(Published as part of the “Oromia Rising: Essays on Freedom and the Future” series. Everyone is invited to contribute. Send your contributions to bantii.qixxeessaa@gmail.com.)
By Bantii Qixxeessaa
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Introduction: When History Becomes a Battleground In every liberation struggle, there comes a moment when the past itself becomes a contested terrain. Identities are questioned, histories are attacked, and indigenous political systems are deliberately mischaracterized—all in an attempt to weaken a people's confidence in their future. For the Oromo, this moment has come. A recent article claims that Oromo identity is a twentieth-century fabrication and that Gadaa—one of Africa's most sophisticated indigenous democratic systems—was fundamentally oppressive. This critique follows a long tradition in Ethiopian imperial discourse, as documented by scholars like Mohammed Hassen and Paul Baxter, which systematically delegitimizes Oromo identity and denies Oromo political agency. This essay responds with evidence, scholarship, and principle. |
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Oromummaa did not emerge in the twentieth century from
nationalist theorists. Rather, it is embedded in the constitutional structures
and social practices of Oromo life: in the Gadaa age-grade system, in safuu
(the concept of moral harmony and order), in the Qaalluu institution (spiritual
leadership), in geerarsa (praise poetry and historical commemoration), and in
adoption and kinship practices that reflect a belief in human dignity grounded
in Waaqa (the divine).
Historical records show that long before the Ethiopian state
extended administrative control into southern and western Oromia in the
nineteenth century, Oromummaa functioned as a lived identity embedded in law,
ritual, and social organization (Legesse 1973; Legesse 2006). What modern Oromo
intellectuals and leaders articulated in the twentieth century—from the Oromo
Liberation Movement to contemporary scholarship—represents the reassertion and
intellectual articulation of a suppressed historical memory, not its invention.
The claim that Oromummaa is "a lie" thus serves to
delegitimize not a modern ideology but a people's continuous historical
existence.
Gadaa: A Democratic System Centuries Ahead of Its Time
Serious scholars across disciplines—including African
historians (Mohammed Hassen, Asmarom Legesse), European anthropologists (Paul
Baxter, Marco Bassi), and American political theorists—recognize Gadaa as one
of the world's earliest institutionalized systems of rotational, deliberative
governance with constitutional safeguards (Legesse 1973; Baxter 1994).
Its documented features include:
- Leadership
term limits (typically 8-year cycles)
- Institutionalized
checks and balances
- Independent
judicial structures
- Public
deliberative assemblies (Gumi Gaayo)
- Mandatory
rotation of executive authority
- Mechanisms
of accountability
- Separation
of military, judicial, and ritual authority
- A
moral and legal foundation grounded in safuu (propriety) and nagaa (peace)
(Legesse 1973; Legesse 2006; Baxter 1994).
A system with institutionalized term limits and peaceful
power transfer was functioning among the Oromo centuries before the United
States Constitution, French democratic institutions, or the British Parliament
adopted comparable mechanisms. Reducing this sophisticated constitutional
system to the label "apartheid" represents an intellectually
negligent and historically baseless comparison.
The Gabbaro Question: Historical Complexity Versus
Anachronistic Labels
No pre-modern society was free of hierarchy and status
differentiation. However, hierarchical organization is not synonymous with
racialized apartheid, and conflating the two distorts both historical analysis
and comparative political theory.
Scholarly examination of gabbaro (a term variously
translated as dependent, tributary, or absorbed group) reveals significant
complexity:
Integration and Mobility: Ethnographic and historical
research demonstrates that many groups classified as gabbaro were incorporated
into Oromo gosa (clan structures) through ritual adoption, intermarriage, and
alliance (Legesse 1973; Bassi 1996). These were not permanent, heritable
statuses but negotiable social positions that could shift across generations
(Bassi 2014).
Comparative Context: Tributary relationships and
status hierarchies existed across all pre-modern East African and Ethiopian
polities, including Christian highland kingdoms, Muslim sultanates, and lowland
confederations (Levine 1974; Donham & James 2002). Singling out Oromo
society for the label "apartheid" ignores this regional pattern and
applies a twentieth-century racial classification system anachronistically to
sixteenth- and seventeenth-century realities.
Conceptual Precision: Deborah Posel's analysis of
apartheid emphasizes that it required a racial ideology, codified racial law,
centralized bureaucratic enforcement, spatial segregation, and systematic
political exclusion (Posel 2001). No comparable racial doctrine has been documented
for Oromo societies. Ethnographers consistently describe Oromo identity
formation as culturally absorptive and flexible rather than rigidly
exclusionary (Bassi 1996; Baxter 1994).
To label Gadaa as "part apartheid" therefore
represents conceptual misuse rather than historical analysis.
Why These Attacks Occur Now
The intellectual and political renaissance of Oromummaa—and
the growing coherence of the Oromo national project—creates tension with those
invested in older imperial or assimilationist narratives. When demographic
strength, cultural self-confidence, and political mobilization converge, those
fearing this shift predictably attack the foundational pillars of collective
identity: history, culture, and moral legitimacy.
The attack on Gadaa is therefore not fundamentally about
historical methodology. It is a political intervention designed to preserve a
narrative in which the Oromo serve as permanent subjects rather than as equal
partners or potential sovereign actors in the regional order.
A Candid Reckoning with Historical Complexity
Oromo history, like all histories, encompasses conflict,
migration, territorial expansion, and cross-cultural encounter. No people has a
"spotless" past. However, what distinguishes the Oromo historical
record—as documented by scholars including Hassen (1990), Megerssa (2014), and
Bassi (2011)—is a robust pattern of cultural and social absorption: newcomers
and conquered peoples were incorporated into Oromo identity through adoption,
intermarriage, shared moral frameworks, and participation in Gadaa structures
(Hassen 1990; Megerssa 2014; Bassi 2011).
This pattern of incorporation and cultural flexibility
stands in contrast to rigid ethnic or racial exclusion. Gadaa provided the
constitutional and moral framework through which this integration occurred.
Where historical shortcomings existed, they were not unique to Oromo society;
where constitutional innovations emerged, they were extraordinary within the
regional and global context of their time.
Conclusion: Gadaa as Historical Foundation and
Contemporary Relevance
The Oromo polity of the future will not, nor should not,
replicate sixteenth-century Gadaa structures. However, the constitutional
principles animating Gadaa—rotation of power, deliberative democracy, term
limits, accountability, and governance grounded in moral principles—retain
profound relevance for contemporary political theory and practice.
What the Oromo nation defends is not nostalgia but
historical truth. What it rejects is not scholarly critique but deliberate
distortion designed to deny political legitimacy.
The Oromo nation's right to remember its past accurately and
shape its future with self-determination remains non-negotiable. Oromummaa is
not a fabrication. Gadaa was not apartheid. And the future of Oromia will not
be determined by those who fear the political awakening of a people who have
recovered their own history.
Key References
Asmarom Legesse. (1973). Gada: Three Approaches to the
Study of African Society. Free Press.
Asmarom Legesse. (2006). Oromo Democracy: An Indigenous
African Political System. Red Sea Press.
Marco Bassi. (1996). "Institutions in a Stateless
Society: The Gada of the Oromo." In Ethnology and Archaeology:
Proceedings.
Marco Bassi. (2014). The Politics of History in the Horn
of Africa. Journal of Eastern African Studies.
Mohammed Hassen. (1990). The Oromo of Ethiopia: A
History, 1570–1860. Oxford University Press.
Paul T.W. Baxter. (1994). "The Creation and
Constitution of Oromo Identity." In The Invention of Ethiopia.
James Currey Publishers.
Paul T.W. Baxter. (1983). The Oromo as a Nation:
Nationalist Discourses and the Concept of Oromia. Journal of Oromo Studies.
Donald Levine. (1974). Greater Ethiopia: The Evolution of
a Multiethnic Society. University of Chicago Press.
Donald Donham & Wendy James. (2002). The Southern
Marches of Imperial Ethiopia: Essays in History and Social Anthropology.
Cambridge University Press.
Alessandro Triulzi. (1994). "Battling with the Past:
History and National Identity in Ethiopia and Eritrea." In The African
Past Speaks.
Deborah Posel. (2001). Apartheid and Racial Domination in
South Africa: A Historical Perspective. South African Historical Society.
