Most people prefer to establish own ethnic national regional state wanting to avoid being with a competing another ethnic national. For example the Gurage’s do not want to be grouped with others in the cluster unless the regional capital is at the heart of Gurage. That is they do not want to establish a regional state unless it is under their control, this is because of the awareness they have got from the past 30 years’ experience in SNNPRS. That is they do not want the Sidama case to be repeated in case the zone with the regional capital wants to make cessation and makes negative influence on coexistence of the regions people. The same is true with the other ethnic groups within the cluster, and they want to establish their own regional state unless it is under their control, that is unless they are dominant group over the region.
The problem with the Omo cluster, that is Wolaita, Gamo, Gofa , South Omo, Konso and the five special woreda’s is the same except the bad experience the Gamos have with the Wolaitas. You all know that on 1991/92 E.C the Wolaitas violently demolished North Omo zone to gain their own zone. Not only that but also they denied the language and cultural similarity among the peoples and burned books published for primary school children’s, of whom I was the one at that time. That is the greatest problem which becomes very difficult to reconcile by now. The other problem is the place of the regional capital. Both of them want the regional capital to be at their zonal capital and that is very difficult. The demand for regional capital is to be dominant within the region because of competing ethnic nationalism between the dominant groups of the region.
And everyone is fan of this idea that is ethnic based national regional state, but no one asks what are the pros and cons of establishing own ethnic national regional state. Those people who quest for own ethnic regional state do want see/show the bigger image of Ethiopia and what is going on in Ethiopia. Ethiopian politics should not be left for the Oromo’s, the Amara’s and the Tigreans. We have to be united to have stake in it. Otherwise we will be valueless. We will not have the power to make influence that is we cannot force to take our own fair share of the limited resource of the country. This is one of the demerits of establishing own ethnic regional state demolishing SNNPRS. The merit is only having dominance within the regional state while others are dominating nationally.
I think it will be very difficult for PP to reconcile these problems and come at solutions that answers each ethnic group’s demand. Thank you for reading!
