The 1994 Ethiopian Constitution celebrated self-determination, but it laid the groundwork for todayโs violence. Devolution could offer a way out.
By โ Addisu Lashitew. FP
Addisu Lashitew is a research fellow at the Brookings Institution. Follow Addisu Lashitew: On Twitter
Before the conflict, the Tigray region under TPLF rule was edging toward de facto independence. After the TPLF lost its hegemonic position in Addis Ababa in 2018โwhere it had dominated Ethiopiaโs ruling coalition for decadesโit relocated political and bureaucratic personnel to Mekele.
When national elections were postponed due to COVID-19, the TPLF rejected the constitutionality of the decision and went ahead with its own regional election, which it won handily.
On Nov. 28, 2020, Ethiopiaโs military took control of Mekele, the capital of Tigray region, after a monthlong fight with the Tigray Peopleโs Liberation Front (TPLF).
Then, it declared that it no longer recognized the federal government as legitimate, and it successfullyย thwarted the appointmentย of a new head to the Ethiopian armyโs Northern Command, effectively apportioning to itself the most heavily armed section of the National Defense Force. This was followed by a coordinated, preemptive attack on the Ethiopian armyโs Northern Command in the early hours of Nov. 4 that enabled the TPLF to take control of the army headquarters in Mekele and several other bases. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed quickly appeared on TV to launch a military operation to dislodge the TPLF from Tigray.
The conflict in Tigray is not merely a political squabble between the TPLF and Abiyโs Prosperity Party, but a struggle for sovereignty between the federal government and a regional state. This is also not the first time the federal government went to war to reclaim control of an intransigent regional state. In August 2018, the federal government undertook an armed operation toย dislodgeย Abdi Mohamoud Omar (also known as Abdi Ilay), the then-president of the Somali regional stateโleading to many deaths and the displacement of civilians, especially ethnic minorities.
Ethnic federalism has made Ethiopia a more fragmented, polarized, and conflict-plagued country.
Ethiopiaโs constitution, which was ratified in 1994 under the auspices of the Ethiopian Peopleโs Revolutionary Democratic Front, which was dominated by the TPLF, is unique in endowing sovereignty upon the countryโs nations and nationalities. Its position is also radical because it allows an unqualified right for self-determination, up to secession, to Ethiopiaโs more than 80 ethnic groups. This has raised the stakes in federal-regional disagreements, and potentially increased the risk of conflict by allowing secession to be a bargaining chip in political disputes.
For its supporters, the ethnic-based federal system represents a triumph for the age-old quest of Ethiopiaโs disenfranchised ethnic groups for autonomy and self-rule. The federal system is seen as the answer to the โquestion of nations and nationalitiesโโa school of political thought that critiqued and rejected sociopolitical domination by Ethiopiaโs northern Christian elites, mainly ethnic Amharas and, to a lesser degree, Tigrayans. Ethnic federalism was intended to create a new dispensation that ensured that the political, cultural, and economic rights of all ethnic and religious groups are equally respected.
But the turmoil of the past few years has also exposed the limits of Ethiopiaโs experimentation in ethnic federalism. Even its ardent supporters cannot conceivably deny that ethnic federalism has raised as many questions as it has answered, and that it has made Ethiopia a more fragmented, polarized, and conflict-plagued country.
The endorsement of the Marxist-Leninist notion of self-determination in Ethiopiaโs constitution was all the more puzzling in light of historical developments at the time of its inception. In the early 1990s, just as Ethiopiaโs constitution was being drafted, the Soviet Union and Yugoslaviaโtwo federations that had enshrined ethnic self-determination in their respective constitutionsโwere going through violent episodes of disintegration.
The TPLF and other architects of Ethiopiaโs constitution could not have missed the ominous signs on open display; They most likely considered their own countryโs eventual breakdown as an acceptable, perhaps even desirable, outcome. The bloody dissolution of Yugoslavia, which was attended by bitter interethnic wars, was also a red flag for what self-determination could entail in a multiethnic mosaic like Ethiopia. It was already clear fromย the 1984 national censusย that only 30 of Ethiopiaโs 580ย woredasย (districts) at the time were actually monolingual ethnic islands.
In reality ethnic identities are fluid and overlaid, and ethnic territorial jurisdictions are often overlapping and contested.
The constitutionโs endorsement of the right to self-determination is based on the contentious supposition that ethnic groups can be neatly subdivided into mutually exclusive categories, each with a claim to a distinct territorial homeland. In reality ethnic identities are fluid and overlaid, and ethnic territorial jurisdictions are often overlapping and contested.
Even in Tigray, the only regional state that nominally existed before the current constitution, regional boundaries were entirely redrawn upon the creation of new administrative units in 1994. Much of the current West Tigray and North West Tigray zones (Welkait, Humera, Tsegede, and Tselemte) and some parts of South Tigray (Raya Azebo) wereย apportionedย from the former provinces of Gondar and Wollo, which were mainly inhabited by Amharas.
These territories, which roughly make up one-third of present-day Tigray, are vigorously contested by Amhara nationalists as their ownโa dispute that contributed to the involvement of theย regionโs special forcesย in the recent war in Tigray. Had Tigray under the TPLF proceeded with secession, it would have only been a matter of time before it descended into an intractable border war with the rest of Ethiopia, just as Eritrea did after winning its own de facto independence in 1991, which was formalized through a referendum in 1993.
The 1998-2000 Eritrean-Ethiopian border war, which led to the death of more than 100,000 people from both sides, helped entrench the TPLFโs rule in Ethiopia, but it also severely weakened Eritrea, sowing the seeds of a deep-seated animosity between the TPLF and Isaias Afwerki, Eritreaโs authoritarian president. At the peak of the Tigray conflict in November 2020, the TPLFย fired a series of rocketsย at the capital of Eritrea, accusing it of sending in its army to Tigray, an allegation that Eritrea denies but is supported byย recent independent reports.
One of the most devastating effects of Ethiopiaโs ethnic federalism is its utter failure to protect minorities. For instance, the 1994 constitution created a new region called Benishangul-Gumuz as one of Ethiopiaโs nine (now 10) administrative regional states, as a homeland to the Benishangul and Gumuz ethnic groups. The regionโs constitution affirms that the region โbelongsโ to five native ethnic groups: the Berta, Gumuz, Shinasha, Mao, and Komo. Other important minorities like Amharas, Oromos, and Agaws, who make up at least 40 percent of the regionโs population, areย treated as second-class citizensย without a right to create their own (ethnic) parties for legitimate political representation.
The failure to safeguard minorities extends to all regional states, leaving minorities in a precarious situation where they live with a constant fear of eviction. A narrative of โnativesโ versus โoutsidersโ and a political discourse grounded in ethnic grievances inevitably feeds into cycles of violence. In times of political change and instability, such as the period since 2015, ethnic tensions have boiled over, making minorities victims ofย brutal killing, eviction, and displacement.
The number of these incidents is despairingly too great to count but includes recent episodes where Amharas were displaced by the thousands inย Oromia, Oromos were displacedย from Somali region, Tigrayans were violently evicted from Amhara region, as well as aย perpetual violenceย in Benishangul-Gumuz region that has brought death and destruction to hundreds from all ethnic groups. Theseย tragic eventsย have not only traumatized millions but also frayed the tender threads of trust and social capital that have held communities together for centuries.
Moreover, in its fixation on ethnic autonomy, the current constitution has severely impaired, perhaps intentionally, the political power of urban centersโwhich are ethnic melting pots and thus do not fit the ideological straitjacket of ethnic purity. Since the constitution defines land as a property of ethnic groups, cities without a specific ethnic identity have been left without land, and hence without a right to statehood.
The capital, Addis Ababaโdespite being the economic and political hub of the country with far greater population that four of the original nine regional statesโis constituted as a federally administered enclave that, according to the constitution, is located โwithin the State of Oromia.โ In a country where ethnic identity has become the most fundamental variable of political and economic organization, multiethnic urban centers like Addis Ababa and Dire Dawa are reduced to being staging grounds of political influence among competing ethnic parties rather than being able to administer themselves.READ MOREAll Is Not Quiet on Ethiopiaโs Western FrontThe War in Tigray Is a Fight Over Ethiopiaโs Pastโand FutureDonโt Let Ethiopia Become the Next Yugoslavia
The experiment in ethnic federalism has led to the formation of powerful, militarized, ethnic regional states thatย harbor old grievancesย against one another, along with unresolved border disputes that could ignite conflicts at any time. Unless the power of these regional administrations is checked proactively, there is tangible risk that they could be drawn into devastating conflicts that will wreak havoc not only in Ethiopia, but also in neighboring countries, each of which shares at least one ethnic group with Ethiopia.
Boundary disputes between ethnic regions are hard to resolve, because almost all ethnic boundaries are artificial concoctions that lack historical precedents. Prior to the creation of these boundaries in 1994, Ethiopiaโs many dozens of ethnic groups seldom had administrative boundaries entirely based on ethnic affiliation. Administrative boundaries were typically porous as people freely moved across geographies, especially in the lowlands, where people followed a mobile, nomadic lifestyle. None of the regional states of the federation existed in their current form and many, such as Amhara and Oromia regions, ever historically existed as separate, independent entities, within Ethiopia or outside. The top-downย manufacturing of ethnic nations, complete with sovereign territorial boundaries, has begotten simmering border disputes that threaten to plunge the country into a civil war.
Even from the perspective of ethnic rights, the current system has not enabled the majority of the countryโs ethnic groups to exercise the right to self-rule. An arbitrary nomenclature of ethnic classes has been used to allow certain ethnic groups to be organized as autonomous regional states, while denying the same right to other groups of similar population size.
The current system has not enabled the majority of the countryโs ethnic groups to exercise the right to self-rule.
The constitution, for example, lumped together around 20 million people of no less than 50 ethnic groups within a region called Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoplesโ Region (SNNP), while allowing the creation of a Harari regional state in Harar City, with a population of less than 300,000. Hararis were accorded statehood despite making upย only 9 percent of the population, purportedly in recognition of the unique historical and religious significance of the city of Harar, which is fully encircled by Oromia, a massive region with close to 40 million inhabitants. These size differences create asymmetric power relations among competing administrative polities and the associated political entities that administer them, leading to political, administrative, and economic imbalances.
A highly exclusionary ethnonationalism will create persistent risks of volatility and violence, which could undermine democracy by making authoritarian positions more palatable on the grounds of peace and security. It also creates the risk of major ethnic groupsโthe Amhara and the Oromoโforming alliances that co-opt smaller ethnic groups, leading to a political settlement that is neither inclusive nor progressive.
It is clear that Ethiopiaโs ethnic federalism needs a major overhaul in order to sustain a peaceful electoral democracy. Without a reform, the system remains a risk to itself and the country, as ethnic rivalries could easily descend into cycles of violence that will endlessly repeat the traumatic experience of the past five years.
Fixing Ethiopiaโs broken federal system will require a constitutional reform that establishes new checks and balances to mitigate the risk of ethnic politics exploding into downright violence. One potential approach would be a referendum on political devolution that elevates administrative zones to the level of administrative states, thus replacing regions. Zones, which are currently the second-tier administrative units after regions, are typically inhabited by a distinct majority ethnic group.
The elevation of zones to state-level members of the federation can ensure ethnic self-administration, which would be in keeping with the constitutional emphasis on autonomy and self-rule. At the same time, it would significantly reduce the likelihood of major military or political clashes between neighboring regions, and between regions and the federal government. It would also lead to zonal states that are relatively uniform in size, facilitating a more fair and equitable sharing of political and other forms of power across them.
More importantly, having zonal states as main administrative units would be a significant step toward ensuring self-rule among dozens of nations and nationalities. This solution would, for example, automatically resolveย the contention in SNNP, where Wolayta Zone andย 10 other ethnic zonesย are demanding the right to statehood. It will also put to rest many territorial disputes including the ones over Welkait, Humera, Tsegede, Tselemte, and Raya, in which the Amhara and Tigray regional states are pitted against each other.
Ethiopia has more than 60 zones, and having so many first-tier administrative units can introduce many administrative challenges. This, however, is a technicality that can be resolved through procedural mechanisms. Kenya, for example, has adopted 47 counties as its major administrative units after a constitutional change that was enacted following the 2007 post-election violence. The devolution of administrative power to county governments has improved governance quality and given more voice and power to citizens. A Council of Governors, comprising the administrative heads of the 47 counties, coordinates collective action over issues that cut across counties.
Political devolution does not have to lead to the dissolution of the current regional states.
This political devolution does not have to lead to the dissolution of the current regional states. The regions, which can be seen as collective associations of major ethnic groups, can be reformed to serve as traditional, cultural entities charged with cultural stewardship and the pursuit of interethnic harmony.
Many African nations have similar traditional structures parallel to formal political structures. For example, Nigeria and Ghana eachย have dozens ofย traditional chiefdoms and kingdoms that do not have official political power but wield considerable influence as stewards of traditional ethnic cultures. If supported by proper governance mechanisms, the presence of parallel administrative structures could enrich and promote cultural interaction, reducing the risk of interethnic political conflict. It can also help redefine the meaning of ethnic โterritorial homelandโ to its cultural rather than political connotation, reducing the risk of border friction between ethnic groups as well as the disenfranchisement of minorities.
The violent end of the TPLF-dominated era has demonstrated the perils of organizing political power along ethnic lines. The episode also presents an opportunity to rethink Ethiopiaโs political system and remake it to accommodate competitive politics. Without reform, Ethiopiaโs ethnic federalism holds the seeds of endless conflict that will undermine the countryโs very existence.
Devolution of political power to zonal states could offer a path out of the current conundrum and reduce the risk of a catastrophic conflict among militarized ethnic regional states. If approved at the ballot box and executed effectively, such a change can help usher in a democratic system in which the rights of individuals and ethnicities are balanced. It could also lead to a more sober, secular, and constructive political discourse that focuses on building communities rather than tearing them apart
