Eritrea celebrates 16th Independence anniversary
By Berhane M Tekeste
May 23, 2007 –As of May of 1991, when Eritrea emerged as a politically independent and self-governing sovereign nation, May 24 is Independence Day in Eritrea. This year Eritrea and Eritreans celebrate the 16th Independence Anniversary. Congratulations and happy Independence Day to Eritrea and all Eritreans at home and abroad. They can deny us of our National Constitution but they cannot take away from us our country’s national independence. We will celebrate and relish our national independence under all circumstances for as long as there is even one single Eritrean standing, Eritrea is here to stay.
Let there be no mistake whatsoever and they can turn and roll it all they want all day but Eritrea’s national independence is neither a charitable act of EPLF/PFDJ to the ‘destitute’ people of Eritrea as they would like us to believe, nor that of article 39 of the Ethiopian constitution (“Right of Nations to Self-determination”) as those Ethiopians insanely afflicted by the hallucinogenic 2000-year-old Abyssinia-Myth would like to claim, or the result of the bogus “referendum” of 1993 as the international media would like to pretend.
Eritrea gained national Independence the hardest way. Eritrea wrested its national independence by the blood, sweat, and tears of all Eritreans with the ultimate sacrifice of life and limb of the valiant combatants of the EPLF (Eritrean People’s Liberation Front) and ELF (Eritrean Liberation Front) against all possible odds posed by all major power houses of the world and after paying dearly with the lives of no less than 70,000 people and comparable number of disabled veterans, which is a lot for a nation of barely 4 million.
This is how Eritrea gained its legitimate and rightful national independence and this is how Eritrea defended its territorial and national sovereignty when it foiled Abyssinia rulers’ renewed attempt to re-occupy Eritrea during the 1998 – 2000 border war, and that is going to be the way how any and every matter appertaining to the people and country of Eritrea will be determined and decided not by the whims and wishes of the one-man, one-party tyrannical rule of Esayas Afwerki/PFDJ.
Eritrea is a country with a nation that simply won’t go away or vanish despite being subjected to various and varying consecutive colonial occupation for 50 years (first Britain, then the Ethiopian empire) in addition to the initial colonialization by Italy for 51 years. That is more than a century of colonializaton, occupation and subjugation by foreigners (101 years!). All that just because international major power houses (US, UK) were hell-bent to link Eritrea to Ethiopia in exchange for Ethiopia’s unconditional service as a bulwark and bastion of their hegemonic control of the strategically and geopolitically significant region, The Horn of Africa. They did this by their own well-documented admission in reckless disregard of the expressed wishes and will of the people of Eritrea for national independence simply because they could. But come 1991, when Eritrea emerged as a legitimate geopolitical reality that cannot be undone, this policy was defeated to no recognition and the USA under George Herbert Walker Bush was even the first to accept Eritrea’s national independence and to live with it.
Today, Eritrea celebrates its 16th year of existence as a totally sovereign nation but yet it is not governed as such but as a private estate of president Esayas Afewerki and PFDJ. The people of Eritrea don’t deserve it. That is why, this year, Independence Day Celebrations are overshadowed and eclipsed by Eritrea ruler, Esayas Afewerki’s one-man, one-party tyrannical rule by the barrel of the gun that has befallen our country for now 16 years.
Congratulations and Happy 16th Independence Anniversary ERITREA
Eternal glory and fame to all Eritrea Martyrs,
Long live all Eritrean veterans,
Long live the people and country of Eritrea.
* The Author is an Eritrean-American. He can be contacted at [email protected]