Congressional Record
102nd Congress (1991-1992)
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DOES DEMOCRACY HAVE A CHANCE? -- (BY MICHAEL JOHNS) (Extension of Remarks - May 06, 1992)
[Page: E1281]
- Mr. BURTON of Indiana. Mr. Speaker, Ethiopia and Eritrea are emerging from decades of warfare with many problems but with a determined spirit to succeed. This determination is already showing results in the political and economic spheres. I would like to place into the Record for the benefit of my colleagues an article by Michael Johns, formerly of the Heritage Foundation, from a recent issue of the World and I regarding the situation in Eritrea and Ethiopia.
Does the ongoing demise of African autocrats mean that democracy will at last have a fighting chance in Africa? This may now be the central question facing the embattled, poverty-stricken nation of Ethiopia. Its autocratic leader, Mengistu Haile Mariam, fled for Zimbabwe on May 21, leaving behind a nation mired in political chaos and famine. Whether the country's nightmare conditions improve or not will depend largely on what that country's new government does next.
Mengistu's departure is significant for two reasons. First, should the new government, led by acting president Meles Zenawi, abandon Mengistu's 14-year failed experiment in autocratic, socialist policies, it could potentially signal the beginning of a new, more promising era for Ethiopia's 51 million people. (Since 1977, Ethiopians have suffered under Mengistu's Stalinist regime, one of the world's most horrific since Cambodia's Pol Pot.)
Second, combined with the promise of free and fair elections in Soviet-backed Angola next year, Mengistu's departure marks the end of Soviet client-states in Africa. Mengistu enjoyed, from 1977 until his recent departure, some $10 billion in Soviet military aid. The demise of Soviet-backed regimes in Angola and Ethiopia opens an opportunity for Washington to abandon its Cold War policies that were designed to contain and counter Moscow's geopolitical advance in Africa. Washington will now have an opportunity to rethink its policy toward the African continent, and to contribute constructively, should it so choose, to the potential emergence of political and economic liberty there.
How might the new Ethiopian government--a coalition known as the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF)-- fit into this new agenda? So far, there are some modestly encouraging signs that the front intends to abandon Mengistu's autocratic practices. Washington, appropriately, has made it clear that without such a move, American foreign aid to Ethiopia will be jeopardized. Encouragingly, the new government is promising a meeting this summer to develop a transitional government and to discuss free and fair elections.
If these promises are kept and democracy arrives in Ethiopia, it would be among the most significant steps forward for political democratization on the African continent to date. Mengistu's departure from power is the latest in a series of political changes in Africa--Benin's Mathieu Kerekou, Guinea-Bissau's Joao Bernardo Vieira, Liberia's Samuel Doe, Mali's Moussa Traore, and Somalia's Mohammed Siad Barre have all been toppled within the past year. But, as in Ethiopia, it remains to be seen whether or not the departure of the autocrats does pave the ground for genuine political and economic liberalization or whether they will simply be replaced by other like-minded leaders.
Looking at the political chaos currently rocking countries like Liberia and Somalia, there is plenty of room for skepticism. Democratic promises have been made and broken before in Africa (recently in neighboring Sudan, Lt. Gen. Umar Hasan Ahmad al-Bashir took power in a coup, promised democratic change, and then took his nation still further in the direction of authoritarianism). Thus, there are no guarantees that Mengistu's successors will not fall to the same temptation.
Like many other African nations, Ethiopia also faces another challenge: deep ethnic and national divisions. Most of the resistance movements that fought Mengistu sought not a democratic Ethiopia, but the independence of their respective provinces. In one case, that of the northern province of Eritrea, this objective may now be in sight. For thirty years, the Eritreans fought Ethiopia's heavily armed army, which, under Mengistu, was sub-Saharan Africa's largest. Now, with Mengistu's forces defeated, the new Ethiopian government appears ready to grant the Eritreans the right to hold a referendum on independence. If held, it almost surely will be adopted and Eritrea will emerge as a new, independent nation.
Eritrea is not the only Ethiopian province seeking a greater distance from Addis Ababa, Similar movements also exist in Tigre, Oromo, and other provinces, but these movements seem more intent on achieving greater political and economic autonomy, not necessarily independence. However, if these movements do at some point succeed in breaking away from Ethiopia, it would spell the breakup of Ethiopia. This, in turn, could potentially lead other African nations to push for similar ethnic or nationalist dissolutions in their respective lands.
The managerial capabilities are also being questioned of the new Ethiopian leadership. Clifford Krauss, who has been writing from Ethiopia for the New York Times since the coup, observed in early June that the new government has `no administrative experience and [is] resented by much of the population.' Having spent the vast majority of their professional lives as guerrilla fighters for the Tigrean People's Liberation. Front (TPLF) and other resistance forces, it remains to be seen whether the EPRDF will be up to the enormous challenges that await them. Furthermore, some analysts contend that the new regime contains factions from the far Left, some of whom have cited Albania's former Marxist government as their political and economic model.
There also are no signs that Mengistu's departure will signal the end of the famine that has struck Ethiopia with regularity since 1984. The severity of these famines were magnified by Mengistu's largely Stalinist political and economic programs. But, even with his departure, problems continue to linger. According to recent testimony by Bread for the World's Sharon Pauling, `at least 21 million people are at risk of starvation in the [Horn of Africa] region.
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