"At this point I cannot suppress a sigh and a last hope. What is it that I
especially find utterly unendurable? That I cannot cope with, that makes me
choke and faint? Bad air! Bad air! The approach of some ill-constituted thing:
that I have to smell the entrails of some ill-constituted soul!"
- German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
Wondering about man's (human being, that rational, or is it irrational
animal?) inherent vacillation from good to evil, Nietzsche wrote the above
lament more than a century ago. Human nature fundamentally does not change;
it has not changed significantly over the millenia. The question is: why
should we expect it to change now?
That is why some of us skeptics are not putting all our faith on one person
or group of persons. We instead would like to see a mechanism implemented
which in the future would help our country, Eritrea, achieve the desired
stability and the checks and balances needed in government. That is why, in
the on-going debate, we are saying it's unfair to put some unnecessary and
trivial restrictions as money and taxes now when we are on the verge of
ratifying a constitution. Granted, taxes owed must be paid, laws and rules
and regulations, because we are human, must be respected so that chaos
doesn't reign. This was supposed to be an obvious point; it becomes a
tautology after a while.
But I see an ironic and somewhat hypocratical argument coming from those who
say that we should expect a higher standard or value from those who would
be representing us in this Constituent Assembly. Agreed. But why is it not
fair also to demand the same from the leaders who, elected or not, represent
the Eritrean people today? Why do people jump up and down when these folks
are criticized? Aren't we supposed to expect a higher standard from them?
Paulos.
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** the Liberation Front Becomes the State: The Case of Eritrean Women". **
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