The current crisis in Tigray has not appeared from a clear blue sky. Its roots are deep in Ethiopia’s history and its outcome will dictate the country’s future.

 

It is unlikely that Ethiopia will fall apart. But a period of violence is probable and will continue until there is a further adjustment of government at the centre and a rebalancing of the relationship with the regions. Increased democratisation is one potential solution, but by no means the only outcome.

 

Throughout its history, Ethiopia has been in a state of flux, with a central authority that has waxed and waned, and borders that have grown and shrunk as regions on the periphery have had more or less independence.

 

During the 20^th century, Ethiopia, like all of Africa, struggled with the impact of globalisation. It was able to resist Italy’s imperial ambitions, and Emperor Haile Selassie benefited from the national unity that this challenge created. But his regime, though attuned to the need to maintain a delicate regional and ethnic balance within the country, proved ultimately too sclerotic to respond to the new challenges of a rapidly changing world. It fell to the brutal centralisation and Marxist modernisation of the Derg, which sought to maintain its authority through force and terror.

 

This also failed, and it was in the struggle to overthrow the Derg, which fell in 1991, that the Tigray region became a key player in the country. That struggle was led jointly by the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF) and the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the two most effective fighting forces in the country. Eritrea’s reward for victory was independence, a story well told in Michaela Wrong’s book I Didn’t Do It for You. The TPLF’s reward was a controlling interest in the post-war government.

 

Both parties, with representatives of other regions, were part of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the wartime coalition against the Derg. The TPLF’s leader Meles Zenawi led the coalition and emerged as the new Prime Minister, giving Tigrayans a tight grip on the new government’s security apparatus and military command. The new constitution was based on ethnic federalism, with each ethnic region given a right to secede, but political control was firmly maintained by the constituent parties of the EPRDF who brooked no rival in their respective regions.

 

Stability depended on two things: the EPRDF’s successful efforts to modernise the Ethiopian economy, preventing future famines such as the one that led to the downfall of the Derg, and creating new jobs through inward investment and rapid industrialisation; and on Meles’ ability to maintain a political balance between the different ethnic parties that made up the EPRDF. While external or public criticism of the government was suppressed, vigorous debate took place within it, behind closed doors.

 

Tentative steps towards greater democracy in the 2005 elections frightened the EPRDF leadership, which realised it could unleash forces they would be unable control. The subsequent clampdown seemed aimed primarily at preserving the existing regime: opposition politicians, human rights activists and independent journalists were locked up. And at the subsequent elections in 2010 and 2015, the EPRDF parties managed elections in order to secure victory. In 2015, the EPRDF parties secured 95% of the vote and, with other allied parties, controlled all 547 seats in the parliament. Before his death 2012, Meles defended this direction in private on the grounds that it was too soon to liberalise; more open public political debate would risk destabilising the country which could all too easily fall apart. Historic ethnic rivalries between Oromia and Amhara, and grievances over land between several regions (including Amhara and Tigray) would become a basis for ethnic nationalism and mutual antagonism. Ethiopian leaders were also aware of the growing tension between the Christian Orthodox elite and the growing, but relatively poorer, Muslim population.

 

But the failure to democratise stored up resentment against the EPRDF. When Meles died in 2012, the appointment as Prime Minister of a non-Tigrayan, Hailemariam Desalegn from the south of the country, failed to restore the party’s credibility. Popular unrest in a number of regions, especially amongst the largest ethnic group in Oromia, broke out in violent riots in 2018 which threatened to get out of control. The EPRDF swiftly replaced Hailemariam with Abiy Ahmed, the first Oromo and first person of mixed Muslim and Christian parentage to become Prime Minister.

 

Though a man from the inside of Ethiopia’s security apparatus, Abiy moved fast to release political prisoners and side-line or remove the existing Tigrayan leaders at the federal level. By global standards, Ethiopia is not one of the world’s more corrupt countries, but corruption does exist and the wealth disparity between the political elite and the masses bred resentment. Targeting the existing elite was popular and opened opportunities to promote those from other regions. Abiy also replaced the EPRDF, which guaranteed a regional balance, with the Prosperity Party which, while perhaps seeking to break down regional differences, was also more centralised on himself as leader. Not just in the security services, but throughout government, Tigrayans found themselves removed from positions of influence. Abiy defended his actions in his public statement of 9 November 2020.

 

The extent of this purge undermined confidence amongst Tigrayans that their interests would continue to be protected at the federal level. The political leadership withdrew to Tigray, in the north of the country, and debated how to respond. When Abiy postponed indefinitely the country-wide elections due in August 2020 amid the COVID-19 pandemic, they asserted their autonomy by going ahead with elections in Tigray alone, consolidating public support for their negotiating position. More threatening for the federal government, they also mobilised Tigrayan military units which still constituted a core (and some would say the most effective) part of Ethiopia’s army.

 

For Abiy, if Tigray is seen to be able to defy the federal government, so too will other regions. He makes a point of highlighting Tigrayan contacts with other separatist groups. For him it is therefore imperative to reassert central authority over Tigray, and he has chosen to do so by force rather than co-option or negotiation. When Tigrayans took control of federal military equipment in the region and refused to allow a non-Tigrayan sent by Abiy to take over the Northern Command, this became for him a casus belli.

 

Tigray is a tough and mountainous region and breeds a tough and tenacious people. Though landlocked, and pitches only 6 million people against 100 million in the rest of Ethiopia, Tigrayans will fight ferociously to defend their land. Abiy has the advantage of air power and an ally to the north in Eritrea, but a war in this country is more likely to end up like that in Yemen than that against Biafra.

 

Tigray is not – at least not yet – fighting for secession. Its leaders do not want Ethiopia to disintegrate, but for Tigray to have a respected place at the centre and sufficient autonomy in their region. Their objective seems to be regime change rather than independence, and the action taken against Tigrayans remaining in Addis Ababa since the war started has reinforced this objective. But they no longer trust Abiy. This is therefore becoming a direct power struggle, not so much for control of the state as over what kind of state Ethiopia should be and the balance between its constituent parts.

 

So there is a stand-off. Abiy will not negotiate with the Tigrayans, who must submit, and the Tigrayans will not negotiate with Abiy. The scope for international mediation is therefore limited. But the prospect for a decisive military outcome is equally dim. An intensified civil war resulting in a violent stalemate beckons.

 

At which point two factors will influence the outcome: events elsewhere in Ethiopia; and the role and influence of Ethiopia’s neighbours, including those on the other side of the Red Sea.

 

One reason for Abiy’s action is an awareness of his own vulnerability if unrest spreads to other regions. Amongst the wider population, the hopes for change pinned on Abiy when he became PM have been largely disappointed, especially in Oromia. Having dismantled the EPRDF, it is less clear how regional interests can make their concerns known at the centre of government in Addis, or how an internal debate can take place within the ruling party as it did when Abiy replaced Hailemariam in 2018. In concentrating power in his own hands, Abiy has actually weakened the centre. Who are now his allies? Primarily, it seems, the Amhara who benefited most from the TPLF’s withdrawal. This makes the situation in Oromia most critical, and most unpredictable.

 

All Ethiopia’s neighbours in the Horn are deeply concerned about the regional instability a war in Ethiopia would cause – except one. Underpinning Abiy’s reconciliation with Eritrea – or more precisely with President Isaias Aferwerki – was a mutual distrust of Tigray. The bloody and apparently pointless border war between Eritrea and Ethiopia in 1998-2000 was prolonged by the intense personal rivalry between Isaias and Meles. Eritrea’s support, tacit or active, for Abiy’s efforts to crush Tigray means the region will be cut off from outside supply if its contacts with Sudan or Djibouti are severed. Hence the Ethiopian Army’s efforts to secure the Sudan border, across which thousands of refugees are fleeing, as well as Tigray’s airports. Djibouti is already deeply worried at the collateral damage it could suffer.

 

The excellent analysis by Nic Cheeseman and Yohannes Woldemariam in Foreign Affairs highlights the risks for the region, and the whole of Africa, of a prolonged civil war in Ethiopia. The regional organisation, IGAD, is toothless and has usually relied on Ethiopian leadership. But if supported by the African Union (AU), Abiy would find it hard to ignore his neighbours if they speak with a single voice. Aside from Eritrea, other regional leaders have no wish to take sides in this quarrel and every interest in encouraging a solution by negotiation rather than by arms. The Tigrayan leader, Debretsion Gebremichael, has already appealed for AU mediation, but Abiy is reluctant to let any outsiders in on the quarrel.

 

Both Saudi Arabia and the UAE could help encourage him. Both have supported Abiy up to now, including financially, and Saudi Arabia is aware it could find refugees flooding across the Red Sea if fighting spreads.

 

The wider international community too has nothing to gain from a civil war. China has big investments, Russia has no bases, and ‘the West’ is desperate for Ethiopia to be a successful example of economic and political progress to help stabilise an already unstable region where conflicts simmer in both South Sudan and Somalia, and where Sudan is going through a delicate transition. But internationally, the UN Security Council still seems hamstrung by the deep divides between its permanent members and UN action looks unlikely.

 

At this stage, most likely outcomes look bad. It is in crises like this that a physical meeting, brokered by a neutral party, is often the only way to move forward. It is hard to bang heads together by Zoom. But with leaders reluctant to meet in person, the chances of forestalling these outcomes is slipping away.

 

It needs South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa, as AU Chair, together with Ethiopia’s neighbours, and with support from the US, EU, UK, China and the Gulf countries, to persuade both Abiy and the Tigrayans that there is no military solution and to get a negotiation process under way.

 

And where would these negotiations go? Somewhere that solves the underlying problems: by ensuring all regions feel they have a recognised stake at the centre through the federal system, and all people feel they have an avenue through which their grievances can be addressed through a commitment to real democratisation.

 

Without at least the start of a discussion on these lines, the Horn will be faced with a new and intractable conflict that risks destabilising them all.

 

Nicholas Westcott is the director of the Royal African Society.

 

Corrections [16 November 2020]: The date of the “subsequent elections” was changed to include a mention of the 2010 as well as 2015. The year in which the Derg “fell” was changed to 1991; although the Derg was formally abolished in 1987, its leaders remained in power until 1991.