THE BLIND SAMSON.....Bye! Bye!
By Solomon Tessema G. (semnaworeq.blogspot.com)
Great
questions have the habit of reappearing in Human history. They reappear among
all peoples and in all races; and since the establishments of a government in
human history; people have been confronted at many periods with a tendency on
the one hand to confer greater power upon the single leader, and the other to
confer greater authority upon the majority. It is the larger outlines of this
problem in which I am more deeply interested, because, having all my readings
and studying the fundamental principles and the underlying policies of
socialism. I am profoundly convinced that Ethiopia’s ruling party and the late
Meles Zenawi are/were opening the door to that policy. If this act relentlessly
perused, it inevitably brings a totalitarian form of government in Ethiopia.
At the
time of the 1970’s students’ movements, the progressive camp was confronted
with innumerable difficulties. But, unfortunately they were diverted for cheap socialist
propaganda by the herculean regime. Tilahun Gizaw passionately exclaimed that
the men who struggled for that change were “great men, not for that time alone,
but for any time, for all time.”
However,
the blind Samson and his successor (the other blind one), had not almost
thorough and accurate knowledge of all the experiments in government made in
the centuries gone. Without having adequate insight into human nature and human
motives, they don’t understand at once the strength and weakness of all these
attempts at government, and they did not seek to formulate a system that would
preserve the one and eliminate the other.
They
gleaned from the frightful pages of history that governments in the past had
not endured because they had failed to recognize one or the other of the two
fundamentals of all stable government- the rights of the individual on the one
hand and the rights of the State on the other.
THE INDIVIDUAL VERSUS THE
STATE
The
blind Samson and his successors didn’t know that in some countries the
formulated principle of the government established was individual right and
individual liberty—the
one dominating, overwhelming idea being that the individual was everything and
the State nothing. They didn’t/do not see that the application of that
theory to the affairs of the government
ended in a tyranny of the one man to despotic that it could not long be
tolerated, and that all such efforts resulted in an utter failure to accomplish
the chief end for which government must be designed if it is the endure.
They
did/do not understand, too, that in other countries that fundamental principle
upon which their government were established was the right and power of the
majority—the
one undisputed idea being that the State was everything and the individual
nothing—and
that the State was but the will of the majority as expressed at any given time.
They were blind that governments thus established were
unstable because the individual was entirely submerged and the minority was
given no consideration whatever, and, of course, inasmuch as the man and the
minority were deemed to have no rights, there was no provision made in any of
these countries for protecting or defending them. Our blind leaders didn’t see
that this led to tyranny of the majority as despotic and far more dangerous than
the tyranny of the individual, for no matter how galling the rule of the one
tyrant, the majority can finally overthrow his power and, if need be, destroy
him. But who can behead the majority? No matter how intolerable their rule,
what power can stay the hand of the multitude?
And,
therefore, our leaders didn’t see that if they would establish a permanent
government they must nicely adjust and balance the right of the individual on
the one hand and the right of the State on the other, giving to each the
largest possible sphere of activity consistent with the rights of the other and
securing each from indiscriminate invasion by the other.
These
blind Samson were ignorant to knew, as every student of history must know, that
the great struggles of the past were to secure the recognition of individual
liberty; and they didn’t see, as we observed, the leader mustn’t see, that all
governments that failed to take this fundamental into account when establishing
their institutions have failed and fallen and passed into history. Whenever
they mix up the question of the individual’s right with the tricky jargons,
such as ‘the proletarian’ or ‘the nations, nationalities and peoples’ or ‘the
terrorist’ or ‘fundamentalist/extremist’, they pay the heavy cost dearly.
These
blind Samson didn’t investigate that because of this failure monarchies were
destroyed, kingdoms subverted, principalities ruined, aristocracies overthrown,
and that they were all finally swept away by the ever-ascending spirit of
individual liberty, which is the white-winged angel of human progress. And yet
they didn’t learn from a study of the past, as we tried to do, a blind Samson
who didn’t study, about any government founded upon the one overmastering
principle of the liberty of the individual cannot endure. And so our leaders denied without
the duty of recognizing and preserving the rights of the individual on the one
hand and at the same time giving equal recognition and preservation of the
rights of the State. And they didn’t/don’t wave a fabric so enduring, that from
that time to this the progress of our country to challenge the wonder and the
admiration of the world.
THE FOUR PILARS OF
ENDURING GOVERNMENT
In my judgement we are confronted with a
condition that in the first place will add to the autocratic authority of one
man, and on the other hand will give increasing power to the majority. These
institutions of ours are based upon four fundamentals. They are, first,
individual rights and to preserve these individual rights a government
threefold in character—legislative,
executive, and judicial. The four pillars of enduring representative
government, founded upon a constitution and preserved by its provision, are,
therefore, individual rights—the power of the legislature, the power of the
executive, and the power of the courts. If either one of these pillars be
pulled down by any blind Samson, the whole edifice will crumble and fall to
ruin. Therefore, when we consider the result of giving increased power either
to the leader of Ethiopia, we threaten the invasion of the sphere of
representative government from both sides, which, if persisted in, must
inevitably bring the whole fabric to destruction.
What do I
mean by that prepositions? We all know that for many years in this country the
inevitable, aye, the well-nigh irresistible tendency has been to augment the
authority of the leader. This has resulted, first, because of the general
demand of the people, who almost universally believe in the leader and insist
on his sole leadership; and , second, because of his being the titular head of
the party in power, and the general desire of members of the parliament to
follow his leadership for political reasons. This policy has been pursued the
leader to wield a power that is blindfolded.
But how
was it all wielded? By the one man at the head of it all, the blind Samson
(tyrant) who governed it all and controlled it all, and who wielded that
immense organization because this socialized state enabled him to do it.
THE DANGER IN “GOVERNMENT”
OWNERSHIP
If it be
stated this predictions is only an ideal dream, I answer that this use of these
forces has already begun in this country and will become more and more
dangerous as the number of industries under Government control is increased.
There is no enough room in Ethiopia for the Command Economy’s flag and for Free
Market’s flag, thus we must fly the free market’s flag over the other. How
could we allow the two flags to fly high? But the blind Samson tried to so for
the last two decades maliciously.
The blind
Samson often says, “You are all my boys and girls, and I don’t intend to let
anyone kick you around, for I will defend you to the limit when you are loyal
to me and my party, and you won’t go wrong against my will.... I am sure.” Here
comes the significant statement, which points the moral to my argument.
Samson’s idea is as straight a bid for control as was ever made anywhere in
this country. Suppose there were 5,000,000 of them, cannot anyone see the
power, cannot anyone apprehend the danger? And what was the inevitable result?
Scarcely has his words ceased to echo throughout the county until there was a
perceptible letting down in efficiency among the unemployed. This is but human
nature, and nothing less was to be expected, for if the men who are employed are
told by the man who employed them that, in substance, they can do as they
please, and that nobody shall be permitted to interfere, as a matter of course
that will result in a greater laxity in the performance of duty.
Everybody
knows that this is the situation with the unemployed nowadays, and everybody
must know, too, that the governmental control of the lines will mean a greater
degree of inefficiency in their operation, just as it does wherever the
Government controls. And this movement for government ownership, like a ball of
snow, gathers force as it is pushed along.
There was
too much of a tendency here and now and always to accentuate class existence in
Ethiopia since the military regime. Some want legislation for labouring men.
Some want legislation for the manufacturers. Others want legislation for the
men engaged in some particular calling or vocation. I object to that sort of
class legislation. What kind of class existence the ruling party cadres talk
controlling the land ownership by the hands of the government? What kind of
labour right form any side they want to legislate, after they control all the
industries, factories, buildings, and businesses; even the bigger cafes at the
hands of their officials and affiliates? We ought to have Laws passed for the benefit
of the whole Ethiopia people, knowing that what inures to the benefit of one
would, if it be a just policy of government, inure to the benefit of all, and
that what helps all would, with the proper exercise of industry, help each
individual unit of society.
*******************************
If the
loyalty or patriotism of any one is suspected, let him/her be investigated, let
him be placed under surveillance, let his communications be censured, but don’t
on order to catch the guilty few inaugurate a universal system of espionage in
the country that will prove expensive and oppressive and achieve no results
comparable to the mischief it will produce.
አስተያየቶች
አስተያየት ይለጥፉ
Thanks a lot for your comments.