All popular movements, including Eritrea’s secession led by EPLF, revealed the true characteristics, limitation and historical nature of the Ethiopian central state. These movements profoundly questioned the capability of the Ethiopian central government to change the material wellbeing of the local people. That was absolutely contrary to my view and expectation about the Ethiopian central state. Why Professor Donald Crummey interpreted century of history in the way that I did not mean to be interpreted. History shows that whatever mantle it wears, unitarist or federalist, the central Ethiopian state is true to its tradition: very much elitist and extractivist.
