Mereja.Forum

The saying goes, if you have to fight, “Pick your enemy!” That means if you think your enemy is bad, don’t fight. To many, TPLF seemed a formidable enemy and when we think of the past, you can’t discount TPLF as an easy one. But Abiy all along was confident of destroying TPLF (even at one point he was bragging that TPLF is our shooting practice range) and he picked the best enemy in TPLF. What was he relying on?

Abiy had the time to release the population to think free, to speak free and to feel unrestrained so that when they’re told that TPLF is fighting, the people did not need anyone to persuade or convince or push them to fight or to oppose the TPLF.

On the other hand, TPLF and Tigrians are predictable (that is different from secretive), made from cookie cutter oneness, not allowed to think outside of TPLF’s mesimer (let alone to think outside the box) and they’ve been traumatized by TPLF’s authoritarianism and weakened by advantages thrown their way which killed their critical thinking process.

This was big advantage for Abiy. If he deals some blows, TPLF is predictable on how it attacks, counterattacks, and devises it’s way. There is no thinking outside the box and since it is not a pluralistic society with people allowed to think as they see fit, they lacked the capacity to come up with a supply of fresh and innovative ideas. In this changing world/life where adjustment and pragmatism are the names of the game, if you knew TPLF 20 years ago, you know it today too as dogmatically trapped in its stubbornness.

TPLF has been driven by “politics of ethnic affinity” & not by reason, reality and truth. This causes TPLF to be blinded by ethnic pride/ego/shame unable to correct mistakes for fear of ethnic “shame”. This didn’t allow them to make midcourse correction or come up with innovative ideas tailored to the reality of now. What more can Abiy ask for?

One example was the use of human waves which was replicated from Badme at TPLF's shellacking at Kasagita and even if TPLF was losing, they were bringing truckloads of their innocent jeganu for obliteration.

People may think of Amharas and Oromos divided but that is the beauty of a healthy society which is full of people with diverse ideas, critical of one another, and having various outside-the-box ideas that cannot be had from a “hade hizbi hade libi” people whose minds are tied down by blinding ethnic tyranny.

Also look at how pluralistic Oromo society is: even when the Oromos are said to be in power, there are those who fight that government and those who are bitterly against the government (eg Jawar), even if that means they could have advantages by aligning themselves with the government. THAT IS A SIGN OF A HEALTHY SOCIETY!

What better nemesis for Abiy than one that helps you by doubling down on its faults?

“So who should be left to live and who should be seen off to the world beyond?” Was the question for Abiy when marching to Mekelle to fight with TPLF.

To reduce TPLF to be a worthless enemy:

(1) the thinker minds should be eliminated,

(2) the fighter hand and the emotional quasi-leaders (that have no mind and will only function by sheer rage/emotion) should be left to lead the group to commit even more blunders out of anger;

(3) the reasonable pacifists had to be rescued and brought to Addis;

The people? Just tell them “Amhara did this!” and shepherd them; they’ll do what they’re told.

Leave the followers to be punished by their own. Let the fighters do the job for you and leave them to their own vices.

The robbing of critical thinking and the robotization of Tegaru by TPLF helped Abiy to laser focus his actions as they have no independent thinkers to help them save some of what Meles built. This made his work easier as he had to confront one dimensional thinking saving him energy as there is no intricacy or complexity from herd mentality. TPLF lost in 2018 but what was left was finished off by its own undoing.

The sane are ditching TPLF’s path as they hit the wall.

One is faced with the futility of his exercise and is desperately bargaining with reality but it’s not long before the specter of jeganu myth would bring him back. If you haven’t trained your mind of critical thinking the addiction of robotic herd mentality will drag you back.

TPLF has automatized the people of Tigray into thinking in one dimensional loyalism by inebriating them with the Kool-Aid that cloaked itself in a narrow focus of Tigriay vis-a-vise the whole world, disproportionate nationalism, sentiment of paranoia borne of minority status as all is there to get them.

And they can’t question anything because (1) it is not the time to ask and that will be dealt later (after victory) or (2) everything is good no need to question anything. This added to the merciless cruelty of TPLF against those who step out of the line, reduced Tegaru to be at the mercy of the organization.

Even those who are “intellectuals” either fear, or subscibe to official line or fee like they know less than the organization leading them to stop thinking and play within the safe parameters set by TPLF. This is not healthy as a group/ethnicity/people that doesnit have divided groups of thought would be terminally diminish its influence. (see Amhara and Oromo who have strong divisions of thoughts as people. Even see how Amharas played key role in toppling Hailesilassie or Oromos challenging Abiy currently.)

People who have no viable differences of opinion are doomed to get weak. Organizations are a collection of individuals and they tend to make mistakes and devolve around their intrinsic personal drives that would compromise the interest of the group. And if that organization is not challenged or is not put on notice once in a while that it could be expelled, then it would destroy the people’s interest.

That is what has happened to TPLF. Those in Ethiopia wonder why TPLF drove them all the way to this point if it didn’t have a clear destination in mind. Those outside think why stop now without finishing the goals TPLF set in destroying Eritrea and Ethiopia to the end.

TPLF enjoyed and still enjoys complete monopoly of Tegaru’s destination. It’s becoming too little too late for Tegaru to stop or correct TPLF while it’s deciding on their fate. TPLF succeeded in saving itself and the handful of its leaders from demise by retail trading on the lives of Tegaru. Can anyone put in percentage as to what drive the Pretoria deal - the interest of the people of Tigray or the selfish interest of TPLF’s leaders not to end like Seyoum Mesfin? What percentage - 30/70, 50/50…?

But as TPLF had hypnotized the people for far too long both the people and the group have become so exhausted and indifferent that they’ve become exposed to such horrors and ups and downs.

What has been beneficial to Abiy all along is that there was (almost) only one front of thoughts and interest groups he faced from Tegaru which is encapsulated in TPLF making it easier to pigeonhole and plough through his response. This was and is easier to politically hammer through in one dimension because no alternative force is there for him to contend with or for TPLF to check its path and correct its path making it difficult for Abiy.

I’m sure Tegaru would remain this way dependent on or indifferent to TPLF’s carte blanche power and eventual skid into oblivion.

Don’t be surprised when you soon see TPLF as the strongest ally to Abiy playing to present itself as alternative to Amhara and Eritrea. Will Tegaru buy it? But the real question is “Do they have a choice or the wherewithal to fend for themselves without being bullied by TPLF?”