Jawar Must Repent and Redeem to Succeed in His Political Transformation

Yonas Biru, PhD

Let me start with two caveats. First, I want to see Jawar succeed in his political transformation because I want to see a peaceful and prosperous Ethiopia. As a popular figure in the Oromo political space, he has the potential to play a constructive role more than any one I can think of.  Second, I have not read his book. My interest lies in his claimed political transformation. My analyses are based on his past and recent writings, public statements, and interviews about his book with the BBC, Tsedale Lemma, and Moges Teshome.

I do not know how much of this issue is addressed in his book. If the issues I am raising are addressed in his book, he or his supporters can take this opportunity to clear things up. I have listened his explanation about his 2013 rallying cry “Ethiopia Out of Oromia.” It was a futile shenanigan at best or laughable at worst.

My earlier article titled “The Unstoppable Collapse of Oromummaa & the Immovable Dogma in Oromo Elites” has touched raw nerves and unleashed a tremor of anger and contempt in Jawar’s corner. Many accused me of being “Oromo-Phobic.” Sorry, I am as Oromo as Jawar is. We both are part Oromo. So, spare me the “Oromo-Phobic” crap. The poor souls are emotionally and intellectually chewed, swallowed and spit out by the Oromummaa cult. They cannot see Oromummaa has damaged the Oromo tribal land than any other. ኦሮሞዋ አያታችን መሃይምነት ፀጋ ነው ድንቁርናን አይደርስባትም እንጂ ይሉ ነበር.

My above-noted article was focused on two important points: The fight between Jawar the realist and Jawar the opportunist and his reluctance to break clean from the Oromummaa cult.

The Oromummaa cult, as I have noted in my article, refers to the religiofication of the Oromo tribal politics. It places precedence on tribal identity over citizenship and religious allegiance. “I Am an Oromo First, Above All Else” is the beginning and the end of its Commandment.

In his recent interviews, Jawar used his prison time as a marker for his political transformation. He alleged prison gave him time and space for introspection, reflection and recalibration.

In one of his recent forums, he explained and defended the title of his book as follows. The reason he chose አልፀፀትም (I Have No Regrets) as a title is because his focus is on what he and Qeerroo have achieved in their quest for defending Oromo rights and forcing the TPLF-led government out of power. For this, he said, he takes pride and harbors no regrets. This does not cut it for me.

The PR ecosystem around his book launch is aimed at heralding a new chapter in his political transformation. In that regard, one must look at his political life not only until 2018 when he played a significant role in overthrowing the TPLF-led government, but also after he returned to Ethiopia and claimed the role of co-prime ministership.

Since his current campaign is focused on the nation’s security, peace, and economic crises, he must introspect and reflect on his own and Qeerroo’s contribution to the state of the nation. This is where his political transformation demand repentance and redemption.

What do repentance and redemption mean in his case? Repentance requires acknowledging his past mistakes and sins and expressing regrets (ፀፀት). Redemption entails redressing the past and bending the arc of his political trajectory toward justice and peace. This starts and ends with breaking clean from the Oromummaa cult that is the source of all current evils. All else is a theatrical blend of የኦሮምኛ ጭፈራ and Argentine tango, as I noted in my article.

A cursory look at Jawars past shows a study in contradictions. One minute he is the author of the nation’s tribal conflict and bloodletting. The next minute he is a peace maker. Balancing the dual role of a bloodletting conflict peddler and a Gandhian peacemaker was his modus operandi.

Until he returned to Ethiopia, the Qerro movement that he built from scratch and led was peaceful. His followers’ signature protest signs were white handkerchief and crossed arms raised above their heads – a sign Feyisa Lilesa globalized at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympic games.

Once he returned to Ethiopia in 2018, he started using the Qeerroo movement as his powerbase to disrupt the nation’s political order in a bid to appraise his political currency. His foot soldiers dropped their white handkerchiefs and picked matchets, knives and sticks weaponized with nails as their weapons of choice – their badge of honor. Terror became the lingua franca of their political lexicon. He unleashed them with the frequency of regularity to reck havoc at a moment’s notice and beckoned them to end their carnage at the drop of a hat.

In March 2019, in a two-part interview with Tsion Girma of the Voice of America (VOA), he reveled Qeerroo is well organized with proper chains of command all the way down to every nook and cranny of the Oromo tribal land (link: interview part 1 and part 2). After the VOA interview, he gave another interview where he declared there are two prime ministers in Ethiopia: Abiy and Qerro. Further, he asserted the real power resides with Qerro that is able to takeover Addis Ababa within 24 to 48 hours.

He reaffirmed this in another interview that “If war (“ግብግብ”) is needed, that is easier for me because all I need to do is incite Qeerroo and tell them let us finish the job we have started.” He has since removed this from the social media. But the social media is full of incriminating posts, showing that he regularly posted conflict inciting messages. Even worse, he regularly forwarded false and polarizing messages posted by extremist conflict peddlers from Oromo and Amhara Shene circles. This was a man with over 2 million Facebook followers, amplifying bloodletting conflicts.

For two years, he played the Qeerroo like a seesaw at a carnival – up one moment as a peaceful warrior and down the next as terrorist mob. As he told Tsion, he knew where the legal red line was. He pushed his conflict-inciting rehetoric to the limit to enrage, incite and galvanize his followers and retreated without crossing the red line. But his followers did not know where the legal redline was. Enraged and primed for revenge, they crossed the red lines day and night and terrorized innocent and defenseless people. They killed thousands and displaced hundreds of thousands.

In 2019, I wrote many articles explaining Jawar was crossing thick moral and ethical red lines, but he was too careful and smart enough not to cross the thin legal red line. But he knew his “legally defensible” actions were resulting in a systemic legally criminal actions by Qeerroo.

In March 2019, the government accused him and his OMN media outlet of inciting tribal conflicts. At the time there was an ongoing petitions on change.org that blames him of inciting genocide. I had nothing to do with the genocide petition because I do not believe there is genocide in Ethiopia against any group.

On March 18, 2019, Jawar posted an angry response on his official Facebook, stating: “Activism and the media are not causing fire, their advocacy and reporting is just fueling a fire lit up by the action and inaction of the political parties and their leaders.”

What were the actions and inaction of the political parties and leaders? It was supposedly their failure to listen to him to bargain for a negotiated settlement. He wrote: “political elites should sit around the table and engage in serious discussion, negotiation and bargain on the transition roadmap and rules of engagement. Particularly, as I have said time and again for over a decade, the Oromo, Amhara and Tigryan elites must sit for real, perhaps painful, negotiation to lay down the foundation for consensual democracy that can bring lasting stability to the region.”

True, he was calling for a negotiated settlement. Par for the course to his character, he was also vehemently against negotiated settlement.

On July 28, 2018, Jawar tweeted: “Multinational federalism engrained in the current constitution is here to stay. It’s in not up for discussion, let alone negotiation. Anyone caught in some FANTASY should wake up from their hallucination,” On March 3, 2019, he posted on his website: “በፈደራሊስዝም አልደራደርም !!!“ He has since deleted this post from his website.

The social media testifies there is nothing Jawar has not used to polarize the Oromo, including religion and the nation’s iconic history. For example, Jawar believes Adwa is an epitome of Ethiopia’s history that demeans the Oromo. On March 2, 2017, he posted on his Twitter handle: “This Adwa thing should come around every month because it is kind of win-win for both sides. The other side gets high reliving the fictional glorious past rubbing salt on our wound and helping us further unify and mobilize our base.”

His current campaign to stop the spiraling existential crisis should be welcomed and encouraged. But he lacks the moral ground to launch such a campaign with holier than thou disposition. His attempt to paint a picture that had the government listened to him Ethiopia would not be where it is today indicates his usual shenanigan filled shameful political chicanery.

ነገረየው ጨው ለራስህ ስትል ጣፍጥ ነው. As a political ideology and Oromo theology, Oromummaa is in a comatose state. Deleting incriminating posts and curating new false narratives are not the answer. Repentance and redemptions are. Unfortunate to Jawar, he cannot repent and redeem without breaking from the Oromummaa cult.

I challenge Jawar to ask himself why did the Oromo version of tribal politics lead to such a level of crisis. Both the Tigray-led and Oromo-led governments are governed by the same tribal constitution. Neither the political architecture nor the constitutional order has changed. Both have the same political target: The Amhara. Why is the country under the Oromo-led government more blood thirsty, more diabolical and quite frankly more stupid and more self-destructive?

Let me explain. Tigryans saw the Amhara as a threat for their political power. Their goal was to make sure that it will not revive and become a threat to their power. With Oromo politicians, it is not only power politics. It is revenge for Anolee fiction that Jawar himself peddled as the history of Oromo. It is a revenge for the 5 million Oromos Menilik exterminated per the Oromummaa narrative that Jawar himself has peddle as true.

Seventy-one percent of the Ethiopian population is under 30. This is the age group in the police force, in the military and in Jawar’s Qeerroo. This is the generation that the Oromummaa cult has inflamed with rage and recruited for revenge. Jawar’s challenge is addressing this. Deleting incriminating posts from the social media will not cure the metastasized cancered whose clinical name is Oromummaa. What he needs is a clear break from Oromummaa for the sake of the people of Oromo whose culture and legacy have been adulterated by Asafa Jalata and his blind followers.

Where should Jawar start the break from the Oromummaa’s culture of  ውሸት and ክህደት and start the journey to restore the Oromo creed and ethos.

A starting point can be the question: Who liberated Oromo?

The two primary demands of the Oromo movement were: “The Rights of Nations and Nationalities” and “Land for the Tiller.” The “rights of nations and nationalities” doctrine that the Oromo political class swears by is authored by Walelegn Mekonen, an Amhara from Wello. History stands as witness to those Amhara and Tigrayans who died advancing numerous political demands that benefited the Oromo more than any other tribe.

There were two prominent political groups that grew out of the student movement and changed Ethiopia for good or bad. The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party (EPRP) and Meason. The top EPRP founding leaders included, six Amharas (Getachew Maru, Germachew Lema, Samuel Abebe, Abebech Bekele, Keflu Tadesse and Tsegaye Gebremedhin); five Tigryans (Tesfaye Debesay, Teselote Ezkias, Zeru Kishen, Berhane Meskel Reda, and Yosef Adane); and two Oromos (Abera Wakdjira and Feseha Wolde Michael).

Meason’s founding leaders included ten Amharas (Worku Ferede, Kebede Mengesha, Negede Gobeze, Andargachew Assegid, Yayerhad Kitaw, Fikre Merid, Endrias Eshete, Mesfin Kassu, Tamrat Kebede and Amare Tegbaru); four Tigryans (Dereje Alemayehu, Tadesse Gessese, Nigist Adane, and Hagos Gebreyesus, ); three Oromos (Haile Fida, Kebede Diriba, and Terefe Weldetsadeq); one Gurage (Desta Taddesse) and one Eritrean (Haile Merkorios)

I may have missed a name or two or may have added a name or two by mistake, but the general picture holds that Oromos were underrepresented in the student movement leadership and subsequent revolutionary parties that advanced the Oromo political demands.

The seeds that the student movement planted in the 1970 culminated to Oromo’s ascension to the apex of that political power architecture in 2018. Thanks to a large part to Amhara and Southern People representatives who voted for the Oromo candidate. Majority of the Southern People and 100% of Amhara representatives vote for the Oromo candidate.

Acknowledging this is not by any means undermining the role Oromo liberation forces and Jawar himself played in expediting the collapse of the TPLF regime. The fact that the Oromummaa cult totally ignores the role that Student movement and recent non-Oromo youth movements such as Fano, Zerma, Egeto and Woro played in bringing the Oromo to the apex of national power manifests the hallmark of its theology of ውሸት and ክህደት.

People who are interested in reading more about Oromummaa can read my articles that are a Google search away by title. The articles contain over 50 references of published articles and books. None of the references come from Ethiopianist authors. They are all from Oromo and foreign authors.

1. Oromummaa’s Religion Cleansing and Cultural Evilgelization Project
2. The Oromummaa Politics is Weaponized with Lies and Soaked in Blood.
3. Oromummaa is a Low-Grade Nazification Movement
4. Slavery and Terror Were Integral Parts of the Gadaa System

As I have noted in my earlier article, I am open to discuss this issue with Jawar on any forum, including his own forum.

እነኝህ ሁለቱ የኦሮሙማ ኦነግ ፋሽስቶች ልዩነታቸው ይሄ ብቻ ነው እኔ ልብላ እኔ ልብላ የሚል እንጅ ሁለቱም ፀረ አማራ ፀረ ኢትዮጵያ ፋሽስቶች ናቸው pic.twitter.com/hKCRCegSbs

— ንስር 🦅 (@bluenile8954904) January 8, 2025