By Dr. Solomon Abebe, Professor
Amhara history stands today at a moment of profound and irreversible consequence. The Amhara people confront a threat unlike any they have faced in the modern era. The scale and brutality of killings, forced displacement, mass arrests, targeted disappearances, systemic humiliation, and the dismantling of cultural identity that have occurred since the rise of Abiy Ahmed far exceed the abuses of the Derg and the Tigray People Liberation Front combined. Under the current structure of power that operates under the ideological umbrella commonly referred to as Oromummaa, the Ethiopian state has become not simply hostile but structurally oriented toward the destruction of the Amhara population. For Amharas, Ethiopia today is not an imperfect nation in need of reform but a political environment that functions as a machinery of dispossession and physical annihilation. In such circumstances, survival requires not only courage and resistance but also conceptual clarity. The scientific concept known as the Signal to Noise Ratio provides a rigorous system for distinguishing truth from deception, organization from sabotage, and the struggle for survival from the many distortions that threaten to weaken it.
In science, the Signal to Noise Ratio, commonly abbreviated as SNR, measures the degree to which meaningful information rises above interference. A signal is the structured and intentional component of a transmitted message. Noise is anything that distorts or obscures that message. When the signal is strong and the noise is weak, communication is clear. When the noise is strong or the signal is weak, confusion becomes inevitable. Applied to the Amhara struggle, this framework provides a powerful analytical tool. The signal represents the disciplined, organized, and truth-based effort to defend the Amhara people from extermination and to restore a just and stable Ethiopia. Noise represents every internal and external force that distorts, weakens, or corrupts this effort. A community confronting existential danger must understand these dynamics with precision, for the cost of confusion is measured in human life.
A signal in engineering is the part of a transmitted message that carries meaning. It may be a voice, a coded pattern of light, or a sequence of digital bits. Its purpose is to reach the receiver clearly enough to be understood and acted upon. Noise is anything that does not belong to that message. It includes random disturbances, interference from competing sources, and distortions introduced during transmission. When noise becomes strong enough, it can overwhelm or replace the signal entirely. This scientific model translates with remarkable accuracy to the political and social environment in which the Amhara struggle for survival unfolds.
The signal in the Amhara struggle is the legitimate, coordinated, and purposeful effort to stop mass killings, to prevent forced displacement, to defend Amhara communities everywhere in Ethiopia, to resist systems crafted to marginalize or erase them, and to reconstruct Ethiopia into a lawful, stable, and equitable state. This signal is embodied in three essential pillars. The first pillar is Fano, the organized defensive force that acts when others remain silent. The second pillar is the Amhara people, whose unity, resilience, and moral legitimacy amplify and sustain the struggle. The third pillar is Ethiopia, not as it currently exists, but as the larger political system that must eventually be reconstructed if it is ever to cease serving as a mechanism for targeted violence.
Noise in the Amhara context takes many forms. It includes propaganda that denies or distorts atrocities. It includes infiltration by sleeper agents who infiltrate Amhara organizations, including Fano, to redirect or weaken them. It includes opportunists who convert the suffering of their own people into personal wealth or political advantage. It includes deceptive calls for peace or national unity that offer negotiation in place of justice and that aim to neutralize genuine resistance while leaving the machinery of violence intact. It also includes diaspora actors who transform Amhara suffering into a platform for personal branding, fundraising, or influence without accountability or measurable benefit for those facing danger on the ground. Each of these forms of noise weakens the clarity and direction of the Amhara struggle. Noise creates confusion about who is genuine, who is compromised, and what actions serve Amhara survival rather than endanger it.
The Signal to Noise Ratio provides a method for evaluating the health of a communication system, and it can be used metaphorically to assess the health of the Amhara struggle. In technical terms, the ratio compares the power of the meaningful signal to the power of the background noise. A high ratio indicates clarity and strength, while a low ratio indicates that the message is being distorted or lost. Applied analytically, the signal power within the Amhara struggle corresponds to the unity, discipline, strategic coherence, and moral clarity of Fano, of the people, and of honest leadership. The noise power corresponds to the combined effect of propaganda, infiltration, deception, opportunism, and emotional manipulation. A high ratio corresponds to strategic direction, unity of purpose, resistance to manipulation, and durability. A low ratio corresponds to confusion, division, and extreme vulnerability.
Understanding the channel through which the signal must travel is essential. In communication, the channel is the medium that carries the signal. A channel may weaken or distort the message even if the source is strong. In the Amhara struggle, Ethiopia functions as this channel. However, contemporary Ethiopia is not a neutral medium. It is an engineered environment that operates with deliberate hostility toward the Amhara people. The ideology of Oromummaa is embedded in state institutions, producing patterns of behavior that match the internationally recognized definition of genocide.
The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, adopted in 1948, defines genocide as any intentional act committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. The convention identifies specific acts that constitute genocide, including killing members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm, deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction, imposing measures intended to prevent births, and forcibly transferring children.
When one applies this definition rigorously to the situation of the Amhara people under the current Ethiopian government, the alignment is unmistakable. The state sanctioned killings of Amharas, widespread massacres in multiple regions, targeted arrests and torture, the displacement of millions, destruction of identity markers, starvation level blockades, and the deliberate creation of unlivable conditions reveal a systematic pattern designed to destroy the group at multiple levels. This is not accidental or incidental. It is a structure of governance.
Because the channel is genocidal in design, even strong and disciplined Amhara resistance is persistently obstructed or reversed. Defensive actions are framed as terrorism. Victims are blamed for their own deaths. The search for justice is portrayed as extremism. Public narratives are shaped by institutions that normalize anti- Amhara violence. Laws are selectively applied to criminalize Amhara mobilization while protecting perpetrators. Administrative bodies engage in demographic engineering that actively accelerates Amhara disappearance from key regions. Under such circumstances, redesigning the channel, meaning reconstructing Ethiopia into a lawful and accountable state, is not a secondary goal but a fundamental component of Amhara survival.
The three pillars of the signal each require sustained clarity. Fano must maintain independence from political cooptation, foreign interests, and internal corruption. A compromised Fano is comparable to a transmitter that continues to broadcast but transmits an enemy controlled message. The Amhara people, serving as the amplifiers, must remain unified and disciplined to strengthen the signal rather than amplify the noise. Fragmented people amplify falsehoods, misinformation, and the agendas of infiltrators, thereby weakening the entire resistance. Ethiopia as a channel must eventually be transformed so that the signal can pass through a lawful and just medium rather than a machinery that distorts every attempt at self-defense.
An existential threat is one directed not at political preference but at the continued existence of a group. The scale and coordinated nature of the violence against Amharas demonstrates that such a threat is present today. Using the Signal to Noise framework, the existential signal is a coherent effort to survive, defend, and rebuild. The existential noise is everything that makes this effort appear unnecessary, divisive, extreme, or hopeless. Any actor who lowers the ratio, whether knowingly or by negligence, becomes part of the mechanism of destruction.
The purpose of this first episode is to provide conceptual clarity by defining the signal before attempting to design filters for the noise. Without a coherent understanding of what the signal is, it is impossible to protect it. Subsequent episodes will categorize the different forms of noise, both scientific and political. They will map these forms into specific behaviors and actors within the Amhara struggle and will propose strategies for filtering destructive interference to elevate the Signal to Noise Ratio. Only by increasing this ratio can the Amhara struggle maintain clarity, stability, and strategic effectiveness in the face of a state apparatus that is committed to their destruction.
Editor’s Note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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A political comedy: An Electrical engineering signals transformation becomes a political strategy platform, to advance Fano’s armed resistance.
With the spanking new fleet of F35’s and Al-Toweel Isu’s Su35’s, Ethiopia, you’re toast. You will not even a chance to say ‘What did just happen?’ After the victorious armies of el-Sisi, Al-Toweel and a squadron F35’s march into Addis, the first task in order will be to deport all those Amharas and Oromos from Ethiopia to where they came from, Hadhramaut[ and Dhofari in Southeastern Yemen and Southwestern Oman. These two groups of people have always been causing mischief and trouble. Good riddance!!! The rest groups of people will be used as hammaals(coolies) ny the victorious Sisi and Al-Toweel.
Somebody asked me how about the Tigres. They have their own country. Debre and his entourage will move to Al-Toweel Isu’s fiefdom to do the brick laying on his driveway and shoe shine his boots everyday. The rest of Tigres will voluntarily deport themselves to where they came from: Along the Tigris River in present day Iraq.