Beyond the Cycle: Can Ethiopia Break Free from Ethnic Division?
February 18, 2025
"Let me tell you something, friend," I began, leaning back against the wall, the Addis sun warm on my face. "You know, sometimes I look around at our Ethiopia, and I just feel…tired. Tired of the same old story, the same divisions."
You nodded, settling in beside me, the usual market sounds of the city swirling around us – the hawkers, the buses, the chatter in a dozen languages. "Tell me about it, Yonas. It feels like we're always fighting the same ghosts."
"Exactly!" I exclaimed, gesturing with my hand. "Ghosts of the past, ghosts of ethnicity… it's like we're trapped in a loop. I remember being just a kid, maybe ten years old, at my aunt's place. You know how it is there, always a crowd, always talking."
I paused, remembering the scene vividly. "This one time, it wasn't even a holiday, just some friends gathered, talking politics, you know, the usual Ethiopian way. And there was this man, friend of my uncle, Tigrayan guy. He was holding court, laughing loud, but his eyes… they were cold, you know? He wasn't even talking to anyone specific, just making a statement to the whole room. He said, 'You think you've had enough?' Not even 'You Amhara,' or anything like that. Just 'You.' Like anyone who wasn't him and his… Then he said it, clear as day, 'We will actually rule you for the next hundred years.'"
I shook my head, the memory still unsettling after all these years. "As a kid, it was just… weird. Rule us? What did that even mean? But it stuck with me. It wasn't just about Tigray versus Amhara, you understand? It was like he thought he was just… better. Inherently better than everyone else. Like he deserved to rule, just because he was Tigrayan."
You sighed, picking up a small stone and turning it over in your fingers. "Yeah, that arrogance… I've seen it too. From all sides, Yonas, if we're honest."
"That's the thing!" I agreed, feeling a surge of frustration. "It's not just one group, is it? Remember when Hailemariam Desalegn became Prime Minister? Everyone was relieved, maybe, after Meles… but then, at my aunt's again, my father scoffed, 'A puppet—TPLF still pulls the strings!' And everyone agreed. We wanted change, but we were so used to being ruled by someone, we couldn't imagine anything else. We wanted a strongman to liberate us, not… well, not a leader who wasn't from the group we thought should be in charge."
"And then Abiy came," you prompted, knowing the story as well as I did.
"Abiy…" I breathed out, a mix of emotions swirling within me. "For a moment, it felt like… dawn. Remember the hope? The talk of unity, of prisons opened, of the truth about the TPLF's torture? It was like a cleansing. He spoke about the victims of the TPLF, and we rallied around that. We wanted them gone. I wanted them gone."
My voice dropped, a shadow passing over my face. "But then… then it got ugly. So fast. The propaganda, the fear-mongering… 'They're coming for you!' 'The Amhara are coming!' 'The Oromo are coming!' It was the same old playbook, just a different cast. The TPLF, the corrupt ones, they used the oldest trick in the book, ethnicity. They painted themselves as victims, even after all they'd done. And they convinced their people that Abiy, that anyone who wasn't them, was a threat to their very existence."
"And the war," you said softly, the word hanging heavy between us.
"The war…" I repeated, the word tasting like ash in my mouth. "A million lives, they say. A million. And for what? For power? For pride? For the same damn cycle? I remember seeing people, people I knew, justifying it. 'They deserve it!' they'd say about Tigrayans. 'All of them!' No thought for the innocent, for the families, for the fact that these were… neighbours. It was horrifying, friend. Justifying the suffering of a whole group because of the actions of a few. It was the opposite of everything Mandela stood for, you know? He didn't want the oppressors to become the oppressed. But we… we seemed to want to become the new oppressors ourselves."
I ran a hand through my hair, the weight of it all pressing down. "And Fano… they rose up, fueled by anger, by the desire to destroy the TPLF. 'Destroy them!' was the cry. And they fought. But in the end, who suffered? The ordinary Tigrayans. The ones promised greatness, sacrificed for the ambitions of the few. And then… the cycle just keeps turning. Amhara people killed in Oromia. Silence from the government. It's like… does anyone see the pattern? Does anyone see that we're all just… contributing to this mess?"
You nodded slowly, your gaze distant. "It's like we're all trapped in our own stories of victimhood, Yonas. Each group with their history of suffering, their grievances, their demands. And in that noise, we forget we're all… Ethiopian."
"Exactly!" I exclaimed, feeling understood. "And it's not just the big political parties, is it? Look at us, friend. Even in our everyday jokes, the casual racism. Remember the jokes about Oromo people when we were kids? 'Dumb Oromo,' 'slow Oromo'… It was normalized, you know? Part of the air we breathed. And now, you see the pendulum swinging the other way. Oromiffa everywhere in Addis, which, okay, fine, maybe it's time. But is it about equality, or is it just… tit for tat? Is it just another group taking their turn at the top?"
"And then you hear the Amhara nationalists," you added, "talking about the 'golden age,' about Amhara greatness. Like only they know how to rule Ethiopia. It's the same damn thing, just a different group saying it!"
"It is!" I said, frustrated. "It's all the same. Tigrayan supremacy, Amhara supremacy, Oromo… whoever gets a taste of power, they start thinking it's their birthright. And we, the ordinary people, we get caught in the middle, fighting each other, killing each other, for what? For someone else's power trip?"
I paused, taking a deep breath, trying to find a glimmer of hope in the gloom. "But… but it doesn't have to be like this, does it? We're not doomed to repeat this forever. We're not inherently hateful people. We're Ethiopians! We're smart, we're hardworking, we're… capable of so much more than this."
"So what do we do, Yonas?" you asked, your voice quiet, but earnest.
"I don't know all the answers," I admitted, "but I have ideas. Stupid ideas maybe." I chuckled, a dry, humorless sound. "Like… language. It's a crazy thought, but what if we really invested in communication? Translators everywhere, in every government office, in every hospital. Second languages in schools, not just Amharic imposed on everyone, but a choice, a way to connect with each other, to understand each other's cultures."
"Like building bridges instead of walls?" you offered, a flicker of hope in your eyes.
"Exactly!" I said, feeling a spark ignite within me. "Bridges of language, bridges of understanding. We're not going to erase our differences, we shouldn't even try. But we can learn to live with them, to respect them, to even celebrate them. Imagine a country where an Oromo farmer can trade with an Amhara merchant without suspicion, where a Tigrayan doctor can treat a Somali patient without prejudice, where policies are made for all Ethiopians, not just one group."
I looked out at the bustling city, at the faces passing by, a kaleidoscope of ethnicities, of histories, of dreams. "We're all in this together, friend. Amhara, Oromo, Tigrayan, Somali, Gurage, all of us. This is our land, our future. We can keep fighting over the scraps of the past, or we can build something new, something better. We can join the world, embrace progress, technology, everything that's out there, waiting for us. But only if we do it… together."
I met your gaze, a silent question hanging in the air between us. "Maybe it's just a dream," I said, a hesitant smile touching my lips. "But maybe… maybe it's a dream worth fighting for."