Including, “የኦሮሞ እና የአማራ እውነተኛወ የዘር ምንጭ”

By LJDemissie

January 22, 2017

“The pen is apparently mightier than the sword – and sometimes the authorities have been so fearful of the written word that they’ve banned it altogether.”  

I am writing this commentary because I read an article that stated Professor Fikre Tolosa’s famous new book titled “የኦሮሞ እና የአማራ እውነተኛወ የዘር ምንጭ “– which I translated to the Oromo and Amhara Real Ancestor – is outlawed in Ethiopia by the Woyane –  the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front’s (TPLF’s) Command Post. Consequently, in this article, I champion reading books the coward Command Post prohibited. I aim to try persuading you to read banned books to show that you stand for the freedom of speech and you stand up for the right to choose what to read. I share my opinions about Paulos Milkias (PhD) and Professor Getatchew Haile’s reviews of Tolosa’s book and the author’s responses to his critics along with report cards with grades (A, B, C or D) I gave for their writings: boldness, significance and thoughtfulness. I got the idea for grading them from CNN’s “Obama’s final report card”.

I’m not following a dysfunctional team playbook to appear aiding the fascist TPLF. I’m not undermining Professor Al Mariam’s call for “a truce in the war of words” among members of team New Ethiopia. Actually, I appreciated his call. I read and appreciated Professor Messay Kebede’s article titled “Ethnicity is not about Descent” – which shocked me to the core. And I drew great lessons from it. Maybe I would share my understanding of his messages that I cut out from this piece at another time if I think it would encourage a good conversation with Kebede. By writing this article, I’m trying to showcase that the New Ethiopia team’s strength is that its members openly share their opinions about one another’s contribution for the struggle against the brutal TPLF.

Although I feel bad about taking readers time by getting this article posted, I want to be heard. I want objectively to be on the side of Prof. Tolosa because some of his critics appeared to be disparaging and insulting him. They are intimidating him by asking him a barrage of questions – which I think he is dealing with in a confident way. They also seemed to me that they are determined to belittle his book and, by extension, his reputation without providing a decent review of his book. A review that I read which I thought was significant, constructive and thoughtful was a review by ከፍያለው አባተ (ዶር) titled “ወንድማማች አማሮችና ኦሮሞዎች”.

Last year in April, I wrote a critique about a book titled “ፍጹም ነው እምነቴ” (“Fistum Naew Emnetae”) which is riddled with “serial untruths” – which cries out for a critique from someone who is informed about Higher-15 prison in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.  I didn’t share my review of the book with the reading communities because, among others, I didn’t want to divert readers’ attention from the struggle against the TPLF. I also figured that the issues which need to be addressed might be unimportant for the former Ethiopian People Revolutionary Party (EPRP’s) leaders and members, particularly most former Higher-15 prisoners’ although they were important to me. Inspired by Tolosa’s critics and his responses, I will share a condensed version of my review shortly after this article is published.

Looking at the bright side

I found out about “የኦሮሞ እና የአማራ እውነተኛወ የዘር ምንጭ” from its author’s interviews on Ethiopian’s websites and YouTube videos. I noted that he is a great communicator, and he can easily catch his audience’s attention and persuade them to act on his messages. For instance, based on his recommendation, I saw his YouTube video titled Multi Colored Flowers. And I loved it because it made me laugh and made me feel proud of my culture. So I clicked “Like” and shared it with friends and families.

Though I didn’t read Tolosa’s new book yet, I read several reviews of it and his responses to his critics to date. Basing the reviews and responses I read, it appeared to me that the writer and his critics are on the same team, New Ethiopia, which I belong to. My definition of team New Ethiopia is that it is a progressive team whose members work independently across the globe. In cyberspace, they exchange knowledge, information, opinions or concerns at the speed of light. They speak out and stand up against the massacre, corruption … of the evil TPLF’s leadership. They labor to keep the societal cancers, the TPLF’s leadership, “on life support” and to lend a hand in hammering the last nails in the fascist leadership’s coffin.

My Observations about Critiques of “የኦሮሞ እና የአማራ እውነተኛወ የዘር ምንጭ”

First, Paulos Milkias’ (PhD) Review  — I read his review on Ethiomedia website. On his appraisal of the book, he stated the following:

“Dr. Fikre’s monograph is selling like hot cakes to gullible Ethiopians whose background in Ethiopian history is nil or those nationalist Ethiopians disillusioned by the Woyane’s ethnicization of their motherland who buy and read it though they do harbor doubts about the veracity of the assertions in the book. I hope young Ethiopians who have no background in their country’s history will not read this book and quote it in their research papers.”

I was astounded by his unconstructive judgment on the book. Without providing evidence, he listed the author’s assertions that he think are “fiction and Fairy Tale”. His presentation was below par for his caliber. It wasn’t well thought out, and it wasn’t thoroughly proofread, and it wasn’t his best. If he submits it to English teacher that makes a student earn his/her grade, I think the best grade he would get for it is a C+. To me his sloppy review shows his lack of respect for his readers. His statement that discouraged young Ethiopians from reading the book just because he thinks their history knowledge is nil and the book is garbage is plainly wrong. It spooked me because it underestimated a generation’s intelligence that is protesting and/or fighting across Ethiopia against the brutal TPLF oppression.

I found his review too harsh with an excessive inquisition. It didn’t provide to me any substance except trashing the book and its author. Some of the issues he discussed were off the subject. Moreover, his review didn’t help me to make up my mind about reading the book. Therefore, contrary to his hope that “young Ethiopians who have no background in their country’s history will not read this book and quote it in their research papers”, I strongly encourage readers to critically read the book because I think it would do much more good than harm.

Let’s say that a religious fanatic urges young people not to read and quote from Milkias’ book titled Paulos Milkias’ Dictionary of Ethiopian Christianity. What would he think about the extremist’s effort? I like to think that he would reason the extremist is interfering in others right to choose what to read. And he would hopefully stand against the fanatic.

While rereading Milkias’ Review, I think I discovered an answer for a question why some less educated Ethiopians belittle some highly educated Ethiopians though getting higher education supposed to bring more respect. It seemed to me that they get undermined, belittled or insulted because of their unprofessional presentation of their ideas, opinions, criticisms… A typical example to support my assertion is the following statements of Milkias:

He articulated that Tolosa’s statements and assertions “… are total fiction and total Fairy Tale [he said it eleven times in 77 words] …” “They are much in the realm of delusionary and phantom apparitions symbolized by Dukak diktats that qat [chat] addicts describe after taking a pause in their chewing regimen. [Emphases added.]”

I couldn’t easily understand his statements because I didn’t know the definition of the words (“phantom”, “apparitions”, “diktats” and “qat”). So I looked them up in a dictionary, and I wondered if he uses those kinds of words regularly. Qat wasn’t in a dictionary so I googled it, and I learned that it is a Yemen word for chat. I also learned that “The khat plant is known by a variety of names, such as qat and gat in Yemen, qaat and jaad in Somalia, and chat in Ethiopia.[2] It is also known as jimaa in the Oromo language and mayirungi in Luganda Language …”, according to Wikipedia

Rereading his statement to understand it more (which became a reason to write this section) made me feel embarrassed and sad. Because it reminded me of one of my saddest regrets not knowing how to help a chat addict. Furthermore, to me his statements exhibited that he absolutely has no sympathy for addicts whatsoever. And it appears that he lacks awareness about addiction. For instance, various research indicates that “one in seven people is addicted to alcohol or drugs” such as cocaine, heroin or crack.

His lack of pity for chat addicts made me want to speak out about chat addiction because I think it is a social problem. I also think that addicts deserve at least some sympathy. Certainly, they need people with a good heart and mind to understand their situation and maybe to guide them to sobriety. I believe that most addicts wouldn’t dare to touch alcohol or a drug if they could get another chance at life. “Khat [chat] contains a monoamine alkaloid called cathinone, an amphetamine-like stimulant, which is said to cause excitement, loss of appetite and euphoria”, according to Wikipedia

Ideally, I expect from a person of his caliber to show some empathy for addicts. I would love to dream that he would campaign to raise awareness about chat addiction and to raise funds to establish treatment centers for them.  For those addicts who don’t have resources to get to his rehab program, he would give them a scholarship for their treatments from the funds he raised. Even better, he would consider bringing the issue to the TPLF’s regime attention to solicit it to use some of the income it earns from exporting chat – which is the “country’s second-largest source of foreign currency” – to offset the cost of these programs. He would also try to persuade the regime to use some of its airtime to let its subjects become aware that chewing chat can cause addiction instead of boring them with its fake and manipulated news and programs.

Note: By being an “Ethiopian utopian”, I want to make my point. Since it was common among my generation chewing chat to stay focused during studying time, I chewed chat once in a while which one of my dear friends used to buy when I was a high school senior. I was fortunate for not liking its taste and its effect that increased attention and calm it gave me. Every time I think of my friend, I feel bad, sad or cry because I regret not knowing how to talk him out of it. At times, I wonder about what could have happened to me if I liked it as much he did.

Milkias’ Review Final grade: A+ on boldness; C- for significance; C- for thoughtfulness

Side Note₁: I think Milkias is a great man and a respected scholar. “He wrote more than five books. “Paulos Milkias … is Professor of Humanities and Political Science at Marianopolis College/Concordia University in Montreal Canada… Dr. Milkias’ major publications include The ABC of Ethiopian Christianity (University Press of America, 2006), The Battle of Adwa”, according to Cambria Press.

Second, I read Professor Getatchew Haile’s reviews of Tolosa’s book due to the unprofessional remarks by Milkias and his derogatory comments about addicts. From reading Haile reviews of the book and his other articles about Ethiopia’s history, I learned so much and developed more confidence about Ethiopia’s history. I encourage readers to click the hyperlink to read some of his articles.

Based on his writings, it appears to me that he is passionate about the truth. But he unthoughtfully presented his arguments against Tolosa’s claim that his book is Ethiopia’s true history without providing evidence. As if he is Tolosa’s boss or teacher, he threw at him a barrage of questions, which Tolosa entertained patiently and confidently. It seemed to me that his aim was only to sow seeds of doubt in his readers’ minds about the books genre (fiction, mythology …) – which I thought was fine.; for example,

1. He briefly mentioned about national mythology. Since his explanation wasn’t clear enough to me and I didn’t know the definition of mythology let alone national mythology, I reached to a dictionary to learn the definition of mythology. I learned that mythology means “ideas or opinions that many people believe, but that are wrong or not true”, according to Longman Advanced American Dictionary.

2. He thinks that Tolosa’s book is mythology. And he argues that mythology doesn’t come after history and replace history. It comes before history, and it gets replaced by history. It sounds like a solid argument to me. However, what is wrong with breaking this rule and inventing a new idea in order to write a “believable fictional mythology”? If readers like me, who Milkias think are “gullible”, accept the stories wouldn’t that be more power to the author?

3. He alleged that the author supported some/most of his assertions by information he gathered from unreliable sources – an author named መሪራስ አማን በላይ made up stories. But he didn’t provide a single proof for his allegations, so I think that it is just his opinion. Consider reading Tolosa’s articulation about Haile’s inappropriate allegations; click the hyperlink and read the third paragraph on page 4.

4. He argued that key evidences – an important archaeological find that “the ancient manuscripts found at Jebel Nuba” – the author used to create his myth(s) are counterfeited. I think this is a serious accusation against the author that needs to be resolved squarely.

Although I enjoyed reading his reviews and learned from them, I think he should support his allegations with evidence. He shouldn’t spoil the book’s element of surprise. He shouldn’t rush to get the manuscripts (which the author believes are more than 3,000 years old) authenticated. My reasoning is that getting the manuscripts authenticated isn’t an immediate need. Yes! Absolutely, they should be carbon dated eventually. Until then, I sit tight and enjoy reading the book to see whether the author would be brave enough to invalidate Milkias and Haile’s allegations (at least some of them) against his book by getting his manuscripts carbon dated. And I will keep my fingers crossed that the ancient manuscripts would turn out to be legit.

Ideally, I think getting the manuscripts carbon dated would be the right thing to do before claiming the book is a true history.

Haile’s Reviews Final grade: A+ on boldness; C- for significance; C- for thoughtfulness

Side Note₂: I think Professor Getatchew Haile is a wonderful person and a distinguished scholar.  “… he wrote more than twenty books. “… Haile … is an Ethiopian-American philologist widely considered the foremost scholar of the Ge’ez language alive today. He was acknowledged for his contributions to the field with a MacArthur Fellows Program “genius” award and the Edward Ullendorff Medal from the Council of the British Academy.”, according to Wikipedia

The author’s responses to his critics

To me the author’s responses to his critics made him appear that he is a cultured gentleman. He also seemed certain for writing Ethiopia’s true history unless one disproves him. He, for example, stated that “መልሶቼ ሁሉ ተደምረው የሌሎቹንም ግለሰቦች ሁሉ ጥያቄዎች ይመልሳሉ ብዬ ተስፋ አደርጋለሁ፡፡ በጥንቃቄና በቀና ልብ ያነበቡት ሰዎች ሁሉ መጽሀፉ ራሱ ጥያቄዎቻቸውን መልሶላቸዋል፡፡ (page 1 0f 16)”. He confidently speaks about his book; he said that   “…የኢትዮጵያን ሀዝብ አንድነትና ፍቅር በሚያንጸባርቅ ሀቀኛ መጽሀፍ …” (page 2 of 16) “ፈላስፋውና ነቢዩ ደሸት የኦሮሞ አባት፣የአማራ አያት መሆኑን በበቂ የመከራከርያ ነጥቦች አረጋግጫለሁ፡፡” (page 15 of 16). He also said that his book is a work in progress – another edition of it is already published – that he would keep revising it as he gets more feedback and information.

In passing, I found out that the author and I have the same outlook about the word “አበሻ”. He said that “እኔ ‹‹አበሻ‹‹ ማለት ውርደት፣ኢትዮጵያዊነት ግን ኩራት ስለሆነ ኢትዮጵያውያን መባል አለብን፣ እላለሁ፡፡” (page 15 of 16). I totally agree with him. Let me explain, so far in my life I never used the word “አበሻ” to refer to an Ethiopian because it sounds derogatory to me, and I didn’t learn its definition until recently. When my family members use it to refer to an Ethiopian, I usually ask them about what it means to them. They say that it means Ethiopian. And I recommend to them using the word “Ethiopian” because it sounds better to me though I was never been able to explain why they shouldn’t use “አበሻ”.

The Author’s Responses to his critics’ Final grade: A+ on boldness; A+ for significance; A+ for thoughtfulness

To sum up, I don’t have all the answers about why team New Ethiopia looks dysfunctional at times. However, using this opportunity, I would like to try addressing it partially by using Professor Getatchew Haile‘s reviews of Tolosa’s book. It seemed to me that he should write his review methodically so that a reader would be able to make up his/her own mind whether to read the book, and the author might get constructive feedback. I think he didn’t need to list thirteen questions and ask the author to provide him answers. Who is he to challenge him like that in public?  I know he is “philologist widely considered the foremost scholar of the Ge’ez language alive today.” But I don’t think he is Tolosa’s boss or teacher? Couldn’t he find the answers to his questions in the book? I think he could. What I think he should have done was for the record present his argument to his readers by quoting the authors’ three or four assertions which he thinks are false along with evidences the author provided to support his claims. And explain painstakingly why the author’s evidences don’t support his assertions. Then leave it to his readers’ judgments instead of ruffling some feathers.

If the author used counterfeited manuscripts and unreliable sources to rewrite Ethiopia’s history, I think his assertions wouldn’t make a dent in Ethiopia’s history.  Even worse, he would lose credibility among his readers. I believe that his critics’ allegations which claim that reading the book would damage young readers outlook who don’t know much about Ethiopian history is baseless. It undermined their intelligence. I think a threat to our legacy that has been facing us over forty years is a result of our own failure to set aside our petty differences (such as the unconstructive discussions about Tolosa’s book) and to form a united front against the TPLF – which has been one of its vital strengths so far.

I thought Tolosa did his best to awaken Ethiopians national unity and identity. He also did a great job addressing his critics’ questions. Though some said that his diagnose of Ethiopia’s societal cancer – the TPLF’s language based ethnic politics – didn’t provide the right remedy. For instance, Professor Messay Kebede said that Ethiopians’ problem is political so it requires a political answer. I also noted the below articulation of Kebede that:

“The supporters of the idea of a common origin think that it will significantly decrease the ethnic tension between Oromo and Amhara. If Oromo and Amhara are related, then the arguments of secessionist Oromo go down in flames. On the other hand, those who maintain that the idea of a common origin is just a fantasy actually share the same assumption only to say that the idea is unfortunately untrue. They do believe that the attempt to base Ethiopian unity on a fantasy is a dangerous game if only because it misunderstands and underestimates the Oromo grievances.”

Lastly, if we want our legacy wouldn’t fall apart, we take another lesson from this unfortunate experience. And we try to do our level best to make our future discussions constructive because our “legacy hangs in the balance”. So, let’s make this moment to make the best of it. Let’s make this moment to bring out the best from each other. Let’s make this moment our legacy – which we start restoring our Ethiopian national unity and identity! And let’s make this moment to chant together DOWN, DOWN, WOYANE!!!

READ BOOKS THE TPLF’s COMMAND POST BANNED

Including, Oromo and Amhara Real Ancestor

“የኦሮሞ እና የአማራ እውነተኛወ የዘር ምንጭ”

“TO PROTECT YOUR RIGHT”

“TO CHOOSE WHAT TO READ”

“ETHIOPIA FOREVER!!!”

The writer LJDemissie can be reached at LJDemissie@yahoo.com

Yehunie Belay | New Single | BE ZEMEN MEBACHA “በዘመን መባቻ” 2017

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Yehunie Belay – Bezemen Mebacha በዘመን መባቻ | New Ethiopian Music 2017

By Prof. Alemayehu G. Mariam

The T-TPLF (Thugtatorship of the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front) is out in full force once again on its annual panhadling circuit.

In January 2016, the T-TPLF was out peddling for food aid and blaming the West for being ungenerous.

For the past one-quarter century, the T-TPLF has been panhandling in the name of the Ethiopian people.

Aaah! So mortifying to listen to the annual chatter of beggars’ teeth.

Last week, the T-TPLF Disaster Commissioner Mitiku Kassa yelped to the international community to cough up “USD$948 million in aid” because “we are facing a new drought”.

That is the same Mitiku Kassa who in 2010 declared, “In the Ethiopian context, there is no hunger, no famine… It is baseless [to claim hunger or famine], it is contrary to the situation on the ground. It is not evidence-based. The government is taking action to mitigate the problems.”

In May 2016, Dr. Alex DeWaal, Executive director of the World Peace Foundation at Tufts University and a longtime associate of the T-TPLF also declared: There is “no famine in Ethiopia… Ethiopians aren’t starving to death… People aren’t dying… Animals are dying of thirst…”

In 2017, there is aggravated famine in Ethiopia; and the T-TPLF is completely paralyzed in a state of emergency and unable to “mitigate the problem”

In his first press conference in Addis Ababa after the T-TPLF seized power, its late leader Meles Zenawi declared that the litmus test for the success of his regime should be whether Ethiopians were able to eat three meals a day. (Watch video here.)

Two decades later in 2011, Meles pompously declared, “We have devised a plan which will enable us to produce surplus and be able to feed ourselves by 2015 without the need for food aid.”

A quarter of a century after the T-TPLF seized power, Ethiopia is still in the grips of Biblical famine and endless “new droughts”.

Save the Children in its June 2014-June 2016 report stated that it was “by the middle of 2015… that the Government of Ethiopia played its fundamental role of recognizing  and responding to the gravity of the loss of harvest, and lack of food and water for hundreds of thousands of families, calling on the support of the international community  to prevent a terrible catastrophe.”

Simply stated, until mid-2015, the T-TPLF was asleep at the switch or just pretending “there is no hunger and no famine” in Ethiopia. Ho hum! Yawn. Another famine?!

The 2017 “U.N. Humanitarian Requirements Document”, claims in 2016 “the Government of Ethiopia, allocated more than $735 million to initiate the HRD response and to facilitate a speedy response to additional needs as the situation evolved.” It also reports, “As we turn to 2017, the number of people that require humanitarian assistance has significantly decreased from that of 2016. This is due to the positive impact of the kiremt/gu/ganna rains and the subsequent above-average meher harvest”.

So the simple question is: Why is USD$ 1 billion needed (nearly 25 percent more aid) if “the number of people that require humanitarian assistance is significantly decreased in 2017”?

In July 2016, Save the Children warned that by the end of the year, An estimated 10.2 million people, including more than 5.75 million children, will remain reliant on emergency food assistance. In 2015-16, Save the Children “programmed USD$90 million worth of relief activities.”

In 2016, the “worst drought in 50 years” is alleged to have occurred in Ethiopia “devastating eight out of 10 people who depend on farming and livestock.” Some 18 million (18 percent of the population) Ethiopians received $1.7 billion in emergency aid in 2016. (I am using the word “alleged” because I wonder if the T-TPLF and its international poverty pimp partners are using hyperbole and over-dramatization to scare and squeeze more dollars from private and governmental donors. “The sky is falling,” clucked Chicken Little as he announced the end of the world.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization warns that the “impact is expected to be most dire in early 2017 among livestock, with unusually early migrations, excess mortality rates and extreme emaciation.” In April 2016, USAID Administrator Gayle E. Smith said exactly the same thing. They all share the same talking points in their unified campaign to squeeze more aid dollars from donors.

In May 2016, the T-TPLF Disaster Commissioner at a press conference with USAID Thomas Staal Acting Assistant Administrator for the Bureau of Democracy, Conflict, and Humanitarian Affairs, USAID said: “As you all know, Ethiopia has a drought which is caused by the global climate event, El Nino.  The effect of the current drought is severe as compared to the 1974 and 1984 disasters. So for the drought we appealed 10.2 million people, and with regard to the resource it was $1.4 billion.”

In its 2016 humanitarian response “Mid-Year Review”, UNICEF placed the entire problem of famine on “El Niño, combined with extensive flooding, disease outbreaks and the disruption of basic public services.”

The T-TPLF and its partners are trying to blame everything on El Nino and climate change; and absolve the T-TPLF from any moral, political or legal responsibility for the recurrent famines.

I find it painfully humorous whenever the international poverty pimps circle the wagons around the T-TPLF and try to distract attention from human beings dying from lack of food to farm animals dying from lack of feed. They play these clever semantic games. The fact is that in Ethiopia and the rest of Africa, when livestock die, people also die because livestock are a primary source of household food, income and vital assets.

What is even more jarring and bizarre is the fact that in one of the “world’s fastest growing economies” nearly 20 percent of  the population is facing chronic famine, year after year after year!

In July 2014, in a speech before the Committee of the U.N. Disaster Risk reduction, Disaster Commissioner  Kassa said Ethiopia as “one of the world’s fastest growing economies” and the “Government of Ethiopia has put a disaster risk reduction and resilience building at the top of its agenda”. He assured the Committee that his government’s “disaster risk management approach is in line with the Hugo (sic) Framework of Action”.

The Hyogo Framework promotes strategies for “disaster risk reduction being underpinned by a more pro-active approach to informing, motivating and involving people in all aspects of disaster risk reduction in their own local communities.”

In July 2016, the T-TPLF’s puppet prime minister (PPM) Hailemariam Desalegn said:

Agricultural output during the 2014/15 meher season was better than last years, but improved 2016 belg rains saw outputs rising by seven percent. This rise impacted the entire sector, triggering a three percent growth in the same year, injecting a one to one and a half percent contribution to the overall Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country.

On December 27, 2016, the PPM gave assurances that Ethiopia “will register a double digit economic growth in the fiscal year as it is now on the right track of growth.” He said, “Agriculture, even though the drought situation is very huge, has shown a positive trend of growth.”

Pray tell:

If Ethiopia is developing economically by leaps and bounds and agricultural output rose “by seven percent”  and the GDP grew in 2016, how is it that nearly one-fifth, and possibly more, of the Ethiopian population is facing starvation again in 2017?

If the “Government of Ethiopia” “proactively” implemented Hyogo disaster strategies, how is it that three years after Kassa’s declaration, nearly one-fifth, and possibly more, of the Ethiopian population is facing starvation again in 2017?

Famine and starvation in Ethiopia are the most important issues to me because the right to life is the bedrock of all human rights.

Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and Article 11 of the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) recognize the right to food as the quintessential human right.

I have written countless commentaries on famine and starvation in Ethiopia. I have tried to call attention to the structural nature of famine and starvation and how the T-TPLF has used famine to profit on the misery of the famine victims and cling to power. I have even demonstrated how the T-TPLF has “weaponized famine”.

In my October 2014 commentary, “The Rise and Fall of the “Baksheesh State” (beggar state) in Ethiopia, I explained how the T-TPLF has made Ethiopia the beggar nation of the African continent. Today the T-TPLF Baksheesh State has descended into a Baksheesh State of Emergency.

The T-TPLF spreads bogus statistics (BS) like horse manure to prove that it is “transforming” Ethiopia into an African “powerhouse” and boasts that it will make Ethiopia a “middle income country by 20125.”

In my January 8, 2017 commentary entitled, “The World Bank Liars in Ethiopia”, I demonstrated how the T-TPLF coordinates and cleverly propagates BS by passing it through the World Bank and other international poverty pimps in an attempt to validate and legitimize its fake economic growth.

I have been challenging T-TPLF BS for quite a few years. But I was not alone in trying to put the T-TPLF to proof.

In 2012, The Economist called out the T-TPLF on its BS:

It is not clear how factual Ethiopia’s economic data are. Life is intolerably expensive for Ethiopians in Addis Ababa, the capital, and its outlying towns. Some think Ethiopia’s inflation figures are fiddled with even more than those in Argentina. Even if the data are deemed usable, the double-digit growth rates predicted by the government of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi look fanciful.

In other words, T-TPLF’s BS is really BS.

But the tragic fact is that in January 2017, life is even more intolerably expensive for Ethiopians in Addis Ababa, the capital, and its outlying towns!

I raise the BS issue because the T-TPLF and its partners (I did not say in crime) claim in their publicity campaigns that the T-TPLF has put in hundreds of millions of dollars towards famine relief and mitigation.

The United Nation’s International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) in its “Humanitarian Response Planning for 2017 reported: “Over the same period [2016] the Government of Ethiopia contributed ETB16.5 billion (US$735 million), including to response activities beyond the initial scope of the 2016 HRD.”

There is ABSOLUTELY not a shred of evidence to support the claim that T-TPLF put in hundreds of millions of dollars for famine relief in Ethiopia. It is just another T-TPLF BS legitimized by the poverty pimps and generally accepted as fact without any demonstrable evidence.

As most of my regular readers know, the T-TPLF coordinates its BS game with the international loaners, donors and poverty pimps. I guess the T-TPLF and its partners follow George W. Bush’s light-hearted advice: “You can fool some of the people all the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on.”

But what exactly is UNICEF doing in Ethiopia? UNICEF supposedly aims to “address the needs of children in the developing world”. Is that what it is doing in Ethiopia?

UNICEF claims to be “mandated” to work and collaborate with the local regimes in addressing the needs of children. The question is why UNICEF does not work with independent nongovernmental organizations, unaffiliated with regime corruptoids  to help children.

There is little doubt that UNICEF’s “resident coordinators” are in the back pockets of the T-TPLF. They are determined to legitimize, justify and affirm T-TPLF actions and remain on the good side of the T-TPLF leaders. Unfortunately, it is on the basis of the reports prepared by these coordinators that UNICEF headquarters makes its decisions.

Famine in Ethiopia is the result of poor governance

The fundamental problem with famine in Ethiopia is poor governance, not drought; incompetent and indifferent governance, not environmental factors.

The recurrent famines in Ethiopia are man made; that is, they are “made” by a corrupt, indifferent, incompetent and a clueless regime that lack political will to deal with the recurrent problem. The T-TPLF leaders in Ethiopia have a petrified “bush mentality” impervious to rational planning and policy making.

On August 16, 2011, Wolfgang Fengler, a lead economist for the World Bank said it straight up: “This [famine] crisis [in Ethiopia] is man made. Droughts have occurred over and again, but you need bad policy making for that to lead to a famine.”

The World Bank liars have been lying ever since.

In fact, Ethiopia today is 123 out of 125 worst fed countries in the world.

There is a joke that has been going around for some years about the time the PPM Hailemariam was asked if he was worried about the poor rains and looming famine in Ethiopia. Replied the PPM, “We are not worried about the rains in Ethiopia; we are worried about the rains in America and Canada.” No joke; the T-TPLF expects North American taxpayers to fill its begging bowls every year while it stands idly by chattering its teeth for alms.

The fox in charge of the hen house?

Can a Beggar State of Emergency end famine in Ethiopia?

The T-TPLF panhandlers are chattering their teeth once again to fleece donors of USD$1 billion for the foreseeable future. We all know that by mid-year the T-TPLF will be out panhandling for one-half billion dollars more. That is how the T-TPLF rolled for the past decade.

But what happened to all of the “humanitarian aid” the T-TPLF received over the past decades?

In its January 4, 2017 Food Assistance Factsheet  USAID reported that its “partners”  in “targeting food insecure Ethiopians with long-term development interventions” include the “Relief Society of Tigray, Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Food for the Hungry (FH), and Save the Children International (SCI) and the Office of Food for Peace (FFP).”

“Targeting food” means food handouts and “food insecure Ethiopians” means starving and famine-stricken Ethiopians. The T-TPLF, USAID and the international poverty pimps think they can fool us with fancy words and phrases.

According to USAID, these organizations, including REST, administered USD$756.9 million worth of USAID “food aid” in Ethiopia in 2016!

But why is REST distributing famine aid in Ethiopia?

What is REST?

REST is an arm of the T-TPLF which has been in the famine and money laundering business for decades.

In 1984, when normal delivery of emergency humanitarian aid to the Tigrai region was made impossible by bombardment of the Derg (military junta) regime, the TPLF used REST to work hand in glove with various American NGOs to supposedly find alternate routes to deliver relief aid to famine victims in rebel-controlled areas. The real aim of REST was to skim and launder humanitarian aid money for  the personal and organizational use of the TPLF leadership.

Much of the firsthand account of famine aid-sharking and money laundering by the TPLF through REST was provided by former TPLF members.

As I documented in my May 2011 Huffington Post commentary  “Licensed to Steal”,  Gebremedhin Araya, a former treasurer and TPLF co-founder Dr. Aregawi Berhe, detailed the scam the TPLF used to swindle, hustle and con millions of dollars from international famine relief organizations in the mid-1980s.

The two former top leaders accused the TPLF top brass, including Zenawi, for taking tens of millions of dollars earmarked for famine relief in the Tigrai region to buy weapons and enrich themselves. Gebremedhin reported personally handing out cash payments and checks in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to the late TPLF capo Meles Zenawi and TPLF godfather Sebhat Nega, the top two TPLF leaders who controlled the cash flow of the organization. Although Gebremedhin was the treasurer, he said he was not privileged to know what happened to the money after he delivered it to Zenawi or Nega.

Dr. Aregawi told the BBC that of the $100 million that went through TPLF hands at the time, $95 million was diverted for weapons purchases and other purposes not related to famine relief. He stated that the TPLF stage-managed “dramas” to “fool the aid workers”. A BBC investigation identified a 1985 official CIA document which concluded: “Some funds that insurgent organizations are raising for relief operations, as a result of increased world publicity, are almost certainly being diverted for military purposes.”

The current administrator of USAID, Gayle E. Smith was an employee of REST in the early 1990s.

According to a May 1991 Christian Science Monitor report: “One of the few Westerners who speaks the Tigre language and has had many contacts with Zenawi over a nine-year period, is Gayle Smith, an American who worked for Tigre’s relief agency, REST, during the 1985-6 drought.” (Emphasis added.)

Lo and behold! Today REST is the principal distributor of “humanitarian aid” in Ethiopia!

The same gang of aid thieves who stole, diverted and laundered hundreds of millions of dollars in aid nearly 35 years ago are now doing the same thing today except on a gargantuan scale.

The REST bagman 35 years ago, Teklewoini Assefa, (depicted in a circa 1984 picture below keeping log of piles of cash diverted from famine relief) is today the Executive Director of REST today (p.21). The only difference is that Tekelewoini today swaggers in designer suits and alligator shoes as he counts hundreds of millions of dollars instead of combat khakis and tire tread sandals.

The old sly fox is still guarding the hen house. The perfect SCAM!

The greatest irony of all is the fact that Gayle E. Smith, the former REST employee, became Administrator  of USAID in 2015. When that happened the T-TPLF hit pay dirt, snagged the the mother lode.

No wonder the T-TPLF is panic-stricken today. The days of the USAID gravy train for the T-TPLF in Ethiopia appear to be numbered as the Trump transition team is asking some tough questions about the fraud, waste, abuse and corruption in U.S. aid to Africa.

But that is not all!

What is even more mind-boggling is the fact that REST in its multi-million dollar “charitable” aid distribution business is exempt from the so-called Charities and Societies Law. (Proclamation No. 621/2009 of 2009.)

REST has at least 31 foreign charity “partners” (p. 37) including the Development Fund Norway, Oxfam America, Packard Foundation, RKK Japan, European Union (EU), IFAD, United States Agency for International Development (USAID), The World Bank, World Food Program (WFP) and other NGOs.

One case that provides clear and convincing evidence of the double standard the T-TPLF uses to discriminate between T-TPLF affiliated “charities” and all others is evidenced in a REST proposal (p. iii) to WellWishers Trust (WW), a “foreign charity”. The proposal seeks funds to support a potable water supply development in “six weredas in Tgray, Ethiopia” for the project period of January 2016 to December 2016.

According to the 2015 WellWishers Trust statement of financial performance, the Trust made “donations to charity (Water Wells in Ethiopia)” in the amount of $661,910.58.

WellWishers declares it conducts its well construction projects in northern Ethiopia with “our partner The Relief Society of Tigray (REST)”. In explaining its “confidence” in REST, WellWishers describes it as “the largest NGO in Ethiopia and is one of the biggest in Africa. They are very professional and we are very happy with the work they do.”

In its proposal, REST submitted a preliminary project budget to WellWishers in the amount of USD$242,451.42. Of this amount, REST requested USD$200,189.90 from WellWishers and made representations that “the balance [USD$42, 261.52] will be contributed from REST and the community.”

Simply stated,  REST will receive 82.56 percent of its project revenue in the proposal from a “foreign charity” source and 17.43 percent from local sources.

Indeed, WellWishers over the years has provided substantial funding to REST which was allegedly used to construct water wells in Tigray.

It does not take a lawyer to figure out that the REST project proposal to WW is patently illegal under the Charities and Societies Proclamation which clearly requires  that local charities can only receive 10 percent of their budget from foreign funding. (See section 2.2., 2.3, 2.4 of the Proclamation.)

Under the “Proclamation”,  “charitable societies” specifically include organizations such as REST engaged in the “the prevention or alleviation or relief of poverty or disaster the advancement of the economy and social development and environmental protection or improvement”.

REST can receive 82.56 percent of its revenue from a “foreign charity” and get away with it! 

In contrast, seven years ago in 2010, a year after the enactment of the Proclamation, the Ethiopian Human Rights Council (HRCO), the country’s first  and only human rights monitoring group was forced by the T-TPLF to close nine of its twelve offices and cut 85 per cent of its staff because it “received” more than 10 percent of its revenue from foreign charities.

Similarly, Ethiopia’s premier women’s rights group, the Ethiopian Women’s Lawyers Association (EWLA), was forced to cut 70 per cent of its staff  because it received more than 10 percent of its revenue from a “foreign charity”.

Should the international community give a dime in “humanitarian aid” to the T-TPLF?

The T-TPLF beggars are chattering their teeth and salivating in anticipation of USD$1 billion in aid from the international community, and mostly from the U.S. The question is whether U.S. taxpayers should hand over $1 billion to the T-TPLF so that they can line their pockets?

I see no reason why U.S. taxpayers have to feed the greedy T-TPLF Beast!

A January 17, 2017 U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Press Release stated, “Nearly 230 representatives from the Government, UN, NGOs and donors visited affected communities across Ethiopia’s nine regions. The assessment concluded that some 5.6 million people will be in need of assistance in the course of 2017.” (Emphasis added.)

Notice that not a single independent journalist came along with the 230 international representatives in the nine regions. Not One!

Why didn’t these “international representatives” bring along international journalists to observe and report on local famine conditions?

Simple! The “international representatives” (poverty pimps) do not want the T-R-U-T-H to be told to the international community. They just want to collect billions of dollars by talking gloom and doom.

Why don’t the “international representatives” show us the photos and videos of the famine-impacted areas, population and livestock? What do they have to hide?  Why aren’t international journalists stationed in the country allowed to travel to the affected areas to report?

I am not sorry to call the “230 representatives” poverty pimps and parasi-ticks sucking the blood of poor Ethiopians who profit by trading on the misery of poor and starving Ethiopians.

Suffice it to say that the 230 representatives talking about famine victims in Ethiopia is like a cackle of laughing hyenas holding a convention to discuss the anguish and misery of antelopes or a pack of wolves agonizing over the misfortunes of sheep.

The “230 representatives” shed crocodile tears for Ethiopia’s famine victims. To hell with them!

The fact of the matter is that a good amount of the USD$1 billion is going to line the pockets of T-TPLF leaders, supporters, hangers-on and flunkies through that infamous organization called REST. That is an incontrovertible FACT! Deal with it!

Not a dime to the T-TPLF UNTIL the international press can visit and report on the famine affected areas.

The world needs to know the truth about famine in Ethiopia.

There are 20 million Ethiopians facing starvation. Let the world see the faces of the T-TPLF famine victims.

I have always claimed that the T-TPLF is hiding the scope and magnitude of the famine by prohibiting travel for foreign journalists to visit famine areas and report.

For any international organization or donor country to give aid without T-TPLF transparency and accountability is tantamount to complicity in crimes against humanity.

Could it be that a T-TPLF desperately short on foreign-exchange reserve is trading on the misery of its poor and starving citizens?

Starve the Beast, Feed the People

In my August 2011 commentary on famine in Ethiopia, I made my stand clear and will repeat here one more time:

No more aid to a regime that clings to power by digging its fingers into the ribs of starving children. No more aid to torturers and human rights violators. No aid to election thieves. No aid to those who roll out a feast to feed their supporters and watch their opponents starve to death. Let’s shout in a collective voice to the West — America, England, Germany, the European Union, the IMF, World Bank and the rest of them–: “Starve the bloated T-TPLF beast feeding on the Ethiopian body politics, and help feed the starving people.”

STARVE THE T-TPLF BEAST, FEED THE STARVING ETHIOPIAN PEOPLE!

Tedla Woldeyohannes, Ph.D.*

Recently I had an opportunity to speak at a conference in Washington D.C. The conference was a gathering of various Ethiopian political parties in the Diaspora. One of the main points of discussion at this conference was aimed at finding an answer to the question why opposition political parties do not effectively work together for a common goal and how they can come together to offer themselves as an alternative to the regime in power if the regime collapses or goes away sooner or later.  In this article,  I expand my talk at this conference where I offered what I take to be one plausible answer to the question raised at the conference, which I think has a much broader implication for our society, in the realm of politics and otherwise. In my view, one of the main reasons why we, Ethiopians, in general, suffer from a continuous lack of genuine cooperation to effectively work for the common good is because of the way we, generally, treat truth or the value of truth. That is, in my view, our society and culture trivializes truth and the value of truth. I take it that treating truth trivially, among other things, leads to some of the widespread problems in our country. This article develops this idea.

Trivializing Truth

We do not need to dwell on various theories of truth (there are several) in order to make progress with the issues I am interested to address in this piece. [I make use of the idea of truth as correspondence without comparing it to other theories since it is the most basic of idea of truth]. It is enough to note that all of us have some idea about what “truth” is without a help from theoretical, philosophical discussions of the nature of truth. If we do not have an idea of truth, we can hardly tell when someone tells us a lie. But almost all of us are able to tell when we are lied to unless the lie is too sophisticated to tell it is a lie initially. Consider the following for a basic idea of truth:  A claim or a statement is true means things are the way they are stated to be by the claim, or the statement. For example: A claim that there is a computer on your desk is true when there actually is a computer on your desk; otherwise false.  That is to say what the claim states matches reality.  For example, when you tell someone that there are four tables in your room when there are actually two tables, you are not telling the truth, especially if you know that there are four tables. Lying is closely connected to truth in the sense that it is knowingly telling the opposite of what is true. Lying, at the very least, involves telling something that is untrue when you know the truth. Lying is intentional as deception is. To report something falsely, by mistake, without intentionally misrepresenting the truth is not a deception or a lie. The moral of this reflection: All of us have a basic idea of what is truth and generally we are able to distinguish intentionally made false statements or lies from true statements. We do not need to teach even young children about what truth is, though we teach them to value truth, that lying is bad, and such things. We have a cognitive capacity to recognize truth, or what is true, and to distinguish truth from falsehood that no body taught us. No need to digress for further philosophical discussion for the purpose of this piece.

Now to one of the main points of this article. In my view, in our Ethiopian culture many people do not care about truth or the value of truth for its own sake; rather, many people care about what benefit they can get if they tell the truth about many issues in life. This mindset, which is widely shared, makes it hard for people to value truth or to care about truth for its own sake or to stand for truth when standing for truth is important. To care about truth for its own sake means valuing truth and speaking the truth whether one gets something or not as a result of speaking the truth.  Inquisitive minds generally are inclined and want to know the truth about anything of interest to them, for the sake of knowing, period. And such minds speak the truth, all things considered, when needed because speaking the truth is a good thing, period. But this does not mean that caring about truth for its own sake is always incompatible with caring about truth for its value in the sense of helping us get what we want. This latter is valuing truth as a means or a tool for some other end or goal. That is fine. But valuing truth only to gain something is problematic. An indifference to truth or caring little about truth creates a mindset that discourages pursuit of truth, openness to truth, a desire for intellectual integrity. In my view, lack of a desire for intellectual integrity commodifies truth and this in turn results in trivializing the value of truth. All of these things are rampant in our Ethiopian culture.

Tolerating Lies

One consequence of caring about truth or valuing truth only as a means to get something can and does lead to easy lying. Lying becomes easier when a person cares about truth only for what one can gain if that person tells the truth or not. Note that in most cases people lie to gain something.  With the exception of pathological or habitual liars who find lying so easy that lying becomes their second nature, generally, people lie when they want to get something that they would not get if they tell the truth. When a culture like ours does not oppose lying, which is rampant in our society, it is not hard to see the larger consequence for such a shared culture. Anyone who knows our culture and interpersonal communications knows how often people who lie about this or that can get away with the lie without being challenged. The extent of tolerance for lies in our culture extends, for example, to even Christians who believe that lying is a “sin” but who often refuse to challenge lying in their community. I mention Christians as an example to show how much pervasive lying is in the Ethiopian community. Christians and other religious people who believe lying is sin should be at the forefront in challenging people who lie to them, but that rarely happens to be the case. Lying need not be seen as a “sin” in order to show that it is bad. Whether lying is “sin” or not, it is bad, all things considered. At any rate, tolerance to lies has a negative consequence which is bad for a society.

 Suspicion, Lack of Trust, and Secrecy

When people realize that lying is widely tolerated, if and when they lie they also tend to believe that others are lying to them even if that is not the case. That means, people who lie become suspicious of others often thinking that the other person is also lying to them. This gives rise to an attitude that encourages treating others with suspicion. Suspicion of others and what people hear could be a lie rather than the truth about this or that also gives rise to a culture of secrecy. Besides suspicion, secrecy is one of those widely shared cultural traits among Ethiopians. Note that there are good reasons at times to value secrecy or withholding some information from others in a country where telling the truth can cost lives. I am making this point for the following reason: The kind of government we have, now and in the past, especially the previous regime before this, forced us to,  rightly, believe that  the government can do harm if it finds out information about people the government targets for political reasons. Having said this, I am not suggesting that the widespread culture of suspicion and secrecy is only due to the government’s treatment of the citizens. The government’s treatment of citizens is an exception when it comes to an explanation for why secrecy and suspicion are widespread in our culture. I argued above, in general, it is an attitude to the value of truth that leads to a culture in which lying becomes easy and tolerated, and that gives rise to suspicion of others, especially what they say which encourages secrecy.

Truth and Character

Let us briefly consider a connection between how we value truth can affect our character. It is not controversial to suggest that a person who does not care much about truth would not care much about personal integrity. Personal integrity and honesty are among virtues anyone desires to cultivate. By “virtues” I mean good character traits.  Obviously, people who demonstrate personal integrity and honesty are admirable and rightly admired. But in a culture that significantly encourages dishonesty and lies, honest people who aspire to be persons of integrity are considered threats to those who do not want to lose what they could get by choosing to lie and deceive others. To value truth for its own sake, whether one gains something or not for telling the truth, is a good reason for a person to choose to be truthful. Truthfulness is a virtue by itself and also a truthful person can be faithful, dependable, or reliable. Even those who choose to lie and engage in deception would not, in their right mind, believe that liars and deceptive and dishonest people are dependable or reliable as people. So far, we have seen a sketch of reasoning that shows   that one’s relation to truth can and does have implications for one’s character. Lying and deception are character flaws, but these character flaws have roots, among others, in one’s treatment of truth and how much one cares about the value of truth—very little.  Those who care about truth demonstrate character traits such as truthfulness, honesty, and personal integrity. This reasoning shows that our cognitive life is deeply connected to our moral life and our character.

Application

Let us briefly illustrate the above discussion by taking concrete examples. Let us take the Ethiopian government first. Lying in countless ways is the modus operandi for the Ethiopian government. Why is that the case? As anyone familiar with the Ethiopian government knows it is practically impossible for the government to remain in power without the power of the gun if the regime tells the truth about so many crimes it commits against the citizens. Note that I argued above that a lie is intentional and people generally lie to get something they would not get if they told the truth. If the regime tells the truth, for example, about the human rights it violates, the actual number of people killed by the regime, and the actual reasons why it jails those who are critical of the regime, including journalists and opposition party members, etc., there is no way for such a government to stay in power without resorting to violence. Hence, lying in order to deceive and to cover up what is real, is its modus operandi, or its mode of operation or its default position. The regime would tell the truth when it is convenient and when it would not lose much by telling the truth. Or, the regime would tell the truth sometimes when it is useful for the government to tell the truth not because those in government care about truth and value truth for its own sake. Now, we need to ask why this is the case. One plausible answer emerges from what I argued above. That is the government is largely a reflection of the culture of the society it comes from. Or, in other words, the Ethiopian government is a mirror image of how the Ethiopian people tolerate lies, or how little truth and truthfulness are valued in the culture. I claimed that there is a widespread mindset of tolerance to lying in our culture. It is only beneficial for those in power to make use of what is widely tolerated in their own society—a disposition to lie about small and big things mostly without being challenged.

With so much lying by the Ethiopian government it is nearly impossible, for example, for opposition party leaders to trust the government in order to come to the table to discuss political options for the future of the country. Some opposition party leaders would join the government [as it is happening these days] for discussion not because they believe that the regime is truthful. They can do so for their own reasons, which would lead to doing nothing significant for the future of the country because such political leaders are playing by the rule the regime has set for them—which has no genuine room for any genuine reform of the deeply corrupt government. At the end of the day, how can anyone trust a government that has practically eliminated a genuine political space for opposition parties either by jailing their leaders or when many have left the country for life in exile?

Unfortunately, there is a much similar explanation as to why it is hard for opposition party leaders to come to a table to work together for a common goal. As I remarked in my recent talk at the Washington DC conference of the Diaspora based Ethiopian opposition parties, it is hard for opposition parties to come together for a common purpose when there is a trust deficit or when there is not enough trust. When members and leaders of opposition parties are suspicious of one another and engage in secrecy and lack transparency, it is hard to come together for a common purpose. I am not suggesting that the points I raised in this article totally, or exhaustively explain the reason why it has become very hard for opposition parties to come together to work for a common good, but the issues I raised play a key role, in my view, in explaining failures among the opposition parties to come together to work together. At the very least, trust is essential for people to come together to work for a common good.

A related explanation for continued failures of the opposition parties to work together can be due to misplaced priorities. If and when the interest of the people of Ethiopia, not the interest of the personalities behind various opposition parties, is the main and non-negotiable priority for opposition parties, the rest is for them to work on a strategy how to get to a mutually held goal and compromise on the strategy going forward. So long as party priorities are not aligned around a non-negotiable common purpose, it would be hard for opposition parties to come together.  Oftentimes, opposition parties fail when their leaders fail mostly on character flaws or when the leaders end up pursuing their own selfish interests. This takes us back to issues about lack of personal integrity and honesty and lack of transparency. These flaws can partly be traced back to people’s relation to truth or how they value of truth and how this can lead to lying or tolerating lies and being dishonest and deceptive.

Conclusion

One can give a lot more examples to show how a widely shared culture of trivializing truth or a widely shared mindset that does not value truth and truthfulness for its own sake can easily lead to lying and to tolerance to lying. Tolerance to lying gives rise to a culture of suspicion and secrecy which eventually leads to lack of trust among people. I used as an illustration what happens in our politics to make points about the value of truth and the problem of  valuing truth only for what truth telling can do for us. Or, I argued that attaching the value of truth to benefits people can get if they spoke truth can lead to problems that eventually manifest in character flaws and these in turn deeply damage a political space which is an arena of moral agency. As moral agents, humans cannot escape being judged by their character and all those who seek leadership positions, including those who are in leadership positions like the Ethiopian government, can only succeed in their leadership to the extent that they succeed as responsible moral agents. It is nearly impossible to expect any meaningful change from the Ethiopian government when it comes to holding a meaningful dialogue with opposition parties. However, it is also an imperative for the opposition political parties to play a role of responsible moral agency going forward. Responsible moral agency is not an abstract talk; rather, it is something that can be demonstrated in real life when those who seek leadership positions first demonstrate that they care about truth, that they will not tolerate lying in their own lives and in others, and  when they lead others with a life of  personal integrity and transparency.

In the final analysis, the cost of trivializing truth and tolerating lies is monumental, both on a personal and on a national level. I leave my readers, especially those who aspire to hold leadership positions to bring about a much needed change in Ethiopian politics to ask themselves the following questions and to answer them honestly and to the best of their ability: Do I really care about truth? Do I really care about being a truthful person? Do I really care about personal integrity and transparency? Do I lie for small or big things to gain something in return? Do I challenge people who lie to me when I know someone is lying to me? Am afraid of challenging a lie when I know it is a lie? Why am I afraid to challenge a lie if I am afraid to do so? Do I put the interest of the Ethiopian people above my own interest and the interest of a party I am a leader? Do I challenge selfish party members and leaders who pursue their own interests at the expense of the interest of the Ethiopian people? Is a party I am a part better than the ruling party in terms of standing for moral character of its members and leaders? How can I and my colleagues prove to the Ethiopian people that we are better leaders who can lead fellow Ethiopians than the ruling party? Can I and my colleagues say “no” to the temptation of seeking power for the sake of being in power and instead show our people that having political power is all about serving fellow citizens? Do I really believe that power is not the goal of my political aspiration but an instrument to serve others? If Ethiopians are looking for a role model in Ethiopian politics, who do you think is such a role model or such role models? Can you be such a role model, if not now, but in the long run? I hope that these questions, among others, can help for personal reflections for those who are seeking leadership positions in politics. Also, those of us who are not seeking positions of leadership in politics can make our considered judgment as to who is truly in a proper political leadership position in Ethiopia for the right reasons and who is in such leadership positions for the wrong reasons.

Tedla Woldeyohannes has most recently taught philosophy at St. Louis University and Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, Illinois and can reached at twoldeyo@slu.edu

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
MEDIA ADVISORY

Spokespeople available for interviews

The next head of the African Union (AU) Commission must place human rights at the centre of the organization’s operations, said Amnesty International as leaders of the 54-member body prepare to elect a new chairperson at a summit in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa.

“The incoming chairperson must make the promotion and protection of human rights not just a convenient afterthought, but an essential and sustainable element of the African Union’s conflict prevention strategy.” said Netsanet Belay, Amnesty International’s Africa Director for Research and Advocacy.

The organization reiterates that ensuring accountability for gross human rights violations should be one of the priorities of the new chairperson of the AU Commission.

“There has been some progress in the last two years, including the historic conviction of former Chadian dictator Hissène Habré for crimes against humanity. But more needs to be done,”

Amnesty International has released a statement outlining six human rights issues that the new AU chairperson must prioritize. It is calling on the incoming head to:

Deliberately and consistently give priority to addressing human rights violations
Ensure that individuals suspected of crimes under international law and gross human rights violations are held to account
Empower the African Human Rights Court and protect other continental human rights institutions from political interference
Take urgent steps to protect civil society organizations from government restrictions and crackdowns
Defend women’s rights and promote gender equality
Support and promote efforts to abolish the death penalty across the continent
The new chairperson will be elected by African heads of state during their 28th annual summit in Addis Ababa from 22 to 31 January.

Five candidates are vying to replace the outgoing chairperson, South African politician and activist Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who is stepping down after one five-year term in office.

Public Document

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For more information please contact Olena Arkhipova on +38 050 240 4690 or email olena.arkhipova@amnesty.org

ENDS

Ethiopians have suffered under TPLF (Tigray People Liberation Front) brutal regime for the last quarter of a century. This elite group of Tigraen origin which was  conceived  in the womb of hate and jealousy has  ruled Ethiopians  through its sophisticated oppressive means. From its inception, it was anti-unity, divisive, hate monger and self oriented opportunistic regime. With its small departments created  by adding   prefixes (Amhara,  Oromo and  Southern people) to “blind” people, TPLF ruled Ethiopia under the cover name of EPRDF. It  has led anti democratic regime that denied Ethiopians fundamental human rights in their own country.

TPLF is owned by an  elite  ultra Tigrean and pro-Eritrean secession family members. It doesn’t even represent the Tigray people which itself comprise 6% of Ethiopian population. TPLF shield itself under Tigrean people as if  it’s legitimate representative. The majority Tigraeans in Tigray live under fear and double oppression. They are not allowed to say anything except supporting TPLF. Those who live outside Tigray and in Diaspora, most benefited from the system  and defend TPLF’s merciless killings and brutal crackdown against Ethiopians. They make every effort by hook or crook to sustain TPLF’s rule.

TPLF  created a delusional federal system in Ethiopia with puppets figure heads while its operatives rule under iron fist. It continued its divide and rule policy by fermenting  and  waging violence among different ethnicities, nationalities  and religious members. Its inflammatory polices have made Ethiopians displaced, homeless, dispossessed, unemployed and to flee from their country

In the last 25 years, TPLF controlled the military, the economy, security, communication   and all part of society through force, intimidation and harassment. The famous  “five to one” controlling system paralysed the public for years .

The Fascist brutal regime has saw seeds of hate, suspicion, disunity, false identity and history. It has established a structure that facilitate its minority regime while majority are left divided, disunited and paranoid of each other. These would create obstacles for smooth transition even after TPLF’s death.

“The strength “of TPLF that helped to stay on power for the last 25 years are as follow;

• Divide and rule policy ; which makes the majority weak and ruled by minority.

• Control of the major religious institutions and its leaders by its supporters.

• Control of the Ethiopian economy, principally the land. All land belong to TPLF.

• Failure of the different ethnic, religious and political group to understand TPLF’s system of rule, mainly inciting one against another.

• Ability to use ” Carrot and Stick policy”;  those weak ones who betrayed its own people for bread and money are given “Carrot” in from of land, money, business  to be a spy, servant, and  supporter of the regime; while those who dare to stand firm against TPLF were given “Stick”  in form of killing imprisonment,, harassment etc.

The Ethiopian people have attempted to overthrow this parasitic regime through peaceful means since early.  But TPLF has used its “strength”  to crash every attempt  including the famous 2005  protest ( 1997 Eth Calendar).

TPLF is  severely shaken  by the new generation peaceful struggle  launched in the last one year. The youth, mostly born and  brought up in the last 25 years have rebelled against TPLF’s  ideology, policy and oppressive regime.

The youth in Gonder protest   cracked  the strong wall, the famous TPLF’s “divide and rule policy” when they said “Stop killing our Oromo brothers”, “Oromo’s blood is my blood”.  This galvanised the existing Oromo youth’s peaceful struggle.   The country was caught by spirit of change and the whole Ethiopia  was “on fire”.   TPLF tried every means to quash the struggle but failed. TPLF  forced to launch “State of Emergency”.

Sadly,  some vocal Diaspora political activists poured cold water on the domestic struggle of the youth  by immersing themselves and actively engaging in pro-TPLF activities. Instead of learning from the  past 25 years weakness, once again the Diaspora politicians who consider themselves as “the leader” instead of “supporter” prepared to eat the fruits of the youth’s revolution before it ripe.  Instead of working in partnership and uniting  the  opposition force  against TPLF,  some went far to be in the TPLF casino to play the age old games.  Some declared how to disjoint  Ethiopia;  some others called conferences of single ethnic group  as if the rest of Ethiopian nationals are “foreign” or not oppressed by TPLF led regime. Even those who are known for their Ethiopian agenda shamefully goes to micro division in ethnicity. While people are being imprisoned, killed and tortured; instead of  focusing on  the current burning states and support popular struggle, some of our intellectuals goes back to debate in disgusting way about  the history that happened  hundred  or millennia years ago. This irresponsible act  has given air and strength for the wounded TPLF which was in death bed to  revive and regenerate.

TPLF’s propaganda outlets in Ethiopia and overseas are drumming day and night false rumours, confusion, disinformation, exaggeration, fear and paranoia   with  disorganised thoughts, pressure of speech, grandiose and paranoid delusions. The culprits, mostly paid mercenaries continue the  futile attempt to dampen the struggle of the Ethiopian People against TPLF.

TPLF, of course invested all its resources for such to divide the Diaspora political activism  from  proactively supporting the  popular movement  at home.  TPLF’s paid mercenaries of Ethiopian origin are able to infiltrate the diasporas political activism  and  trapped it in their decade long “divide  them by their ethnicities and religion,  weaken them and rule” policy. TPLF paid millions of dollar  to European and American  agents and lobbyists for  advice on sophisticated oppressing means, espionage  and lobbying.

Ethiopians have to be smart, measured, matured  and human on tackling this uneven road. Ethiopians have to learn from all the mistakes we committed in the last few decades. Ethiopians have to be unite and work together in partnership. A popular well organised and united push from Ethiopians of different nationalities, faiths, educational status, ability, income, gender and  age  will bring the demise of TPLF.

Lets be  free from our personal ego, political and ethnic inclination and be human (who were born in country called Ethiopia on God’s wish; otherwise we would have been born somewhere). Lets give ourselves time for  clean  mind set and listen  the majority of Ethiopians quest. It will show us the light with in the darkness. It will lead us to the end of  the dark tunnel where light is shining. It cleans us from the hate, fear and animosity we are swamped in.

Ethiopians of all nationalities, ethnicities and clans, open your eyes and ears! Think as human and Ethiopian. Narrow nationalism and chauvinism won’t help us. Only unity and working together can save us!

Never abandon those  brothers and sisters at home fighting TPLF’s led regime. Had our forefathers gave up due to the might of Italian military forces, we would have been different people and our identity would have been lost.

Never give up the struggle against the oppressive TPLF regime! Let’s  stand and work  together to be owners of our country!

Travelers Today       By    FG Dullin

Anyone choosing Africa as the next continent to spend one’s vacation could choose to travel in Ethiopia for an exceptional off-beat experience. In this North African country, there are two popular tourist destinations worth noting: the capital city of Addis Ababa and the alluring backwater of Axum. Interestingly, both cities are unlike each other.

Between the popular Addis Ababa and the mystical Axum, many people would choose to visit Axum. Here are the reasons why:

Two-day Road Trip

From the airport in Ethiopia’s capital city, the journey to Axum takes about two days on the road. While many people would conveniently go for another round of aerial travel, spending two days on the road might prove to be a fun African safari road trip. Warning: travel at your own risk.

Historical Wealth

One of the key reasons why people would visit Axum is because of its very rich cultural heritage. This city has thousands of years of history behind it. The local obelisks and stele slabs take academic tourists back into the golden age of the Kingdom of Aksum that thrived around 400 BC.

Ancient Christianity

Axum is also a significant site of the earliest Christian society in Africa (if not the whole world). In fact, the Church of the St. Mary of Zion allegedly guards The Ark of the Covenant – the most important Judeo-Christian artifact.

f Axum is too much of a backwater for others who travel in Ethiopia, one would rather choose to visit Addis Ababa. Here are the following reasons:

Tourism Powerhouse

As of July 15, 2015, Addis Ababa was awarded the number 1 spot by the European Council on Tourism and Trade. For the last ten years, Ethiopia’s capital city has experienced a 10 percent increase in its tourism growth.

Life and Industry

One of the reasons behind Addis Ababa’s recent appealing decade has a lot to do with the government’s efforts to increase its productivity. This has been made obvious by the proliferation of many commercial skyscrapers.

Groovy Nightlife

Another reason why people also like to visit Addis Ababa is its thriving nightlife. This metropolis is teeming with music clubs, fusing modern genres with traditional Ethiopian beat. The most recent trend in the city is the revival of its ‘ethnic-jazz.’

US exit from United Nations could become reality with fresh bill
Published time: 23 Jan, 2017 10:03

ESAT Radio 24 Tue Jan 2017

By Mark Savage
BBC Music reporter

Paris was 11 years old when her father died of a heart attack brought on by an overdose of painkillers

Michael Jackson’s only daughter, Paris, says she believes her father was murdered.

In her first in-depth interview, Paris told Rolling Stone she was convinced Jackson’s 2009 death was “a setup”.

The singer died from an overdose of the powerful anaesthetic propofol. His doctor Conrad Murray was later found guilty of involuntary manslaughter.

But Paris believes there is more to the story. “He would drop hints about people being out to get him,” she said.

“And at some point he was like, ‘They’re gonna kill me one day.'”

Asked by interviewer Brian Hiatt if she thought her father was murdered, the 18-year-old replied: “Absolutely”.

“Because it’s obvious. All arrows point to that. It sounds like a total conspiracy theory… but all real fans and everybody in the family knows it. It was a setup.”

She went on to say “a lot of people” wanted her father dead, and that she was playing a “chess game” to bring them to justice. The teenager did not name specific people, and did not implicate Conrad Murray in her accusations.

Image copyrightROLLING STONE

The youngster recently hit headlines for complaining about a Sky Arts comedy drama series, in which her father was played by white actor Joseph Fiennes.

Writing on Twitter, she said she was “incredibly offended” by the show, and that the episode made her “want to vomit”. Sky subsequently pulled the show.

In her Rolling Stone interview, Paris spoke glowingly of Jackson’s parenting techniques – describing him as a “kick ass cook” who “cussed like a sailor” – and dismissed speculation that he was not her biological father.

“He is my father,” she said. “He will always be my father. He never wasn’t, and he never will not be. People that knew him really well say they see him in me, that it’s almost scary.

“I consider myself black,” she continued, adding that her father would “look me in the eyes and he’d point his finger at me and he’d be like, ‘You’re black. Be proud of your roots.'”

Paris was just 11 when Jackson died on 25 June, 2009. She told Rolling Stone she still wore an African bracelet her nanny had retrieved from his body that day.

“It still smells like him,” she said.

Image copyrightGETTY IMAGES

Paris also revealed she had been sexually assaulted by a “complete stranger” as a teenager, and spoke openly about depression and her 2013 suicide attempt.

“I was crazy,” she said. “I was actually crazy. I was going through a lot of, like, teen angst. And I was also dealing with my depression and my anxiety without any help.”

After a spell in hospital, she is now sober and only smokes menthol cigarettes (which carry their own health risks). She is pursuing parallel careers in modelling and acting, and says she shares her father’s passion for environmental activism.

Since the interview was published on Tuesday, Paris has taken to social media to ask for privacy.

“I will not be answering any press regarding the Rolling Stone article whatsoever,” she wrote on Twitter. “If you have questions then read it, it’s crystal clear.”

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus

Today, WHO has taken the next step in the election of the Director-General of WHO.

Initial screening of the 6 candidates nominated by Member States was conducted by the Executive Board. The Board then voted to determine a short list of 5 candidates.

The short list comprises the following candidates:

• Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus
• Dr Flavia Bustreo
• Professor Philippe Douste-Blazy
• Dr David Nabarro
• Dr Sania Nishtar

Tomorrow, on 25 January, Members of the Executive Board will conduct interviews, and shorten the list to 3 nominees, by vote. Their names will be announced by the Executive Board Chair, Dr Ray Busuttil on Wednesday evening 25 January. All Member States will choose among the three nominees by voting at the World Health Assembly in May 2017. The new Director-General will take office on 1 July 2017.

For more information, please contact:

Gregory Härtl
Tel: +41 22 791 44 58
Mobile: +41 79 203 6715
E-mail: hartlg@who.int

Fadéla Chaib
Tel: +41 22 791 3228
Mobile: +41 79 475 5556
E-mail: chaibf@who.int

Tarik Jašarević
Tel: +41 22 791 5099
Mobile: +41 79 367 6214
E-mail: jasarevict@who.int

Christian Lindmeier
Tel: +41 22 791 1948
Mobile: + 41 79 500 6552
E-mail: mailto:lindmeierch@who.int

Photo: The Ethiopian Herald.
Troops of the Ethiopian army (file photo).

Addis Abeba — To the media’s keen observation, the immediate cause that triggered Ethiopia’s recent nose-dive into the unknown began when, on November 12, 2015, the residents of Ginchi, a small town some 80 Kms South West of the Capital Addis Abeba, took to the streets demanding authorities in Oromia regional state, the largest and most populated regional states to which Ginchi is a part, to halt a move to give a football pitch to private investors.

What followed was a year-long incessant public protest against the ruling EPRDF at a scale never seen in its quarter-century rule. It was unprecedented in many ways than few, but something that the government thought would be easily put down using brutal interventions both by the region’s and the federal’s security apparatus. That was until the hitherto region-wide protests, dubbed #OromoProtests, were joined, nine months later, by yet another unparalleled anti-government protest in the north, home to the Amhara regional state, the second largest regional state in the federated Ethiopia, and was dubbed #AmharaProtests.

Following these protests, which by then have shaken almost two-thirds of the country and have claimed the lives of hundreds of Ethiopians, in mid-August 2016, Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn announced that he had given an order to the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF) to intervene in Amhara regional state to control the spiraling anti-government protests. In his announcement, Prime Minister Hailemariam asserted that the government would use “its full forces to bring the rule of law” into the region.

As one catastrophic event continued to lead to another, a ministerial cabinet meeting of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE), chaired by Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, declared a state of emergency throughout the country effective as of Oct. 08, 2016.

The state of emergency was declared as an immediate remedy to control intensified anti-government protests particularly in Oromia regional state that followed a mass death of civilians at the annual Irreecha festival on Sunday, Oct. 2nd. (A hysteric stampede was caused as a result of security officers’ act of firing live ammunition and rubber bullets into the air, as well as teargas bombs in the middle of major parts of a gathering of millions.)

By all reviews so far, the declaration of the six months state of emergency is nothing short of a free pass to the ever militarized security apparatus of the regime to brutally put down increasing dissent by the public.

Already, the “full force” that Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn referred to in mid-August was in full display for nine months in most parts of the country, making one fact crystal clear – the civilian government led by a grand coalition of four parties and five smaller proxies, has continued to heavily rely on its military and intelligence might to engage with the public.

This is further aggravated by none other than the sheer fact that the last 26 years have been marred by a systematic gradual deterioration (and in most instances) demise of independent institutions (both state and non-state in nature) that were initially incorporated into the body politics of the country in the advent of EPRDF as a governing coalition.

The slow, tragic death of a multi-party parliamentary system

In the general elections held in May 2015, the fifth since EPRDF assumed power in 1991, the incumbent and its affiliates have unashamedly won all the 547 parliament seats, putting the final nail on the coffin of a prospect of a multi-party parliamentary system. In the preceding election, held five years earlier, the Parliament had a single representation from the opposition. A closer look at the opposition’s presence in the national parliament over the years demonstrates a country in regress.

In the first election after the passing of the Constitution in 1995, the EPRDF and its affiliates had managed to win 471 seats while 75 seats were gone to opposition parties mostly from peripheral regions such as Somali, Gambela, Benishagul-Gumuz, and Harari as well as a people who ran independently. In the next election in 2000, which registered a 90% voter turnout, according to the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) , EPRDF had increased its seats in the Parliament by 10 to 481 while members from several opposition parties took 53 seats. Thirteen seats went to independents.

In the highly contested, yet much disputed 2005 election, which was marred by allegations of vote rigging that followed deadly riots, (and which is considered, rightly, as the turning point in Ethiopia’s contemporary political moment) official results put EPRDF’s win at 327 seats, while the two major opposition parties, the Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) and United Ethiopian Democratic Forces (UEDF) won 161 seats collectively, the largest share of opposition seats in the country’s history.

Girma Seifu had been the only opposition member in the 2010 Parliament representing his party, Unity for Justice and Democracy Party (UJD). Girma finds it difficult to recognize the parliament “back then or even before” as a properly functioning institution. “You got to see heated debates sometimes but that was attributed to the [few] opposition [party members] who had seats. For members of EPRDF, however, the parliament was a place where it threw its inconsequential members just to raise their hands and agree on whatever is said by the high priests of the party,” Girma tells Addis Standard. “The senior members, those with real power, ran the government. Some were in the parliament of course, but some were not,” he said during an interview. Whatever is decided at the party headquarters is poured down to the Parliamentarians and “they accept without blinking an eye.” One hardly sees the checking and supervision of the government’s actions that is expected from them, according to him.

Ezekiel Gebissa, a Professor of History and African Studies at Kettering University in Flint, Michigan, agrees. “It would be a misnomer to suppose that there was ever a functioning parliamentary system in Ethiopia. Since 1995, elections have been held and governments have been formed every five years. However, the formal government structure has not functioned independently of the party structure. The government is simply the party’s instrument of control,” he told Addis Standard. “The actual governing structure is the party structure. The federal arrangement was only a scheme used to feign power decentralization and deny responsibility for when things go awry.”

According to him, the EPRDF coalition members, created by the TPLF during its advance on Addis Abeba, are ostensibly the governing party in their respective regions. “But they were never independent of the Executive Committee of the EPRDF which is in turn closely controlled by the TPLF cabal.”

Discourse on a deathbed: From non-existent opposition to suffocating political space

One of the glaring aspects of political reality in today’s Ethiopia is one that is often exploited by the EPRDF: absence of a well-organized opposition bloc that can offer an alternative policy to the discontented public. While several parties are incubated, from time to time, more often than not, their very existence is known to the public during election years. In the 2015 election, for example, 47 Political parties, including the incumbent, have participated by fielding a total number of 1828 candidates.

Some go as far as pointing their fingers at the opposition bloc’s own mismanagement of its problems as the root cause of its failure. The oppositions are not only fragmented, they say, but also spend much of their time and energy on inter-party squabbles.

For Ezekiel, this “is a tortured argument” because “as a matter of historical fact, the failure of state-building in Ethiopia has always been the refusal of the ruling elite to share power with competing forces. Just as its predecessors, the EPRDF has refused to share power in any meaningful way with the representatives of the disenfranchised.”

To make his point clear Ezekiel states as an example the year 1991, when members of the TPLF and Oromo Liberation Front, OLF, came out triumphant against the militarist Derg and vowed to construct a decentralized federal state together. But once securely ensconced in power, the TPLF felt no need to share power and ousted the OLF, which eventually ended up designated as a terrorist organization by Ethiopia’s parliament.

For Girma the prime responsibility for the country’s lack of well-organized opposition bloc lies within the regime itself, which, “with its irrational laws that it passes as it sees fit hampers the growth of any dissent in the country.” “Take [the national electoral board] for example; as it happened to my party [during the run up to the 2015 election], one day you wake up from your sleep and you find out that your party is taken over by a bunch of rascals, and the NEBE, without having any mandate whatsoever decides the party is theirs, not yours,” he says.

As the government continues to jail, to force into exile and intimidate “the best and the brightest in politics, it is weakening not only the opposition but also the discourse itself. Thus, with no outlet or means of expressing their dissent, the people choose the last resort, public demonstration.”

The series of restrictive laws that were adopted by the parliament, argues Ezekiel, have made it impossible for opposition parties to form, recruit members, and organize. And, according to him, the EPRDF makes no secret that it must continue to rule without opposition on the basis of the following reasons: it takes longer than one election cycle to bear fruit; it is the only guarantor of Ethiopia’s unity and stability; it is the only defense against genocidal civil war, and it has the right to rule indefinitely because it has removed a brutal dictatorship. “It is only the government that can open up or close off the political space. No one else can be culpable of decimating the political opposition and civil society institutions. It is axiomatic.”

Furthermore, in the wake of the fateful 2005 election, the EPRDF has taken measures that would stiffen the rules of procedure in the parliament, thereby limiting the discursive space even within the EPRDF-dominated parliament in which a member of the Parliament is not urged to make his or her points for not more than three minutes. This was followed by a series of legislations constraining freedoms that are instrumental for the construction of a democratic system. Among them, the most infamous ones were the Freedom of Mass Media and Access to Information Proclamation (Proclamation N0. 590/2008), the Anti-terrorism Proclamation (Proclamation No. 652/2009), and the Charities and Societies Proclamation (Proclamation No. 621.2009).

As the government’s intolerance of dissent became crystal clear, self-censorship has become the new normal among journalists and other writers who could otherwise contribute to the flourishing of critical discourse. This was further degraded by the blocking of several websites (perceived to be in opposition to the regime in power), and jamming of other press/media outlets, including those based outside of the country.

Civil societies that were engaged in the cultivation of a democratic culture and the promotion of human rights were also forced to change either their focal areas or left out to play a negligent role on issues essential to the country’s political health. Institutions like Inter Africa Group, a civil society which played a pivotal role in organizing debates on various issues in the run-up to the 2005 election, have receded from the public eyes and seem to be lingering in oblivion.

Despite that, however, “the news of the death of civil society institutions in Ethiopia is premature,” argues Ezekiel. “They have gone under, but not dead,” so if the government is courageous enough to allow civil society institutions to operate freely and within the confines of a reasonable regulatory framework, they will flourish again. The problem is, “the government knows these institutions can be effective” thus “it wants to reduce them to an instrument of coercion and control to perpetuate itself in power.”

But Ezekiel still sees hope in indigenous institutions which can somehow play the role of civil societies, for instance, in terms of conflict resolution which work “to resolve conflicts at the local level or even step in to govern for a while. In the Oromia region, the Abba Gadaa institutions could play the role of mediation to resolve the impasse or even serve as a caretaker in situations where a civil administration has collapsed.”

Damning reports, government dismissals

One such institution that is deeply affected by the Charities and Societies Proclamation is the Human Rights Council (HRCO). Founded in 1991, the Council vows to work towards building a democratic system, promote rule of law and due process, and encourage and conduct human rights monitoring.

“In earlier times, the HRCO used to issue frequent reports on various human right issues often confronting the regime for its misdeeds,” says Girma. “But now they don’t have the same capacity they had once; because of EPRDF’s restrictive rules they can’t raise enough funding, the result of which is a debilitated capacity to move around the country and see what is going on first hand.” But the pressure doesn’t end there; as of late, the council has fallen under the spell of government forces. In the months of July and August 2016, the Council has reported that four of its members were detained in Oromia and Amhara regions, measures that it believes were related to the members’ monitoring and documentation of the crackdown against the protests in these regions. Among them was Tesfa Burayu, Chairperson of the council’s West Ethiopian Regional office, who was detained at his home in Nekemte, Oromia.

In its report, “Respect the people’s Right to Demonstrate! Stop the Violence by State Security Forces!” , focusing in North Gonder zone of the Amhara Regional state, and which was on Sep 06 2016, the Council urged the government to stop the violence against protesters and condemned the violence by security forces, including killings, and arbitrary detention of citizens for exercising their constitutional rights.

But the government has always reacted in the same manner for reports like this; it often undermines the level of severity, it denies any wrong doing on its part and it even blames “outside forces,” “those who hate to see Ethiopia’s growth” and “neoliberal ideologues” for being behind damning reports. It also has its version of a similar institution, the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, EHRC, which is often used to directly counteract against reports by other independent institutions.

However, unlike the report EHRC, HRCO’s report was widely distributed by a group of other civil society organizations including the East and Horn of African Human Rights Defenders Project, the Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia (AHRE), Amnesty International, the Ethiopia Human Rights Project (EHRP), Front Line Defenders, and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH). Unfortunately, most of these institutions are now allowed to open offices in Ethiopia.

Their actual absence from the ground gives the government in Ethiopia the unbridled opportunity to vehemently deny any of the reports produced by them. Take for example Ethiopia’s response to the report by the HRW released in mid-June 2016. The then chief spokesperson of the government, Getachew Reda, dismissed the report stating that an organization far removed from a presence on the ground has no mandate to issue an accurate account of the human rights situation in Oromia. He then argued the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, has issued its own report which recognized the death of only 173 people in Oromia and declared it “proportional”.

Partial police, politicized military

In theory, the police in Ethiopia, which includes the Ethiopian Federal Police Commission (EFPC), is constitutionally mandated, among others, to prevent and resolve conflicts, strengthen the federal system, uphold federal-regional relations in the country, and maintain good relations, peace and tolerance among different religions and beliefs. The Regional Police Commissions, Community Police Offices throughout the country, and law enforcement apparatus established under Federal government bodies like the Ethiopian Revenue and Customs Authority (ERCA), the Federal Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (FEACC) and the Federal Prisons Administration Commission (FPA) are also constitutionally mandated to be politically impartial and loyal only to the country’s supreme law, the Constitution. The Federal Police Proclamation No. 720/2011, for instance, asserts that the commission shall “maintain and ensure peace and security of the public and the state by respecting and ensuring the observance of the Constitution.” However, in practice, like in all authoritarian countries around the world, their loyalty is to the political party in power.

The police, in Ethiopia, together with the army, are instruments of a government that always appears to be keen to resort to its prowess to resolve political crises of any kind as is manifested by Prime Minister Hailemariam’s recent claim that his government “has ample capacity” to subdue the rising tide. This stems from EPRDF’s origins. “TPLF, which is the architect of the entity we call now EPRDF is essentially a militaristic group to its bones,” says Girma. “The group has never walked past its history. It has never evolved into being a civilian party. Beneath the surface, it’s all guns and armors.”

Girma’s sentiments were shared by Ezekiel. “From its guerilla days, the TPLF had a party army whose commanders acted as diplomats, administrators, judges, and social workers,” Ezekiel says. After assuming power to reconstruct a state on the verge of collapse “the Front installed its military leaders and political commissars as ministries, ruling party’s officials, heads of business organizations and top leaders of the new national defense force. In this respect, the reconstructed state was essentially a military government whose political power depended entirely on the gun.” Even after the parliamentary system was put in place and elections were conducted to form a representative government, the military’s influence has always been enormous, Ezekiel asserted. More often than not, “the military has been called in to deal with the opposition. The [ENDF] isn’t just a politicized military; it has been a militarized civilian government since the EPRDF’s accession to power. The military has always been politically connected. And its engagement in economic activities as an institution has made it economically powerful. The military has a stake in politics.”

Now, with a state of emergency to contain the widespread protests all over the country, the governing structure is in crisis, argues Ezekiel. “What remains intact is a politically connected, heavily armed and economically powerful military. [The government’s] institutional interests are in danger. It has to use force to protect them. But force will breed more instability and the use of more force. Another cycle of collapse and reconstruction, and a perpetually failing state.”

As Ethiopians look at what is to follow anxiously, the incumbent, spoiled by the respite brought by its excessive military deployment in the name of the state of emergency, is busy conducting what it called “deep reform” in order to address the grievances. It is also busy showcasing the boom in infrastructure; a topic the government always gave precedence to the people’s well-being.

But Girma (who was interviewed for this piece before the state of emergency was declared) likes to speak prudently about what to expect; “there is what I hope to happen, say in the next six months,” he said in September 2016, “which is the government would truly understand the severity of the problems it and the country are facing. I would like to see the government taking drastic measures up to declaring a transitional period in which all the stakeholders both inside and outside the country are invited to participate. The military can be part of this transition,” he said. However, “what I think would actually happen is far from this. It’s in EPRDF’s nature to falsely believe that it has managed the situation whenever protests subside. Buying time is what it strives for. But the protests are coming back again more ferociously.” Given how things evolved since then, Girma’s statement comes as an alarming forecast. AS

The prisoners were convicted of a variety of offences including murder and rape

BBC News

Kuwait has executed seven prisoners for the first time since 2013, including a member of the ruling royal family.

They were hanged at the central prison, according to a statement carried by state news agency Kuna.

The royal family member was named as Faisal Abudallah Al Jaber Al Sabah, who was convicted of premeditated murder and illegal possession of a firearm.

The other executed prisoners included nationals from the Philippines, Egypt, Ethiopia and Bangladesh.

They were convicted of a variety of capital offences including murder, attempted murder, kidnapping and rape.

Al Sabah was found guilty of killing another Kuwaiti prince in 2010.

The BBC’s Middle East editor, Sebastian Usher, said it was very rare, but not unknown, for members of the various royal families in Gulf states to be imprisoned or executed.

Such cases are given as proof that no-one is above the law, he added.

Among the executed prisoners was Nusra al-Enezi, a Kuwait national, who was convicted of setting fire to a tent during a wedding party for her husband, who was marrying a second wife.

The blaze killed more than 50 people.

Among the others executed, two were domestic workers, one Filipina and one Ethiopian, convicted of murdering members of their employers’ families.

Dr. Fikre Tolossa’

Not all history – including many from the recent past – is verifiable to everyone’s satisfaction. Forget Ethiopian history of 3500 or 4000 years ago, we are still debating about our history of a hundred years ago. And, a hundred, two hundred years from today, our great grandchildren will read at least two versions of the facts about the Ethiopia of today. Some will read about the miraculous transformation the country achieved under the TPLF rule, while others will read how Ethiopia was vilified and defiled under this same regime. Both versions are being written as we speak. If we leave them a poor and contentious country, they will not only debate about the different versions of history but will also fight to defend their version. If, instead we inherit them a prosperous and more unified country, they will read all versions of history but will derive inspiration from the ones that fit their particular circumstances.
Dr. Fikre Tolossa’s book fits our particular circumstance. It is intended to make a positive contribution in how one of the most important political dynamics in Ethiopia today plays out. This dynamic, namely the relationship between the Oromos and the Amhras has the potential to determine if our country will overcome its current predicaments and chart a peaceful and prosperous future for the current and future generations.

This is not to suggest Dr. Fikre’s book should be exonerated from any criticism for its scholarly merits. As in every scholarly discipline, a new finding that contradicts an existing paradigm must face the utmost scrutiny and test of validation. And, reading the book, I can understand why the critics went all in arms. Even for a layperson like myself, there are simply too many assertions in Dr. Fikre’s book that cannot be taken literally. In most cases, many of the troubling assertions are not even necessary to the central narrative of the book. He could easily have dispensed with most of these assertions and get a much limited hit as a result. Since my intention is not to start another firestorm on the same thread, I will not go into specific examples, but I intend to share them with Dr. Fikre offline.

In fairness, however, even though Dr. Fikre is an accomplished scholar in his own field, I don’t believe he wrote this book as a scholarly masterpiece. It appears to me, Dr. Fikre wrote this book for the largely non-historian populous whom he believes would benefit from his historical findings (verifiable or not) in putting aside their current acrimonious relationships and instead re-calibrate a mutually rewarding brotherly-sisterly relationship. And the response has been positively phenomenal, so much so that if his staunchest critics are still worthy of their credentials, they have however found themselves in the wrong side of the market for public opinion. My advice to them is to give it up or may be take the fight to a different (academic) platform. After all they have made their points and should let people make their own judgment. Further debate on this issue will be a distraction from what is unfolding in that old poor country today. One hundred million people are being squashed under the boots of a minority, anti-Ethiopian regime that is bent on dismembering the country altogether if need be. The call of the day is to save Ethiopia, not to debate about its history of 4000 years ago.

I believe Dr. Fikre’s book has a great deal of incontestable material that will promote Ethiopia’s unity and future direction. No one, to my knowledge, has documented the many great contributions of the Oromo people to Ethiopia’s history as vividly as Dr. Fikre has. The central theme of his book, that Amharas and the Oromos go back millennia in their kinship is not only appealing but is something most Ethiopians feel in their bones to be true. There simply exist too many distinctive biological and cultural similarities between the two people to believe any historical assertion that dates their first encounter to a few hundred years.
I hope students of Ethiopian history will take Dr. Firkre’s lead and unearth more untold histories of the kinship and shared heritages of the various ethnic groups of Ethiopia both from the recent and the long past. This, for our time, will be the antidote of the poison of mutual alienation and enmity TPLF administered into our body politic for over 40 years. finally hope Dr. Fikre will somehow take all the criticisms he received from everyone in good faith, ponder over them and make future editions of his book more rigorous. My small suggestion would be to remove the extraneous assertions that are not
I finally hope Dr. Fikre will somehow take all the criticisms he received from everyone in good faith, ponder over them and make future editions of his book more rigorous. My small suggestion would be to remove the extraneous assertions that are not important but cause distraction from the bigger claims he wants to make. Second, even though he has included a dozen references, the book’s major and new claims are mostly based on Aman Belay’s books. He needs to address this glaring imbalance.
I wish him well.
Shiferaw
Shiferaw Abebe can be reached at shiferawabebe1@gmail.com

ESAT Radio Thursday 26 Jan 2017

The Christian Science Monitor

Bogaletch Gebre cofounded an organization that’s credited with virtually eliminating female genital mutilation in the part of southern Ethiopia where she grew up. A key reason for the organization’s success has been its focus on ‘community conversations.’

Tedros Adhanom, a politburo member of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) that has been ruling Ethiopia for the last 25 years is in the inner circle of the regime well known for its systematic patterns of political repression and egregious human rights violations against Ethiopian citizens. The abysmal human rights record of the Ethiopian regime is very well documented by all the major international rights groups (Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and Freedom House) as well as by the U.S. State Department in its annual human rights report.

In 2008, under his watch at the Federal Ministry of Health (2005-2012) there was a major cholera outbreak in Ethiopia’s Oromia Region. As a result of the deliberate inaction of Dr. Adhanom, the preventable and treatable outbreak tragically claimed many lives. Dr. Adhanom’s tenure as head of the Federal Ministry of Health was fraught with mismanagement and gross incompetence particularly as it relates to the monies (USD 1,306,035,989) granted from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS Tuberculosis and Malaria (GFATM).

The audit by the Office of the Inspector General into the USD 1,306,035,989 allocated to Ethiopia found: 1) misappropriation of funds and use of donor funds for unsound and politically motivated programs, 2) substandard quality of constructed health facilities and 3) ineligible expenditures. It was the recommendation of the OIG that the Ethiopian government should refund USD 7,026,929 to the Global Fund.  To this day, no action  has been taken  by the Ethiopian government to refund the money.

The candidate for Director General of a prestigious organization such as the WHO should not only be a person of high personal achievement but should also embody the highest adherence to internationally recognized human rights standards. Dr. Adhanom’s record as one of the leaders of the ruling party in Ethiopia and specifically his record as Minister of Health does not meet the exceedingly high standards required for a Director General of the WHO.

https://www.change.org/p/we-oppose-tedros-adhanom-s-candidacy-for-director-general-of-who?