Op-Ed Archives – OROMIA TODAY

Article | Op-Ed | Politics
Regression Preference Syndrome: Debunking the Regressive Tendency in Ethiopian Politics
By Roobaa Hawaas (MA, Psychology) Posted on2026-05-172026-05-17
Regression Preference Syndrome is proposed as a political-psychological framework explaining Ethiopia's recurring tendency to favor historical rollback over incremental democratic progress. Using contemporary examples from autocratic rule, internal wars, unresolved national questions, maritime access discourse, and hard-power politics, the article argues that regression often appears psychologically easier than reform. It calls for Ethiopia to reject destructive coercive approaches, embrace soft power and negotiated settlements, and pursue gradual democratic progress instead of disruptive retrogressive steps that risk repeating historical cycles.
Read More Regression Preference Syndrome: Debunking the Regressive Tendency in Ethiopian Politics
Article | Op-Ed | Politics
What Does the Demand “Remove Article 39” Really Mean?
By OT Editorial Posted on2026-05-152026-05-15
Article 39 of the Ethiopian Constitution is often portrayed as a threat to national unity, but its deeper purpose is widely misunderstood. Far from encouraging separation, Article 39 functions as a constitutional safety valve that guarantees coexistence by consent rather than coercion. This article explores why the demand to remove Article 39 alarms many nations and peoples, the political psychology behind self-determination, and how abolishing constitutional guarantees could unintentionally weaken the very unity its opponents claim to defend.
Read More What Does the Demand “Remove Article 39” Really Mean?
Article | Op-Ed | Voices from the Struggle
When Guardians Become Predators: A Cry from an Oromo Elder
By OROMIA TODAY Posted on2026-05-022026-05-02
In this compelling personal note, an Oromo Elder speaks out on the spread of organized criminal groups and the collapse of moral order in Oromia. From Ambo to Finfinnee, from Adama to Shashamane and beyond, his words capture a painful reality: citizens are left defenseless as those in power enable injustice. The Oromo Elder urges prayer, action, and collective awakening to confront this dark moment before it defines the future.
Read More When Guardians Become Predators: A Cry from an Oromo Elder
Article | Op-Ed | Politics
Ethiopia Forward to the Past: The Politics of Nostalgia and the “Menelik Syndrome”
By Yadessa Guma (PhD, Anthropology) Posted on2026-04-282026-04-28
“Menelik Syndrome” captures a recurring pattern in Ethiopia’s political imagination: the selective revival of an idealized imperial past as a solution to present crises. Framed around the legacy of Menelik II, it elevates symbols of unity, strength, and state consolidation while downplaying the coercive foundations on which that unity was built. In contemporary discourse, this manifests in calls to “restore Ethiopia’s past glory”—a narrative that resonates emotionally but risks reopening unresolved historical contradictions. As a political lens, Menelik Syndrome helps explain how nostalgia, when filtered through power, can shape national identity, influence policy direction, and—paradoxically—intensify fragmentation rather than resolve it.
Read More Ethiopia Forward to the Past: The Politics of Nostalgia and the “Menelik Syndrome”
Article | Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
The Ethiopian Perspective Gap: Why Some Voices Sound Like Truth—and Others Like Rebuttal
By Roobaa Hawaas (MA, Psychology) Posted on2026-04-232026-04-22
This op-ed explores how mono perspective sociopolitical views shape both art and politics, often presenting particular experiences as universal truths and thereby constraining meaningful dialogue. It argues that progress requires moving beyond such narrow vantage points—particularly among politicians, who are uniquely positioned to resolve complex sociopolitical issues. To do so, they must step outside mono perspective, engage competing realities with discipline, and adopt a genuinely multi-perspective approach capable of addressing long-standing tensions with clarity and fairness.
Read More The Ethiopian Perspective Gap: Why Some Voices Sound Like Truth—and Others Like Rebuttal
Article | Commentary | Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
Cui Bono? The Political Economy of Conflict and the Oromo Question
By Yadessa Guma (PhD, Anthropology) Posted on2026-04-202026-04-19
“Cui Bono?”—who benefits? This article applies that question to Ethiopia’s recurring cycles of conflict, arguing that instability is not accidental but structurally embedded. By centering the Oromo experience, it shows how political, military, and economic elites—historically reproduced through entrenched advantage—derive disproportionate benefit, while the broader population bears the cost. Without confronting this imbalance and the unresolved Oromo question, durable peace and equitable development will remain elusive.
Read More Cui Bono? The Political Economy of Conflict and the Oromo Question
Article | Commentary | Op-Ed | Politics
The Peace Conference Without the Other Side
By Roobaa Hawaas (MA, Psychology) Posted on2026-04-052026-04-04
A peace conference without the other party present is not a peace conference. It is a political performance. The recent speech by Oromia president Shimelis Abdissa and so-called peace gathering reveal a deeper political reality: peace is being used as rhetoric while politics, historical grievances, and negotiations are carefully avoided. The tragedy of the current conflict is not simply war, but the collapse of trust — and without trust, peace cannot exist.
Read More The Peace Conference Without the Other Side
Essay | Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
History Comes to the UN and Asks for a Vote
By Olii Boran (PhD, Sociology) Posted on2026-03-262026-03-25
A United Nations vote to condemn the enslavement of Africans and the trans-Atlantic slave trade should have been morally straightforward. Instead, the voting pattern revealed something deeper about the modern world: the past is never just the past. It lives in politics, memory, and responsibility, and sometimes history returns and asks the present to respond.
Read More History Comes to the UN and Asks for a Vote
Article | Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
Oromos and the Rising Risk of Regional War: Power, Leverage, and Post-War Reality
By Dereje Hawas (PhD, Elec Eng) Posted on2026-02-222026-02-16
War is not decided by outrage, slogans, or population size, but by organization, internal consolidation, and clear political priorities. As tensions re-emerge in northern Ethiopia, Oromos face a strategic question: will they shape a potential regional war’s outcome, or be shaped by it? Demography and geography create leverage only when converted into disciplined coordination. The lessons of 1991 and 2018 show that mobilization without institutional capacity yields participation without authorship.
Read More Oromos and the Rising Risk of Regional War: Power, Leverage, and Post-War Reality
Article | Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
Ethiopia, Empire, and the Architecture of Perpetual Violence
By Elemoo Qilxuu (MA, Political Science) Posted on2026-02-202026-02-20
Video footage circulating on social media showing ENDF forces deliberately destroying grain stored in Amhara farmers’ warehouses stopped me cold. If you were challenged to write an essay on this sadistic act, what would your take be? How would you title it—The Banality of Cruelty in a Militarized State? When the State Trains Young Men to Laugh at Hunger?
For me, this footage reveals far more than a single atrocity. It exposes something deeply rotten—structural, inherited, and unresolved—at the core of an empire called Ethiopia.
Please bear with me. Stay with me for a brief but unflinching analysis of what lies beneath the surface.
Read More Ethiopia, Empire, and the Architecture of Perpetual Violence
Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
"Dr Dereje Gerefa Tullu": When Education Turns Against Humanity
By Malkkaa Beenyaa (MA, Social Psychologist) Posted on2026-02-182026-02-17
When a PhD-educated public figure like Dereje Gerefa Tullu employs dehumanizing, eliminationist rhetoric, the issue is not political disagreement but moral collapse. Education is meant to civilize power, not aestheticize violence. When learning is repurposed to normalize threats and glorify force, it ceases to be enlightenment and becomes an accessory. The danger lies not only in the words spoken, but in how confidently they are spoken—revealing how ordinary cruelty can sound when dressed in educated language.
Read More "Dr Dereje Gerefa Tullu": When Education Turns Against Humanity
Op-Ed | Opinion | Politics
When a Just Cause Is Made to Fail: Oromo Fragmentation, Elite Proliferation, and the Cost of Permanent Politics
By Dereje Hawas (PhD, Elec Eng) Posted on2026-02-102026-02-10
Oromo Fragmentation is not a sign of political maturity or ideological diversity; it is the visible cost of elite proliferation detached from existential survival. As land is taken and communities are displaced, the struggle splinters into competing parties, fronts, and narratives that drain energy without building power. Fragmentation shields elites from accountability while leaving ordinary Oromos without leverage, unity, or an effective defense against dispossession and erasure. This op-ed argues that moral unanimity must precede politics if a just cause is to survive.
Read More When a Just Cause Is Made to Fail: Oromo Fragmentation, Elite Proliferation, and the Cost of Permanent Politics
Article | Op-Ed | Opinion | Politics | ⏭
The Policy of Lying: How Power Is Sustained by Fabrication
By Elemoo Qilxuu (MA, Political Science) and Roobaa Hawaas (MA, Psychology) Posted on2026-02-062026-02-05
Ethiopia has crossed a moral and political threshold. Lying is no longer an occasional deviation but a governing method. From the fabricated pretext of the Tigray war to the attempted rewriting of Eritrea’s role—publicly rebutted by Gedu Andargachew—the pattern is unmistakable. When power substitutes for truth, institutions collapse, Parliament applauds falsehood, and citizens are conditioned to accept governance without reality. This is not political spin; it is rule by fabrication.
Read More The Policy of Lying: How Power Is Sustained by Fabrication
Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
How Will Medemer Be Remembered?
By Kumaa Daadhii (PhD, Political History) Posted on2026-01-072026-01-07
Medemer will not be remembered by its promises but by its consequences. Branded as a "doctrine" of unity, Medemer instead presided over spectacle development confined to the capital, permanent war governance, economic unraveling, normalized brutality, and systematic evictions of central Oromia. The glitter of street lights masked structural collapse, while fear became an instrument of rule. History is likely to record Medemer not as "addition", but as "subtraction"—of lives, trust, justice, and peoples' unrealized potential.
Read More How Will Medemer Be Remembered?
Op-Ed | Politics | ⏭
The Forgotten War in Wallaga: Why Atrocities in Western Oromia Remain Uncounted
By Yadessa Guma (PhD, Anthropology) Posted on2026-01-032026-01-02
1 Comment
While the world associates Ethiopia’s mass violence with the Tigray war, a longer and largely uncounted war has devastated western Oromia—especially Wallaga—since 2018. Displacement, repeated massacres, school closures, and the collapse of health services have become a grim norm, yet the true civilian death toll remains unknown. This article explains what we know, what we still do not know, why the suffering has been under-reported, and why an independent investigation by credible human rights bodies is now urgent.
Read More The Forgotten War in Wallaga: Why Atrocities in Western Oromia Remain Uncounted
Op-Ed | Politics
Gadaa on Trial: How Yonas Biru Turns Selective Ethnography into Political Prosecution
By Kumaa Daadhii (PhD, Political History) Posted on2025-12-242025-12-24
1 Comment
Yonas Biru’s “Gadaa is part apartheid” is not scholarship but a political prosecution dressed in citations. It announces a verdict (“Oromummaa is a lie”), then cherry-picks evidence to delegitimize Oromo identity claims, smear Oromo scholarship as extremism, and insinuate guilt-by-association with violence. The apartheid analogy is a sensational moral grenade, not a serious comparison. UNESCO’s recognition of Gadaa underscores its governance value, not Yonas Biru caricature.
Read More Gadaa on Trial: How Yonas Biru Turns Selective Ethnography into Political Prosecution

Tags Cloud