David Pool's detailed and well-informed account of the EPLF is a valuable addition to our understanding of the complex political forces at work in the struggle for independence.
Listed in: African Studies · Violence in Society · Eritrea · Political Science · African History
From Guerrillas to Government
The Eritrean People’s Liberation Front
By David Pool
In 1991 the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front (EPLF) took over Asmara and completed the liberation of Eritrea; formal independence came two years later after a referendum in May 1993. It was the climax of a thirty-year struggle, though the EPLF itself was formed only in the early 1970s.From the beginning, Eritrean nationalism was divided. Ethiopia’s appeal to a joint Christian imperial past alienated the Muslim pastoral lowland people in the areas where Eritrean nationalism first appeared.
