ADOWA Not just a red letter day

By Tesfaye Habisso
habisso@yahoo.co.uk

Adowa - The very word stirs the most profound patriotism among Ethiopians, strength and purpose for other Africans and admiration through out the world. This great victory of a black nation over a white power was the seal that forever shall signify the indomitable spirit of Ethiopia whenever its territorial integrity and sovereignty are under threat. Adowa is an event that ever since, has given food for thought to any aspiring invader.
Having achieved the victory, what did the nation do with the sovereignty it protected so fiercely? What are the fruits of this epic struggle and why are they so bitter? Profound questions and ones that Capital’s regular contributor Tesfaye Habisso tackles in this article dedicated to the 111th anniversary of the glorious victory of the battle of Adowa.

Ethiopia is one of the oldest independent states in the world. Writing during the first century of our era, Greek historians, notably Diodorus, Herodotus and Homer, had noted that, “Ethiopia is the only country in the world which never experienced a foreign yoke.” [S. Pierre Petrides, 1983:1] All along the 19th century, Ethiopia had been the only African country not to succumb to European colonialism, except for a brief period of occupation by fascist Italy from 1935-41. For over one hundred years, between 1835 and 1935, Ethiopia had to fight and repulse an extraordinary number of encroachments, attacks, invasions and wars, and keeping herself free from foreign yoke. Attacked, invaded, plundered, and burned, Ethiopia had to experience and overcome an ordeal of one hundred tormented years, unparalleled in African history. Always the victim of aggression, Ethiopia had to fight, sometimes simultaneously, two mighty forces: African expansionism and European colonialism.
These defensive and just wars fought by Ethiopians, of course, exacted huge costs in human lives and material destruction, impacting negatively on the socio-economic development of this ancient country. Political freedom, yes, but no peace and no economic freedom!
In this regard, the Battle of Adowa on March 1, 1896 fought between Ethiopia and Italy represents an epic struggle of great magnitude fiercely and ferociously fought by Ethiopians for freedom from foreign domination. Although the losses on both sides were of alarming proportions, never before had Ethiopians paid such a heavy sacrifice in their long and war-ridden history. Since then, March 1 has always remained the epicentre of our patriotic nationalism and the central point for rallying our multi-ethnic and multi-religious society for a national cause(s), be it for the defence or development of our country.
Yes, March 1 is celebrated, and will always be celebrated, as our national day in Ethiopia, and the tumultuous events of the victory of Ethiopians over the invading Italian forces in the Battle of Adowa in 1896 are remembered every year with patriotic pride. Adowa indeed symbolizes Ethiopia’s proud commitment to freedom from foreign domination, direct or indirect, and as a historic assertion of Ethiopia’s experience as a long-lived independent polity. Of the many emblems of Ethiopia’s historic independence, Adowa is perhaps the most visible and the most dramatic of all. The spirit of the Ethiopians’ defiant protection of their land from outsiders was visibly witnessed at the Battle of Adowa.
Furthermore, the symbolism of multi-ethnic collaboration evoked by the Battle of Adowa was the most remarkable meaningful aspect of the entire episode. Although members of different ethnic, religious, and regional groups had been interacting regularly in Ethiopia for more than 2,000 years “through trading, inter-marriage, common ritual observances, pilgrimages, and political competition” from the perspective of Ethiopian history, Adowa offers the most dramatic instance of multi-ethnic collaboration before the 20th century. This is because it gave expression to a great outpouring of national patriotism, foreshadowing the great patriotic struggles of 1935-41. Above all, the Battle of Adowa became and remains the most outstanding symbol of what, a half century later, a British colonel would describe as the “mysterious magnetism” that holds Ethiopia together.
Be this as it may, the Battle of Adowa cost the lives of 289 Italian officers, 2918 European soldiers and about 2,000 ‘askari’. A further 954 European troops were missing, while 470 Italians and 958 ‘askari’ were wounded. Some 700 Italians and 1,800 ‘askari’ fell into the hands of the Ethiopian troops. About 70 Italians and 230 ‘askari’ were tortured to death before Emperor Menelik discovered it and put a stop to it. After enduring a terrible forced march back to Addis Abeba through the cold and rain of the highlands, the rest of the captives were held for several months until the Europeans were released in exchange for renouncing the invasion, recognizing Ethiopia’s independence and for payment of a 10 million lire “reparation” by the Italian government. Some 800 Tigrean askari prisoners did not fare so well; they were subjected to the traditional punishment for disloyalty by having their right hands and left feet amputated. In addition to the human losses, General Baratieri’s Italian army lost 11,000 rifles and all of its 56 guns and had to endure attacks by the Tigrean peasantry as it retreated.
On the other hand, an estimated 7,000 Ethiopian peasant warriors died at Adowa, and 11,000 were wounded. As historians described it, Ethiopia had never before had to pay such a tremendous price for victory, and such a heavy sacrifice for freedom. Yet it had been a glorious victory, and a great and momentous event at that.
Nevertheless, when we talk about freedom today we need to be clear in our minds that the essence of freedom is not only freedom from foreign rule but the sanctity of our fundamental human rights and civil liberties as enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1948 and also entrenched in the 1994 Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE). Until the end of the Second World War, fundamental human rights and freedoms were almost unknown in international law as a result of two cardinal principles, based on state sovereignty. The first was the belief that international law regulated only relations between states; the second was the view that the reserved domain of domestic jurisdiction meant that states had complete freedom in dealing with their own nationals. Minor inroads had been made into these principles before the war, for example as slavery was gradually outlawed during the nineteenth century. By and large, however, the view that states were free to treat their citizens as they pleased remained strong.
The brutal horrors of the Second World War and the bitter fruits of totalitarianism, particularly the concentration camps, shattered this complacent view of international relations. The international community was convinced of the importance of entrenching democracy and human rights in international law and of the key role of freedom of expression in this endeavour. The most immediate outcome of this sea-change was the 1945 UN Charter which includes “promoting and encouraging respect for human rights and for fundamental freedoms” as a core purpose of the UN. The UDHR was adopted as an authoritative elaboration of the rights and freedoms referred to in the UN Charter. The basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled, often held to include the right to life and liberty, freedom of thought and expression, and equality before the law; rights that belong to an individual as a consequence of being human. These fundamental rights and freedoms are part and parcel of our constitution of 1994 (read the FDRE 1994 Constitution, articles 13-44).
The more enlightened part of the Ethiopian public—perhaps as much as 15% or 20% of the whole—regards freedom in purely negative terms, as freedom from restraint, intrusion, and compulsion. This consists of such things as freedom of thought, speech and expression, freedom of movement, freedom of religion, belief and opinion, freedom of assembly and association, freedom of the press and other media, freedom of vote etc. In short, the freedom to do or say anything that one wishes as long as one does not directly harm or intrude on others. Many people who believe in freedom in this sense find it troubling that the government routinely violates supposedly guaranteed individual freedoms whenever it feels threatened, or in the name of national security and public order, or even at its whim. In most cases, the courts feel no compunction in declaring that black is white and that written constitutional guarantees do not mean what they plainly state, thereby becoming near-useless as guardians of our rights. Yes, in many cases involving the state and individuals or groups, the courts and paper/constitutional promises have not been and are not in any real sense guarantees of individual rights; and federal, regional/state, and local governments continue to routinely violate our most basic human rights (especially the right to be left alone so long as one is not intruding on or harming someone else).
How did this sorry state of affairs come to be? How could such gross violations of individual liberty be so commonly accepted, in fact supported, in a country whose peoples have paid incalculable sacrifices to safeguard their freedom from foreign yoke, and whose citizens supposedly value freedom most? Again, how could such a horrible thing come to pass? How did our fellow citizens become so degraded as to support such horrendous misuse of government power? How is it that many Ethiopians have so little understanding of and so little concern about their own freedoms and those of their fellows?
In all probability, a good part of the answer lies in what they consider freedom to be. It seems that a great many, probably a good majority, of our fellow Ethiopians do not consider freedom from restraint and freedom from intrusion as fundamental. No. What they see as fundamental to freedom—and many seem to regard this as freedom’s only component—is the freedom from foreign rule and perhaps the right to vote. Moreover, a large majority of Ethiopians passively accept this state of affairs in sheep-like silence, and at least a sizable minority actively support the government’s violations of individual rights. The few who have the courage to stand up against these violations, and the authoritarian herd supporting them, are often crushed like bugs. Further, though not necessarily the most important is the mis-education system in Ethiopia today, unlike in the past. Its backbone is a system of rigid routine and mindless rote memorization. Add to this that critical thinking and scepticism are systematically discouraged—it’s no accident that year after year students in Ethiopian universities and colleges score very badly in science compared with students in Asian and even some African countries—and one can only conclude that the Ethiopian mis-education system is succeeding very well in its mission: production of automatons who do not think for themselves, who lack patriotism, who submissively accept humiliating government intrusions into their lives, and who accept hierarchy, gross economic inequality, a low standard of living, and their own subordinate places in a rigidifying class structure as normal, natural, and indeed inevitable.
Leaving this dismal situation behind, let’s consider a very important aspect of freedom that is virtually never mentioned in Ethiopia: what Emma Goldman called “the freedom to,” that is, the access to the resources necessary to making the “negative” freedoms (freedom of speech, freedom of travel/movement, etc.) meaningful—to put this another way, access to the resources necessary to the freedom to act. Without this “positive” freedom, freedom from restraint becomes nearly meaningless. What is the meaning of freedom for us if we have no access to basic human needs and services, such as food, water, shelter, clothing, education, healthcare, employment, and a modicum of safety and security? As an extreme example, freedom of the press is a mockery to someone who is starving to death. To put this another way, lack of positive freedom, lack of equal access to resources, makes a mockery of all of the freedoms from restraint—freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom of travel, etc.—because unequal access to resources is itself a tremendous restraint. If freedom is to be real, equal freedom—in both its positive (access to resources) and negative (freedom from restraint) aspects—is mandatory. Absolute freedom is impossible (though the rich enjoy something close to it, at everyone else’s expense); the best that can be hoped is equal freedom. In day-to-day life, the rich and the politically powerful are much less likely than the rest of us ever to be bothered by the police, as cops are always much more reluctant to kick in the latter’s doors (if they can get past the perimeter gates in the first place) than they are the doors of those who do useful work—the working people. And, in those rare circumstances in which the rich are charged with crimes, they can hire the best defence lawyers to get them off, sometimes on what seem like open-and-shut murder charges, such as the O.J. Simpson case. (In contrast, the poor often have to rely on overworked public defenders who normally plea bargain cases; as a result, a large number of poor people are convicted of, or plead guilty to, crimes they never committed.) The rich and the powerful political leaders enjoy an extraordinary degree of freedom at everyone else’s expense, as the resources are almost entirely in the hands of the rich and the powerful individuals.
Finally, it is important to remember that the freedom that so many of us now take for granted didn’t just come about because everybody agreed that it was a “good idea.” They were literally fought for by previous generations; that is how much they valued freedom. Those in authority generally don’t give up that authority willingly; freedom needs to be demanded from them (preferably, as Ghandi, by peaceful means). We are now the generation that has become the custodians of freedom. Will we allow it to languish because we have more important things to do, or will we take up the responsibility, as our forebears did, and fight for freedom and civil liberties so that our country and the world is a better place for ourselves and our children? But we have to understand that in order to defend freedom, we will invariably have to make choices between collective and individual freedoms, and in the process our defence of freedom will also paradoxically involve the restriction of freedom. After all, freedom is never absolute, nor is it a license. One’s freedom to do something is always qualified by another’s freedom to be protected from injury. There is no simple formula or easy solution to this balancing act. But there are many different individuals and corporations that are constantly trying to influence that decision because how freedom balances can have huge financial and socio-political consequences. This choice of freedoms, therefore, is each of ours to make, and the consequences of that choice will affect future generations to come.
Great thinkers, politicians, writers, and artists have debated the meaning of freedom throughout history:
What is freedom?
Freedom is the right to choose: the right to create for yourself the alternatives of choice. Without the possibility of choice and the exercise of choice a man is not a man but a member, an instrument, a thing [Archibald MacLeish]
Volumes can be and have been written about the issue of freedom versus dictatorship, but, in essence, it comes down to a single question: do you consider it moral to treat men as sacrificial animals and to rule them by physical force? [Michaela Schied]
The only proper purpose of government is to protect man’s rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence…The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders; and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, and to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law. [Chris Kibler]
True freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made of. [Daisy P. Waters]
Men fear thoughts as they fear nothing else on earth—more than ruin—more even than death…Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible; thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man. [Kate Seebach]
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. [Benjamin Franklin]
Intellectual freedom cannot exist without political freedom; political freedom cannot exist without economic freedom; a free mind and a free market are corollaries. [Ayn Rand]
So many idealistic political movements for a better world have ended in mass-murdering dictatorships. Giving leaders enough power to create ‘social justice’ is giving them enough power to destroy all justice, all freedom, and all human dignity. [Thomas Sowell]
A society of sheep must in time beget a government of wolves.[B. de Jouvenal]
Most people do believe that their leaders are just and fair, even in the face of evidence to the contrary, because once a citizen acknowledges that the government under which he lives is lying and corrupt, the citizen has to choose what he or she will do about it. To take action in the face of corrupt government entails risks of harm to life and loved ones. To choose to do nothing is to surrender one’s self-image of standing for principles. Most people do not have the courage to face that choice. Hence, most propaganda is not designed to fool the critical thinker but only to give moral cowards an excuse not to think at all. [Michael Rivero]
The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in a time of moral crisis, maintain their neutrality. [Dante, The Inferno]
I know not what course others may take but as for me: give me liberty or give me death. [Patrick henry]
Tyranny is always better organised than freedom [Charles Peguy]
Better to die on one’s feet than to live on one’s knees [E. Zapata]
Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves. [Winston Churchill]
An oppressive government is much worse than a man-eating tiger. [K. F. Dzuh]
The greatest tyrannies are always perpetrated in the name of the noblest causes [Thomas Paine]