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 Periodical article |
 Leiden University catalogue |
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| Title: | Eritrea: Transition to Dictatorship, 1991-2003 |
| Author: | Hedru, Debessay |
| Year: | 2003 |
| Periodical: | Review of African Political Economy |
| Volume: | 30 |
| Issue: | 97 |
| Period: | September |
| Pages: | 435-444 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Eritrea |
| Subjects: | political change Eritrean People's Liberation Front People's Front for Democracy and Justice Politics and Government History and Exploration nationalism |
| External link: | https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/07 |
| Abstract: | Eritrea's image in the early 1990s as a peaceful and well-ordered State was coloured by the euphoria of independence following a military victory over Ethiopia. Against all odds, the country seceded in 1991 and attained international recognition in 1993. Ten years later, Eritrea is known as a rogue State ruled by a rigid dictatorship. What happened to the promise of peace, democracy and prosperity? The answer lies in the fact that the people willingly conferred absolute power on the leadership of a guerilla movement that won their freedom from Ethiopian occupation, and then deprived them of liberty. A turning point in the transition to dictatorship came with the drafting of a constitution, a process that took three years (1994-1997) to complete. The authoritarian culture of the EPLF (Eritrean Peoples Liberation Front), renamed the Popular Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ) in February 1994, set definite limits to debate on issues concerning the constitution, and when the protracted constitution-making process came to an end in 1997, the document was consigned to the deep freezer. Independence brought neither peace nor prosperity to Eritrea's youth. Instead, it brought State regulation of their lives from school to workplace, causing youth resentment. At the forefront of the movement which called for reform after three decades of unquestioning loyalty to President Issayas Afewerki were veteran comrades of the president who had lost ground steadily in the decisionmaking process to a clique of relative newcomers that formed around Issayas after independence. After several 'open letters' and other declarations, the reformists issued a document addressed to the public in August 2001. In September 2001 eleven of them were arrested and two years later their whereabouts remains unknown. [ASC Leiden abstract] |
