The Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF), the strongest component of the ruling coalition, from the middle of 2014 has faced the highest level of Tigrean popular discontent since its inception 40 years ago. That came first. Now the unrest in the most populated region of Ethiopia has sent to the regime as a whole the most shattering warning shot since its arrival in power in 1991.
Despite Tigray’s marginality in terms of geography, population – 6% of Ethiopians – and its economy, the TPLF had the strength to impose its hegemony after its victory over the Derg military-socialist junta in 1991. This dominance has recently declined, but it remains the driving force of the coalition between the four ethnic forces constituting the near-single party – the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) – with the Amhara National Democratic Movement (ANDM), the Oromo People’s Democratic Organisation (OPDO) and the Southern Ethiopian People’s Democratic Movement (SEPDM).
It is also the only party that the population sees as its authentic and legitimate representative. However, since the spring of 2014, it has been shaken by a rising tide of popular discontent. “Give us back our TPLF!” cry the Tigrayans, a Front that is righteous, disinterested, devoted as it was during the armed struggle, ready to listen and to serve, but now accused of having succumbed to an unholy trinity: corruption, bad governance, unaccountability.
