A bit rich, Jawar, to suddenly discover #DownWithWarMongers after boasting that yesterday’s Qeerroo now command the skies for the "good men" you lyricise about so unashamedly. You cannot celebrate their passage from agents of protest to instruments of state terror and then perform moral revulsion at somebody else’s militarism. Take a bloody break, mate! Your performance, hypocrisy and contradictions are getting intolerablely grotesque.

I have disagreements with Daniel broadly, ideologically, and here too, including on some empirical claims and on how responsibility is distributed. But this is still the richest political conversation I have heard in what has otherwise been a couple of weeks of clever incitement that generated heat without quite producing serious analysis. Daniel carries the agony of thought: staying with contradiction and refusing to treat criticism of one dangerous path as proof that another is safe. In a political space crowded with certainty and epistemic tribalism, there is something rare about thinking past the point where the easy answer becomes useful. youtube.com/live/Ra4QltLxxMQ…

Ethiopia’s long capacity to mobilise armies proves the historical depth of coercive state-making. It does not prove the historical continuity of a modern, politically neutral military institution. Adwa itself demonstrates the distinction. An empire with uneven territorial administration and still-unsettled frontiers could nevertheless mobilise more than 100,000 fighters through regional political and military networks. Mobilisational strength is not institutional solidity. Institutional continuity requires durable, impersonal rules that survive changes of personnel and constrain successive rulers. Ethiopia’s military-security apparatus is not some timeless institution standing above the country’s unsettled political settlement. It is one of the principal organisations repeatedly remade by that settlement. Put aside for a moment the almost unsurveyable criminality of the current military-security apparatus, itself at the centre of the “state collapse” moral grammar we keep being threatened with. Anyone proposing to entrust that apparatus with preserving the next transition is not really talking about institution-preservation at all. They are deciding which organised holder of coercive power gets to enter the next settlement with its power already secured. Put more plainly, it is a refusal to reopen the political (un)settlement that has been unceasingly generating catastrophe for the past eight years. If you are faint-hearted enough to mistake cleverness for politics, you may be tickled by it. If you are serious about politics, and genuinely worried about state collapse, more precisely, the human cost of state collapse, make no time for such intelligence-insulting street cleverness. When responsibility is accrued vertically to Abiy, abstracted away from the structure that makes his despotic rule possible, while the most critical edifice of the same structure is rescued as a collection of “order-taking good men” and redescribed first as an institution and then, more temptingly still, as the state, look instead at the political (un)settlement the speaker does not want you to examine. The rest is noise, as uninteresting as it is mischievous, chuckles and all.

The intellectual auxiliaries of barbarism always seem to rediscover meticulous language at the most convenient moment. “If true.” “I hope this is incorrect.” “A major escalation.” Suddenly there is caution, objectivity, international law and moral shock, as though history began this morning. An Ethiopia–Eritrea alliance already ended in mass atrocity and genocide in Tigray. Yet when the survivors contemplate an alliance born from the ruins of that catastrophe, it is presented as the new original sin, even a “betrayal” and “declaration of war.” This is how the moral clock is reset. You erase the barbarism that produced the present, restore Ethiopia as the innocent subject, and put its victims back in the dock. The hell with you two, and your October 7 eraser punditry!

He is trying to recruit Amharas into his latest adventure while simultaneously telling them that Bahire Negash was once Oromo dominion, much as he previously did with Gondar? Well, one is left to conclude that he believes the Oromo historical wound can be readily inflamed by irredentist fantasy and healed by its completion, while the intelligence of the Amhara can be just as readily insulted because they, too, are wounded and therefore incapable of reflection. It is a remarkably contemptuous assumption to make about wounded communities, that pain and disillusionment suspend political agency. Abiy is such a Temu Machiavellian that he underestimates the volatility of affective politics. It is one thing to weaponise wounded memory but quite another to imagine you can indefinitely author its trajectory. The signs that you cannot are already written on the wall. Leaders who reduce politics to an economy of wounded affect eventually discover that they are no longer directing it and in fact become captive to it. Abiy and his genocidal entourage, too, will eventually be impaled on the very passions they have spent years cultivating.

አብይ ከጎዣም ወደ በጌምደር ተሻግሯልና "ለእማማ ኢትዬጵያ" ሲል ዬሃንስ ከአልቡርሃን አባቶች ጋር ተዋግቶ መተማ ላይ ተቀላ ፣ የዬሃንስ ልጆች ግን ከአልቡርሃን ጋር ሆነው እማማን ሊውጉብኝ ነው ሊል ነው ደሞ መሰልኝ። I really can't keep up with this reactionary maniac!

"ብቃት” ብዙ ጊዜ በታሪካዊ ጥቅሞች የተገነባውን የበላይነት አጥቦ ለማንጻት የሚያገለግል እንዶድ ነው። በእኩልነት ባልተገነባች ብዝኃ-ማንነት ሀገር ውስጥ ማንነትን ችላ ማለት ገለልተኛ ዜግነትን አይፈጥርም፤ ይልቁንም የበላይና አግላይ ማንነት ርዕዬተ ዓለሙን፣ ተቋማቱንና የብቃት መለኪያዎቹን “ገለልተኛ” እና “ሀገራዊ” አድርጎ እንዲያቀርብ ያስችለዋል። የእናንተ ፖለቲካ ከማንነት በላይ አይደለም፤ የተመረጠን ማንነት በ“ብቃት”ና “ዜግነት” ስም የሚሸፍን የማንነት ፖለቲካ እንጂ። ይህን መሠረታዊ የፍትሕ ሐሳብ የማይረዳ እንደናንተ የደናቁርት ስብስብ ገጥሞኝ አያውቅም። እንደ እናንተ የሊበራሊዝም ሽሙንሙን ከሊበራሊዝም ጋር ግን ፍፁም የተጣላ ጥራዝ-ነጠቅ የአረመኔዎች መንጋም የለም። ሌላው ይቅርና በአንድ ሕዝብ ላይ የዘር ማጥፋት ጦርነት አዋልዳችሁና ደግፋችሁ ስታበቁ ስለ ግለሰብ መብትና ዜግነት የምታሰሙትን ማኅሌት ማን በቁም ነገር ይሰማችኋል?!

You keep miscalculating, Getachew. You mistake the anger Tigrayans carry toward your former comrades for a vacancy in their political memory, a numb patch in the wound that you imagine can be filled, incrementally, with devotion to the authors of their grief. But this is more than a political error. It shows your contempt that your people can be argued out of their memory and led by your hand back to the same horde of vicious executioners. I do not think you understand that your patron has entrusted you not with a difficult task, but an impossible one. Even as he turns the so-called national dialogue, with the monster of Biafra as the guest of honour, into a declaration of genocidal consolidation, he expects you to make Tigrayans forget what was done to them. Now, because pain and righteous indignation do not exhaust the emotional repertoire of Tigrayans, here is a little cotton candy for you. Ethiopians, many of whom have lately hardly witnessed, let alone participated in, an oppositional rally, even during elections, have finally been reminded what protest looks like. You have particularly spared us the burden of explaining it to Gen Z, with less effort than it would take them to figure out a DVD player. Count that among your few achievements. And thank Tigray, as it continues to produce you surplus even from its ruins.