In my last article (The Political and moral Dimensions of our recent tragedy in Libya By Teodros kirosAbugida, May 7,2015) I promised to delve deeply into the proposition that the Immigrant condition could be solved through a combination of public policy and constitutional imperatives. I now proceed to develop the supportive arguments.
All human problems except for the inevitability of death can be solved by intelligent policies mediated by Public Reason and the Political Reason of a functional state. Both Reasons are abundantly present in Ethiopia, at least potentially. Of course, potentiality is not actuality, but all potentiality can become actuality, or that, what we call actuality was once potentiality, and what we think is potentiality is infact an actuality of some kind, at some time in a future time.
Public Reason is the reason of the citizens. Political Reason is the reason of the state, under ideal conditions.
By Public Reason (PR), I understand the reasoning abilities of the Ethiopian citizen. By Political Reason (POR), I understand the ability of a functional state to draw from the resources of its educated elites from a wide strata of the bureaucracy and civil society and call them out to engage their intellectual, moral and emotional powers in service of solving some seemingly intractable problems that Ethiopian citizens are facing, most manifest when PR and existential rights are violated. The present immigrant condition calls for the engagement of PR and POR immediately. PR and POR must work in tandem to solve the immigrant condition.
PR is engaged when citizens feel that the state is fulfilling its duties of feeding, sheltering, housing and keeping its citizens healthy and safe. When fully satisfied citizens express themselves by participating in the affairs of the state, and when suitably employed, they willing contribute to the prosperity of the Ethiopian nation as productive and industrious citizens, go to church, if and when they can to thank God for their safety, health and food. When they are visibly perturbed they express themselves through riots and fleeing the country.
The fact that Ethiopian youth are risking their lives and leaving enmasse in search of a better life is a conclusive proof that the state is failing its citizens and that the citizens must call out the state either to behave properly or get out of the way. When citizens express dismay, frustration, despair and march on the streets, this is a sign that the state is in trouble and the poors are so desperate that they would do anything in search of better life, of which they are denuded in their homeland
PR and POR can change this miserable condition.
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The POR of the regime must be guided by three principles of political justice, which are
(1) All citizens must be guaranteed food, shelter, clothing and medical attention.
(2) All citizens must freely express themselves, develop unique relationships with the Transcendent, peacefully demand that their rights are procured when they are flagrantly violated.
(3) All citizens must be guaranteed equality of opportunity and opportunity of equality in the form of employments with living wages.
These principles of justice must be part of the Ethiopian constitution as a covenant between the Ethiopian state and its citizens.
The regime in power must at all times mindfully uphold these self-imposed constitutional imperatives of POR. These principles can neither be ignored nor distorted. They ought to be written on stone and cannot be removed without antagonizing the PR of the citizens.
If any one the three principles are violated, citizens can exercise their PR and call out the state either to attend to the principles or to get out of the way via the citizens resorting to the mandat imperative and ask for regime change.