A Simple Question to All Who Seek To Exert Pressure on Ethiopia: D0 YOU NEGOTIATE WITH TERRORISTS?
“We shall never forget the barbarism and savagery committed by the greedy and ruthless TPLF junta on members of our Northern Command. We shall not rest even for a moment until this junta is brought to justice and punished. I would like to reassure the Ethiopian people once again that until our efforts to ensure the supremacy of the rule of law is completed, there will be no negotiations with this junta. ” PM Abiy Ahmed, November 10, 2020
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One thing the international meddlers should know is this: “Ethiopian solutions for Ethiopia’s problems. African solutions for Africa’s Problems.
All who seek to pressure the Ethiopian government to “negotiate” with the TPLF should STOP MEDDLING and ask themselves a simple question: “Would they negotiate with a certified terrorist group that declared war on their national defense forces, caused untold deaths and misery on civilians and trashed their constitution? Of course not!
The sanctimonious holier-than-thou leaders and politicians urging PM Abiy to negotiate with the TPLF terrorists should be honest like Secretary Mike Pompeo and declare:
“We stand with the people of Ethiopia and will work with all who are committed to peace, prosperity, democracy, and the rule of law.”
If there is going to be negotiations, let it be on the battlefield. The TPLF will soon be served with two choices: Surrender or Go Six Feet Under! — Alemayehu G. Mariam
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed is being pressured to “negotiate” with the certified terrorist group known as the “Tigrean People’s Liberation Front” (TPLF).
Let there be no mistake.
The TPLF is a terrorist group registered in the Global Terrorism Database.
Let me make it crystal clear! The TPLF is a terrorist group registered in the Global Terrorism Database.
Let there be no mistake.
This is not an ethnic conflict in any way, shape or form!
The action taken by the federal government is specifically and ONLY against the TPLF and NOT the people of Tigray.
The people of Tigray are the worst victims of TPLF’s crimes. In their name, the TPLF has committed so many crimes and engaged in so much corruption.
The TPLF has used the people of Tigray as a political shield and now as human shields as it faces military action.
On November 4, 2020, the TPLF terrorists attacked the Ethiopian Northern Command fort in the Tigray region of Ethiopia and declared war on the Ethiopian federal government.
Today, efforts are underway to pressure Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to “negotiate” with the TPLF terrorists.
The U.S. Embassy urged “an immediate de-escalation of the current situation in Tigray” and “strongly encouraged all parties to prioritize civilians’ safety and security.”
The U.N. Secretary-General called Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok of Sudan, currently chairing the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), Moussa Faki Mahamat, Chairperson of the African Union Commission, and President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, current Chair of the African Union and “expressed the readiness of the UN to support the IGAD and the African Union in any initiative to address the situation.”
The African Union also called for a ceasefire and the European Union expressed its intention to “support to any initiative of IGAD and the African Union to address the situation.”
The purpose of all the telephone calls and public statements is to pressure PM Abiy to “negotiate” with certified terrorists!
PM Abiy has made it crystal clear that he does not negotiate with terrorists.
He stated, “The TPLF has chosen to wage war. The last red line has been crossed with this morning’s attacks and the federal government is, therefore, forced into a military confrontation.”
Just today, PM Abiy declared, “Until our efforts to ensure the supremacy of the rule of law is completed, there will be no negotiations with this junta. ”
Only US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo got it right!
Damn right!
The United States is deeply concerned by reports that the Tigray People’s Liberation Front carried out attacks on Ethiopian National Defense Force bases in Ethiopia’s Tigray region on November 3. We are saddened by the tragic loss of life and urge immediate action to restore the peace and de-escalate tensions. The protection of civilian safety and security is essential. We will continue to follow this situation closely. The United States stands with the people of Ethiopia and will work with all who are committed to peace, prosperity, democracy, and the rule of law. (Italics added.)
Secretary Pompeo’s statement mirrors exactly what PM Abiy has been saying since he came to office in April 2018.
Explaining the current situation, PM Abiy stated the military operations in Tigray seek “to restore the rule of law and the constitutional order, and to safeguard the rights of Ethiopians to lead a peaceful life wherever they are in the country.”
Law and order and peace!
That has been the rallying cry of PM Abiy Ahmed for the past two years.
PM Abiy could best be described as the supreme advocate of prosperity.
He loves prosperity so much that his political party is known as “Prosperity Party”.
Democracy is what PM Abiy pledged from the day he took office on April 2, 2018.
In his inauguration speech before Parliament, PM Abiy pledged:
We Ethiopians need and also deserve democracy. Democracy is not for us an alien idea. When it was foreign to many peoples and countries, we lived under and governed by our democratic Gadaa system becoming an example on to the world… Democracy is unthinkable without freedom. Freedom is not a gift doled out to people by a government. Rather a gift of nature to everyone that emanates from our human dignity. We need to respect all human and democratic rights, especially to free expression, assembly and organization, by upholding the constitution that emerged from this understanding of freedom. The rights of all our citizens to take part in all structures and at all levels in a democratic manner need to be fully realized.
He solemnly cautioned, “Many have also been martyred to give birth to our new democratic order. To develop our fledgling democracy, it is not necessary for us to pay any additional life and bodily sacrifices.”
Pay with additional life and bodily sacrifices is exactly what the TPLF has done over the past 27 years and now in its cowardly attack on the Northern command.
Did Abraham Lincoln negotiate with the South Carolina militia leaders that attacked Fort Sumter?
What happened to the Northern Command in Ethiopia on November 3, 2020 is not much different than what happened to the United States Army at Fort Sumter, near Charleston, S.C. on April 12-13, 1861.
On the morning of April 12, 1861, the South Carolina militia bombarded the federal Fort Sumter and after monthslong siege forced the United States Army to surrender.
South Carolina seized all Federal property in the Charleston area and a federal naval resupply effort failed.
The strategic aim of the militia was to vanquish the U.S. Army, Navy and Marines, take over federal property including military installations and prepare the way for secession, break away from the Union.
On the morning of November 3, 2020, the militia and regional forces of the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front bombarded the Northern Command fort of the Ethiopian federal government with the same exact aims of the South Carolina confederate militia. Not unlike the South Carolina militia, the TPLF militia sought to wipe out the Northern Command, take over all Ethiopian federal military installations and property and prepare the way for secession.
The sneak attack on the Northern Command was a well-coordinated effort by the TPLF. But no one had expected the TPLF would undertake such a cowardly attack.
Unlike the U.S. Army that evacuated Fort Sumter, the valiant soldiers of the Ethiopian Northern Command literally held the fort down and defended against the TPLF militia and regulars.
Ethiopian federal troop reinforcements arrived within hours and mounted a lightening counterattack and routed the TPLF. Thousands of conscripts in the TPLF militia and regulars surrendered to federal forces.
It was a victory that cost the lives of federal troops, militia forces pressed into service against their will and civilians.
When the South Carolina militia attacked Fort Sumter and began its war efforts to break away from the United States, did President Abraha Lincoln negotiate with secessionists in south Carolina?
No! Hell, no!
On April 15, 1861, just three days after the attack on Fort Sumter, President Lincoln issued a Proclamation calling forth the state militias of some 75,000 troops to suppress the rebellion and urged “all loyal citizens to favor, facilitate, and aid this effort to maintain the honor, the integrity, and the existence of our National Union.”
Can anyone reasonably expect less from Prime Minster Abiy Ahmed facing the same existential threat to his nation?
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed did exactly what President Lincoln did.
He mobilized elements of the Ethiopian Defense Forces and deployed them to defeat the TPLF forces and bring their terrorist ringleaders to justice.
Ethiopia’s Federal Council of Ministers issued a declaration “recognising that illegal and violent activities within the National Regional State of Tigray are endangering the constitution and constitutional order”.
PM Abiy stated, “Our defence forces have been ordered to carry out their mission to save the country. The final point of the red line has been crossed. Force is being used as the last measure to save the people and the country.”
The bottom line and the frontline…
The bottom line is that the TPLF which looted, plundered and destroyed Ethiopia for 27 years and bragged about staying in power for 100 years was put out to pasture in 2018 with out a single shot being fired.
The TPLF could not face that fact and so decided to use the billions it looted from Ethiopians to finance terrorism throughout the land.
Since April 2, 2018, the TPLF has been obsessed with overthrowing the government of PM Abiy Ahmed, destabilizing Ethiopia and wreaking havoc in the society.
The issue in the federal defensive action against the TPLF is crystal clear.
The Ethiopian Federal Government has a duty to ensure the Constitution is defended, protected and preserved.
That duty is clearly stated in Article 51(1) (federal government must defend and preserve the Constitution), Article 51 (16) (declare and to lift national state of emergency), Article 93 (1)(a) (Council of Ministers have power to decree state of emergency) and Article 9 (supremacy clause).
No one with a sane mind can argue that bombardment of a federal military installation without provocation or cause can be deemed constitutional.
For years, the TPLF has been threatening war and secession.
I have addressed the TPLF’s war-drumming and -mongering in my February 4, 2018 commentary thoroughly.
What the TPLF leadership did on November 4, 2020 is make good on its long promised threat of war on Ethiopians and the federal government.
There is not a rock PM has not turned to negotiate, mediate, arbitrate and reconcile with the TPLF.
Over the past two years, numerous attempts have been made to bring the TPLF to the discussion table.
Ethiopian elders, religious leaders, civic advocates and activists have urged and even gone to the TPLF’s hideout to work out a peaceful resolution of disputes.
But the TPLF spat on the faces of these leaders.
The TPLF continued with its long train of abuses and usurpations with the aim of unleashing chaos, destruction and instability in Ethiopia.
The TPLF’s guiding mantra follows the proverbial Ethiopian donkey which said, “I do not care if no grass grows after I m gone.”
In other words, “Après moi, le déluge.” After me the flood.
Yes, the flood of blood in Ethiopia.
The TPLF planned, financed and organized terrorist activities throughout Ethiopia causing untold deaths and displacement of millions of people.
The TPLF declared the federal government “illegal” and conducted its own elections in violation of Article 102 (1) of the Constitution of Ethiopia.
The TPLF mobilized its regular regional force and dragooned farmers, students, laborers and others into its militia to attack a federal military installation.
The TPLF pledged to make Ethiopia ungovernable by financing and terrorism throughout Ethiopia.
STOP MEDDLING. Ethiopian solutions for Ethiopia’s problems. African solutions for Africa’s Problems
The United States Government will never negotiate with terrorists and sacrifice its Constitution, compromise its armed forces and the peace and security of its citizens.
Neither will the Governments of the U.K, France, Spain, Germany, Poland, Russia…
Neither will the Governments of Nigeria, Kenya, Sudan, Rwanda….
To negotiate with terrorists is to invite more and more terrorism.
What is good for the goose is good for the gander.
What is good for America, Britain, France, Spain… in dealing with terrorists is good enough for Ethiopia!
NO DEAL WITH TERRORISTS
All who seek to pressure the Ethiopian government to “negotiate” with the TPLF should STOP MEDDLING and ask themselves a simple question: “Would they negotiate with a certified terrorist group that declared war on their national defense forces, caused untold deaths and misery on civilians and trashed their constitution?
Of course not!
President Lincoln did not negotiate with insurrection leaders that bombarded Fort Sumter?
Why should PM Abiy negotiate with the TPLF terrorists that bombarded the Northern Command fort?
When Ethiopians “negotiated” with the TPLF in 1991, they got a raw deal. They got the shaft that lasted 27 long years.
Now, they want us to negotiate with the TPLF? Not happening!
Those who pontificate about negotiations should first understand the root cause of the problem and the existential threat the TPLF poses to Ethiopia.
Scripted blather about “negotiations” will not intimidate the Ethiopian people or their leaders.
If there is going to be negotiations, let it be on the battlefield. The TPLF will soon be served a final notice: Surrender or Go Six Feet Under!
The sanctimonious holier-than-thou leaders and politicians pestering PM Abiy to negotiate with the TPLF terrorists should be honest like Secretary Mike Pompeo and declare:
“We stand with the people of Ethiopia and will work with all who are committed to peace, prosperity, democracy, and the rule of law.”
HAIL TO THE HEROIC ETHIOPIAN DEFENSE FORCES.
YOUR SACRIFICES SHALL BE SEARED NOT ONlY IN OUR HEARTS AND MINDS BUT ALSO IN THE GLORIOUS PAGES OF WORLD MILITARY HISTORY.
NEVER IN THE HISTORY OF ETHIOPIA HAVE SO MANY OWED SO MUCH TO SO FEW!
