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Addisfortune.com: Hardly anyone seems to have as much clout in commanding the congregations of senior leaders across the political divide as the United States Embassy in Addis Abeba. So was the case on Wednesday, late afternoon, March 3, 2010. The bigwigs of all the parties, including the incumbent, were at the embassy to listen and respond as well as discuss with an Ethiopianist, Donald Levine, a professor emeritus from Chicago University, through a live video conference, albeit an imperfect one.

The name Levine has resounded on the Ethiopian political landscape for over 50 years now, being an external witness of history over the past five decades, beginning with the ill-fated military coup against Emperor Haile Selassie in 1963. It is also less surprising that his persona and association with Ethiopia could muster such prominent political personalities as Bereket Simon, Hailu Shawel (Eng), Negasso Gidada (PhD), Beyene Petros (Prof), and Merera Gudina (PhD).

After what seems to have been a long period to digest Levine’s words of wisdom, which appeared to have annoyed the ruling party’s leaders as much as it seemed to have pleased their political opponents, one of the opposition leaders quipped with Levine to share a magic formula to resolve Ethiopia’s current political woes.

“I claim to be a sociologist not a magician!” Levine said.

Hardly surprisingly, one of the two leaders from the incumbent party took advantage of the opportunity and capitalised on the exchange. If there was to be any magic formula, it could only come from within the country. No one from outside could deliver Ethiopia from its political troubles.   

Nonetheless, this did not stop Levine from sharing his words of wisdom, largely focused on reminding political leaders that Ethiopia has had at least five opportunities missed since the coup by Neway’s brothers in the early 1960s. He said he sometimes wonders whether he still is in 1960 rather than 2010, considering that there remains similar frustration in the university community over the lack of academic freedom and independent enquiry; there still exists muscular competitiveness; the importance of defence of honour remains the same; and the political climate is shadowed by backbiting, hearsay, and mutual insults. As the case was in the 1960s, Ethiopia today struggles to get out of the “submit or rebel” dichotomy, argues Levine.

He urged the political leaders to navigate what he described as the “uncharted universe” of dialogue, communication, cooperation and engagement. For Levine, the issue should not necessarily be about who is to win but how the game is to be played.

And the game has already been in play mode for a few weeks now, subsequent to the launching of electoral debates by the various contending parties. After so much juggling and closed-door negotiations on how the debates should be conducted, the second round was held on Monday, March 1, 2010. Despite frustrations shared among the opposition camp, for not being transmitted live, the Ethiopian Radio and Television Agency (ERTA) aired the debate on federalism and decentralisation in a two-part series over two nights.

It has yet to stir interest among the general voting public, for many are those who did not follow it. Some of those who took the trouble to watch the debate may have been given the impression that the ambiance was rather lethargic, filled with political rhetoric from people aspiring to take the throne and the sceptre.

However, a deeper look will show how much things have changed on the Ethiopian political landscape, in nearly two short decades. Close to 19 years ago, when rebels commandeered by the current leaders of the Revolutionary Democrats marched onto Addis Abeba, and thus dismantled the military-political-bureaucratic power base of the custodians of Ethiopia’s highly centralised state, the fierce resistance to their rule was from those who challenged their embryonic plan to federalise the country. It ought not be surprising. They shattered a system built upon a period of over 100 years, and redrew politics as it was known almost overnight.

A decade ago, politics in Ethiopia was largely fought between those keen on devolving political power to autonomous regional entities and those who were suspicious of federalism as a tool to dismantle the country and thus wanted to maintain the status quo the way they saw it for over a century.

Levine reminded his audience on Wednesday about how culture is important in a lot more ways than we think, and how it changes a lot more than we expect. He could have only added the word “politics” to draw a perfect parallel in order to be accurately relevant in the context of last week’s debate.

Two decades down the road, it is ironic to see none of the six major political parties debating the virtues and vices of the nation’s politics and administration, fundamentally different from what the incumbent says it ought to be. Even the rebellious opposition party, Hailu Shawel’s All Ethiopian Unity Organisation (AEUO), which declined to participate in the debates so far, demanding that it be transmitted live, has abandoned its unitary stand five years ago and now subscribes to the federalist camp.

For anyone who is a keen follower of Ethiopian politics, this ought to mean a huge triumph for the Revolutionary Democrats. No one would have as much a claim in introducing the concept of federalism in its modern sense to Ethiopia as the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), even when its political rivals have always been posing strong challenges to this desire. Nonetheless, it pursued, sometimes unforgivably heavy-handed on those who stood in its way and crafted a federalist constitution that it now seems to want people not only to comply with but to believe in.

There appears to be no political party out there who subscribes to a policy view that the political administrative structure of this country should be different from federalism, whether centralist or otherwise. Right there, the incumbent appears to enjoy an upper hand in the policy debate, in that every one of its opponents has no grand vision different from its own. Voters have indeed been deprived of a choice, a real alternative, on issues of which particular direction this country should take its destiny towards.

Ironically, it does not mean that the policy menu is short of other items related to the subject.

The debate last week was rather focused on the pace, quality and forum of federalism. It was rather secondary issues that have more to do its application. It was a kind of discussion conducted among people of the same camp who disagree only on how to refine it.

Politicians such as Beyene were challenging the authenticity of the implementation, rightly criticising the process as a top-to-bottom approach as much as others, such as Lidetu Ayalew, leader of the Liberal Democrats, the Ethiopian Democratic Party (EDP) who wanted to see federalism based on a different form. How different and what form exactly? Lidetu and his party have yet to travel a long way to make themselves clear beyond simply opposing federalism structured on cultures formed on linguistic based identities.

Other debaters were, on the other hand, juggling between these two.

Interestingly, for all the upper hand in policy the incumbent seems to have enjoyed, if there ought to be anyone among the debaters to master the ideological and theoretical discussion on federalism and decentralisation, it should be the Revolutionary Democrats.

This was meant to be an issue considered to be their forte, dear to their heart, and with a record to own it within the Ethiopian context. If the Revolutionary Democrats were not able to unleash their ideological maharishis (sages) to such debates on issues of their proficiency, perhaps it is worth waiting to see if there will be other issues they keep their arsenal for.  

Last week’s debaters from the incumbent’s side, Tefera Derebew and Junedin Sado, the latter a veteran of the 2005 elections, seemed all but excited about the whole debating process. But they were unable to respond to challenges thrown at them from the other veterans of the last elections, Lidetu and Beyene.

Both indeed have raised legitimate questions, although on quality and form, which deserved to have been addressed by those from the incumbent party. These men of the opposition camps, who apparently harbour mutual personal disdain for each other, were impressively substantive and used their limited time efficiently and intelligently. They succeeded in putting their incumbent political foes on the defensive on their own turf. It was supposed to be the other way around.

Tefera and Junedin gave their audience the impression that they were on script, with little focus on what was being said around them. They seemed to make hardly any distinction between a discussion with a likeminded army of cadres in their own house and a debate with political foes across a political divide. They projected themselves to be men of authority rather than assertive and dogged rather than responsive.

While they had a room full of political opponents who swear in the name of federalism and its virtues, hardly did they capitalise on that but attacked their opponents as nostalgic relics of the past, as if the past has anything to do with a federalist state. Attacking opponents when it is not due, in a bid to be illusive, will always backfire. Indeed, it did backfire on the Revolutionary Democrats last week.

And the frustration shared by their own supporters is evident, judging by one of the latest postings on www.aigaforum.com, a blog hosted by a staunch supporter of the Revolutionary Democrats.

“In our mind[s] Ato Ledetu of [the] EDP has won the discussion so far. [The] EPRDF needs to explain Federalism in [the] Ethiopian context in time,” reads a posting on its front page kept up until our press time.

Indeed, being a “black horse” of contemporary Ethiopian politics, just to borrow the description of a commentator who has not dismissed Lidetu as many have, the Revolutionary Democrats have granted him a carte blanch, even when he made an uncalled-for verbal assault in a manner that was too blunt and sloppy. He was allowed to get away with redrawing Ethiopia’s current administrative map, just to make a point about what would happen if the largest federal state broke away. He could have been challenged to draw an alternative map the way his party sees it fit. The chances are that he either would have had none or that he would have settled for the kind of administrative divisions that existed during the Emperor or the military junta.

But supporters ought to be frustrated more about their leaders’ repetitive nature in the debates, hammering on the same issues yet exposing their failure to internalise the subjects they may have studied merely for the purpose of debate. It is clear that architects of these electoral debates among the Revolutionary Democrats have fought hard to win the lion’s share of the time allocated for the debates, to the dismay of their opponents. Thus, now they have the privilege of speaking longer than any one particular opponent, although they could say that in aggregate the opposition camp has the lion’s share. But, it is divided time.

Nonetheless, and regardless of who speaks longer than who, the Revolutionary Democrats need to ask themselves the point of negotiating more time if they do not make use of it to win electoral debates, even when they enjoy an edge in policy.

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