Op-Ed: Where is Abiy’s Leadership

April 8, 2021

By: Abdiaziz Ali Hussein

Onslaughts and counter onslaughts will neither bring last peace nor victory into the yard of any region. Actors who can consciously touch the FULL STOP switch of the tension between the two brotherly regions, Afar and Somali must do thier job.

The conflict between Afar and Somali regional states is not new to the eyes and ears of everyone who cares and concerns it. It has been making the headlines for decades and dated back long while having different faces and gave a hard time both regions and took already braves from both regions into the graves while many are paying the highest price of this long-time fighting.

If the two regions couldn’t agree to solve their differences in a peaceful manner, whose job is it to bring last solutions for these historically marginalised regions?

There is no going back as Mustafa Omer, of Somali State said last year the when the two regions met in the office of the Prime Minister “as the issue is based on land disputes let the concerned body consider this and do its work so that we can provide support in our capacity to liquidate it. ‘’

These two regions are brothers and it was yesterday when the Afar region washed by the huge floods and it was Somali Region the first region that loaded huge humanitarian support to Afar Brothers plus their thoughts and prayers was with them. This shows how the two regions are twisted when it comes to hard times that gives heartache. At times I doubt that the repeated bloodsheds of Afar and Somali people are another disease that is beyond pasture and someone in a tall shadow counting the cost that people of Afar and Somali are paying because of this. Who knows?

These two regions are among the least developed regions (LDRs) not in terms of cognizance but terms of development narratives. They are both marginalized and very orphaned by the policies that favour for few Regions.

If Afar and Somali get a lasting peace by now it would have helped to focus on the study of the inclusive approach vowed by current Ethiopia’s leadership and former member of the dismantled Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) that put Afar and Somali into the deep pocket of the where they are today. So in case the inclusion calls from the centre heal the wounds of history of subjugation, marginalisation and take them into every platform they were blacklisted just because of their way of life for the past two decade-plus rule and benefit.

Therefore, nothing to repeat, if the past regimes of the Ethiopian federal government couldn’t able to defuse this conflict, now the current leadership needs to act and prove its commitment to touching the switch of the FULL STOP consciously.

Abdiaziz Ali Hussein Is a writer, educationist, and award-winning campaigner and education advocate. Mr Ali lives in Jigjiga, Ethiopia and can be reached through abdiaziz172@gmail.com.