Mengistu's evil empire falls
Keren Massawa
Asmara •
THE collapse of General Mengistu's military regime in Ethiopia has led to a flurry of diplomatic activity on the part of the United States. FRANCIS CAZALS
A T THE end of April, the Shen-
go [Ethiopian parliament] adopted two resolutions in an attempt to save the regime from impending disaster. One proposed the legalization of the opposition and the other the call-up of 18 year olds.
The armed opposition fronts treated the first resolution with contempt, while the second never came to life since the army collapsed a few weeks later. The final episode, involving the flight of president Mengistu to Zimbabwe and his replacement by the head of the Ethiopian army, General Tesfaye Gebre Kidan, was unable to halt the political and military collapse
At the end of May the general, who had taken refuge in the Italian embassy, was abandoned by the elite presidential guard, who were busy looting the presidential palace. He appealed to the United States to restore order in the capital.
With the rebels of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) already at the gates of the capital, the US' Mr. Africa, Herman Cohen, who had mediated at the London peace negotiations, felt the time had come to "recommend" that the EPRDF enter Addis Ababa. Eritrean fighters capture key cities
At the same time, the fighters of the Eritrean Popular Liberation Front (EPLF, who have been fighting for independence for two decades, captured Asmara, the Eritrean capital, and Assab, a Red Sea port, cities that had previously been outside their grasp, meeting little resistance.
The London agreement between the American mediator, the EPRDF, the EPLF and the Omoro Liberation Front (OLF) merely set down in writing the relationship of forces on the ground.
The agreement calls for the convocation of a conference on July 1, 1991 to set up a transitional administration. In the meantime the administration of Ethiopia has been entrusted to the EPRDF.
miles 200 Kassala Barentu.
In Eritrea, the EPLF has SUDAN already announced the establishment / GONDAR of a separate transitional 1. government to oversee the holding of a ref- .!: GOJAM erendum on independence
WOLLEGA the result both of their own military advances and the disintegration of the regime and its army, whose fighting spirit has faded away.
Over the years the Mengistu regime had become almost totally discredited. It persisted by appealing to the strong feeling in favour of maintaining the unity of the Ethiopian empire which exists among the Amhara population, from whose elite the Addis Ababa regime was drawn. The secessionist danger in Eritrea and Tigre was constantly emphasized.
### Military clique replaces
Otherwise, after coming to power in the aftermath of the 1974 revolution, the ruling military clique had totally exhausted all the hopes aroused by the overthrow of the imperial regime. A military and bureaucratic tyranny replaced that of the Emperor Haile Selassie.
In order to better prosecute the war against the Eritreans, oppress the peasantry (with hundreds of thousands of deaths in the 1984-85 famine) and crush all civilian opposition (as well as executing generals who had expressed interest in a peaceful resolution of the Eritrean conflict), the regime hid behind a pseudo-Marxist ideology, given credence by their cooperation with the Soviet Union
It may well be that the social situation in 1974 did not offer the possibility of passing over from socialist revolution, but that cannot exonerate the many who have spent the past years trying to pass the Mengistu regime off as an example of some kind of "non-capitalist road of development."
In the course of the years, the regime lost all social support outside of the bureaucracies, and definitively failed to
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TIGRE Makalle Assab! ETHIOPIA
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HARER Addis Ababa crush the Eritrean and Tigrean guerillas. In the dying hours, even erstwhile friends had begun to take their distance, in the first place the Cubans, who refused to go along with the whole military plan for Eritrea. The Soviets, to whom the Ethiopian government was heavily indebted, also reconsidered their military aid.
The events in eastern Europe finally showed Mengistu which way the wind was blowing and he made an attempt to link up with Israel, starting with the restoration of diplomatic relations. For a time Israeli military advisers replaced the Soviets.
Using the Falashas (Ethiopian Jews) as a bargaining counter, Addis Ababa was able to get several consignments of arms from Israel. However in the end these new protectors had to drop Mengistu under US pressure, despite the Ethiopian regime's support for the US in the Gulf. American praise for Marxists
"The Marxists have done good work." These recent remarks by Herman Cohen indicate American strategy, which is especially worried by the prospect of a development similar to what has happened in Somalia (see International Viewpoint, no. 207, May 31, 1991). The US had watched Mengistu eliminate one by one all possible rivals in ruling circles. Last year 18 generals were executed, accused of plotting against him.
By thus turning sectors of the military against him, Mengistu handed Washington a team ready to replace him and at the same time guarantee the continued existence and unity of the Ethiopian state.
At the same time the evolution of the international situation made Washington
1. This reich vet apar arise week, 199) isue 3
of the French revolutionary Marxist weekly, Rouge. June 24, 1991 • #209 International Viewpoint
Some organizations
• The Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF): originated among young "Marxist-Leninist" influenced cadres of the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF). A few years ago, the Marxist references were downplayed. It is the most powerful guerilla force and has been behind the emergence of most of the other guerilla currents in Ethiopia.
• Tigrean People's Liberation Front (TPLF): was set up in 1975 with the help of the Eritreans. Since 1983 it has been led by a small pro-Albanian group, including Meles Zenawi, now head of the interim administration in Ethiopia and at the same time leader of the Marxist-
Leninist League of Tigre, which works inside the TPLF.
• Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF):
was formed around the TPLF in 1989 by the Ethiopian People's Democratic Movement, the Oromo People's Organization and the Ethiopian
Democratic Movement of Revolutionary Officers.
• Oromo Liberation Front: denounces the colonial domination of the Amharas over the Oromo population (40% of the population of Ethiopia) and demands the right to self-determination. Has received support from the EPLF but has come into conflict with the EPRDF. It does not enjoy big military and political influence among the Oromos. * feel more relaxed about the rebels' "Marxist-Leninist" political references. A few months ago there was a change of US policy towards trying to compel the Ethiopian government to negotiate a settlement of the civil war including federalization of the Ethiopian state. The hope was that this would forestall the eruption of rebellion in the capital or the development of mass national movements in those areas of the country, notably in the south, that still remained relatively quiet.
US tries to ride rebel victory
The US strategists have thus tried to ride the inevitable rebel victory in the hope of preventing the explosion of the Ethiopian state. It is this that explains American support for the entry of the EPRDF forces into Addis Ababa and the tacit recognition determination of Eritrea. The US administration will maintain the pressure to limit the developments within a definite framework, making its international cooperation dependent on a satisfactory evolution of the new regime.
The EPRDF was not carried into Addis Ababa on the crest of a national popular insurrection. Built around the Tigrean Popular Liberation Front (TPLF), EPRDF's main base is in Tigre province. The EPRDF is the TPLF supplemented by satellite organizations — one for Ethiopian oppositionists, one for the Oromo people and another for revolutionary army officers — and it is unclear how representative these latter are. The TPLF started out as a revolutionary nationalist organization based on anti-government and proautonomy sentiment in Tigre.