{"id":6755,"date":"2026-06-07T01:33:31","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T01:33:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/?p=6755"},"modified":"2026-06-07T01:36:06","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T01:36:06","slug":"blame-is-not-a-survival-strategy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/2026\/06\/07\/blame-is-not-a-survival-strategy\/","title":{"rendered":"Blame Is Not a Survival Strategy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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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.<\/em><\/p>

This brief reflection follows questions raised by many readers after my recent piece, The Generation That Demands More Is TPLF\u2019s Achievement<\/a>. Some asked whether a generation that demands more from TPLF should also reject any political arrangement still shaped by TPLF. That question is legitimate. TPLF\u2019s failures cannot be dismissed, and no political arrangement should be treated as beyond criticism. But in the current danger facing Tigray, rejection alone is not a strategy. The harder question is whether opposition politics, as currently practiced, is strengthening Tigray\u2019s capacity to survive the current moment, or eroding it.<\/p>

The moment matters. It is not abstract. For more than three years, Tigray endured the slow dragging of the interim arrangement in the hope that political settlement, peace, and implementation of Pretoria might still be possible. That patience came at a cost: continued displacement, unresolved territorial questions, constrained economic life, weakened institutions, and a society suspended between war and recovery. During this long period, opposition forces did not mobilize their constituencies with comparable urgency against the federal obstruction, delay, and manipulation that kept Tigray trapped in uncertainty. Now, when the existing Tigrayan political center moves to re-anchor authority through a difficult institutional transition, that moment cannot be judged as if it emerged from nowhere. As of June 2026, the federal election has proceeded without producing any meaningful political breakthrough for Tigray. Instead, tensions have escalated, and reports of military buildup and recent clashes have sharpened fears that the northern question may again be managed through pressure rather than settlement. This is the context in which Tigray\u2019s opposition politics must be judged.<\/p>

In that context, Tigray\u2019s internal political divisions are not merely a democratic disagreement to be resolved through normal competition; they are a structural vulnerability that external actors, including Abiy\u2019s government, are watching, assessing, and in some cases actively encouraging.<\/p>

Blame is not a strategy.<\/p>

Yes, the existing Tigrayan political center carries responsibility. It governed Tigray for decades, dominated the political space, made strategic decisions whose consequences Tigrayans are still living with, and too often reacted to criticism as if political challenge were betrayal. Some of what opposition parties are saying is true, documented, and important. Accountability is not optional. Reform is not optional. Tigray cannot return to the old political culture as if nothing happened.<\/p>

But accountability must serve survival, not paralysis. If criticism only deepens mistrust, widens fragmentation, or weakens the only organized framework through which Tigray can still act, then it stops being corrective politics. It becomes another form of exposure. The question, therefore, is not whether the existing political center deserves criticism. It does. The question is whether opposition politics is turning that criticism into a practical path for Tigray\u2019s survival, or into a weapon that leaves Tigray less able to defend, negotiate, organize, and recover.<\/p>

Be careful. Opposition criticism may be legitimate, but the way it is framed can become useful to Abiy Ahmed. When every problem is reduced to TPLF, when every mobilization is described only as TPLF militarism, when every attempt to rebuild Tigrayan authority is dismissed as illegitimate, the result may not be the democratization of Tigray. The result may be the weakening of Tigray at exactly the moment Abiy wants Tigray weakened. When Tigray\u2019s organized capacity is described only as reckless militarism or foreign entanglement, the original cause disappears: a people still displaced, a territory still unresolved, and a peace agreement still unimplemented. There is a difference between holding power accountable and providing political cover for those who would destroy what power is defending.<\/p>

One form of this danger is already visible in the way some opposition voices frame responsibility.<\/p>

A dangerous emotional narrative is circulating in some opposition circles: that PP is already the declared enemy, and the real problem is the Tigrayan force that exposed the youth to danger. This framing contains a partial truth and a serious distortion. Yes, internal leadership must be held accountable for decisions that affect young people\u2019s lives. But the conclusion drawn, that all political energy should be turned inward while enemy violence is treated as natural weather, is a strategic error. An enemy\u2019s violence must not be treated as natural weather while all political energy is turned inward. That redirection does not protect Tigrayan youth. It leaves them more exposed, not less.<\/p>

A related narrative is now gaining traction among Tigrayan youth, amplified by Abiy-aligned Tigrayan political circles in Addis Ababa and echoed through urban and digital opposition spaces: \u201cI love Tigray, so I want to live for Tigray, not die for selfish leaders.\u201d This sentiment deserves a careful and honest response. Tigray needs its youth alive, educated, productive, creative, and future-oriented. The argument here is not for reckless sacrifice or blind loyalty to any leadership. The danger is not in saying that Tigray\u2019s youth should live. Of course they should live. The danger is in turning \u201cliving for Tigray\u201d into a slogan for disengaging from the collective struggle that makes Tigray\u2019s future life possible. The choice is not between dying for TPLF and living for Tigray. The choice is between disciplined collective responsibility and scattered self-preservation that leaves Tigray weaker. A people under existential pressure cannot survive if every young person is told that self-preservation alone is the highest form of patriotism. Tigray needs youth who live, build, think, organize, defend, document, serve, and lead. But all of that requires a living political community protected by organized Mekete. If politically active voices in Tigray\u2019s cities and Abiy-aligned circles outside the region encourage youth to abandon the difficult internal struggle in favor of comfortable digital opposition, Tigray risks producing a politically loud but practically detached culture. That is not living for Tigray. That is a slower form of withdrawal from it.<\/p>

This is why the responsibility of opposition parties is so serious.<\/p>

What I am asking of opposition parties is not surrender. It is strategic discipline in a dangerous moment. Some opposition forces do offer alternatives: a different national organization, a different political center, a different path for Tigray\u2019s national question. But the existence of an alternative does not make it adequate to the moment. An alternative that may be valid in a normal political season can become dangerous when introduced in a way that fragments authority during an emergency. If an alternative weakens the only existing survival framework before building a stronger one, it does not protect Tigray. It exposes it. The question is not whether opposition forces have programs or aspirations. The question is whether their method, at this specific moment, strengthens or erodes Tigray\u2019s capacity to survive.<\/p>

A national question is not answered by declaration alone. It requires organization, command, discipline, legitimacy, resources, a social base, and the capacity to act under pressure. Tigray already has an existing survival strategy and organized \u1218\u12b8\u1270 capacity. The task of opposition forces is not to dissolve that capacity because they are not its architects. The task is to enter the framework, reform it, widen it, hold it accountable, and discipline it toward Tigray\u2019s collective interest. Strong organization cannot be built by multiplying separate centers of denunciation. It must be built by bringing political forces into a disciplined common framework, even when they disagree deeply about leadership, legitimacy, and the end-state.<\/p>

There is also a social cost that must be named. Something is happening inside Tigrayan political culture that is more damaging than any particular political disagreement. Families, diaspora communities, former comrades, activists, and ordinary citizens are being pushed into hostile camps. Criticism is turning into contempt. Political disagreement is turning into mutual suspicion. Tigrayans have always argued, disagreed, and challenged one another. That is part of what makes Tigrayan political culture serious. But there was always a deeper understanding that the collective interest came first. That shared ground is being weakened. A people under pressure cannot afford to turn every internal disagreement into a wound that its enemies can use.<\/p>

The conscription debate is one clear example. If youth are being coerced without law, transparency, or accountability, that must be corrected. No survival struggle should frighten the very society it claims to defend. A coerced youth is not less Tigrayan because he was mobilized under pressure. If anything, his vulnerability makes protection more urgent. Opposition to unlawful coercion must not become selective moral concern that stops at the party boundary. But when the conscription issue is raised in a way that strips away the context of military encirclement, renewed federal threat, occupied territory, and mass displacement, it becomes politically dangerous. It allows hostile media and external actors to frame Tigray\u2019s organized capacity as TPLF militarism. A responsible opposition would say: we oppose unlawful coercion, and we do not oppose Tigray\u2019s right to organize its defense. We demand accountability, and we will not become instruments of paralysis.<\/p>

A dangerous moment does not require scattered self-preservation. It requires lawful, accountable, collective emergency authority capable of protecting civilians, preserving institutions, organizing defense, and preparing the ground for normal politics. That is the framework opposition forces should be shaping from within, not undermining from without.<\/p>

The opposition should enter the process, even if it is a bitter pill. National survival is not advanced from the sidelines. The opposition should struggle from within the survival framework rather than weaken it from outside. It should push for transparency, lawful mobilization, broader inclusion, clearer objectives, and a better-defined end-state for \u1218\u12b8\u1270. But the existing political center must also be held to its side of this: if opposition forces are being asked to enter the process, the framework must be made worth entering through genuine inclusion, accountable governance, and a demonstrated commitment to Tigrayan collective interest rather than factional advantage. The survival framework cannot function as a protection mechanism for one faction. If it does, it will not survive the moment it is most needed.<\/p>

Eritrea offers a painful but precise warning, even though Tigray\u2019s situation is different in important ways. Eritrean opposition politics has existed for decades, much of it morally justified, much of it directed against one of the most repressive governing systems in the region. Yet it has remained fragmented, externally located, organizationally weak, and unable to convert moral opposition into governing capacity on the ground. Its voice is often heard, but its ability to convert that voice into authority on the ground remains limited. This is the danger Tigray\u2019s opposition must avoid. If opposition politics becomes only a politics of denunciation, diaspora amplification, and rejection of every imperfect internal process, it may become visible without becoming effective. It may succeed in weakening the existing structure without building anything capable of protecting Tigray.<\/p>

The opposition should also think beyond this emergency moment. If Tigray is restored to its pre-2020 position, if displaced people return, if occupied territories are resolved, and if normal political space is reopened, opposition parties may have a real opportunity to build constituencies, present programs, and compete for power. After all Tigray has passed through, they may find a society more ready than ever to listen to alternative visions. But that future requires Tigray to survive this moment first. An opposition that contributed to Tigray\u2019s weakening at this moment will not be forgiven by the generation that inherits the consequences.<\/p>

Accountability without responsibility becomes revenge. Responsibility without accountability becomes repetition. Tigray needs both, and it needs them held in the same frame at the same time.<\/p>

At this moment, the test of opposition politics is not whether it can condemn past failures. Anyone can do that. The test is whether it can help Tigray survive while preparing the ground for a more democratic future.<\/p>

Blame may explain how we arrived here. It cannot tell us how to survive from here.<\/p>

\u1275\u130d\u122b\u12ed \u1275\u1235\u12d5\u122d\uff01\u1230\u120b\u121d \u1295\u1205\u12dd\u1265\u1293\uff01<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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\u2019s Achievement. Some asked whether a generation that demands more from TPLF should also reject any political arrangement still shaped by TPLF. That question is legitimate. TPLF\u2019s failures cannot be dismissed, and no political arrangement should be treated as beyond criticism. But in the current danger facing Tigray, rejection alone is not a strategy. The harder question is whether opposition politics, as currently practiced, is strengthening Tigray\u2019s capacity to survive the current moment, or eroding it. The moment matters. It is not abstract. For more than three years, Tigray endured the slow dragging of the interim arrangement in the hope that political settlement, peace, and implementation of Pretoria might still be possible. That patience came at a cost: continued displacement, unresolved territorial questions, constrained economic life, weakened institutions, and a society suspended between war and recovery. During this long period, opposition forces did not mobilize their constituencies with comparable urgency against the federal obstruction, delay, and manipulation that kept Tigray trapped in uncertainty. Now, when the existing Tigrayan political center moves to re-anchor authority through a difficult institutional transition, that moment cannot be judged as if it emerged from nowhere. As of June 2026, the federal election has proceeded without producing any meaningful political breakthrough for Tigray. Instead, tensions have escalated, and reports of military buildup and recent clashes have sharpened fears that the northern question may again be managed through pressure rather than settlement. This is the context in which Tigray\u2019s opposition politics must be judged. In that context, Tigray\u2019s internal political divisions are not merely a democratic disagreement to be resolved through normal competition; they are a structural vulnerability that external actors, including Abiy\u2019s government, are watching, assessing, and in some cases actively encouraging. Blame is not a strategy. Yes, the existing Tigrayan political center carries responsibility. It governed Tigray for decades, dominated the political space, made strategic decisions whose consequences Tigrayans are still living with, and too often reacted to criticism as if political challenge were betrayal. Some of what opposition parties are saying is true, documented, and important. Accountability is not optional. Reform is not optional. Tigray cannot return to the old political culture as if nothing happened. But accountability must serve survival, not paralysis. If criticism only deepens mistrust, widens fragmentation, or weakens the only organized framework through which Tigray can still act, then it stops being corrective politics. It becomes another form of exposure. The question, therefore, is not whether the existing political center deserves criticism. It does. The question is whether opposition politics is turning that criticism into a practical path for Tigray\u2019s survival, or into a weapon that leaves Tigray less able to defend, negotiate, organize, and recover. Be careful. Opposition criticism may be legitimate, but the way it is framed can become useful to Abiy Ahmed. When every problem is reduced to TPLF, when every mobilization is described only as TPLF militarism, when every attempt to rebuild Tigrayan authority is dismissed as illegitimate, the result may not be the democratization of Tigray. The result may be the weakening of Tigray at exactly the moment Abiy wants Tigray weakened. When Tigray\u2019s organized capacity is described only as reckless militarism or foreign entanglement, the original cause disappears: a people still displaced, a territory still unresolved, and a peace agreement still unimplemented. There is a difference between holding power accountable and providing political cover for those who would destroy what power is defending. One form of this danger is already visible in the way some opposition voices frame responsibility. A dangerous emotional narrative is circulating in some opposition circles: that PP is already the declared enemy, and the real problem is the Tigrayan force that exposed the youth to danger. This framing contains a partial truth and a serious distortion. Yes, internal leadership must be held accountable for decisions that affect young people\u2019s lives. But the conclusion drawn, that all political energy should be turned inward while enemy violence is treated as natural weather, is a strategic error. An enemy\u2019s violence must not be treated as natural weather while all political energy is turned inward. That redirection does not protect Tigrayan youth. It leaves them more exposed, not less. A related narrative is now gaining traction among Tigrayan youth, amplified by Abiy-aligned Tigrayan political circles in Addis Ababa and echoed through urban and digital opposition spaces: \u201cI love Tigray, so I want to live for Tigray, not die for selfish leaders.\u201d This sentiment deserves a careful and honest response. Tigray needs its youth alive, educated, productive, creative, and future-oriented. The argument here is not for reckless sacrifice or blind loyalty to any leadership. The danger is not in saying that Tigray\u2019s youth should live. Of course they should live. The danger is in turning \u201cliving for Tigray\u201d into a slogan for disengaging from the collective struggle that makes Tigray\u2019s future life possible. The choice is not between dying for TPLF and living for Tigray. The choice is between disciplined collective responsibility and scattered self-preservation that leaves Tigray weaker. A people under existential pressure cannot survive if every young person is told that self-preservation alone is the highest form of patriotism. Tigray needs youth who live, build, think, organize, defend, document, serve, and lead. But all of that requires a living political community protected by organized Mekete. If politically active voices in Tigray\u2019s cities and Abiy-aligned circles outside the region encourage youth to abandon the difficult internal struggle in favor of comfortable digital opposition, Tigray risks producing a politically loud but practically detached culture. That is not living for Tigray. That is a slower form of withdrawal from it. This is why the responsibility of opposition parties is so serious. What I am asking of opposition parties is not surrender. It is strategic discipline in a dangerous moment. Some opposition forces do offer alternatives: a different national organization, a different political center, a different path for Tigray\u2019s national question. But the existence of an alternative does not make it adequate to the moment. An alternative that may be valid in a normal political season can become dangerous when introduced in a way that fragments authority during an emergency. If an alternative weakens the only existing survival framework before building a stronger one, it does not protect Tigray. It exposes it. The question is not whether opposition forces have programs or aspirations. The question is whether their method, at this specific moment, strengthens or erodes Tigray\u2019s capacity to survive. A national question is not answered by declaration alone. It requires organization, command, discipline, legitimacy, resources, a social base, and the capacity to act under pressure. Tigray already has an existing survival strategy and organized \u1218\u12b8\u1270 capacity. The task of opposition forces is not to dissolve that capacity because they are not its architects. The task is to enter the framework, reform it, widen it, hold it accountable, and discipline it toward Tigray\u2019s collective interest. Strong organization cannot be built by multiplying separate centers of denunciation. It must be built by bringing political forces into a disciplined common framework, even when they disagree deeply about leadership, legitimacy, and the end-state. There is also a social cost that must be named. Something is happening inside Tigrayan political culture that is more damaging than any particular political disagreement. Families, diaspora communities, former comrades, activists, and ordinary citizens are being pushed into hostile camps. Criticism is turning into contempt. Political disagreement is turning into mutual suspicion. Tigrayans have always argued, disagreed, and challenged one another. That is part of what makes Tigrayan political culture serious. But there was always a deeper understanding that the collective interest came first. That shared ground is being weakened. A people under pressure cannot afford to turn every internal disagreement into a wound that its enemies can use. The conscription debate is one clear example. If youth are being coerced without law, transparency, or accountability, that must be corrected. No survival struggle should frighten the very society it claims to defend. A coerced youth is not less Tigrayan because he was mobilized under pressure. If anything, his vulnerability makes protection more urgent. Opposition to unlawful coercion must not become selective moral concern that stops at the party boundary. But when the conscription issue is raised in a way that strips away the context of military encirclement, renewed federal threat, occupied territory, and mass displacement, it becomes politically dangerous. It allows hostile media and external actors to frame Tigray\u2019s organized capacity as TPLF militarism. A responsible opposition would say: we oppose unlawful coercion, and we do not oppose Tigray\u2019s right to organize its defense. We demand accountability, and we will not become instruments of paralysis. A dangerous moment does not require scattered self-preservation. It requires lawful, accountable, collective emergency authority capable of protecting civilians, preserving institutions, organizing defense, and preparing the ground for normal politics. That is the framework opposition forces should be shaping from within, not undermining from without. The opposition should enter the process, even if it is a bitter pill. National survival is not advanced from the sidelines. The opposition should struggle from within the survival framework rather than weaken it from outside. It should push for transparency, lawful mobilization, broader inclusion, clearer objectives, and a better-defined end-state for \u1218\u12b8\u1270. But the existing political center must also be held to its side of this: if opposition forces are being asked to enter the process, the framework must be made worth entering through genuine inclusion, accountable governance, and a demonstrated commitment to Tigrayan collective interest rather than factional advantage. The survival framework cannot function as a protection mechanism for one faction. If it does, it will not survive the moment it is most needed. Eritrea offers a painful but precise warning, even though Tigray\u2019s situation is different in important ways. Eritrean opposition politics has existed for decades, much of it morally justified, much of it directed against one of the most repressive governing systems in the region. Yet it has remained fragmented, externally located, organizationally weak, and unable to convert moral opposition into governing capacity on the ground. Its voice is often heard, but its ability to convert that voice into authority on the ground remains limited. This is the danger Tigray\u2019s opposition must avoid. If opposition politics becomes only a politics of denunciation, diaspora amplification, and rejection of every imperfect internal process, it may become visible without becoming effective. It may succeed in weakening the existing structure without building anything capable of protecting Tigray. The opposition should also think beyond this emergency moment. If Tigray is restored to its pre-2020 position, if displaced people return, if occupied territories are resolved, and if normal political space is reopened, opposition parties may have a real opportunity to build constituencies, present programs, and compete for power. After all Tigray has passed through, they may find a society more ready than ever to listen to alternative visions. But that future requires Tigray to survive this moment first. An opposition that contributed to Tigray\u2019s weakening at this moment will not be forgiven by the generation that inherits the consequences. Accountability without responsibility becomes revenge. Responsibility without accountability becomes repetition. Tigray needs both, and it needs them held in the same frame at the same time. At this moment, the test of opposition politics is not whether it can condemn past failures. Anyone can do that. The test is whether it can help Tigray survive while preparing the ground for a more democratic future. Blame may explain how we arrived here. It cannot tell us how to survive from here. \u1275\u130d\u122b\u12ed \u1275\u1235\u12d5\u122d\uff01\u1230\u120b\u121d \u1295\u1205\u12dd\u1265\u1293\uff01<\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6755"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6762,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6755\/revisions\/6762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tigrayinsights.net\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}