Oromia. The secret war of Ethiopia.
While the attention of international public opinion is focus on the horrific conflict in Tigray, the Oromo armed revolt breaks out again, opposed by Eirtrea infantry divisions, disavowing the news of the Ethiopian Premier of a withdrawal of Eritrean forces from Ethiopia. The Oromo rebellion highlights that the conflict in Tigray is only the tip of the iceberg of a political crisis and a civil war involving all of Ethiopia.
November 03, 2020 will be remembered by historians as the date of the escalation of Premier Abyi Ahmed Ali’s policy of replacing Ethiopian Federation with a strong centralized state. This policy had been Abyi’s leitmotif from the first year of his term as Prime Minister. The slogan “Let us all be Ethiopians” was at the time interpreted as a call for peace between ethnic groups. Since 2012 the country had experienced serious ethnic tensions originating from the political conflict between the main ethnic groups: Amhara, Tigrigna, Oromo. Tensions that had brought Ethiopia to the brink of civil war.
The TPLF, (that controlled governmental coalition since 1991), had promoted Abyi’s candidacy in the hope of proposing a “new face”, calming ethnic tensions and guaranteeing government and federalism system survival. The events that took place between 2019 and September 2020 showed the serious error of assessment committed by TPLF. Their Trusted Man cultivated another policy: the concentration of powers to central government to the detriment of regional autonomies. A policy carried out in close alliance with two sworn enemies of the TPLF: the Eritrean dictator Isaias Afwerki and the far-right leadership Amhara.
Within a year of his mandate, Abiy faced a series of ethnic tensions and rebellions. In 2019, violence in the country had tripled compared to the 2016–2018 period. At the time, there was a suspicion that the TPLF was fomenting these tensions behind the scenes. In reality, they were the natural consequence of the central government’s imposition on regions accustomed to extensive administrative autonomy. The Strong State and the destruction of Federalism was, and remains, the absolute priority of the Ethiopian Premier. Faced with the political impasse, to achieve the goal, Abiy decided to shift the confrontation to the military level, opening Pandora’s box.
While the attention of the international community is turned towards the horrible conflict in Tigray, with strong components of ethnic war, a second war is underway in the state of Oromia, which also hosts the capital Addis Ababa, which has an autonomous administrative status. A war kept secret that the international media seem not to notice or care about.
In mid-March, the Oromo Liberation Army — OLA, the military wing of the main Oromia party: Oromo Liberation Front — OLF, launched a series of surprise attacks in the Amaro district of southern Ethiopia and in the Guji areas of the regional state of Oromo. At least eight people were killed during the attack. Among the victims there is Dagnachew Echala, head of the Amaro district office of the Prosperity Party, Abyi’s party.
OLA offensive becomes worrying at the end of March when 13 districts 70 km from the capital Addis Ababa fall under their control. The government, feeling threatened and short of men, is turning to the only major military force present in the country: the Eritrean army. The dictator Afwerki moves two divisions intent on fighting in Tigray, sending them to fight in Oromia. Eritrean divisions managed to stop the advance of the OLA on the capital but fighting continues in the western and southern districts of the state of Oromia.
The military offensive comes after the decision taken by the Oromo Liberation Front not to participate in the legislative elections to be held either in May or July. The self-exclusion of the main opposition party casts a serious shadow on the validity of these elections that were supposed to be held a year ago but cleverly postponed by the Ethiopian Premier using the excuse of the Covid19 pandemic. The choice made by the OLF is mandatory given the impressive number of party leaders and its members currently incarcerated. In Oromia 108 party offices were forcibly closed and the federal police effectively deprived the OLF of the ability to organize itself for elections.
Abdi Ragassa, Colonel Gemechu Ayana, Michael Bekele (aka Michael Boran) Lamii Begna, Kenasa Ayana, Dawit Abdeta are among the most famous jailed senior executives of the OLF, but there are hundreds of other members of the executive committee , as well as the national congress and various zonal and district coordinators. A total of 30 senior officials and 145 mid-level party officials are currently under arrest. OLF leaders faced arbitrary arrests and politically tainted prosecutions, constant postponements and various transfers of detainees to different detention centers without adequate reason and knowledge of the family.
According to the OLF, its members are in deplorable conditions at the Oromia special police camps, under the control of the Ethiopian Premier. Michael Boran and Kenasa Ayana have complained that he is access to medical care was denied. According to Lammi Gemechu (a still vacant OLF), he told the Addis Standard newspaper similar experiences of incarcerated members in which up to 68 people are held in a cell exposed to communicable diseases. Inmates are denied medical treatment and are not provided with food, except for 20 ETBs per day.
On March 2, 2021, there was also an attempt to assassinate two senior executives of the OLF in prison: Lammi Begna and Dawit Abdeta. The two were forcibly brought out of their cells by gunmen at 1:00 am. However, the cries of the rest of the detainees demanding their release made the killers desist. The witnesses were too many to eliminate and the assassination of the state would have been easily discovered. For almost a month the main OLF leaders have been carrying out a hunger strike in prison in order to be released.
The avalanche of Oromo Leadership arrests came in August 2020 after Oromo insurrection attempt in reaction to the state assassination of the singer and militant Oromo Hachalu Hundessa the previous month. The murder of Hundessa provoked a generalized rebellion that also involved the capital where real urban guerrillas took place. In Oromia, various fellow citizens of Amhara origin were targeted accused of supporting the federal government. An undetermined number of Amhara were attacked and their possessions robbed. Several were shot dead.
The intervention of the army managed to restore order but the number of civilian victims is still unknown. The suppression of the Oromo uprising of July 2020 was the preamble to the conflict in Tigray which began 4 months later. At the moment the news on this secret war is still scarce and deserves to be deepened.
