothsayer journalist friends like David Hirst, Alexander Last or Peter Worthington of the Toronto Sun, can alter this fact.

The Eritrean Il Duce thought he was being clever when he started this totally unnecessary dispute in May 1998. He thought he was being clever with his vacillations as Ethiopia and the rest of the world pleaded with him for nine months for the dispute to be resolved peacefully. He still thinks he is being clever even when Eritrea is becoming physically, militarily and economically emaciated by war. Waging war against its will, even when it is clear that it will ultimately win, has been one of the most painful experiences a lot of Ethiopians have had to witness as the Eritrean leader plunged the two counties into war in a carefully choreographed plan to divert attention from their disastrous economic failures.

However, as long as the Eritrean leader continues with his defiance of reason, Ethiopians accept that it must be done for the ultimate good not just of Ethiopians but also, perverse though it may sound, the ordinary Eritreans too.

Isaias Afeworki could have stopped this war at a stroke by the simple expediency of withdrawing his army from the occupied lands so that a lasting resolution of the dispute may start. However it would be against his character to do so, resulting in the continuing mass displacement and disruption of the lives of hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians on the front line who have had to endure shelling by the cowardly Isaias army and the hundreds of thousands of landmines that now litter the countryside. This being the case Ethiopia has no option but to continue to degrade and destroy Isaias’ war machine that has brought so much suffering not only to the Ethiopians but also to the ordinary Eritreans who surely can have no higher wish than to live in peace with their neighbours. The question that needs to be asked is this: in this land of one man band government without free speech or free newspapers, have the so called journalists like David Hirst tried to find out what the ordinary Eritreans would like Isaias to do to end their suffering? The most likely scenario is that these journalists would not be allowed to meet ordinary Eritreans to carry out such interviews, but even if they did the ordinary Eritreans are unlikely to put their trust in such individuals and divulge the secrets of their inner most feelings.

Shatir (intrigue) will not win the war

After the earth-shattering reversal the Eritrean army suffered at Badme and subsequent, and apparently worse, hammering at the hands of the Ethiopian defence forces, the Eritrean leaders have invented a most unlikely story: that Ethiopia is trying to take back Eritrea. This latest story is primarily targeted at the ears of Eritreans in the Diaspora who must ensure the constant flow of funds that are paying for Isaias’ disastrous war. The international community could not be deceived by such a shabby story. So now Isaias has brought David Hirst  & Co out of the trenches to tell outrageous lies for him through the medium of respectable Newspapers, and other media outlets. This attempt at divide and rule, which Isaias learnt from Eritrea's former Italian fascist masters, will fail dismally- just like the disaster that befell his "invincible" army. 

It is about time Isaias Afeworki, and the Eritrean elite, realised that the only sensible way to end the suffering is to withdraw from the occupied lands and then sit down at the negotiating table. Shatir (intrigue) and disgraceful journalism will not save them from the disaster that is staring them in the face. If they persist in defying reasoned persuasion then the pain of the rod will, whether they like it or not, force them to do so sooner or later. In the meantime one shrieks at the vast sums of money Isaias Afeworki is wasting in his futile war effort while the Eritrean people languish in poverty and hardship. One also thinks of all the extra development projects that would have been accomplished in Ethiopia in the past year if the country did not have to deal with the distraction of the petulant Eritrean leader, although the country continues in a business-as-usual manner in many respects.