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People's Front for Democracy and Justice

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People's Front for Democracy and Justice
ህዝባዊ ግንባር ንደሞክራስን ፍትሕን
AbbreviationPFDJ
ChairpersonIsaias Afwerki
SecretaryYemane Gebreab
Founded16 February 1994
(32 years, 106 days)
Preceded byEritrean People's Liberation Front
HeadquartersAsmara
NewspaperShabait
Youth wingYoung People's Front for Democracy and Justice
Armed wingEritrean Defence Forces
Ideology
Political positionLeft-wing[1][13]
International affiliationFor the Freedom of Nations![14]
National Assembly
75 / 150 (50%)
Party flag
Website
shaebia.org (Archived)

The People's Front for Democracy and Justice (Tigrinya: ህዝባዊ ግንባር ንደሞክራስን ፍትሕን, PFDJ) is the founding and sole ruling party of the State of Eritrea. The successor to the Marxist–Leninist Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), the PFDJ regards itself as a left-wing nationalist party, though it holds itself open to nationalists of any political affiliation.[4] The leader of the party and current President of Eritrea is Isaias Afwerki. The PFDJ has been described as totalitarian,[15][16][17][18] and under its rule Eritrea reached the status of the least electorally democratic country in Africa according to V-Dem Democracy indices in 2023.[19][20]

Creation

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The Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), later (from 1994) People's Front for Democracy and Justice, was formed from the secessionist movement that successfully fought for the creation of an independent Eritrean nation out of the northernmost province of Ethiopia in 1993.

The historical region of Eritrea had joined Ethiopia as an autonomous unit in 1952. The Eritrean Liberation Movement was founded in 1958 and was succeeded by the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) in 1961. The ELF grew in membership when the Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie abolished Eritrea's autonomous status, annexing it as a province in 1962. In the 1960s and 1970s, the ELF undertook a systematic campaign of guerrilla warfare against the Ethiopian government. A faction of the ELF broke away in 1970 to form the Eritrean People's Liberation Front. The EPLF managed to secure control of much of the Eritrean countryside and build effective administrations in the areas it controlled. The fighting that broke out between the EPLF, ELF, and other Eritrean rebel groups in 1981 prevented further military gains, but the EPLF subsequently emerged as the principal Eritrean guerrilla group.

As Soviet support of Ethiopia's socialist government collapsed in the late 1980s, the EPLF allied with guerrilla groups in Tigray province and other parts of Ethiopia. After the holding of a United Nations-supervised referendum on independence there in April 1993, the EPLF declared the new nation of Eritrea the following month.

At the third congress of the EPLF Front in February 1994, delegates voted to transform the 95,000‐person organization into a mass political movement, the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ). The congress gave the PFDJ a transitional mandate to draw the general population into the political process and to prepare the country for constitutional democracy.[21]

The leader of the PFDJ party and current President of Eritrea is Isaias Afewerki.

Post-independence

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Eritrea formed itself from a referendum with high voter participation. EPLF provisioned education, health, and other public services to save women, workers, and peasants from poverty and oppression.[citation needed] As a consequence, both domestic and foreign media expressed high hopes that Eritrea would develop a self-governed and democratic government.[citation needed] EPLF leaders at the time were perceived as a “new generation” of African leaders.[22] They enjoyed high popularity rates among their constituents. They endorsed democracy and human rights. They defined clear development policies based on their priorities.[23]

In 1994, the PFDJ established a transitional 150-member National Assembly to determine the pending constitution and elections. The assembly later chose the PFDJ's secretary-general and the former EPLF leader, Isaias Afwerki, as Eritrea's president, and formed a cabinet around him. In 1997, the National Assembly adopted a constitution for a multi-party democratic system. It scheduled multi-party elections for 1997.[24] The new government appeared to practice separation of powers. However, the political institutions other than the executive office – the cabinet of ministers, a temporary parliament, and a nominally independent judiciary – did not actually pose checks on the executive power. The cabinet did not provide a platform for debates. The military remained under the president's control.[25] The PFDJ has not held a party convention since January 2002.[26]

Control of the Judiciary

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After independence, the PFDJ regime adopted the law of the ousted Ethiopian regime with some amendments to maintain law and order and avoid a legal vacuum. A committee of former senior fighters reviewed the old Ethiopian law regime to adapt the law to the newly formed state and make it compatible with the values and principles of the EPLF. Reviews revealed that basic principles of human rights and procedures of due process and models of judicial independence were not emphasized.[27]

Status

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The People's Front for Democracy and Justice is the sole legal party in Eritrea.[citation needed]

There is some debate as to whether PFDJ is a true political party or whether it is a broad governing association in transition. Some observers perceive the PFDJ as a fairly amorphous, diffuse, transitional organization, and a nationalist umbrella.[28]

Eritrean Militarism

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The first attempt of the PFDJ to influence the country's norms and values system immediately after the end of the independence war failed because the fighters were in the minority. The 1998–2000 border conflicts with Ethiopia presented the PFDJ with a second chance to impose its ideology on the society.[29]

U.S. sanctions

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On 12 November 2021, the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control added the PFDJ to its Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list for being "a political party that has engaged in, or whose members have engaged in, activities that have contributed to the crisis in northern Ethiopia or have obstructed a ceasefire or peace process to resolve such crisis".[30][31]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b c O'Kane, David; Hepner, Tricia (2011), Biopolitics, Militarism, and Development: Eritrea in the Twenty-First Century, Berghahn Books, p. xx, ISBN 9780857453990, retrieved 15 January 2011
  2. ^ Sherman, Richard (1980). "The Rise of Eritrean Nationalism". Northeast African Studies. 2/3 (3/1): 121–129. JSTOR 43660060.
  3. ^ Riggan, Jennifer (2016). "Struggling for the Nation: Contradictions of Revolutionary Nationalism". The Struggling State: Nationalism, Militarism, and the Education of Eritrea (PDF). Knowledge Unlatched. Temple University Press. p. 254. ISBN 978-1-4399-1270-6.
  4. ^ a b Markakis, John (March 1995). "Eritrea's National Charter". Review of African Political Economy. 22 (63): 126–129. doi:10.1080/03056249508704109.
  5. ^ "Civic and Ethnic Allegiances".
  6. ^ Joireman, Sandra Fullerton (2003), Nationalism and Political Identity, Continuum, p. 133, ISBN 9780826465917, retrieved 15 January 2011
  7. ^ Hirt, Nicole and Mohammad, Abdulkader Saleh (2021). "Eritrea's self-reliance narrative and the remittance paradox: Reflections on thirty years of retrogression" (PDF). Remittances Review. Retrieved 10 June 2025.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  8. ^ https://web.archive.org/web/20230206090632/https://www.madote.com/2016/10/eritrea-african-cuba.html
  9. ^ erisat.org/2021/09/12/is-eritrea-a-socialist-or-communist-state/&sa=U&ved=2ahUKEwjAnf7-ppSSAxXC6ckDHULVEJMQFnoECBwQAQ&zccpm=epi&usg=AOvVaw274sx6T6T4A6cDdyr56XcD
  10. ^ Connell, Dan (September 2001). "Inside the EPLF: The Origins of the 'People's Party' & Its Role in the Liberation of Eritrea". Review of African Political Economy. 28 (89): 345–364. doi:10.1080/03056240108704545. hdl:10.1080/03056240108704545. JSTOR 4006615. S2CID 145692529.
  11. ^ Gebrekidan, Desalegn Abraha (May 2014). The Leadership Hypocrisy of Four Million Parties and its Insurmountable Consequences on the Political Dimension of Nation Building: An Illustration of the so called "Peoples Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ) Central Office in Eritrea" (PDF). 15th International Academy of African Business and Development Annual Conference, May 26–29, 2014; University of the West Indies, Barbados.
  12. ^ Connell, Dan (September 2001). "Inside the EPLF: The Origins of the 'People's Party' & Its Role in the Liberation of Eritrea". Review of African Political Economy. 28 (89): 345–364. doi:10.1080/03056240108704545. hdl:10.1080/03056240108704545. JSTOR 4006615. S2CID 145692529.
  13. ^ Connell, Dan (September 2001). "Inside the EPLF: The Origins of the 'People's Party' & Its Role in the Liberation of Eritrea". Review of African Political Economy. 28 (89): 345–364. doi:10.1080/03056240108704545. hdl:10.1080/03056240108704545. JSTOR 4006615. S2CID 145692529.
  14. ^ https://ria.ru/20240214/forum-1927299954.html
  15. ^ "Eritrea is a 'totalitarian' state, says UN". Daily Nation. Archived from the original on 26 October 2019. Retrieved 24 July 2019.
  16. ^ Saad, Asma (21 February 2018). "Eritrea's Silent Totalitarianism". Archived from the original on 7 October 2018. Retrieved 19 September 2023.
  17. ^ "Eritrea: Events of 2016". World Report 2017: Rights Trends in Eritrea. Human Rights Watch. 12 January 2017. Archived from the original on 23 August 2018. Retrieved 24 July 2019.
  18. ^ Grill, Bartholomäus (2 November 2017). "Exit Eritrea: A Visit to 'Africa's North Korea'". Der Spiegel. Archived from the original on 26 March 2019. Retrieved 24 July 2019 – via Spiegel Online.
  19. ^ V-Dem Institute (2023). "The V-Dem Dataset". Retrieved 14 October 2023.
  20. ^ Democracy Report 2023, Table 3, V-Dem Institute, 2023
  21. ^ Connell, Dan (September 2001). "Inside the EPLF: the origins of the people's party' & its role in the liberation of Eritrea". Review of African Political Economy. 28 (89): 345–364. doi:10.1080/03056240108704545. hdl:10.1080/03056240108704545. S2CID 145692529.
  22. ^ Andebrhan, Welde Giorgis (2014). Eritrea at a crossroads : a narrative of triumph, betrayal and hope. Houston. ISBN 9781628573312. OCLC 884785342.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  23. ^ Tronvoll, Kjetil; Mekonnen, Daniel R. (17 July 2014). African garrison state : human rights and political development in Eritrea. Boydell & Brewer, Limited. p. 7. ISBN 9781782043645.
  24. ^ (Organization), Human Rights Watch (2009). Service for life : state repression and indefinite conscription in Eritrea. Human Rights Watch. ISBN 978-1-56432-472-6.
  25. ^ Connell, Dan (30 June 2016). "Redeeming the failed promise of democracy in Eritrea". Race & Class. 46 (4): 68–79. doi:10.1177/0306396805052519. S2CID 144808585.
  26. ^ "Eritreans hope for democracy after peace deal with Ethiopia". BBC News. 17 July 2018. Archived from the original on 7 April 2023. Retrieved 19 September 2023.
  27. ^ Kjetil, Tronvoll (17 July 2014). African garrison state : human rights and political development in eritrea. Mekonnen, Daniel Rezene. Suffolk. p. 25. ISBN 9781782043645. OCLC 884725791.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  28. ^ Connell, Dan (4 April 2009). "Inside the EPLF: The Origins of the 'People's Party' & its Role in the Liberation of Eritrea" (PDF). Review of African Political Economy. Archived (PDF) from the original on 19 October 2021. Retrieved 19 September 2023.
  29. ^ Mohammad, Abdulkader Saleh; Hirt, Nicole (March 2013). "'Dreams don't come true in Eritrea': anomie and family disintegration due to the structural militarisation of society*". The Journal of Modern African Studies. 51 (1): 139–168. doi:10.1017/S0022278X12000572. ISSN 1469-7777. S2CID 210221744. Archived from the original on 14 August 2022. Retrieved 19 September 2023.
  30. ^ "Treasury Sanctions Four Entities and Two Individuals in Connection with the Crisis in Ethiopia". U.S. Department of the Treasury. Archived from the original on 13 September 2023. Retrieved 16 January 2022.
  31. ^ "Ethiopia-Related Designations; Kingpin Act Designations Removals; Issuance of Ethiopia-Related General License and Frequently Asked Questions". U.S. Department of the Treasury. Archived from the original on 7 March 2023. Retrieved 16 January 2022.
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