Issue No. 227

A movie night in Addis 

On Saturday 23 April, Addis' sparkling new Adwa Memorial Museum screened a film titled 'For the Love of the Motherland.' Directed by Tedros Teshome, the new picture tells the story of two diaspora Ethiopians who end up on opposing sides of the Tigray War and some of the destruction that entailed. Senior federal and military officials attended the high-profile viewing, including Ethiopia's Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Ethiopian National Defence Force (ENDF) Chief Berhanu Jula. It was met with rapturous applause, with Berhanu saying that the "patriotic" film reflected the truth of the "law enforcement operation." In reality, the film is a grim, one-sided interpretation of the war that whitewashes human rights violations committed by the forces that invaded Tigray. Moreover, the gathering of dozens of senior federal figures came at a time of heightened tensions between Mekelle and Addis.
 
Only three weeks have passed since the 'First Strategic Review' of the Pretoria agreement by senior federal and Tigrayan officials in the presence of African Union (AU), United States, and European Union representatives, among others. It was only the second public face-to-face meeting between the two sides since the cessation of war in November 2022. Though both sides pledged to renew their commitment to the Cessation of Hostilities Agreement, they remain far apart on several key issues, including the disarmament of Tigrayan forces and the occupation of Western Tigray.
 
The build-up to the March 2024 talks was acrimonious, particularly surrounding the question of a referendum in Western Tigray and the humanitarian crisis that is consuming northern Ethiopia. The federal government's refusal to acknowledge the scale of the humanitarian crisis and the deaths of hundreds of civilians has stuck in the craw of Tigray's Interim Administration (TIA), which has done its best to keep Addis onside. More broadly, the faltering implementation of nearly every element of the Pretoria agreement has undermined the belief that Addis was committed to carrying it out. Tigrayan officials subsequently informed Addis that any future talks on the Pretoria agreement could only be held under the auspices of the AU, which has so far been sadly absent as a guarantor of the accord. On 14 March, TIA Interim President Getachew Reda again noted that the "erosion of trust" had come from the "inadequate implementation of key provisions outlined in the agreement."
 
Chief among TIA concerns is the continued occupation of parts of Northern Tigray by the Eritrean army and of Western Tigray by Amhara forces, despite the agreement explicitly stipulating the withdrawal of "all non-ENDF" forces from Tigray concurrently with the demobilisation of Tigrayan forces. At the strategic review, federal officials denied that the Eritrean army was still occupying portions of Tigray. Instead, they made the extraordinary claim that Eritrean troops were on Eritrean sovereign territory as designated in the 2018 Algiers peace agreement between Ethiopia and Eritrea. Not only does this deny the presence of a foreign occupying force that continues to abduct, assault, and pillage vulnerable communities in Northern Tigray, but it also constitutes a wilful misreading of the Algiers agreement.
 
In recent weeks, talk that renewed armed conflict in Tigray could be possible has crept back into the rhetoric of senior federal politicians, including Prime Minister Abiy, who has openly accused Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) leaders of seeking war. In a meeting with community representatives from Tigray, Abiy suggested that renewed violence would be more devastating than the 2020-2022 war. In this context, a jingoistic film shown in the new Adwa Museum has generated further alarm. Moreover, it is arguably a contravention of the Pretoria agreement, which stipulates that both sides halt any "propaganda, rhetoric, and hate speech."
 
In 'For the Love of the Motherland,' the denial of war crimes committed in Tigray is offensive to the millions who suffered from starvation, sexual violence, and ethnic cleansing, among other offences. It is a shame that the first major motion picture about the bloodiest episode in modern Ethiopian history amounts to such an unbalanced portrayal of one side of the war. The film's lack of nuance is hardly surprising given that the director once said he did not know if the "Eritrean army entered Tigray and massacred innocents, but I know that Tigray is a problem for Ethiopia." The film is antithetical to the possibility of the Federal Government of Ethiopia and Tigray moving to a more stable relationship and oxymoronic in the notion that you can establish peace while glorifying war.

By the Ethiopian Cable team