The Red Sea Afar Democratic Organisation (; ; ,

transliteration Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one script to another that involves swapping letters (thus '' trans-'' + '' liter-'') in predictable ways, such as Greek → and → the digraph , Cyrillic → , Armenian → or L ...

: ''Al-tanzim Al-dimokrati Li-'afar Al-Bahr Al-Ahmar'';

abbreviated An abbreviation () is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening, contraction, initialism (which includes acronym), or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened form of a word, usually ended with a trailing per ...

RSADO) is a political organisation and armed insurgent group based in

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. The organisation is made up of mainly ethnic

Afar people The Afar (), also known as the Danakil, Adali and Odali, are a Cushitic peoples, Cushitic ethnic group inhabiting the Horn of Africa. They primarily live in the Afar Region of Ethiopia and in northern Djibouti, as well as the entire southern co ...

, and was founded in early 1995-1996 following a revolt by the Red Sea Afar people led by Ahmed Humed, after the UN-supervised Eritrean independence referendum was held in 1993. The primary goal of RSADO is to achieve autonomy for the region known as Dankalia, inhabited mainly by the Red Sea Afar. , RSADO is a member of the Eritrean Democratic Alliance (EDA) group of 11 Eritrean political organisations attempting to overthrow Eritrean president

Isaias Afwerki Isaias Afwerki (, ; born 2 February 1946) is an Eritrean politician and leader who has been the List of heads of state of Eritrea, president of Eritrea since 1993 and the chairman of the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ) since 1994 ...

's government.

History

Following the independence of Eritrea in May 1991, indigenous Afar started to face unprecedented persecution by the

totalitarian Totalitarianism is a political system and a form of government that prohibits opposition from political parties, disregards and outlaws the political claims of individual and group opposition to the state, and completely controls the public sph ...

one-party government of the

People’s Front for Democracy and Justice The People's Front for Democracy and Justice (, PFDJ) is the founding, ruling, and sole legal political party of the State of Eritrea. The successor to the Marxist–Leninist Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF), the PFDJ regards itself ...

led by

. The

government of Eritrea The politics of Eritrea and the government of Eritrea take place in the framework of a One-party state, single-party Presidential system, presidential republic currently under a Totalitarianism, totalitarian dictatorship. The President of Eri ...

began systematically removing the Red Sea Afar from their ancestral homeland, robbing them of their indigenous identity, denying them the rights to own and live off their traditional land and territories, destroying the basis of the Red Sea Afar economies such as

fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment (Freshwater ecosystem, freshwater or Marine ecosystem, marine), but may also be caught from Fish stocking, stocked Body of water, ...

and

animal husbandry Animal husbandry is the branch of agriculture concerned with animals that are raised for meat, animal fiber, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, management, production, nutrition, selective breeding, and the raising ...

, and confiscating Afar businesses. The rule of Shabia was unreservedly welcomed by the Kebesa community while the bulk of Muslims were skeptically watching the situation and wishing that Shabia would rise up to the occasion and their fears would be proved wrong. They adopted a wait and see attitude giving the regime the benefit of doubt, but the regime did not attempt to take advantage of the opportunity and win back their trust or play down their fears and suspicions. The regime lost no time in exposing its partisan and partial nature totally ignoring their feelings. The regime went on harassing, imprisoning and purging citizens who dared to stand for their basic rights or even at a mere suspicion that they entertain such thoughts. This vindicated the worst fears that haunted the Muslims ever since Shabia's control of power. This combined with dissatisfaction over the ruling PFDJ government led to a rebellion by the Red Sea Afar in Southern Eritrea in 1995, led by Ahmed Humad. The group used guerrilla war tactics and launched attacks in Eritrea. Though they posed great problems for the Eritrean government and army, it was also facing internal political conflicts in the very late 1990s.

References

{{reflist

External links

Official website

RSADO Facebook page
National liberation movements in Africa Guerrilla organizations 1999 establishments in Ethiopia Rebel groups in Ethiopia Rebel groups in Eritrea Political parties of minorities in Eritrea