What’s next for Ethiopia?

In the privacy of my world, I thought I can come up with an idea that can be helpful to us, humans.

I have been thinking about how a system works. Be it a society, or a machine, a system works when its parts function properly. Every part plays a role to accomplish what is expected from its performance. The above definition fits best for a man made system.

When we talk about humans, though, we’re delving into a different territory. It’s a very complex world.

A system of humans is viciously complex. If we breakdown the parts of a societal system, there are those who wholeheartedly work to fulfill their duties, while others challenge and confront the purposes of the accomplishments and go above and beyond to formulate other means of making the system work; their way. This usually ends up helping their ultimate goal of attempting to change the whole agenda of the society.

There are also those who look into the holistic view of the society they are in and try to come up with a compromising idea that helps all parts of the system to choose a somewhat working solution of keeping everyone’s interest as an instrument for change rather than a hindrance to change. The approach of this kind of people helps contribute to a gradually building society, while the former tends to go as far as using destructive means to build a "better society", the problem being, these kinds of groups like to ignore the damaging consequences of their risky techniques. This is because they believe at some point, all means of a peaceful coexistence has exhausted. The day everyone realizes the whole objective was proven wrong, usually when it’s too late can be a recipe for disaster. This can be the result of lack of learning a lesson from other similar disasters.

According to rules of nature, a society will change to a better state either way; the destructive, or the gradually building way. If one asks me which one I would choose, it’s of course the method of building a society one brick at a time over a long period of time. The reason being, building from scratch has no guarantee, as it can easily be likened to child play. I don’t think any of us wants to play a wasteful game, as we have no time to spare to makeup for the lost property and time.

You may wonder what implications could be made of the above comment. It can be implied in many different situations.

What I am implying could very well be the Ethiopian situation at the moment.

In my previous article, I tried to analyze differing scenarios the government should weigh to bring about a lasting solution for the unrests in the Oromo and Amhara regions, most recently mixed with border tensions among nationalities. This has led to catastrophic stagnation of all developmental projects, showing all signs of a failing system. Based on these negative developments, I suggested the government should seek a series of quick fixes to find a resolve for what seems to be a serious lack of confidence in the system. If all fails, then the solution may be to dissolve the parliament and start a new election, as the problem may have to be the way the party came to power. We all remember the ruling party claimed an unprecedented 96% of the seats in the parliament. This may be because the party believed its developmental system of government should not give priority to wasting its time bickering with the opposition. It wouldn’t be a bad idea if it worked as it was hoped for. But to the contrary, it has given way to corruptions of all kinds. In my belief, this is the result of the absence of the closely watching opposition in the parliament, not to mention the dumbness of the media.

Many encouraging developments have been observed since then. The party, starting with apologies to confess it has been part of the problem, pledged to do its best to fix the crisis. The major reforms include the resignation of the prime minister Ato Hailemariam Desalegn, after a lengthy meeting to restructure the government in what seems to be an unprecedented move to be ahead of the fast paced developments.

The new prime minister, Dr Abiy Ahmed, an ambitious young leader has made new approaches to compromise with the people. With the help of the emergency measures, his appeals are creating a relative calm. To make sure this move is at a point of no return, the next action should be a courageous step to create a clearer direction toward participating the major parties without any preconditions in the upcoming elections. It should go as far as dissolving EPRDF into party affiliations that should contend against other peaceful parties in an equal footing. This should be an attempt to make sure people see the clear direction of their future so that they build hope and as a result, achieve peace for a clearer direction of progress.

Needless to say, the above commentary is solely my own opinion. It’s not intended to be followed as a guideline for all solutions, but as an idea open to be polished by other contributions if need be.