Genesis of the fall of Ethiopian Regimes
By: Shabait Staff
November 20, 2003

A famous Ethiopian writer, Bealu Girma in his book “Oromai” the story of a man who had a beautiful fiancée called “Tsegereda Maakel Hager”, but his heart was engaged by another woman with the name “North Star”. He was totally infatuated by the latter. At the end of the tale, he lost both women. The writer throughout the events of his story was attempting to advise the rulers of Ethiopia to be wise and prudent, though the fate of anyone who makes such an advice is gloomy and may in fact lead to his doom- death. The writer actually paid his life for making such an advice.

The cause and factors, however, that led to the demise of both Haile Selassie and the Derg regimes are now repeating themselves. They are leading the TPLF regime to a downfall worst than that of its predecessors. In this context, there are three main causes or factors. These are:

1. Expansion Towards the North:
Usurpation and annexation of what belongs to others in a deep-seated desire and tendency in the psyche of the leaders of the Ethiopian regimes. Their goal was continuously to expand towards the north and to the sea. It seemed an incurable chronic disease. This expansion at the expense of others had always been justified on their part by twisting facts and trampling on principles of justice and rectitude. Thus, Ethiopian regimes have the strong conviction that force and violence are its means for realizing the set agenda. This is despite the fact that history bears witness to the fact that sheer force has never overpowered rightness, because the party that possesses right also possesses determination and perseverance to attain its legitimate cause- its rights. Therefore, we always note that ultimately a just cause, i.e. right triumphs over oppressive and unjust power.

2. The Hegemony of Minority over the Majority:
The second cause is the continued attempt of one nationality to dominate and control the other nationalities. In addition, it practices racist policies and violates the rights and debases the dignity of the majority as well as violating the rule of law and other fundamental human values and norms. However, under such circumstances there is always a counter reaction.

And by the logic of things, such an oppressive power finally consumes itself and exhausts its energy, because its continued success, which is against any logic, would mean the prevalence of chaos and instability.

3. The Repercussions and Consequences of the aforementioned two factors:
These two factors that led to the fall and collapse of the successive Ethiopian regimes is consequential to the repercussions and interactions of the above-mentioned causes. Ethiopia possesses huge natural resources and wealth, which, if properly exploited, could help in realizing considerable economic development that can enable the Ethiopian people to attain a satisfactory level of socio-economic development and prosperity. Despite this, however, Ethiopia has become in the present-day world a real symbol of backwardness and an abode for famine with the accompanying of poverty, disease, crime and chaos. These are indeed, common symptoms in the Ethiopian scene. This is how the world visualizes the image of this godforsaken country.

What is really sad and painful is that these dignified and sagacious people are deprived and in dire need of leaders who take to heart their suffering, troubles and aspirations for a better life, and thus work for improvising their standards of living on the level of those states aiming at all-round progress on the basis of hard work.

All along, Ethiopia was plagued by corrupt and criminal regimes whose regimes whose footsteps are nowadays treaded by a amore gruesome and hideous regime, i.e. The TPLF. Nonetheless, the sages and judicious people of Ethiopia have to look for a way of breaking this vicious circle which only leads to more suffering, destruction and backwardness.