Abiy and his Amhara collaborators are fighting Tigrayans, Oromos and others to control Ethiopian state power. Their winning the war in Tigray and Oromia would allow the Abiy regime to continue a modified version of Ethiopia’s pre-1991 policy. For Tigrayans, losing this battle would be equivalent to losing political power and returning to victimisation, poverty and the threat of annihilation.
AuthorAsafa Jalata
Asafa Jalata is a Professor of Sociology and Global and Africana Studies at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville.
His expertise focuses on the area of global studies, development and international inequality, social movements, nationalism, terrorism studies, indigenous studies, and race and ethnicity.
Professor Jalata’s most recent books include The Oromo Movement and Imperial Politics: Ideology and Culture in Oromia and Ethiopia, New York: Lexington Books, 2020; Cultural Capital and Prospectus for Democracy in Botswana and Ethiopia, London: Routledge, 2019; Phases of Terrorism in the Age of Globalization: From Christopher Columbus to Osama bin Laden, (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016; and Contending Nationalisms of Oromia and Ethiopia: Struggling for Statehood, Sovereignty, and Multinational Democracy" (2010). He has also published and edited thirteen books and authored 80 book chapters and refereed articles in regional and international journals and book chapters.