ENCDC has to pursue a constructive productive and effective diplomacy in their struggle for change. Since its foundation in 2011 has failed to win the sympathy and support of foreign states.
ENCDC is now in its revival with a new spirit and mutual respect.
ENCDC have to make use of the diplomacy based on the know-how of the modus operandi of international relations which had been administering the world today, the interests of countries with national sovereignty, and international organizations attends to the interests of international security, regional organizations that sponsor the security and interests of the countries in the region, as well as non-governmental organizations that has become of great influence in international politics and overseas companies with a significant impact on the process of political decision-making.
Therefore any formulation of diplomatic action plan must be based the above mentioned backgrounds, it would be helpful to point out some important guideline here bellow:
1. A diplomatic action built on positive interaction, that is to say, there are parties in the world who have their respective stakes in Eritrea, who need to be convinced that the opposition can be faithful to their interests as long as not inconsistent with the national interests of Eritrea, therefore countries which their interests have been damaged by the Eritrean Regime will cooperate with the opposition, but first, the opposition must confirm its credibility and seriousness
2- A diplomatic action built on negative interaction, and we mean that there are parties in the world that Eritrean Regime constitutes a source of concern for their respective national security, whether serious or minimal concern, such forces would be more than happy to watch the Eritrean Regime disappearing.
The recent relations with Ethiopia are only personal relations and are temporary. Most of the Horn of African countries have genuine interests in the disappearance of this Regime due to the keenness to their respective national security, but these countries can not risk to establish relations with the opposition unless ascertained in the seriousness of the opposition, for fear that the establishment of such a relationship might deteriorate the internal affairs of their respective countries, the Eritrean Regime is notorious/warmongering in exploiting the internal contradictions of foreign countries, which constitute a threat to the security of those countries, the seriousness of the opposition/ ENCDC would be associated with its political discourse and its mechanisms.
3- A diplomatic action built on bilateral policy and attitudes, where some countries are in harmony with opposition/ ENCDC on their stance towards many issues, attitudes towards public issues is inconsistent with the positions of the Eritrean Regime, therefore compatibility with opposition or contradiction with the regime, is stimulus for diplomatic cooperation between the opposition and the foreign nations.
4- Diplomatic functioning based on lobbying through local communities, civic organizations and individual relationships, where every vote counts on the part of the Western countries in times of elections, the grouping of communities and activating civic organizations or take advantage of individual relationships can influence and stimulate the policies of Western states towards Eritrea.
5- Benefit from Non-governmental Organizations of certain areas of concern, such as human rights organizations, and organizations concerned with freedoms of religion or press, or transparency and those NGOs fighting corruption, and even the relief and health humanitarian organizations that the Eritrean Regime refused to give access to providing aid to the Eritrean people, all these factors could be valuable for the diplomatic advancement of the opposition if used properly.
The Eritrean opposition need to muster the factors that manipulate world politics through a specialized and skilful apparatus the make use of its political and administrative authority, and perhaps the most important aspect in this regard is appoint united-external-political unit. The following points might be useful in this respect.
- Formation of diplomatic apparatus for the Eritrean National Council for Democratic change/ ENCDC to run the international relations with political and administrative competency and capabilities.
- Consensus on the features of the external political discourse of the ENCDC.
- Coordination of the foreign policies of the political organizations through a united committee consisted of the external relations officials of the ENCDC organizations. With the task of making ENCDCs’ foreign policy a non-partisan policy through the evaluation of external policy functioning, exchange of information and proposal of plans, and benefiting from the relationships of organizations and individuals in this area.
- Coordination with the civic organizations that support the overall objectives of the opposition, especially in Europe, America and Australia, and take advantage of their relations, and to mandate the civic organizations to implement and illuminate the foreign policy of the Eritrean opposition.
- To draw a maximum benefit from all partners struggling for freedom and change at regional and global level.
- Improvement of ENCDC’s website so that it could be a reference to all the questions that may arise in the mind of any policy-maker or a diplomatic mission, as well as writing leaflets carefully prepared and in different languages.
Strategic Media Development
In today's world, which is dubbed as the “age of information evolution”, though the media of the Eritrean opposition is not commensurate with the magnitude of the cause it is raising and the challenge it is facing, despite the progress that opposition media has registered in general, but that is not enough to deliver the message of opposition, especially when the regime it is opposing has an information outlets that are considered the most prominent strengths of the regime.
even the improvements that opposition’s media outlets have shown are due to efforts without any coordination which is not enough to deliver the message of the opposition , most of the oppositions media outlets lack professionalism, most of the ENCDC’s organizations have their own media outlets which lessen the effectiveness of the spirit needed for change, even the oppositions media outlets are often used to highlight the secondary political contradictions between ENCDC organizations , we could point out the following points in this respect:
- Formulation an information policy with clear goals and instructions to convey a convincing message through all available information means.
- Tolerate secondary contradictions of political and civil forces, and focus on the overarching challenge of removing the dictatorial regime in Eritrea.
- Coordination of work between media organizations and the signing of the Code of Conduct for the media outlets, so that the media war between the organizations, degradation or questioning of the principles, personal attack would be perceived as a red-line.
- development of the radio through the creation of an independent radio with working-hours for as long as possible pursuing a dynamic approaches in conveying the opposition’s message to resist the Regime and to deliver ENCDC’s message in an intelligent way.
- Diligences in founding a TV-channel to convey the goals of the opposition and reflect the suffering of the Eritrean people, and work to highlight the abuse of the regime against our people.Establishing ENCDC’ Satellite TV challenging the PFDJ’s ERITV.
- Develop opposition websites on the web and make it more professional and more easily viewed, and more substantive and meaningful.
- Pay much attention to the Internet to benefit from groups on facebook, Twitter and other tools that gains the attention of a large number of sympathizers.
- The importance of training and the adoption of assigning media work according to individual competency and not organizational affiliation.
- Opening up communication with TV channels, news agencies, global and regional newspapers and magazines and all that can contribute to delivering the message of the opposition.
- Use the universal language in the media, in terms of focus on the concepts of human rights, democracy, transparency and good governance.
- Documentation of the regime’s Violations, and reporting the evidences in figures and images because it makes the message of the opposition more credible and acceptable to the recipient.
- adoption of mechanisms and means to evaluate the feedback such as surveys, questionnaires and others to determine the effect of the message on the recipient
- Co-operate with global organizations that provide skills and Knowledge on democracy, human rights, rule of law , good governance and peace.