[By Horn of Africa Geopolitical Review]
The people of Tigray today continue to endure the devastating aftershocks of political tyranny, deliberate structural sabotage, and systematic corruption that were planted decades ago by former Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi.
As Tigray struggles under the wreckage of genocide, political division, and security collapse, it is imperative to remember how Meles, hailed by some as a statesman, in reality laid the very foundations of destruction that enabled today’s genocide and lawlessness.
History must be rewritten. Meles Zenawi was not a saviour of Tigray but rather the architect of political nepotism, social exclusion, economic marginalisation, and anti-Tigrayan independence policies. His administration was characterised by favouritism, cronyism, and the deliberate promotion of mediocrity over brilliance, ignorance over enlightenment, and loyalty to party over loyalty to people.
This article seeks to remind Tigrayans and the world: tyrants are remembered not for the illusions they built, but for the devastation they left behind.
The Tyrant Behind Tigray’s Current Crisis
Meles Zenawi systematically destroyed Tigray’s potential for political and economic independence. While he rose to power as the head of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and later Ethiopia, he built a one-man legacy rooted in repression and authoritarianism.
He discouraged independent, brilliant, and open-minded Tigrayans, fearing they would challenge his authoritarian system.
He established a culture of nepotism and cronyism, promoting incompetent loyalists while sidelining visionary voices. He deliberately weakened or blocked the independence of Tigrayan institutions. Instead, he centralised everything under the TPLF’s iron grip.
He prioritised Ethiopia’s broader geopolitical ambitions over Tigray’s development, ensuring that the region remained economically stunted and politically dependent.
By silencing independent thought and discouraging institutional autonomy, Meles guaranteed that Tigray would one day become vulnerable to both internal betrayal and external annihilation.
Meles Zenawi: The Enabler of Eritrea’s Tyranny
The Eritrea-Ethiopia border war (1998–2000) revealed the depths of Meles’s flawed strategic judgement. When the Eritrean dictator Isaias Afewerki invaded Ethiopia in May 1998, Tigrayans paid the heaviest price in human losses and economic devastation.
Despite opportunities for a decisive Ethiopian military victory, Meles saved Isaias Afwerki from total defeat by prematurely halting the war and signing the Algiers Agreement in December 2000. This historic blunder ensured Eritrea’s survival as a rogue state—and more importantly, enabled Isaias Afwerki to become the “architect of the Tigray Genocide” in 2020.
Meles’s protection of Isaias Afwerki was not just a tactical error—it was a historic betrayal of Tigray’s security and national interest. His actions shielded a tyrant who would later orchestrate the killing, rape, displacement, and starvation of millions of Tigrayans.
The Legacy of Nepotism, Cronyism and Corruption
Meles institutionalised a system of corruption and a one-party state system that today thrives in the TPLF and its loyal “Above-the-Core” military, political and economic networks.
Meles used nepotism, cronyism, and loyalty as the TPLF’s main political tools to expand its repressive rule. He appointed relatives, party and high-ranking military loyalists, and yes-men into positions of power, creating a culture of corruption on a grand scale where competence was irrelevant, and loyalty to the TPLF tyrant was everything. The current TPLF leadership uses Meles’s nepotism, cronyism and loyalty as political tools to control and repress the people of Tigray.
Meles cultivated systematic corrupt networks that enriched themselves through economic, employment and resource exploitation, while ordinary Tigrayans remained impoverished in a safety net aid handout.
He devised a policy of the suppression of accountability: no independent judiciary, no free media, and no civic institutions were allowed to challenge the TPLF and his rule.
Today’s illegal gold mining exploitation mafias, land-grabbing warlords, and corrupt TPLF leadership and its loyal generals are the direct products of Meles’s tyranny political system. They inherited not only his political machinery but also his moral bankruptcy.
Economic, Political and Social Exclusion in Tigray
Meles Zenawi’s administration was marked by deliberate exclusion of entire communities in Tigray from political representation, economic opportunity and developments but made them rely on safety net aid.
Many zones and districts in Tigray were systematically marginalised, denied equitable land and resources, and excluded from political participation.
Tigrayan intellectuals who questioned his methods were silenced, imprisoned, tortured, killed, exiled, or branded as enemies.
The majority of Tigray’s society were reduced to mere spectators while a group of corrupt elite controlled the entire economy and ruled unchecked in the absence of accountability. Freedom, liberty, good governance, rule of law, and justice had become scarce in Tigray. Human rights abuses flourished under the TPLF. This deliberate fragmentation weakened Tigray’s social fabric and created the resentments that fuel today’s divisions.
The War on Freedom of Speech and Independent Media
Meles was notoriously hostile to independent media, civil society, and freedom of speech. In Tigray, there was no independent media outlet—only the TPLF’s controlled voice of propaganda, Tigrai TV and DW. Journalists were silenced, opposition voices imprisoned, and independent researchers expelled.
He promoted a culture of loyalists and personality cults, where blind obedience was celebrated and critical thinking demonised.
The result was an entire generation shaped by fear, silence, and ignorance—an intellectual vacuum that today hampers Tigray’s progress to recovery and development.
From Authoritarian Legacy to Genocidal Aftermath
The seeds planted by Meles Zenawi directly enabled the atrocities of 2020–2022. No independent institutions were allowed to operate in Tigray. A culture of ignorance, corruption, and idolatry flourished during and after Meles’ leadership. Loyalty to the TPLF corrupted zonal, district, and local leaders and made them above the law to exercise bad governance and human rights abuses. With every organ of Tigray tied to the TPLF, there were no strong security institutions to defend the people of Tigray during the genocide.
Meles had empowered the people of Tigray’s enemies; by protecting Isaias Afewerki and failing to secure Tigray’s sovereignty. Meles guaranteed Eritrea’s future aggression against Tigray, i.e., the genocidal war on Tigray 2020 until present day.
Today’s lawlessness in Tigray—illegal gold mining exploitation, sexual violence, kidnappings, killings, torturing, detention without due legal process, warlordism, organised corruption and human rights abuses—is the legacy of Meles’s authoritarian-devised rule.
His successor, Dr Debretsion Gebremichael, is following in his footsteps to unleash similar repression and human rights abuses against the people of Tigray, i.e., the massacre of Mekhoni and the kidnapping, imprisoning, torturing and killing of civilians in Seharti, Wehrrat, Adigudom, Tenbein, Wukro, Adigrat, Shire, etc.
Remembering Meles Zenawi: A Tyrant, Not a Saviour
History must judge Meles Zenawi not through the carefully crafted propaganda by his cadres and loyalists but through the devastation his policies produced:
- He left no independent institutions, only TPLF loyalists of “yes men”.
- He left a divided and fragmented society by exclusion and mistrust.
- He left a culture of corruption, nepotism, and cronyism, inherited by today’s failed TPLF leadership.
- He left a vulnerable Tigray, exposed to genocide by the very enemy he once saved, the Eritrean regime of Isaias Afewerki.
Meles must be remembered for what he truly was: a tyrant who betrayed his people, weakened Tigray, and empowered the genocidal enemies of Tigray.
Lessons for Tigray’s Future
Remembering Meles Zenawi is not about vengeance—it is about clarity. Tigray must learn from Meles’s tyranny and the legacy left for the current TPLF leadership to continue the repression regime he had built.
Tigray’s path forward demands the rejection of Meles’s legacy and the rebuilding of a society founded on democracy, transparency, accountability, meritocracy, freedom, liberty, and the rule of law.
The people of Tigray now realise what the TPLF is for, and they are struggling to end the TPLF power dynasty and its repressive ideology.
Only by remembering the tyrant for what he was can Tigray ensure a future where tyranny never again flourishes.