In Deuteronomy 27:17, the bible tells us "Cursed is he who moves his neighbor's boundary stone." To say having Tigray as a neighbor has been nothing but a curse to Eritrea is an understatement. It is enough to make you ask God, "What did we ever do to deserve a neighboring enemy like that?" It was Tigray's attempt to push its boundaries north into Eritrea that has been the cause of all of the complications Eritrea has experienced in the last 15 years. This week marked the 12th anniversary of the signing of the Algiers Peace Agreement. The current leaders of Ethiopia who hail from Tigray, in whose name an expansionist war was fought to cure an inferiority complex, show no sign of vacating sovereign Eritrean territory. But it doesn't stop there. If one considers the opportunity cost alone that has been lost to Eritrea and the region over the last 15 years is incalculable. The fact that Tigrayan leaders were willing to risk it all and gamble everything the
Ethiopian State had as long as it meant that they could take Eritrea down with them is indicative of the depth of the inferiority complex that they are afflicted with. Having failed to militarily dismantle Eritrean sovereignty, they now seem to be pursuing a long-term stealth agenda that is aimed at reversing Eritrean sovereignty. It is hard not to notice how Tigray seems to be co-opting Eritrean culture and national symbols wholesale in the hopes of deliberately blurring the differences and staying close enough to the Eritrean heartbeat until the day is weakened enough through repeated sanctions that Tigray can walk-in and have its way with Eritrea. If it were possible to change your geography, Eritreans would do it in a heartbeat. How nice would it be to trade Tigray for another Sudan that deals with its neighbors in good faith and doesn't suffer from inferiority complex?
Received on Fri Apr 18 2014 - 14:08:51 EDT