IN MEMORY OF PROFESSOR MESFIN ARAYA

In early November a memorial service was held for the late professor Mesfin Araya at the college he taught for over 20 years. During his tenure at York College, he served for many years as the coordinator of Afro-American Studies and Director of the African American Resource Center. He developed and taught many courses in his discipline, including Introduction to Afro-American Studies and The Black Experience in the Caribbean.  A specialist in African politics, his research was centered on the state in the Horn of Africa, covering Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia focusing on the North/South conflict, political development and social change. Several of his publications appeared in the Ethiopian Review, The Journal of Northeast-African Studies and the Journal of Modern African Studies. So ends the life of an illustrious figure who played quiet significant role in Diaspora politics.

The story of Prof. Mesfin is the story of many of his generation in Ethiopia and the world over. He came out of age when students in many parts of the world begun to question the global state of affair where the world was divided into diametrically opposed economic and political camps. In the 1960s, the young led by citizens of the industrial world begun to question the capitalist system that fell short of its promises of making life easier for people to live equitably and freely at home and abroad. The global division between haves and have-nots was amplified by the war in Indochina and by the flagrant intervention in the affairs of the mineral rich Congo, for example.  The famine in India followed by that of the Sahel region in Africa with Ethiopia as a posture child of everything gone wrong to countries of the Southern hemisphere added vigor and determination to the actions of the idealist young. Clearly, it was an era where a well meaning and enthusiastic young from the industrialized world begun to echo issues long articulated by scholars and revolutionaries of the developing world from Ho Chi Minh to George Padmore, to Kwame Nkrumah and Samir Amin. Revolutionary thinkers such as Franz Fanon, Amilcar Cabral and Malcolm X unequivocally indicted the developed world for greed and exploitation of the so-called third world. In this regard Mesfin was in the center of it all first in his home country and later when he migrated to the United States.

In Ethiopia, Mesfin not only participated in demonstrations and sit ins against the feudal system with the Emperor at the hub but also was a core member of the strategizing group who worked tirelessly to give momentum to the student movement. The clarion call of the student movement at the time was ‘land to the tiller’ and democratic rule ‘now’. Although, not entirely enticed by the activities of the Eritrean Liberation Fronts whose goal was to separate his home region, Eritrea from Ethiopia nevertheless he tacitly supported their efforts in the hope that their armed struggle may ultimately weakening the grip of the Imperial system on Ethiopia and free the entire populace victims of crude exploitation by handful land owning class. 

He was Marxist through and through to be branded as an ideologue. He looked at society as organic whole always in changing mode. His view on life was that it is in constant change. He unabashedly supported the theoretical view that there is continuous interaction between positive and negative or the fusion of thesis and antithesis create synthesis, hence for the new to emerge.  He surmised that, it is through this dialectic process that modern human emerged.  Throughout history its this ‘class’ struggle that was the determining factor for societal progression. He firmly believed that with the intensification of class struggle society would purify and purge itself from vices such as greed and aggrandizement at the expense of others so as to think and act beyond individual interest.  Despite the fall of the Soviet Union and many others mimicking the system, Mesfin remained unshaken that the triumph of socialism over capitalism was inevitable.  He viewed capitalism as irrational system prying on the weak. He admonished its wastefulness and consumerism that have little to do with the wellbeing of society. 

He tends to agree with the classic Marxist teaching that only the highly developed and industrially advanced nations could transform into socialism first before the agrarian societies do. His assertions is based on the dictum that countries with huge accumulated wealth, high literacy rate and a sizeable number of working class (in the case of America, the middle class) have the potential to critic the capitalist system for the good of socialism.

Like the early Greeks he invited dialogue. He was unyielding when it comes to defending his principles but at the same time leaving space for more intellectual discussion to continue. His motto was that nobody monopolizes the truth and in fact truth itself is relative to simply accept as is.  Mesfin was always against shutting the door that stifles discussion and more discussion.  When unsure of topic under discussion he shows readiness to listen but not submitting totally to the explanation at hand. 

To many he was delight to engage in scholarly debates but to few he was caustic and perhaps out of control. One would assume that coming from the restive region of Eritrea where secessionist tendency is at high pitch he was walking on tight rope to support the movement or stand against it. But not to Mesfin who was an avowed socialist who saw no good in fragmentation. Throughout his life he worked tirelessly for the true liberation of his people while casting serious doubt whether the petit bourgeoisie led rebellion in his home region was in the best interest of the downtrodden. He always argued that the leadership of the secessionist movement had its eyes focused on ‘grabbing the colonial leftovers’ and not trying to build new material wealth based on unity of the entire people. Unlike some of his colleagues he died without reconciling with the fact that Eritrea was an independent state. 

Despite his earlier misgivings with the direction that the Eritrean fronts were taking, he continued to participate in the early formation of Eritreans For the Liberation in North America (EFLNA).  His first disappointment with EPLF came when news that his friend a student activist from the days of Haile Selassie University was murdered by the front accused of being CIA agent. The killing of Meles by the paranoid leadership and the subsequent liquidation of many activist entangled in the power struggle of 1973-74 turned him off completely. He wrote repeatedly that the battle hardened now ossified leadership are incapable of leading the people to the Promised Land. Watching at what has transpired in Eritrea after its separation from Ethiopia one cannot help but concur with Mesfin’s suspicion earlier on.  He is perhaps smirking in his grave that history has vindicated him. He remained critical of the EPRDF government as well and was in complete agreement with the Ethiopian Diaspora politics that the TPLF dominated government is an ethnic based but smarter than EPLF.

In person he was mixed bug. A kind person but not viscerally sentimental, an arrogant and yet humble, serious but comical/satirical at times, a Marxist (raised as Catholic) but with high reverence to the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as one of the earliest and a significant part of the whole Christian edifice. He loved savoring wine and Italian food. His style of dressing impeccable which perhaps acquired from his infrequent visit to Paris, his favorite city in the world.

His Ph.D dissertation was on Eritrean Nationalism, which has yet to be published in book form. It awaits one daring scholar to take the challenge with his/her perspective added to the masterpiece as his colleague and chief adviser Professor Irving Leonard Markovitz remarked.