26 May, 2025
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A former senior leader within the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) has come forward with a damning insider account that dissects the party’s unraveling from within. He agreed to speak exclusively to Ethiopia Insight in hopes of “clearing the air” amid growing online finger-pointing and recrimination.
His testimony arrives as public criticism swirls in the aftermath of Getachew Reda’s resignation from the Tigray Interim Administration, with many placing blame for TPLF’s deterioration and Tigray’s devastation by the war squarely on Debretsion Gebremichael.
But the whistleblower rejects such simplifications. “What we are witnessing is not the fault of one man,” he says. “It was a cumulative disaster decades in the making.”
Rotting Legacy
According to the insider, the seeds of the TPLF’s implosion were sown in the aftermath of Meles Zenawi’s death in 2012. “It began with a hollowing out of leadership,” he reflects. “Merit was replaced by loyalty. The talented were sidelined for housemaids,” he said, borrowing the Amharic phrase Ye Ashkeroch Sibisib.
Following the 2001 internal split, which consolidated Meles’s dominance, a culture of political subservience took hold—leaders began recruiting inferiors to preserve their own positions, leading to an internal environment hostile to independent or critical thinking. He described the few competent members who had risen on merit as feeling like “endangered species” in an increasingly mediocre leadership.
He rejected the notion that Debretsion Gebremichael’s leadership was chiefly to blame for the TPLF’s downfall, arguing instead that the crisis that culminated with Abiy Ahmed’s rise was a “cumulative disaster” that had been long in the making. The post-Meles transition saw the TPLF slowly lose its grip on the federal structure.
With Hailemariam Desalegn’s rise to power, he explains, figures such as Abadula Gemeda and Gedu Andargachew were emboldened and began to push the TPLF toward the political periphery. It was in the wake of these shifts that Debretsion assumed chairmanship of the party—at a time when, as the insider put it, “the regime was already Yejaje Shimagile—an old man on his deathbed.”
He was equally critical of the TPLF’s delusional self-perception and strategic blindness, characterizing its leadership—going as far back as the 2001 split—as “arrogant, self-assured, and all-knowing.” This attitude, he argued, dulled the party’s capacity to read a changing political landscape, slowly leading it down a path of stagnation. The 2018 shift in power, he contends, was not a sudden rupture but rather “the outcome of a clash between a stagnated political system and a changed society”.
He recalled how internal fractures had paralyzed the party by the time of Debretsion’s ascent in late 2017. The leadership shake-up that year, which ousted Abay Woldu’s faction and elevated Debretsion’s, exacerbated existing resentments. Azeb Mesfin, the widow of Meles, was removed from the executive committee and reportedly fell out with most party leaders. The insider notes that this period was marked by chronic infighting, with personal and institutional rivalries eroding coherence across all levels of leadership.
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Even Ethiopia’s top security figures—both former TPLF fighters—were divided: Getachew Assefa, the powerful national intelligence chief, sought to block Abiy’s nomination as prime minister, sensing a coordinated plan to dismantle the TPLF’s influence.
However, General Samora Yunis, then chief of staff of the military, overruled him—thus, according to the insider, driven by personal embitterment, allowing the “silent coup” to proceed. In his view, the conflict between the two military heads was “a manifestation of the longstanding divisions within the leadership that had spilled over into the military sphere”.
While the TPLF deliberated internally, engaging in a 35-day gimgema (evaluation) in Mekelle preoccupied with party protocols and procedural disputes, the Oromo People’s Democractic Organization (OPDO) and Amhara National Democratic Movement (ANDM) had already finalized their plan to elevate Abiy. “The sad thing is, on the day of their funeral, they didn’t know they had died,” he said.
The insider recalled how the ANDM orchestrated the final vote: Demeke Mekonnen, one of the four candidates officially nominated for the premiership (alongside Debretsion Abiy and Shiferaw Shigute), withdrew at the last minute, effectively throwing ANDM’s full support behind Abiy and ensuring his victory. In stark contrast, the TPLF failed even to agree internally on a single candidate. “It was to this extent they were disorganized…it was embarrassing and suicidal.”
He dismissed retrospective criticisms that the TPLF made a strategic error in withdrawing to Mekelle after Abiy’s election rather than remaining in Addis Ababa. It “was the correct decision,” he insisted. Had the TPLF remained—disorganized and politically isolated—it would have been vulnerable to extermination by the new administration. “If they had stayed in Addis, he [Abiy] would have massacred them.”
The TPLF no longer had a structured presence in the capital, and once the Prime Minister’s Office—the locus of federal power—fell to the dissident “Oro-Mara” alliance, any continued presence by TPLF leaders in Addis would have left them exposed. “They would have been like sitting ducks.” Nevertheless, he insisted that the shift to Mekelle “should have been strategic, not disorganized and panicky”.
By the time the OPDO-ANDM alliance moved decisively to sideline the TPLF, the insider concluded, any chance of a comeback had already slipped away. “It was too late to avert the takeover. The [TPLF] was already dead—the killer king was merely announcing their death.”
Strategic Paralysis
Despite rising tensions, in 2019 and 2020 the TPLF leadership refused to believe that war was imminent. “They were prisoners of their own ideology,” the insider reflected. “They clung to the belief that the nations and nationalities would never allow a centralized regime to wage war on Tigray.”
This ideological entrapment, he explains, resulted in a dangerously passive posture. Even as Abiy and Isaias ramped up their coordination, the TPLF leadership remained convinced that the federal military would never actually invade Tigray—let alone do so in collusion with Eritrea.
“It was only three or four months before the war that Lieutenant General Tadese Werede and the other retired Tigrayan commanders were finally given the green light,” he recalled. Most of these commanders had long since left active service, running private businesses and living in quiet retirement.
It was only in the final months—when the threat became too obvious to deny—that Debretsion’s leadership authorized the rebuilding of the Tigray Regional Special Forces. “That delay nearly cost us everything,” the insider said. “But the preparation carried out in those final months saved us.”
He credits the surprise preemptive strike on the Ethiopian Northern Command as a necessary and life-saving measure. “It was the only thing that prevented a total massacre of Tigray’s political and military elite,” he insists.
Admissions by ENDF Chief of Staff Birhanu Jula and others confirmed that the federal forces were thrown into disarray by the sudden collapse of the Northern Command. “We caught them flat-footed,” he said. “That strike would have forced Addis to the negotiating table—if not for one unanticipated factor: Eritrea.”
According to the insider, around 10,000 Tigray Special Forces had upended years of Ethiopian military planning. “They would have forced negotiations,” he said, “but the Eritreans saved [Abiy’s forces].” The entry of the Eritrean army—deploying an estimated 45 divisions—was, in his words, the decisive factor in the eventual collapse of Tigray’s resistance.
While acknowledging the impact of UAE-operated drones launched from the Assab base—used to disable much of the heavy arsenal seized by Tigrayan forces—he believes the true turning point was the full-scale Eritrean ground invasion. “Drones mattered,” he concedes, “but without Eritrea’s massive ground force, they wouldn’t have physically occupied Tigray. That should have been anticipated—and prepared for.”
He also pointed to the overt gratitude shown by Ethiopian commanders toward their Eritrean counterparts in the aftermath as further proof of how pivotal the intervention had been. “That gratitude was telling. It showed just how much the Ethiopian military depended on Eritrea to avoid total defeat.”
Power Struggles
The insider rejects attempts by Getachew Reda and Lieutenant General Tsadkan—both of whom emerged as key figures after the Pretoria Agreement—to place the blame for Tigray’s wartime setbacks solely on Debretsion’s leadership.
In his view, Getachew and Tsadkan are equally, if not more, responsible for the TDF’s retreat from the gates of Addis. He strongly disagrees with the portrayal of some reports that place the blame solely on Debretsion’s leadership. “Neither Getachew nor Tsadkan can claim the moral high ground,” he insisted. “They contributed more than anyone else to the failure.”
He argues that Getachew’s “unrestrained tongue” on television—particularly his inflammatory remark that “we have a score to settle with the Amhara people”—was a catastrophic blunder. “That statement cost us dearly,” the insider said. “Militarily and diplomatically. It gave Abiy’s regime all the ammunition it needed to stir up mass mobilization in the Amhara region against us.”
Worse still, Getachew’s public statement claiming the TDF had no interest in administering Ethiopia beyond removing Abiy—and Tsadkan’s categorical rejection of negotiations after capturing Dessie—deeply alarmed Western powers. “I still don’t understand what drove Tsadkan to say that. You never close the door to negotiations—not even after total victory. Even if they surrender, you still need a transition plan.”
The impact, he believes, was decisive. The US, which had previously denied drone support to Abiy due to successful Tigrayan lobbying, reversed its stance. “It was their statements,” he says, “that made the international community—especially the US—panic and rush to save Abiy in the name of Ethiopian stability.”
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His description of the two men is scathing. “This was Yejajewin habtam nibret lemewres yemidereg gibgib,” he said—“a fight over a dead man’s wealth, and Tigray was the inheritance.” He accuses both of putting personal ambition over Tigray’s national interest. “They were both ruthlessly trying to seize power—no matter the cost.”
Getachew, whom he says he has known personally for years, is described as “a narcissist who can’t stand anyone he can’t manipulate.” He adds: “He’s never been serious about anything. No principles, no anchoring values. He’ll say or do anything—including betray his comrades.”
He was especially outraged by Getachew’s recent accusation that TPLF leaders colluded with Eritrea—calling it “morally abhorrent.” When asked if Getachew might simply be acting in Tigray’s interest, the insider shot back: “How could that be? His words weakened Tigray’s negotiating position under the Pretoria Agreement.”
As for Tsadkan, he describes him as driven by an unresolved grudge from the early 2000s, when he was removed as ENDF Chief of Staff during Meles Zenawi’s purge. “Yalwetalet kim—he never got over it.” After years of focusing on his business ventures, the war gave him a path back into political relevance.
The insider confirmed long-standing rumors that Tsadkan advised Debretsion to flee to Sudan in the early days of the war—a ploy he believes was aimed at seizing power. “His obsession with taking the presidency before he dies is now more obvious than ever. And he’s willing to pay any price for it.”
Debretsion: Incompetent, Not Corrupt
Strikingly, he defends Debretsion—not as a capable leader, but as a decent man tragically out of his depth. “He lacks political instincts. Chilota yelewim. He thinks politics is about being nice,” he says with visible frustration. “He believes tolerating Getachew’s overnight drinking habits and the resulting chronic absenteeism is a form of mature leadership. That’s not leadership—it’s blindness.”
Debretsion’s background, he notes, is as a technician in radio communications, not a statesman. “He simply doesn’t understand the ABCs of politics—let alone the Machiavellian games of Abiy or Isaias.”
He is particularly baffled by Debretsion’s naïveté in “forgiving” Tsadkan for what he describes as an old scheme to trick Debretsion into fleeing to Sudan during the early days of the war—a ploy many saw as an attempt to seize power. “Not only did he forgive him, he sent him to Pretoria to negotiate on behalf of the TPLF and even lobbied GSTS to make Tsadkan deputy president of TIRA” a position Tsadkan used masterfully to sideline Debretsion and the TPLF.
Still, the insider maintains Debretsion is innocent at heart—kifat yelewim. “As a lawyer, I can tell you: he has no problem of intention. He never compromised Tigray’s interests. Unlike others who want the palace—even if it means selling out Tigray or colluding with Abiy—Debretsion never betrayed the cause. He just didn’t know how to fight for it.”
Decline and Resilience
The insider emphasized that external analysts—particularly Westerners—often misinterpret the true nature of the TPLF, underestimating both its capacity and tenacity due to a superficial reading of its internal dysfunction. “TPLF is not simply a political organization to Tigrayans,” he stated. “It is a spirit.”
According to him, the party’s enduring relevance lies in its symbolic weight as an existential force within the Tigrayan psyche, rather than its current institutional strength. He argued that the party has repeatedly drawn vitality from moments of apparent collapse, galvanized by Tigrayan mass mobilization in response to perceived existential threats from external actors.
In this context, he contended that the Prosperity Party’s (PP) efforts to eliminate the TPLF inadvertently activated a collective “survival instinct” in Tigray, reigniting support for the party even in its weakest state.
Ironically, he noted, similar revivalist dynamics were triggered by the internal campaign—led by Tsadkan and Getachew Reda—to dissolve the party, which paradoxically restored its relevance rather than dismantling it.
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The observer emphasized that the Tigrayan public’s current tolerance of the TPLF does not stem from satisfaction with its performance, but from anxiety over what might fill the vacuum if the party were dismantled. “The Tigrayan elites are not short-sighted. They know that if the TPLF collapses, it won’t be Tsadkan or Getachew who replaces it—it will be PP.”
He added that opposition parties in Tigray have failed to earn public trust, citing their “lack of institutional maturity and incompetent leadership,” and accusing them of prioritizing power acquisition over programmatic substance.
Nevertheless, the observer stressed that if the TPLF is to retain a decisive role in Tigray’s political future, it must acknowledge its past failures and take tangible steps to restore public confidence. This includes accepting political responsibility for the devastation Tigray endured under its leadership. “This does not mean a wholesale abdication of power,” he clarified, “but it does require clear symbolic gestures—such as a public apology to the Tigrayan people and the resignation of key individuals,” most notably Debretsion.
Responding to TPLF Deputy Chairman Amanuel Assefa’s remarks in a Reyot Media interview—wherein Amanuel claimed that Debretsion had intended to resign but was urged to stay to preserve the party’s public face and external diplomatic ties—the insider categorically rejected this reasoning.
He asserted, “Abraham Tekeste [a TPLF Executive Committee member] is a highly capable figure who could replace him,” and dismissed the diplomatic justification as weak and indicative of a culture of impunity. In his view, Debretsion’s continued tenure is driven less by necessity than by personal interest and an entrenched habit of evading accountability.
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Main photo: Left to right: Fetlework Gebregziabher, Alem Gebrewahid, Getachew Reda, and Debretsion Gebremichael at the 35th anniversary of the Tigrayan Martyrs’ commemoration, held in Mekelle, June 2023