Eritrea always plays the victim in its international relations, when it should be embracing and growing together. The 'self-reliant' agenda does not seem to be working, case in point, this week's social media attention.
For the first time in a long time, some of the biggest online noise makers from Africa are talking about Eritrea. Yea, Eritrea, that small Horn of African nation that only appears on the news for all the wrong reasons such as their footballers defecting during regional competitions or their citizens dying in the Mediterranean sea while fleeing the country.
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This time however, this time the conversation was different, it was humorous. “Eritrean men forced to marry a minimum of two wives or face imprisonment”. Well, the semi-factual basis of this was a supposed report by Amnesty allegedly quoting the Mufti in Arabic stating that so many Eritrean men are fleeing the country and there is a shortage of men in Eritrea. In short it was a hoax.
And social media went wild. Kenyans and Nigerians started planning trips to Eritrea to claim their two wives. It was a trending topic in both countries and it was/is funny. Brands such as Kenya Airways and Safaricom used this opportunity to engage with their customers on taking them to Eritrea.
A great opportunity had presented itself for Eritrea.
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ERITREA’S ENEMIES
“The story illustrates vileness of the dark forces of disinformation and proclivity of others to readily embrace the negative narrative on Eritrea” quote from the Eritrean Minister of Information.
“Media frenzy to parrot this ludicrous, fabricated and trite story of the Mufti’s presumed religious decree on mandatory polygamy is appalling,” Eritrean Minister of Information.
This is where the problem with Eritrea came to light. Eritreans felt attacked and got to ‘war mode’, kind of like Kenya’s #SomeoneTellCNN or whoever attacks or mocks Kenya. Every patriotic Eritrean started fighting back on how much of a lie the story was and it was a targeted attack on Eritrea to ‘defame’ it. Most (including the Kenyans and Nigerians) also tweeted that the Nigerians and Kenyans had no chance at getting Eritrean women (insert racism)
In the geo-political arena, Eritrea seems to have so many enemies, its biggest being itself followed by its four neighbors; Ethiopia, Sudan, Djibouti and Yemen across the Red Sea. It has had conflicts and wars with all its neighbors (as I explain later) and is still not in good relations with Ethiopia, Djibouti and Yemen.
The Eritrean people are known to be hot tempered naturally and always ready to fight, ironically by head butting each other. A wedding is not considered a success if a fight does not break out in the middle of the dancing. The dancing though is beautiful, that beat can make anyone want to get out of a seating position.
Its other ‘enemies’ are the United Nation who have imposed a sanction on it for its support of terrorists in the Somalia. The UN Human Right formed a ‘Commission of Inquiry on Eritrea’ which reported gross human right abuses in the small African nation as well as Human Right Watch, Amnesty International, any organization that advocates for the rights of journalists and add a bunch of other human right NGOs and anyone who says anything bad about Eritrea.
Eritrea does not seem to have any PR at all when speaking in international arenas and blatantly calls out powers both in the region and even globally including the United States and even the United Nations as detractors of peace and enemies of the nation, a route that has not and will not bare any fruits in the world of DIPLOMACY.
SELF-RELIANCE
Self-reliance is the mantra Eritrea pretends to live by, aka isolation. The government believes the people owe the country a duty to spend their life to grow it willingly or by force.
The current leader of the country, well he has been in power since ‘independence’ and there have not been any elections in the country for the past twenty five years. Eritrea is celebrating its 25 years of independence this year.
Ethiopia and Eritrea have no similarities when it comes to culture, language and history. Ethiopia and Eritrea have a lot of similarities when it comes to culture, language and history. Eritrea was part of Ethiopia.
The leaders of both countries speak a different variation of the same dialect, Tigrinya and they both wear the same kind of clothes and eat the same food.
Before the war between the two countries that started in 1998, Ethiopia used Eritrea’s port and Eritrea used the resources from the mainland’s agricultural produce. It was a win-win situation.
Foreign media, majority of international NGOs and some religious groups are not allowed in the country. Eritreans are fleeing out of the country at an alarming rate of 5000 per month, according to the UNHCR data in 2015. Eritreans make up the highest number of migrants from Africa to make it to Europe.
TOURISM ATTRACTION IN ERITREA
Beautiful women. That should be enough for most of the Twitter noise-makers, but on a more serious note, there is a lot more than just beautiful women. It has both historical and cultural. Western tourists who have visited Eritrea always comment on the extra-ordinary beauty and difference of the country.
Eritrea, a former Italian colony has beautiful architecture and clean side-walks in the small Eritrean capital of Asmara. The Eastern escarpments of the Rift Valley have breath taking views as one of the oldest steam engine trains cascades through the different topography of the nation is a ride to remember, through the mountains and tunnels on the Asmara-Masawa line to the coast.
Both Christians and Muslims live in harmony in Eritrea. The oldest mosque in the continent is believed to be in Eritrea as well, the Sahaba Mosque as well as beautiful monasteries.
Oh Yea. Eritrea has over 1000 kilometers of beautiful beaches, with a lot of attractions for deep sea diving and fishing.
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