http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/mar/21/eritrea-efforts-deserve-better-press?newsfeed=true
Eritrea's efforts deserve a better press
- guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 21 March 2012 17.00 EDT
It was good to read the analysis piece by Simon Tisdall (20
March<
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/mar/19/eritrea-ethiopia-isaias-afwerki>)
on the apparent silence in the west about the recent military attacks and
incursions into Eritrea by Ethiopia. As he points out, the Meles regime in
Ethiopia has refused to accept the UN-resolved peace line following the
1998-2000 war, and Eritrean submissions to the UN and the big powers have
been studiously ignored.
Yet the article then describes Eritrea as a totally controlled and
economically failing society, which is far from the case. Not only has it
avoided the famines which recur in the Horn of Africa, it is developing its
own self-sufficiency and self-reliance philosophy and practice with results
in agriculture, reforestation, water distribution, healthcare provision,
gender awareness, and some participatory democracy, notwithstanding the
postponement of formal elections to the national parliament. Its
determination to devise its own path to recovery and development alongside
its geopolitical location costs it dear in terms of isolation, but the fact
it is not a willing partner in the "great game" of power politics has been
made worse by the determination of the US and other western powers to trash
its status and actions, and wrongly continue to accuse it of fomenting
support for al-Shabaab. Eritrea would like, from all evidence I have, to
live and let live. It is the US and its Ethiopian neighbour who have their
own agenda and which beget the dirty tricks.
The accusations made against President Afewerki's regime and its external
policy are at best unfair, and at worst deliberately incendiary, and its
economy is certainly not in the "death spiral" which US ambassador McMullen
attributed to it. It is far from being some equivalent of North Korea or an
error-inducing environment, it hosts mining companies which deliver a
useful social dividend to the state, unlike so much of the globe, and is in
constant dialogue with its diaspora, including those who have opposed the
leadership. It deserves a better press.
**
*Gordon Peters*
*London*
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Received on Thu Mar 22 2012 - 10:31:39 EDT
