Embraces at border, but for Ethiopia peace is not yet won
They share a common language, a shared Christian heritage and hundreds of years of history. But for more than 20 years, Ethiopians and Eritreans were separated by a bitter conflict and militarised frontier sealed as tightly as the Berlin Wall.
Now, Eritreans and Tigrayan Ethiopians are mingling again in what has been hailed as an unexpected and rapid thaw that has profound implications for the Horn of Africa.
“We are the same,” declared Dharar Bahlab, an Eritrean baker visiting the Ethiopean frontier town of Mekele for the first time last week.
“We are brothers,” he said of his Ethiopian neighbours as he milled freely around Friday’s livestock market.
Just a few months ago, such scenes would have been unthinkable.
Abiy Ahmed, Ethiopia’s young prime minister, and Isaias Afwerki, the president of Eritrea, signed a peace deal officially ending the 1998-2000 war between their countries in July, restoring diplomatic and trade relations between the nations. Selected border points were reopened last month.
The declaration came amid a wave of optimism that has made Mr Abiy a poster boy of reconciliation who has drawn praise from across the world and was tipped for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The 42-year-old, the youngest leader in Africa, came to power in March after his predecessor, Hailemariam Desalegn, unexpectedly quit. Since then he has brokered peace with Eritrea, lifted a state of emergency, and released political prisoners – even apologising before parliament for police brutality.
He has also legalised opposition parties, relaxed internet restrictions, and opened state-run industries, including Ethiopian Airlines and Ethiotelecom, to private investment. The subsequent frenzy of optimism has been labelled “Abiymania”. Opinion polls suggest he has a 90 per cent approval rating at home.
In Addis Ababa, his image adorns not just public offices but the walls of restaurants and the bumpers of taxis. Street sellers tout Abiy T-shirts, and during his six-month stint in power a number of biographies have been hastily published.
But in Mekele, at the frontline of the changes near the border, there is no Abiymania paraphernalia. Its residents speak with far less enthusiasm about their country’s new leader.
And cracks in Mr Abiy’s popularity are showing in other parts of the country too, fuelled by a surge of violence between the country’s more than 80 ethnic groups.
In Mr Abiy’s home state of Ooromiya, violence has broken out between youths from the Oromo, the country’s largest ethnic group, and the Somali minority.
At least 23 people were killed last month in Addis Ababa itself, when Oromo youths chanting “leave our land” attacked ethnic minorities in the district of Burayu, looting business and storming houses.
Some believe the violence has been stirred up by the return of exiled opposition leaders who Mr Abiy has allowed back into the country.
“Freeing political prisoners – that’s what caused this. Those who were released are responsible for the conflict,” said Tigist Muez, an ethnic Tigrayan who fled with her family from Addis Ababa to Mekele, in her home district, five months ago.
“The Oromo and Amharans, we don’t hate them but they hate us,” she adds.
“We are very different from them – in fact, we have much more in common with the Eritreans.”
Dawud Ibsa, the long-exiled leader of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), a party fighting for Oromo selfdetermination, held a rally in Addis Ababa’s Meskel Square in September. Supporters of the OLF clashed with those of the opposition group Ginbot 7, whose leader, Berhanu Nega, has also returned to Ethiopia.
The government has struggled to bring the situation under control and has resorted to measures that recall the tactics of Mr Abiy’s authoritarian predecessors.
About 3,000 people were arrested last weekend in a crime crackdown, 1,200 of whom have been detained in a “rehabilitation centre” just outside the capital.
The move has left many wondering if Mr Abiy’s rebranding of the EPDRF, the coalition that has ruled the country for nearly three decades, is merely cosmetic.
“All countries need to address criminality,” said Maria Burnett, associate director of the Africa division of Human Rights Watch.
“But these mass arrests raise real questions about what the overall objective of the operation is. It looks like scare tactics, not law enforcement.”
In Mekele, many locals are cautious. Mrs Muez said she liked Mr Abiy when he was first elected, but now she has “no faith in him”.
Milion Asafar, who runs a car rental company in Mekele, agreed. “Ethiopia is not ready for democracy. The Tigrayans maybe, but not the rest of the country,” he said.
Estifanos Mebrahtu, an Eritrean engineer eating in a restaurant in Mekele, disagrees. “It is wonderful to come to Ethiopia,” he says. “Ethiopia is democratic.”
Tigrayans at nearby tables sniggered. “Ethiopia is not a democracy,” one said. They have reason to be sceptical. With a GDP of $51 billion (£39 billion), Ethiopia is Africa’s fastest growing economy.
Child mortality has dropped from 200 per 1,000 live births in 1990 to just 60 in 2016.
About 30 per cent of national expenditure has been channeled into education, rapidly increasing the number of children in schools, and dramatic improvements have been made to healthcare.
But these advancements have come at a cost.
After decades of repressive rule, many Tigrayans are reluctant to speak publicly about the government. The EPRDF’S record of locking up – or silencing in more sinister ways – political opposition leaders and other dissenters, has not been forgotten overnight.
“There are so many repressive laws from the previous period to be reformed,” said Fisseha Tekle, Horn of Africa researcher for Amnesty International, referring to Mr Abiy’s new government.
“The terrorism proclamation, the media freedom proclamation, the charities and societies proclamation: it’s a long list.”
There is, he says, much to do.
‘Freeing political prisoners – that’s what caused this. Those who were released are responsible for the conflict’