Repeatedly we have seen people wondering whether a certain person is an Eritrean just because he/she has not agreed with their viewpoints or he/she has failed to live up to their confusing and varying standards. They might have done that out of the desire to score some cheap political points or because of sheer ignorance. Yet, everybody measures everybody with his/her own political, social, traditional or/and cultural yardsticks. “Ember’ke Eritrawi/t dyu/ dya/ diKa/diki?” is the usual question that is posed after they have measured an individual and after that individual has failed their test.
To the PFDJ extollers and their cronies, an Eritrean should be “wfuy,” “qrub,” “gdus,” “hagerawi,” etc. To them, if a person is more “wfuy, qrub, etc…” than another person, he must also comparatively be more Eritrean than that other person. Ultimately that would mean anyone that exhibits none of the above characteristics is also non-Eritrean. Name-calling, character assassination, denial of one’s rights, and even disowning follow their mistaken judgements. “Traitor,” “Agame,” etc are names that would be given to whomsoever dubbed “un-Eritrean.”
The proper query that comes into one’s mind here would be how the thugs would identify the “wfuynet and “qrubnet” in a person who is being evaluated. The method of identification, which differs according to the place where the “evaluatee” lives, is relatively simple. To identify whether a person who lives in Diaspora is more “wfuy” or “gdus,’ they observe the commitment with which he/she would meet the never-ending and ever-growing requirements of the PFDJ. If the individual in question is quick on his feet to respond to such demands as attending seminars or festivals or paying the 2 per cent tax, the bonds and all those “wefeyas,” he is considered to be “gdus,” “wfuy,” etc. One would be considered to have more of those qualities (the wfuynet and gdusnet), if he/she also occasionally throws in a couple of lines in the PFDJ websites approving whatever the government does and/or insulting anybody that tried to criticise it. To identify a person who is in Eritrea may either be costly – claiming sweat and blood – or very cheap – as cheap as telling on friends and neighbours (mHsaw).
In the opposition camp, Eritrean-ness has other standards. For some naives, you probably are truly an Eritrean if you hate PFDJ and identify yourself with the cause of the opposition. According to them, those who support Isayas and the PFDJ are not Eritreans. Confusingly enough, then, if you are an Eritrean to the supporters of the government, you are not an Eritrean to the opposition and vice versa.
The confusion grows into further complication when you add other standards in the Eritrean-ness equation. According to some Eritreans (whatever their affiliation is), a true Eritrean should be a person who has some kind of achievements or exhibits some desirable personality traits – such as goodness, fairness, honesty, etc. Their standard would not allow for under-achievers or the so-called “society-parasites” to ever be counted as Eritreans. Their standard leads them to beleive that Meb Kiflezghi (the Olympic medallist) is more Eritrean than Mukthar Ibrahim (the would be London bomber).
With all these standards comes pride – a disillusioned pride of being an Eritrean. If Eritrean-ness is going to be measured by these standards, we do not even have a pride at all. This is because, according to our standards, the pride of belonging-ness also differs. Some are proud to be an Eritrean because they associate their Eritrean-ness with the causes they believe in. Others are proud because they belong in the same group as someone who has achieved something. These folks take their pride from the fact that Meb Kiflezghi has won a medal. Though it is wise to applaud others’ achievements and learn from them, I do not think it is of any good to anybody to take this as a source of pride in one’s origin. Those Eritreans who were proud of their Eritrean-ness because Mr Kiflezghi has won a medal may have hated their origin when Muktar Ibrahim tried to blow himself and others in London.
Some are proud to be Eritreans just because they are not Ethiopians. They compare their situations and try to identify one more thing they could find in which they can be better off than Ethiopians. “We have access to the sea. Ethiopians do not have that access. Therefore, I’m Proud of being an Eritrean” is one source of such amour propre. Famine, AIDS, etc are cited as good reasons in their empty “thanks-God-that-I am-not-an-Ethiopian” kind of conceit that borders with arrogance. What about the famine and the AIDS prevalence in Eritrea? It is this set of mind, this unduly elevated self-importance, that urges some people in both Eritrea and Ethiopia to plunge into intellectual and verbal fights over the origins of famous personalities such as Pushkin.
True, comparison could be a source of pride. But where do we find ourselves when we compare ourselves with other countries – such as Seychelles (or even Ethiopia or Somalia as comparisons in some measures would easily reveal)? “Ab tiHti tsifrey ki’atw deliye,” would have been the level of our pride.
The next logical questions would then run like this. If Eritrean-ness is not measured by standards, what is it that makes a person an Eritrean by origin? This question can be easily answered if we try to solve the following hypothetical query carefully. “If one had a choice of a country in which he would like to be created or born before he comes to this world, what would his/her choice be?” If we are true to ourselves, we know no one amongst us would say, “I would have preferred to be born in Eritrea.” In its extremity, as one friend of my friend puts his resolve, the response to the query can be derogative: “I would rather be a spoon in the U.S. than a human being in Eritrea.”
I have once read in a certain book that we can choose our friends, but that our families are chosen for us. Similarly, we can choose our citizenship, but we cannot pick our origins. An invisible hand selects our origin for us. Hence, whether I like it or not or whether others approve of it or not, I am an Eritrean. If I had an opportunity to choose my place of birth, I know what I would have chosen. Alas, it cannot be the case. I need no standards to tell me where my origins are. I need no ID cards, no passports, and no assurance from anybody that I am of an Eritrean origin. I do not need to be “wfuy, gdus, sw’e, etc”. With or without these, I am still an Eritrean. I can be brave or a coward, a hero or a traitor, an oppositionist or a supporter, yet I am still an Eritrean.
I do not need to be an achiever or a good person to be an Eritrean. Mr. Meb Kiflezghi is an American of Eritrean origin. It is not because he won an Olympic medal that he has attained his Eritrean-ness. It is just because he has no choice but be of an Eritrean origin. If he had a choice, it would have been simple to guess that he would not have wanted to be of an Eritrean origin. Because, he has already chosen - an American citizenship over Eritrean citizenship. In the same vein, Muktar Ibrahim, (the would-be London Bomber) though he is a terrorist, is a British but still of an Eritrean origin. We cannot take away his Eritrean-ness (by origin) just because he does not fall into those standards that we set. The soldier who is condemned to fight (or die) in the “senseless” war to re-claim Badme and the Sultan who sold Assab to the Turks (or was it to the Italians?) are both equally Eritreans.
Does it mean that I have no pride in my Eritrean-ness, just because I would not be an Eritrean if I had the choice? May be or may be not. I cannot give a simple black and white answer. Given our situation, one can maintain a pride. However, this pride is identical to the pride that one acquires by living with one’s helplessness – a helplessness that comes from the fact that one cannot change one’s origins. Thus, one would resort to saying, “I am proud of my Eritrean-ness,” although one knows in his heart that this utterance is nonsensical and although what he/she really wants to do (or is doing or even has done at the moment) is to cross over oceans and seas so that he/she can better him/herself in other countries whose accomplishments he/she claims he/she is not so proud of.
We can ameliorate the situation in our country so that we can get more things to be proud of.
· It might be possible for anyone to be proud by trying to better the position of one’s helplessness. If, say, one is born disadvantaged from a backward society and an illiterate family, the first thing one should do is to learn to deal with the disadvantages. Then one has to do whatever one can to better oneself and improve one’s situation. If one can do that, there must be some sense of pride that comes with it.
· Better yet, one way to improve our position in the question of pride in our origin is by taking part in the efforts for improving all the problems in Eritrea. If each one of us work hard individually or in a group to end the predicaments that befell Eritrea, the outcome would be a country that we all might take pride on. The shaping of our pride might take some time but it is among those limited choices we have and we better start to do something about it.
The sad thing is that although our options are limited, we are further squandering them away by falling into traps put on our way by individuals and groups who do not care whatever happens to us and our prides as long as their interest – be it power or greed – is not compromised. We let ourselves to be chained by standards set by ignorant, greedy and power seeking people so tight for so long that we could not take actions because we are afraid of being dubbed – traitors, non-Eritreans, “weyanes,” “t’Hte hagerwis,” etc. It is about time to tell those who set the standards to go and find ways of living up to the standards they set. You and me need no standards. Our answers should always be, “I am an Eritrean and nothing that you can do would change that.”
