When
this issue was first brought up two years ago, I was one of the very few people
who talked about it. And, from my own point of view, the issues are still the
same: what is the reason for Prime
Minister Meles Zenawi to leave office?
To demonstrate the democratic nature of EPRDF? Has he performed poorly? Will his departure improve things, such
as the expansion of democratic spaces and enforcement of state laws? These are
examples of concerns by honest and responsible citizens. Talk about them and
don’t worry about being labeled by those useless thugs as pro-EPRDF or
pro-Meles.
The advantage of democracy
is that it allows leaders to leave power voluntarily. But, democracy must also
be re-branded to suit specific country situations. The South American masses in
Venezuela just voted to extend the term of the current president Hugo Chavez,
who has already ruled for 10 years, so that he rule as long as he gets elected.
Is this a violation of the principles of democracy?
Maybe. Or, it depends on who is talking. What is clear is that – considering
that freedom
of autonomous choice is one of the core principles of democracy – we are forced
to acknowledge the fact that Venezuelans have believed that Chavez respects and
cares for them. Another example is
Russia about which some still write how this country has backslid to
authoritarian rule under Vladimir Putin, yet this man remains popular among
ordinary Russians. We have actually entered an era when scholars and practitioners
from every discipline are debating if the priority should be lifting humankind
out of miserable conditions of poverty or spend another century trying to
universally apply a neo-liberal version of democracy with state power rotating
among self-centred educated elites in the name of elections and democracy. I
know those of you who are genuinely concerned would appreciate the contribution
of my previous pieces which tried to show that democracy without strong and
visionary leadership is meaningless, and therefore, anyone in Ethiopia vying to
seize state power should be put to the test of leadership.
Whether we like it or not,
Meles Zenawi has worked his way up throughout the years to emerge one of the
powerful and vocal personalities representing Africa. Instead of leaving his
post as a prime minister, he can use his experience and international
connections to promote Ethiopia’s image and help international investors and
opinion makers gain confidence in terms of trade, tourism, diplomacy and cultural
exchanges. I know people have once before challenged me on this kind of
argument, arguing that EPRDF could only demonstrate its democratic nature when
its leaders leave office voluntarily. This is true. But at issue here is also
the interest of the general public, especially when nobody knows who Meles’
successor is and how on earth that successor is supposed to establish himself/herself
as a
leader of a complex party apparatus in just a short period of time. When you
have a weak governing party plus weak and warring opposition parties, the
result could be poor governance. And the losers are your poor relatives. I certainly would have thought differently
if Meles’ departure could result in the
building of a momentum for the movement of opposition parties. They are instead
being fragmented and destroyed by their own contradictory internal dynamics.
The suggestion here, therefore, is that Prime Minister Meles serves another
term and goes by 2015.
I recognize the importance of criticisms of Meles
and EPRDF`s leadership in general. In particular, the political
behaviour of EPRDF people is unpredictable and continues to irritate us, as we
saw in the recent re-arrest of Birtukan Mediksa. The problem is that most of
the criticisms are so politicized that they do not tell us the whole story. For
example, how much should EPRDF get blamed for the ongoing food insecurity in
the country? Since the 1990s, on the advice of international agencies, mostly
UN agencies, the rural development policies of many governments including
EPRDF’s have been focused on supporting smallholder farmers. This approach was
not questioned until the recent global food crisis, the question being the
extent to which small farmers are capable of producing surpluses to feed
growing urban and affluent populations, given the increasing complexity of
production constraints like land scarcity, resource degradation and high cost
of inputs. Today we talk about government leadership in mass production of food
crops (through large scale farming), non-farm income sources and rural
industrialization. Other tasks also
remain formidable. For example, in Canada, on average it may cost US $100,000
to build 1 km of a rural road in five days. In Ethiopia, the average cost of
building 1 km of rural road could be up to US $2 million and it could take
several weeks. In Canada, people earn money and then spend it to stimulate the
economy. In Ethiopia, people earn money and, after spending a bit, they keep
the cash in their pockets or bury it. As the Reporter rightly noted, most of
the money in the country does not get circulated and so it has no impact on the
economy. You can promote cognitive changes by making people aware of
sanitation, nutrition, health, transportation, saving, investment, leisure and
other issues, so that they can consume (buy) manufactured goods and services.
But these take time. You cannot force people to change their way of life. This is what I mean when I say that critics,
while legitimate, do not tell us the whole story. We can also
help by sharing innovative ideas and approaches for responding to emerging
challenges and opportunities.
Ottawa, Canada
February 2009