By Teodros Kiros ( Ph.D.)
In this article, I continue an argument which I presented in Aiga Forum, under the title, New Thinking; A Pragmatic Imperative for a New Tigray, where I wrote,
“I By New Thinking, I mean a thinking that begins the project of newness by searching its soul, and making sure that its soul is in good condition and that it is continuing to examine itself, as an imperative spiritual exercise. This self-examining soul does not point at others. It points at itself first, and only after that, can it use itself as a measure and demand that others do the same, if they can, and if they are willing to do so. For such persons, if there are such, self-examination is a necessary and sufficient condition for the possibility of cultivating New Thinking. New Thinking is a potential towards which we Tigreans must grow. We are not born as persons, we grow to become persons. On this measure New Thinking, like personhood, is a possibility that we must consciously cultivate. This New Thinking requires, Exemplary Leaders, which we do not have, but we must cultivate them, if we are to rebuild a New Tigray, which must be embodied in new leaders for whom New Thinking could become a motivating attribute.”
(b)My observation is that self-examination is not part of our civic virtues, but the New Tigray must be inhabited by those who are willing and committed to embrace New Thinking, because our dire Tigrean condition exacerbated by the civil war has only taught us to point at others and not our own souls first. This challenge is a categorical imperative. We must first be willing to change, and them commit ourselves to do what we must and cultivate the persons we wish to be. Choice must be resolutely followed by change.
The old party is saturated with old thinking, distrustful of the genuinely educated Tigreans, whose works we do not know, and yet we judge them from a distance, without research. We live in a society that does not encourage reading, writing or authentic dialogues. We willfully block, ridicule, imprison, harass and ignore all those who disagree with us. We divide churches, groupings, parties on ethnic lines, by going to the level of villages, and give individuals virtues and vices on the basis of the villages from which they come. These practices are the content of Old Thinking, which refuses to die, and is destroying Tigreans inside out. It is precisely this corrosive and outmoded thinking, the opposite of the requirements of Spiritual Modernity, spearheaded by Zara Yacob, which we must consciously and resolutely cultivate, or else Tigray will not be fully restored. Yes we can restore the building and factories in time but not the damaged souls of its people. The latter restoration demands deep spiritual cleaning guided by the Heart.
©After recently attending a two day meeting of Tigrean scholars which I attended dutifully and made several attempts to participate by raising my hands and was willfully ignored, I despaired and realized that Tigray is in serious trouble. My intention was to engage the current leader of the Tigrean people in a genuine dialogue, but was willfully blocked with several others who wanted to do the same.
This event reminded me of TPLF’s worn out tactic of choosing its own fake scholars who grew up under its leadership and have internalized its old habits in a new form. They are surely young but their ideas are replicas of the old thinking, with its self-serving agendas and jargonistic language, a hybrid of English phrases and belabored Tigrigna words, repetitive, long and mostly irrelevant with all kinds of technocratic staff aiming at making money when NGOS begin to bombard Tigray.
This is not what Tigray needs. Tigray needs modern spiritual thinkers unafraid of new ideas based on the demonstrated accomplishment of its genuine and globally respected scholars who teach and write books, and not merely convene two day conferences which achieve nothing other than impress one another.
The New Thinking I am calling for must be genuinely inclusive of scholars with demonstrated abilities in books and international recognition, and not merely a gathering of clannish, close minded so called scholars, chosen by the old party and pushing its old ideas in new forms.
The Tigrean people must challenge this and demand that we think and act courageously as we rebuild the New Tigray we want and retire old ideas and replace them with new ideas propelled by New Thinking.”
I would like to go further, and expand on Self-Examination as the crucible of building a New Tigray to be led by exemplary leaders, the media and scholars, which Tigray does not have in sufficient numbers.
We must cultivate new habits to save Tigray from catastrophe. Our small population should encourage us to carry out fundamental and radical changes because we can. Our small population is an asset, which we can manage, and develop a powerful and stable nation. We can rebuild Tigray to be a model for its neighbors, exactly as Rwanda. A victim of genocide continues to do under the leadership of an exemplary leader, Paul Kagame. The future of Tigray is in our hands, individually and collectively.
All of us Tigreans, from our current leaders, our educators, our farmers must engage in individual and collective self-examination, a feature of genuine radical democratic personality, a practice of democracy in our everyday lives, which can be drawn out from our rich spiritual tradition, Christianity and Islam, buried in our souls, and of which we ought to be proud, if we are not already.
In a recent meeting of Tigrean leaders and some of the led, a heart wrenching discussion of corruption and stealing among the people and their leaders took place, and was featured in Tigray horizon. This is a first step, but a crucial one, if those who spoke, including General Tsadkan, and his call for self-examination, which I called for in New Thinking, is from the heart, the place of honest and courageous thinking. Of course our leaders and the sham Tigrean and other media plagiarize shamelessly. This too is stealing but we have made it a habit, so that we can sound intelligent and own insights and arguments others labored on. Self- Examination must begin here.
Corruption and stealing are not new practices. They are habits which liberal, Neo Liberal, authoritarian communist states systematically implant in the people’s minds. They have nothing to do with human nature. Rather, they are byproducts of conditioning. When our leaders steal and enrich themselves, the media steals ideas, our scholars steal from other scholars without acknowledgement, what are the people to do. They do the same. When our leaders dine and wine in expensive hotels, they are making the poor who cannot ,but fiercely fought in their war, to be envious, and steal, if and when they can to survive. This should not surprise us. Corruptions begin at the top and filters to the envious masses.
Our leaders must engage in genuine Self-Examination and search their souls and control their massive appetites by being exemplary leaders. This project must begin now, as we are seeking to realize the Pretoria agreement. The two projects are not contradictory. They are complementary.
While we mobilize globally, as we are now, we can simultaneously look deeply into our souls, and stop stealing on all levels, and instead share what we do not need, with those whose basic needs are being stolen by them.
Let us draw from our rich spiritual tradition to repent, ask for forgiveness, and accept the sentences which match our crimes, collectively. All of us are guilty to different degrees, as was noted in a recent meeting of Tigrean leaders. Let us begin from the top and hold leaders, media pundits, scholars and many others.