Mereja.Forum

[Za-Ilmaknun]

The southern regional state was designed in a way that contradicts the core idea of the constitution. There was no enough justification coined to cobble together ethnic groups that are larger in land mass and population size than most of the existing 9 regional states. This blip however, was intentionally done so that in the event TPLF needs to go for the 39th or any major changes that are anathema to the desires of TPLF , this block is an assurance to garner the necessary vote. So many misfortunes have happened between now and when the constitution was crafted and the shame federation was established none of which are in favor of the original intentions of the TPLF party.

With the realities on the ground changing there came a necessity to alter the original equation all together there by supporting splinter groups by TPLF. What seems to have been lost by the boor is the genuine desire by every ethnicity to administer their own fiefdom and the complete rejection of any kind of master- servant relationships. In as long as hegemonic aspirations are checked and rejected, no matter how many small fiefdoms are coming to be, the green pasture for TPLF has been gone for no return. In real ethnic federalism, there is nothing TPLF can gain more than its proportional size there by rejecting vehemently any genuine endeavors. Those who are comically trying to replicate what TPLF has been rejected for are only elongating the sufferings of the country with no eventual success.

[Ethoash]

To fix this problem we must have 3 level of government

first one fed. government where Dr. Abiy rule everyone

second level where 9 region govern themselves..

3rd level city or town level where u elect your own mayor to run your own city.. no body tell the other how to do their job hence everyone will be at peace all leave of government their power limited so they dont have to worry what the power they going to get it

[Za-Ilmaknun]

To fix this problem we must have 3 level of government


second level where 9 region govern themselves..

3rd level city or town level where u elect your own mayor to run your own city.. no body tell the other how to do their job hence everyone will be at peace all leave of government their power limited so they dont have to worry what the power they going to get it

I share your thought. You sometimes make sense all is not lost, I have hope

[Ethoash]

To fix this problem we must have 3 level of government


second level where 9 region govern themselves..

3rd level city or town level where u elect your own mayor to run your own city.. no body tell the other how to do their job hence everyone will be at peace all leave of government their power limited so they dont have to worry what the power they going to get it

I share your thought. You sometimes make sense :lol: all is not lost, I have hope

how about if i stop participating in this forum if i get one agreement i dont think i will top this ... i am not joking .. bye good bye...

[Za-Ilmaknun]

To fix this problem we must have 3 level of government


second level where 9 region govern themselves..

3rd level city or town level where u elect your own mayor to run your own city.. no body tell the other how to do their job hence everyone will be at peace all leave of government their power limited so they dont have to worry what the power they going to get it

I share your thought. You sometimes make sense all is not lost, I have hope

how about if i stop participating in this forum if i get one agreement i dont think i will top this ... i am not joking .. bye good bye...

Look I am not against you as a person. Despite your vulgarities, I never reciprocated in kind. All I try is see thru your comments and counter argue when I see things that I don't agree with and encourage your positive contributions. Change starts at individual level. You could contribute positively to change the ever toxic political discourses ...but it is also a choice to be part of the toxicity. Your going away solves nothing but your constructive arguments do. This is from your buda friend..lol

[Za-Ilmaknun]

The SEPDM position rests on the achievement of a “southern identity” rooted in respecting diversity and Ethiopian unity. Often supported by academics like Kinkino, statehood advocates argue for dignity through equal recognition, as smaller groups such as the Harari received a region when the federation was designed. The SEPDM leadership argues that SNNP is a cost-effective arrangement, while activists and local elites claim that smaller regions would be more administratively efficient. For example, Keffa, a western Zone with a history of autonomy is a long way from Hawassa. Arguably, even the relatively sparsely populated South Omo Zone—whose extreme ethnic diversity, with its many agro-pastoral peoples—adds yet another layer of complexity and could potentially become a viable region with a seat at Jinka. Much will now depend on how Sidama fares in its unprecedented bid to become the federation’s tenth member.

Currently, Sidama Zone is lumped in with other lower revenue-raising capacity zones and special weredas in SNNP, while Hawassa City is the only self-sustaining administration in the region. SNNP provides a subsidy of 3.2 billion birr to Sidama Zone, which has livestock and cereal and is the leading coffee-producing zone in Ethiopia, the single largest grossing export commodity. More than 40 percent of Ethiopia’s washed coffee comes from Sidama, but it has no powers to levy taxes on this production, which could lead to a regional request that primary commodities have similar federal-regional tax revenue-sharing arrangements to extractive industries.

Largely as a product of EPRDF’s unitary-like de facto control of a de jure radically devolved system, despite the right to raise taxes, regions rely on federal grants and, despite the right to grant weredas and zones revenue-raising powers, weredas and zones rely on regional transfers. Moreover, there is little tax competition between states, again presumably because it is EPRDF and affiliated parties that have jointly set policy.

With the EPRDF system more strained than ever before, these federal dynamics could begin to shift. And with increased inter-regional tensions, better performing states may start objecting to subsiding those that rely more on federal grants. Regional administrations would be in a better position to adjust to this new scenario than zones or special weredas because of regions’ constitutionally guaranteed
revenue-raising rights.

https://www.satenaw.com/southern-comfort-on-the-rocks/

[Za-Ilmaknun]

In the Transitional Charter, 63 NNPs were grouped into 14 regions, with the original 45 NNPs of the south spread across five multi-ethnic districts.

Yet the constitution, drafted by a commission selected by transitional parliamentarians, eventually compressed the five regions into one. The official reasoning was partly a concern about a lack of qualified civil servants, according to a recent SNNP government-commissioned study. The Sidama and others saw the consolidation as inconsistent with the creation of Harari, Gambella and Benishangul-Gumuz regional states, which had much smaller populations than a number of southern NNPs, and this triggered the ongoing

The EPRDF’s travails combined with the democratization agenda, which should mean respecting the rule of law, are leading to the constitution being tested more than ever, according to Ethiopian federalism expert Van der Beken. He stresses that critical parts of the constitution have now become important practical considerations after lying largely dormant. Provisions such as Article 39, the secession clause, and Article 47, the rules for statehood requests, were largely theoretical, as there had only been the Somali case for secession in the early years of the federation, a short-lived claim by the Berta in 2001 for separate statehood from Benishangul-Gumuz, as well as a previous Sidama statehood push in 2006.

[Za-Ilmaknun]

The Southern drama is not just a product of local divisions. If Sidama activists claim rights to statehood as part of democratization promised by Abiy, opponents of ethnic federalism see it as a classic example of the blinkered ethno-nationalism they say is tearing the country apart. Instead, they want Hawassa to become an autonomous city accountable to the federal government like Addis Ababa; and possibly a campaign for that eventuality will emerge if Hawassa City is shown by disaggregated results to have voted against statehood. Abebe Gellaw, the Managing Director of ESAT, has crowed that fragmentation in Southern Nations would provide conclusive evidence that ethnic federalism has failed.

While Oromo nationalists received widespread support when they stoked unrest against the EPRDF, and against the Tigray People’s Liberation Front in particular, under Abiy, there is no reason for opposition elites that back the prime minister to support ethno-nationalist agitators. Sidama might have expected support in July from Oromo activists like Jawar, but he was not forthcoming. Other than the Oromo Liberation Front, Oromo parties sat on the sidelines, presumably because they faced the no-win outcome of upsetting either the government or Sidama campaigners.

[Za-Ilmaknun]

While these types of positions are part of the broader debate surrounding the Southern Question, the most acute issue is within the ruling coalition. Under assault from opponents, EPRDF has also been internally fraying due to suspicion and competition among its members, as shown by the heated rhetoric between Tigray and Amhara’s ruling parties following the June 22 assassination, which put the bad blood on public display. The TPLF position that SEPDM should handle the statehood requests (basically, by accepting them; contravening the TPLF’s earlier stance during the Meles era) and the latter’s rejection of that interference was another sign of ruling coalition’s internal trauma.

The EPRDF has been ruled by each of its four parties having a quarter of the share of the vote in the coalition’s decision-making committees, regardless of their demographic weight. This arrangement is already under pressure with the country’s most populous region, Oromia, in the ascendancy, and would come under increasing strain if one or several new southern states emerged.

But the broader risk is that the EPRDF’s unraveling could be triggered by the disintegration of SEPDM, if its efforts of holding together the region fail, which would then undermine its own raison d’être. Abiy’s answer is for EPRDF’s bickering members to merge into a single national organization, while also adding the affiliated ruling parties from five other regions into the mix of what would be called the Prosperity Party.

But this untested and bold move—for which a new method of apportioning voting weights between regional chapters has not yet been agreed upon—could create further instability in the federation. The first signs of this are indicated by Jawar’s criticism and TPLF’s vote and statement in opposition to Abiy’s proposal. Yet, the move to merge also contains the potential for positively re-balance the political spectrum by at least moving the EPRDF beyond its current travails, albeit into an uncertain future.