Yonas Biru, PhD
Between October 23 and November 30, 2019, I posted several blogs on Koki Abesolome’s Facebook page, following the standoff between the Ethiopian government and Jawar’s followers. One of the titles of the blogs was “Fifty Years from Now, Ethiopians Will Praise Jawar for Uniting Ethiopia.” I reposted the blog on People-to-People forum on Jan 8, 2021.
In 2019, Jawar saw himself as co-prime minister. The political standoff between the two prime ministers started on September 13, 2019. The trigger point was Jawar’s arrogance to issue a bold ultimatum to his co-prime minister, stating: If the Oromo Democratic Party that Prime Minister Abiy was leading dared to undermine the Oromummaa agenda the desk of Prime Minister Jawar would send him “a calendar with Ethiopia’s expiration date”.
On October 23, Prime Minister Abiy sent a swat team to Jawar’s residence to withdraw his government-provided bodyguards in the middle of the night. In response, Jawar sent out an SOS call to his Qeerroo enterprise. Within hours, armed Qeerroos unleashed a murderous wrath upon innocent people, killing 67 and wounding 213.
Jawar’s SOS call was based on his belief that if the Prime Minister dared to take action against him, the entire Oromo tribal land will rise up in protest. That failed to materialize. To the contrary, Qeerroo’s wrath pushed the Oromo silent majority to speak up, calling upon the government to take action against the murderous cabals. At the time I wrote:
The impact of this confrontation is that it will bring the concealed division between Oromo political forces to the fore. The division across the radical v. moderate Oromo will necessarily spill into regional divisions. To top it off, the silent majority will enter the Oromo political space. If two of the three happen (it is supremely likely for all three to happen) Jawar’s greater Oromia dream will dissipate like a morning dew. For tribal federation to have a whiff of life the Oromo tribal land must stand together. That will no longer be the case.
Jawar cannot be salvaged as Oromo leader in the way that he has been before the crisis happened. He has seen his political calculus reduced to elementary algebra. Having lost his bluffing power, he will need to readjust his political strategy rather drastically. His only political option is to moderate his position. This is neither a wishful thinking nor a political prediction. This is a hard reality that is as real as the blend of political gravity, inertia and centrifugal force.
On October 26, 2019, I wrote further:
Tribalism has been Bing Banged out of Ethiopia’s political space beyond the realm of reconstruction. What we are now witnessing is spasmic contortions and death twitches of an expired body politics.
Below is the full blog as it was published in 2019 titled “Fifty Years from Now, Ethiopians Will Praise Jawar for Uniting Ethiopia.” I am reposting the full text to show that Jawar’s motives whatever they may be do not mean shit. What determines his political trajectory is the political dynamics. His current transformation is a result of the political dynamics not his alleged hidden motive that some people are obsessed with.
“Fifty Years from Now, Ethiopians Will Praise Jawar for Uniting Ethiopia.”
Fifty years from today, Ethiopians will praise Jawar for two momentous accomplishments. The first momentous event that he played a major role in was the deconstruction and destruction of TPLF beyond redemption. His role in this cannot be undermined. His leadership was both deliberate and methodical.
The second momentous accomplishment that will go down in Ethiopia’s history as one of the most watershed moments is the division he forced on the Oromo political universe. For fifty years Oromo intellectuals avoided division or conflicts within Oromo political space, until Jawar and Abiy became the two primary protagonists.
Two people with diametrically opposite visions and strategies that are orthogonal to each other came to power. Jawar wanted to be the king maker and power broker of the modern-day Abyssinian kingdom. He basically told the Prime Minister that he cannot go for election until he signed on Jawar’s political power sharing blueprint. He wrote: “በስልጣን ክፍፍል ላይ ሳንደራደር ወደ ምርጫ አንገባም.”
Abiy yawned and came up with his own blueprint that was diametrically opposite to Jawar’s vision. Either Abiy or Jawar needed to retreat as a strategy or tactic to avoid division in the Oromo political landscape. Abiy had less reason to do so, because division in the Oromo tribal land, though undesirable, avoiding it by any means is not a necessity for his strategic goal of forming a united Ethiopia.
For Jawar, avoiding division in the Oromo tribal land was absolute necessity for his strategic goal of creating a strong Oromo kingdom within a weaker Ethiopian project. Jawar failed to show a mastery of reconciling short-term retreats with a long-term strategy of slowing Abiy’s agenda, if not achieving his own objective. He overplayed his hand and chose the path of confrontation.
The problem is that both Abiy and Jawar have significant following within the Oromo tribal land. The head on collision between the two meant division within their followers. The sacred principle of Oromo politics was breached.
In October 2019, I wrote: “One of the consequences of this is that the silent Oromo majority will enter the political process with overwhelming support for Abiy, the man who holds the lever of the administrative power and the military complex.”
I added: “There is another consequence. The division in the Oromo tribal land will knock the oxygen out of the Amhara tribalist air. The goons who have been accusing Abiy of serving the OLF and carrying Jawa’s water will find themselves in political netherworld, looking part moronic and part political zombies.”
There is more, I said: “TPLF, whose recent infatuation with Jawar can only be approximated by an old Ethiopian song “ባባቷ እምላለሁ አባቴን አስክዳኝ,” and whose political strategy is riding on Jawar’s coattails will find itself without hope. Jawar who ended their dynasty failed to be their chance of last resort to blow life into their body politics. As Jawar goes down, so will TPLF.”
Jawar was named “የቡዳ መድሃኒት” against the Amhara and “the terminator” against TPLF. There is no chance in hell for him to revive his power because his power was based on the perception of his invincibility. Perception is like virginity. Once assaulted it will never remain intact.
This is a historic development for the Ethiopian project. History will credit Jawar for dividing Oromo politics and initiating the unification of Ethiopia, be it by accident or sheer stupidity.
In a sort of a subversive way, Jawar is Ethiopia’s Phoenix – the proverbial bird that kindled a fire into which it perished but gave a life from the ashes of the fire. Friends of mine and foes of mine alike, as I often say, this is the only plausible explanation. All else is a cruel satirization of an already satirized life. [The 2019 blog ends here].
Why is Jawar Rising Now
The timing is perfect. You must give him credit for choosing his political comeback after Abiy turned himself into a delusional Boy King and self-destructed beyond redemption. What caused Abiy’s fall? It is not his policy per se. When he came to power, he did everything right. He released prisoners and expanded the political platform inviting opposition forces to enter the political market. He abandoned TPLF’s developmental state and revolutionary democracy doctrines and embraced market economy and liberal democracy. His cautious and gradual approach to move away from tribal politics was the right approach. Now the question is what led to his fall?
Four things contributed to his fall. First, ሌባ ላመሉ ዳቦ ይልሳል እንደሚባለው rather than building on the goodwill and unconditional support of Ethiopians from all corners of the nation and the international community, he chose to be a blend of a pseudo-Machiavelli and the second coming of the homicidal and hedonistic King Nero. He relied on manipulation and diabolical reign of cruelty to protect his throne.
Second, his narcissistic and psychopathic personalities exacerbated his pseudo-Machiavellian and the homicidal and hedonistic King Nero. Third, his and his administration’s utter incompetence led to the nation’s economic, political and security crisis.
Fourth, his transactional political doctrine and thirst for power meant he has zero allegiance to either the Ethiopian or Oromummaa project. He moved in and out of the two, depending on his short-term political expediency rather than on strategic political calculus and awareness of long-term consequences. This left him without a reliable political base outside of his party.
Unfortunately, the Ethiopian politics is such that there is no political force ready to challenge his rule. Moderate forces lack a center of gravity around which nationalist forces can coalesce around. This was a role that the Amhara could have played. This requires a clear political agenda and all-encompassing strategy (manifesto if you will) and flexible political maneuvering to grow a wining national coalition. Hermitized Amhara intellectuals show neither the ability, nor the vision to fill this role. This is to put it mildly and not to call them moronic.
Unfortunately, Fano got hijacked by extremist Amharas both at home and in the diaspora. Shene Amharas led by the likes of Professor Habtamu became Fano’s international representatives. Clowns such as Eskinder and Zemene Kassie became the two prominent faces of Fano. With an utterly failed Prime Minister, and zombified extremists crowding the Amhara opposition, the moderate ground in the middle became empty. That is the vacuum Jawar is attempting to fill.
Of recent, Jawar’s primary contribution to Ethiopian politics is twofold. First is showing the worst face of Oromummaa through Qeerroo, and dividing the Oromo political space in 2019. Second is turning to the political middle in 2024, when Amhara political elites are chained to extremist mullah like ideology. I am not saying much about Tigryan politics because they have spectacularly destroyed themselves and are busy in a palace war in Mekele.
If Jawar plays his cards right, he may leave extremist Amhara and Tigray forces in their chains and lead to the rise of moderate forces. His success will depend on: (1) his ability to shift the center of gravity of the Oromo politics from the Qeerroo universe to Oromo moderates and the silent majority; (2) winning the confidence and support of moderate forces outside of the Oromo universe, (3) being truthful to himself and the people of Oromo and Ethiopia at large, and (4) above all repenting his sins and redeeming himself.
Extremist forces may not accept him. That is fine because his success does not depend on them. His success depends on moderate forces who are interested in saving the nation rather than in protecting their extremist agenda.
