Recovered leverage is not victory. It is a test of judgment: Tigray must turn its growing room to maneuver into durable gains without making the survival of its people depend on assumptions that may prove wrong. Tigray is no longer where it was under the transitional arrangement. The endurance of our people, the sacrifices of those who defended Tigray, and…

I loved the country that taught me to disappear inside it. I know now that a culture can hold you completely and still not hold your name, and that no state worth keeping asks a people to vanish to belong. Before the letter This is a political letter, not a dissertation. Its point of entry is one life: a Tigrayan…

Documentary notes on Western and Southern Tigray — a companion to The Mask I Wore Willingly This note gathers, in one place, the record on which the letter’s territorial claims rest, so that the argument may be weighed against evidence rather than assertion. The record for Western Tigray and the record for Southern Tigray are not the same; they are…

A companion note to The Mask I Wore Willingly Purpose of this note The Mask I Wore Willingly is a political letter grounded in one Tigrayan life. Its central argument is autobiographical, historical, and strategic at once: a person may be educated, governed, and culturally formed through the institutions of a state without thereby surrendering a deeper identity; likewise, the…

Mekhete must be anchored in Tigray’s non-negotiable national purpose and guided by clear, measurable objectives. But Tigray should not lock itself into one final political destination before the balance of power, the conduct of its partners, the viability of coexistence, and the growth of its own capacity have revealed which destination can most securely protect its people. Over the past…

Why Washington’s Strategic Diagnosis Keeps Failing the Region America is deeply present in the Horn of Africa, yet increasingly unable to see the region it is trying to stabilize.Ambassador Massinga’s visit to Mekelle is not the story. The framework that sent him is. * This essay builds on earlier TigrayInsights analyses of Western Tigray, Sudan, and the language of diplomacy.…

Public Confidence, Political Responsibility, and the Future of መኸተ መኸተ carried Tigray through an existential struggle. Its next test is whether sacrifice can be converted into lasting national capacity. TPLF carries the greatest responsibility because it leads. But leadership is not ownership. It means correcting weaknesses honestly, preserving public confidence, aligning every institution with national priorities, and organizing committed and…

Mekhete saved Tigray. Now it must evolve to achieve what survival alone cannot: the return of the displaced, the restoration of occupied territories, justice for genocide, and the recovery of Tigray’s full national rights. Recent exchanges in Ethiopian political and parliamentary discourse have once again illustrated something that many Tigrayan observers like me have been tracking for some time. The…

The question is not whether Tigray should be flexible. The question is: flexible about what, under what conditions, and in whose strategic interest? When the United States announced visa restrictions on what it called “hardline members of the TPLF,” I decided to wait before responding. Not because I had no views. But because within hours of the announcement, every camp…

The most important political question facing Tigray today is not who should lead us next. It is whether we have built a society capable of continuously producing people worthy of leading us at all. On the night of November 4, 2021, police came to my house in Addis Ababa at around nine o’clock. Seven of them. Two secret service agents…

Why Tigray Must Think More Carefully About Political Renewal Politics is often consumed by events. History is shaped by institutions. At a time when political developments in and around Tigray are moving quickly, this may seem an unusual moment to write about political organization rather than current events. That choice is deliberate. Events will continue to unfold, and there will…

Before Tigray decides what it owes Ethiopia, it must decide what it owes itself. There is a case for putting Ethiopia first. It is not a weak case. It deserves to be stated honestly before it is examined. Ethiopia remains Tigray’s largest market. It remains the framework within which Tigray’s trade, its infrastructure, its financial relationships, and its administrative connections…

This is probably the longest article I have published in a very long time. I hesitated before writing it, and I hesitated again before publishing it. Not because the subject is unimportant, but because it touches one of the most sensitive debates in Tigrayan political life today. I am not asking anyone to agree with me. I am only asking…

For decades, Egypt sought to manage the Nile equation through Ethiopia and Eritrea. The actor that repeatedly altered regional outcomes was neither — it was Tigray’s organized political capacity. The lesson is not about Egypt. It is about Tigray. If Tigrayans fail to understand their own strategic weight, others will continue to calculate it more clearly than they do themselves.…

Tigray has emerged from its most dangerous internal test more consolidated than many expected. The task now is not merely to preserve that consolidation, but to convert it into diplomatic strength: entering every room with one clear message, one clear objective, and the discipline to distinguish restoration from adjustment to loss. Tigray has spent the past months passing through one…

Tigray’s trauma has amplified its disagreements so deeply that many Tigrayans now struggle to recognize how much shared ground still remains. The task is to recover that ground, organize it, and turn friction into cohesion before others turn it into fracture. እዚ ፅሑፍ፡ ናይ ድሕረ-ፕሪቶሪያ ትግራይ ፖለቲካዊ ምስሊ ብቐሊሉ ኣብ መንጎ “ደለይቲ ሰላም”ን “ደለይቲ ኲናት”ን ወይ ኣብ መንጎ “ደገፍቲ ፕሪቶሪያ”ን…

Obasanjo’s re-engagement will have meaning only if it moves Pretoria from process to enforceable chronology. But that will happen only if Tigray enters the room with sharper demands, documented positions, and a second track that does not depend on the goodwill of those who benefit from delay. Obasanjo’s arrival in Mekelle comes at a consequential moment. It follows Ethiopia’s June…

No political alternative becomes serious until it explains who protects Tigray during the dangerous interval between rejecting the current framework and building a stronger one. I have been following, with real unease, the voices now filling the social media space against the current Tigrayan መኸተ authority. I did not follow them to dismiss them. I followed them because I wanted…

Tigray needs criticism that forces emergency institutions to become real, not commentary that reduces every crisis to one man. I listened carefully to Tedros Tsegaye’s commentary on the Sheraro drone strike and the reactions that followed. He raised some points I agree with. Formulaic statements after an attack that kills Tigrayan youth are not enough. Leadership must be accountable. Drone…

When a people is under pressure, the first test of its political class is not whether it can condemn past failures. It is whether it can hold together long enough to survive them. This brief reflection follows questions raised by many readers after my recent piece, The Generation That Demands More Is TPLF’s Achievement. Some asked whether a generation that…