UN: Conflict Prevention--Warning Signs of Collective Violence in Ethiopia

Introduction

This article discusses warning signs of collective violence with a view to helping the UN make timely and effective decisions to prevent civil war, genocide, ethnic-cleansing and political violence in Oromia, Ogaden and Addis Ababa. Since the adoption of the United Nations´ Agenda for Peace in 1992 under the leadership of Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the international community has devoted a rising attention to peacemaking, peacekeeping and peace-building—summed up under the broader title, "preventative diplomacy." The Agenda for Peace was a remarkable development that came immediately after the end of the cold war era´s bi-polar divisive politics. Although the implementation of promises detailed in this document have been sought after to prevent the violent breakout of wars, it could not stop the armed conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovinia (1992-1995) and the Rwandan Genocide (1994). The UN cites disagreements among veto-power-wielding members of the Security Council as the primary reason why its plans for peace have not materialized effectively and timely in some regions (UN, 1992:3).

In article 26, the document makes a generalized reference to early warning systems regarding "natural disasters, mass movement of populations, threat of famine and the spread of disease" (1992:7). Nevertheless, it rarely mentions the methods of predicting collective violence resulting from natural and human disasters. It glosses over the significance of theory-based conflict analysis and resolution as ways of predicting the early warning signs of collective violence.

I argue that conflict resolution theories and methods will help predict not only the early warning signs, but also the root causes of conflicts. I will provide examples from conflicts in sub-Saharan Africa, particularly from those in Ethiopia, a nation strategically located near the Middle East and the Gulf of Aden. Over the last two decades, Ethiopia has contributed to destabilizing Eritrea, Somalia, Kenya and now risks being destabilized itself because of alienating and repressing 94 percent of Ethiopians (including the Oromo who are the single largest group systematically denied representation in power). Unless the UN intervenes timely, it is inevitable that a serious episode of collective violence will occur in Ethiopia in the next few years. Especially, a scenario of state-sponsored ethnic-cleaning may unfold against ethno-national groups such as the Oromo and Ogaden. The types of violence will be riots, revolution, guerilla attacks, and massive state terrorization and killings of civilians in these areas.

Major Warning Signs and Conditions for Outbreak of Violence

The first set of warning signs of collective violence in Ethiopia and the Horn seem to emerge from two deeper structural sources: ethnically biased repressive governance and natural disasters that result from misguided state policies in regions that the state considers homes of "enemy" ethnic groups. Because often the UN and its humanitarian branches attribute natural disasters such as famine and drought solely to natural causes (failure of rain, for example), interventions tend to be misplaced on addressing symptoms that arise from structural devastations wrought by deliberate attempts by states to marginalize and alter the population dynamics in Oromia and southern regions.

Gross human rights violations and the narrowing of political space are two of the major manifestations of collective violence in Ethiopia. Since the violent capture of state power by Ethiopian People´s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) , a ruling party controlled by ethnic Tigire core (6 percent of Ethiopia), fundamental human rights of non-ruling ethnic groups have been violated, leading to over 55,000 refugee exodus into Kenya (UNHCR, 2011:1), countless IDPs, 4, 279 extrajudicial killings of Oromo, 987 disappearances (OSG, 2010:1), the overcrowding of the country´s prisons with Oromos, 7.8 million in need of emergency food aid (OCHA, 2011). Although 33 percent of Ethiopia´s budget comes from donors (England, the U.S. and the EU), no donor paused to question Ethiopia over the ways it handles human rights domestically. As a result, aid itself has come to "underwrite repression in Ethiopia" because even to get food aid one is required to join the EPRDF or he/she is condemned to a slow death from starvation (HRW, 2010).

It is perhaps useful to cite specific and recent examples of segregated human rights violations against members of ethnic Oromo to show how actually the trends point toward a more escalated collective violence. In April 2011, fearing that the peaceful revolt that rocked North African nations would spread to Ethiopia, the state security forces preemptively arrested hundreds of key Oromo intellectuals, business persons and opposition leaders. It fired live ammunition into crowds of students on several university campuses, arresting, maiming and indiscriminately killing hundreds of students who were staging mini-protests demanding academic freedom and equality (HRLHA, 201:1-4; Times, 2011). After holding over 200 Oromo civilian political prisoners for weeks without due process, the government charged them with ´terrorism´. The tragedy of the state´s ability to charge Ethiopian civilians as ´terrorists´ under Ethiopia´s 2009 anti-terrorism law (number 652/2009) is indicative of how Ethiopia purchased itself the right to crackdown on opponents or alleged opponents with impunity since it invaded Somalia in 2006 and automatically qualified thereafter to become a U.S. ally on the war on terror. Gudina (2010:3) articulates Ethiopia´s ideologized use of anti-terrorism law as a new post-Cold War immunity shield from international criticism as:

the art of election manipulation has been perfected by both old and new authoritarian leaders in much of the continent while more interestingly the American ´war on terror´ has provided a new opportunity equivalent to the Cold War where dictators could declare themselves as ´anti-terrorists´, but allowed to terrorize their own citizens without a closer scrutiny of the western powers…

Similarly, In Reasons to Kill, Rubenstein (2010:128-156) argues for "war as a last resort" and makes strong observations on how old Cold War policies, rules and strategies continue to justify U.S.´s refusal to employ conflict resolutions methods and how instead the country tries to resolve deep-rooted conflicts militarily. ´Anti-terrorism´ is the new boogeyman replacing ´communism´ where states in the sub-Saharan Africa have similarly started adopting it as core party ideology because of its appeal and currency to uncritical donors. ´Donors´ do not bother to verify whether regimes are legitimate and have a wider-support base from citizens.

The second set of manifestations of collective violence in Ethiopia arises from economic underdevelopment and natural disasters. The government tries to explain away the causes of the so-called "Green Famine" in the south and south eastern Ethiopia by attributing it to plausible but simplistic ´causes´ such as "rainfall patterns, soil erosion, bad preferences for vegetables…" (Epstein, 2010:9). It did not take Helen Epstein, The New York Review of Books journalist who traveled in the region, to find the facts out for herself. She realized the state´s reasoning was nonsense meant for saving face. Natural disasters are exacerbated and at times caused by state´s punitive policies towards the ethnic ´Others´ whereby basic infrastructures such as roads, clinics and nutrition centers are denied to civilians in conflict zones. At times forests are razed to the ground on the ground of eliminating rebel hideouts. Epstein (2010:9-17) recounts her observation of malnourished children and mothers as follows:

Several had obvious goiter, and a few were so anemic they nearly fainted while they were speaking to me…When I asked these women why they could not adequately feed their children or themselves, most replied that they didn´t have enough land, and therefore couldn´t grow enough food either to eat or to sell.

Confirming Epstein´s and my own suspicion that the causes of these deprivations were structural and political than natural, OCHA (2011:1) found Ethiopia to be one of the countries with lowest performance on the Human Development Index, ranking 157 out of 159.

Comparable to Arab and North African states, in Ethiopia and the region rising food and fuel prices, massive youth unemployment and dissatisfaction with their governments are the main tenets of the current landscape. University graduates who are not members of the ruling Tigire or the ruling party are openly discriminated against and denied employments. In fact, membership in an ethnicity or ruling party, not merits and academic performance or work experience, are the basis on which Ethiopia employs public servants (HRW, 2010:59, 73). The devaluation of the local currency by almost 17 percent against USD, and 40 percent rise in fuel prices are making food inaccessible to millions of Ethiopians (World Bank, 2011:1). Even those who supported family members for many years by selling tea and bread on streets (making $1/ day) are faced with economic challenges to meet their basic needs. With at least three most active rebel groups (OLF, ONLF and EPRP) opposed to the government and wide public disapproval of the regime, the tendency for mass movements and crackdowns are already in sight. Economic inequality is perpetuated by the state´s control of all lands, telecommunications, the banking and the rural credit sectors. The remaining half of the national economy is held by an EPRDF-affiliated business consortium called the Endowment for the Rehabilitation of Tigray (EFFORT) (Epstein 2010:8). EFFORT´s freight, transport, construction, pharmaceutical and cement firms "receive lucrative foreign aid contracts and highly favorable terms on loans from government banks," (Epstein, 2010:8).

Conclusion

As the examples of provided in this paper and other histories of signs of collective violence show, it is very highly likely that popular revolt will take place anytime in Ethiopia and the worst consequence can be a Rwanda-style genocide unless the UN intervenes timely. This is highly likely because the minority controls the military and nearly all high-ranking military positions are filled with members of ethnic Tigire loyal to the Ethiopian tyrant, Meles Zenawi. Now is the right time to implement preventative diplomacy before the conflict enters irreversible stages and opportunities are squandered. The warning signs must alert the UN and set it in motion to implement the promises provided in the Agenda for Peace. The UN can do this in at least four ways: use its diplomatic leverage to ensure that the current conflict between the parties will not escalate and spread at an uncontrollable pace; implement conflict resolution (peace-making) strategies and methods to bring all the parties (government and armed and unarmed opposition) together to negotiate a national structural change; prepare to deploy the UN peacekeeping forces to the field (especially in Oromia, Ogaden and Addis Ababa regions) in order to prevent genocide and to facilitate transition to representative democracy; use its humanitarian branches to deliver humanitarian assistance(food, shelter, and medicine) to those in urgent need.

Map credit: IISS Armed Conflict Database

References

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