I’m the last person to talk about Ethiopian politics, but I find the framing of your question/post to be weird.
Do the government do things for a specific ethnicity? Sure, but on certain things.
Does the government fully represent and vows to represent the best interest of that specific ethnicity? Nope, I don’t think so.
The government only uses that ethnicity to get a stronghold it has on power, nothing more nothing less. It’s not interested on the plight of the common men of that ethnicity. How do I know? Well each thing you listed out as an exploitation is happening not to certain ethnicities only, it’s happening to every one, even the ethnicity the government is claimed to “favor.”
In my neighborhood, the bajaj enterprise is totally dominated by Oromo people, yet Federal was released upon them to stop from engaging in their work. Also the population in my neighborhood is also dominated by Oromo people, whose house is being demolished left and right. Another one, The Oromo farmers are exploited too.
This framing of us and them, baked in ethnicity is the thing the government wants.
Instead of the people of Ethiopia working together and ask the government questions, it divides it. The government hides behind an Ethnicity, and the more we conduct our conversation through an ethnicity lens, the more string the government cover becomes.
Hope this helped separate the common myth that the government is benefiting a certain ethnicity. It only does as far as it protects its power, and there’s no concrete structural benefit. If you are a common Oromo person, you’re exploited as every other ethnicity, no special treatment. Question the authority, not the poor population it hides behind.
Mar 13, 2023
