Of Jawar and Ethiopia

Paulos Milkias, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science
Concordia University
Montreal, CANADA

For many Ethiopian intellectuals, including myself, Jawar Mohammed has been perceived as an Oromo nationalist with a Moslem bent. However, this interview reveals a different perspective. He emerges as a fervent Ethiopian nationalist, offering balanced insights and crucial suggestions to steer the country away from its current state of internal conflict, military unrest, and political turmoil. His urgency is palpable, underlining the immediate need for his proposed solutions.

In Jawar’s view, the fact that there was never a common platform to carry out healthy discourse to solve ethnic, political, and regional conflicts led to the rise of ethnic-based paramilitaries in Tigray, the historical and political mum of contemporary Ethiopia and the two demographically fundamental states of Oromia and Amhara with over 60 percent of the Ethiopian population.

He argues, Ethiopians have never had a tradition of choosing reconciliation over total war and total conflict, rather opting to go to a situation of zero-sum game to solve common problems. In the ongoing war they fanned already incendiary situations in the three regions with destructive results that claimed millions of combatants, civilians, young and old and decimated billions of dollars in property with which tanks, warplanes, and drones were bought instead of being spent for the growth and development of the country. He uses the euphemism of an Ethiopian tukul to demonstrate that a war in one region cannot be looked at differently from one in another region. It is akin to a fire in one corner of a tukul or thatched hut. If not nipped in the bud, all parts are doomed to be trashed by the inferno. The same with the wars in Tigray, Oromia and Amhara. An OLA revolt cannot be viewed differently than a war triggered by the TPLF and the ongoing Fano uprisings. And in all three cases, there will be no winner. If the federal state based in Ararat Kilo and the combatants fail to stop the conflict, discuss the problems pointed out by the warriors fairly and squarely, and ultimately trash out the grievances each has, we are all the losers. For this failure, he doles out the Lion’s share to Abiy and the Prosperity Party, which are currently sitting at the apex of state power.

Regarding the open bragging by some members of the Oromia power circle that the Oromos have now earned their turn to benefit from Ethiopia’s collective wealth, Jawar says that those who say so are not speaking for the common Oromo person who, due to the raging combat, wide-ranging abductions and ransom demands and the resultant killings everywhere even in the suburbs of Addis Ababa such as Dukem and Bishoftu, cannot farm and live in harmony with one another and cannot even travel in peace from one district to another. Jawar claims that there are currently over 100,000 Oromos in jail and that in Shagar alone, there are 3,000 prisons. For him, the powers that be are using the Oromo people as palliative for their brazen loot and robbery.

Jawar claims that bringing peace to the whole country is not only the wish of the Ethiopian people but is, in actual fact, the ardent wish of the militarily and economically powerful countries of Europe, Asia, and North America, as well as the oil-rich Middle Eastern nations including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. He is categorical that the salvation of Ethiopia is not, has never been, and will never be through war; it could be achieved only through reconciliation and peace.

For a long time, Jawar was condemned as a Narrow Oromo Nationalist, some even accusing him without proof that he was a fifth column for the Wahabi Movement. All these accusations arose because of his assertion that the majority of the Oromos are Moslems [whereas, in fact, according to the most recent national census, they are evenly divided between Suni Moslems (48%) on the one hand and Orthodox and Protestant Christians (48%) on the other, the remaining 6% being categorized as animists practicing the Gada age grade system.] In this interview, you see Jawar as a diehard Ethiopian citizen representing all ethnicities, not as a narrow Oromo nationalist rooting for secession.

Regarding the Ethio-Eritrean conflict, Jawar’s Ethiopian nationalism shines very brightly. He repeats that the war between the two Habasha people had no winner. This was true of the Badme conflict of May 1998 to June 2,000 and the Tigray Warm from November 1.2020, to November 3, 2022, in which the Eritrean army supported Ethiopia against the TPLF. In both, Ethiopia was said to be the winner (the interviewer insisting it was Eritrea that won the latter.)

Jawar stresses that in the war, there was no winner. For him, the federal government of Ethiopia, the TPLF, and the Eritreans were equally the losers. His negative assessment is buttressed by the wanton death of millions of people, the rape and vast destruction of property worth billions of dollars as well as the skirmishes that are still ongoing and the Fano revolt it sparked on the formula of demarcation of territories known as Humera and Tsegede between Tigray and Amhara and the disarmament of the Fano which fought on the side of the federal government. The latter refused to abide by the federal dictat and instead raised arms and is furiously fighting in Gondar, Gojam, Wollo, North Showa and even in some Oromia regions such as Kamisie and Wollega.

Jawar contends that the de jure independence of Eritrea from Ethiopia in 1993 did not mean complete divorce; it was incomplete because the same people, the Habashas, with the same culture, language, and economic interdependence, inhabit both countries. He points out the dramatic show of the reopening of the Ethiopia-Eritrea border, which was reopened on 11 September 2018, whereby Habasha relatives, divided by war, celebrated the reopening of two key crossing points more than 20 years after a border war shut them down. He points to the fact that multitudes of people from the two countries hugged each other, and some wept as their leaders led celebrations to mark the reopening. This is, for him, a stark reminder of the indivisibility between the Eritrean and Ethiopian people.

Jawar suggests that the agricultural and demographic power Ethiopia has ought to be used to strengthen Eritrea, and Eritrea should, in turn, open her ports to Ethiopia. Following on the footsteps of Professor Dr. Tesfatsion Medhanie of Bremen University in Germany, what should be done is to immediately create economic collaboration followed by the Confederation, which would facilitate the process to political federation. He believes that there are well-to-do Eritreans who share his view. In support of that assertion, he mentions some Eritrean investors who chose Ethiopia over other countries in the region.

Jawar contends that Ethiopia and Eritrea are inseparable. He maintains that a peace dividend will benefit the people of both countries. For Jawar, instead of going from war to war which devastates both nations, to achieve mutual benefit for the Habasha people of Ethiopia and Eritrea, everything should be on the table. Ethiopia should use the ports of Massawa and Assab. Ethiopia should also be ready to share the benefits of the GERD, the Ethiopian Airlines, and Ethio Tele, and, if need be, even land. This would create a win-win situation for both Eritreans and Ethiopians. I do not know how other colleagues received this Jawarian proposition, but I would like to admit that it is music to my ears!

Long live the Habasha people wherever they are, whether in the diaspora or at home!

…Rejoinder to his two interviews, with Dereje Haile particularly the 2^nd one

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=ethio+forum+jawar+interview

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(people can reach me if they wish via my work email paulos.milkias@concordia.ca)

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