An “Election” Ethiopians Don’t Need

January 25, 2010

In the last free and fair election in 2005, the Ethiopian people rejected the ethnic dictatorship of the Tigrai People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and voted out of office the corrupt criminal enterprise of Meles Zenawi. Yet, in the most brazen act of election fraud in the 21st century, Zenawi overturned the will of the Ethiopian people - basically grabbed power in a coup d'état after losing the election - and promptly put the nation under “martial law.” that’s still in effect to this day.

In the 4 ½ years since that ill fated election, Ethiopian pro-democracy activists have faced imprisonment, harassment, torture and death as they have voiced their demands for peace, justice, individual and ethnic rights, and a democratic form of government that is representative of all Ethiopia’s people.

It is under these horrific circumstances that the Meles regime is getting ready to hold another sham election, primarily intended, to place a veneer of legitimacy on itself while side stepping the glaring fact that Ethiopia is a shattered, poverty-stricken country on the verge of implosion due to the regime’s destructive economic policies and its use of egregious oppression to maintain its ethnic dictatorship at the expense of the lives of millions of Ethiopians.

Some in the international community naively view the 2010 election as an opportunity. But, Ethiopians know better and they will not sacrifice the democratic principles for which millions have marched and thousands have been arrested, tortured and killed for just to participate in a process that holds no hope whatsoever for bringing freedom and true democracy to a deeply traumatized nation.

That being said, the international community can play a genuinely constructive role to avert a catastrophe in Ethiopia. First of all, the international community needs to stop buying the fear mongering by a tribal dictator that has been playing the cheap and tired game of ethnic politics. For 18 years, Meles has tried to divide the Ethiopian people along ethnic and religious lines, exploiting fears and pitting groups against one another because that is the only way he can maintain his grip on power. As “we can't choose our ethnicity” Ethiopians understand that they need to have a good relationship and coexist in peace and mutual respect with each other in a diverse multi-ethnic society. They refuse to live in fear and insecurity and turn against each other no matter how hard the dying regime of Meles Zenawi keeps trying.

Homing in with the instincts of a born divider, Meles has suggested, time and again, to the international community that an environment filled with danger is right there on the horizon if he were to be voted out or forced out of office. The international community has bought this farce for far too long and it’s time to say enough is enough. He is the “wrong political leader” for Ethiopia and the sole impediment to peace and stability in the Horn of Africa.

Second, the U.S. and all other Western nations should put their money where their mouth is and stop bailing out an illegitimate tyrannical minority regime ruling Ethiopia under the barrel of the gun. In keeping with their tradition of standing in solidarity with all who yearn for peace, democracy and the rule of law around the world, it behooves the West to support the struggle of the Ethiopian people for the democratic values that they are fighting for. The international community should not be willing to lock its principles in a safe deposit box and start cheer leading for another ill-fated election whose outcome is a foregone conclusion. It is in Meles’ DNA never to commit to bringing people together rather to playing them off against one another for cheap political gain no matter what the consequences.

Let no one doubt the Ethiopian people’s resolve not to be cowed or coerced into participating in a fatally flawed political process that robs the people of the freedom for which many have lost their lives.