(2 of 2)
In the 54 years since he came to power, the Emperor, now 78, has tried to nudge his medieval land toward the modern world. He has built a public school system that few attend, established an income tax that few pay and created a Parliament that has little power. The country's most basic need, land reform, is stymied because most parliamentarians and Cabinet members are landholders. "My biggest problem," says one government official, "is convincing the Minister of Land Reform that land reform is necessary." One-third of this year's $208 million budget is allocated to defense and security, with practically nothing for industrial and agricultural development.
Two for One. For decades, the Emperor has maintained control by playing the game of shum-shir (up-down in Amharic), a technique of raising and lowering his subordinates' status so as to maintain their loyalty without letting them become overly powerful. In the same way he balances his security forces against each other. In Eritrea, for example, there are two ranking generals but only one division, a paramilitary force of 5,000 field police to balance the division and a smaller force of home guards to balance the police. The inescapable conclusion is that the Emperor's fear of an internal coup is greater than his fear of the E.L.F. rebels.