The Ogaden: Versus the Mythical Ethiopian Claim

History records that as early as AD 100, there was a small feudal kingdom in an enclave called Axum located in the Horn of Africa. It was known as Abyssinia, and its inhabitants were Abyssinians-the Amhara and Tigrai peoples. Today, it is these two groups that monopolize power in the present mythical Ethiopia. But how did they rise to such power, and what does that power mean or the people of that land? In The Ogaden, author Jama Mohamed Ghalib challenges myths of Ethiopian imperialism and sheds some light as to how the Abyssinians collaborated with European colonisers in the scramble for the African continent. They expanded their previously small enclave of Axum into the territories of the free African nations of the Afars, Arusi, Benishangul, Borana, Gambella, Gurage, Hararis, Oromos, Somalis, and others. In this way, they created the mythical Ethiopian empire as it is known today, resulting in conflict within the occupied nations that has been ongoing for decades.