Long before the advent of the current leaderships, there was a loss of reason and logic in the region. Somalia had a brief exposure to democratic exercise in the sixties of the last century, albeit as clannish as it was, which brought in a twenty something years of military rule where the rule of law, discussion, debates and reasoning were thrown out of the window.

Ethiopia never had an opportunity to have a space for discussion and debates. It arrived at the modern world as an imperial country under the rule of a monarchy and ended up with a military dictatorship and then one-party ruling systems, thereafter. It stays in that political landscape till this date.

The countries of Eritrea and Djibouti were born into a region where the rule of law was under the thumb of one person or one party and perhaps still think this is the only way of governance in the region. They have leaders that have stayed long after they were supposed to leave in a normal democratic system.

No wonder there is opposition to the one-party dictatorships that currently run the region. This is not only normal opposition, but armed opposition shaded by tribalism and clannism and in some cases by religious extremism. Should the opposition succeed, they would probably continue on the same trajectory of no debates or discussion. The poor Horn African will be deprived of the freedom of choice, forever, unless there is a change in the societies of the region.

Many millions of Horn Africa States must be asking themselves “What is wrong with our region?” It is plain and simple. There are no independent judiciary systems, no independent parliaments (they are mostly nominated by the ruling........

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