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The Right Honorable Philip Hammond MP
Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
King Charles Street
London SW1A 2AHOpen letterSystematic repression: Torture, Killing, and Harassment of unarmed school Children in the Oromia regional state of EthiopiaDear Minister,It is with sadness and anger that we report the renewed crackdown on peaceful Oromo protesters by government security forces in Ethiopia. More than 70 students were killed, many made to disappear, others jailed simply for taking part in a peaceful demonstration in April 2014. Amnesty international compiled a detailed report giving a clear account of this crackdown in its report of “because I am Oromo- a sweeping repression in Oromia.” Over the past week the same tragedy was taking place in Oromia high schools and universities as they were protesting against the continued eviction of the Oromo people from their livelihood without compensation and by driving them down to extreme poverty.While more than 15 million peasants are reported to have been starving (BBC report, 9 Nov, 2015) the oppressive regime in Ethiopia continues to push its policy of evicting the Oromo people from their livelihood on
a wider scale. This policy, coupled with the burning of a vast area of natural forests and continued eviction of indigenous people has been opposed in peaceful protest yet met at all times with brutal suppression in the forms of mass arrest, torture and killings.
The government security forces have killed already Twenty four students since the protest began in different parts of Oromia. Among those first casualties,
In this brief commentary, I will address some general conceptual issues related to resistance against development intervention and then I will proceed to the specific case about the ongoing contested master plan of Finfinne city called “integrated urban development”. This assessment is aimed to achieve multiple purposes; namely to contribute academic inputs to policy making, to clarify to the readers on the nexus between development interventions and resistance, and to indicate that the ongoing resistance from the Oromo is within the context of rights enshrined in the constitution of the country.
Like elsewhere in the modern world, successive Ethiopian governments have been engaged in translating various versions of development discourses into practice – albeit posited within different ideological orientations. The imperial and military regimes had put in place hegemonic systems in channeling down policies and programs that they also tried to sell to the populace under the buzz concepts such as ‘development’ and ‘modernization’. In this regard, historical accounts remind us the social, economic, cultural and political consequences of such modernist development discourses and practices of different groups in the country among which the Oromo were significantly affected. To mention one, the collectivization (villagization) program of the military regime disrupted social ties, economic practices and cultural connectedness of the people to their land. This hints at the repercussions of development projects that are conceived, implemented and managed within hegemonic systems of governance because absence of democratic systems opens the path to external interventions without proper consultation of citizens. Nevertheless, the post-1991 political order in Ethiopia has put in place for the first time in the history of the country a system whereby nations and nationalities are given rights of self-determination to decide on matters that affect their communities including the right to administer resources and development projects, and to promote the language, culture and history of their people to mention a few – no matter how the practical implementation is still the subject of contestation.
2. Development Interventions and Popular Resistance: An Overview
High modernist development practices all over the world entailed the exercise of top-down and expert-based scientific knowledge that considered participation of ordinary citizens and local knowledge at odds with the development visions of the state and/or non-state actors. High modernist development discourses give limited room for participatory approaches of development and government-public partnership. This approach was practiced by colonial powers and continued in the post-colonial periods as well. The general assumption behind high modernist development discourses was that few elites would plan development programs and mobilize the mass for its implementation under strict control of ‘experts’. However, as a famous scholar on peasant resistance, James Scott, has noted, the power of domination often produces the power of resistance from the group that is seemingly powerless as seen in literal conceptions of power. Since the mid-1980s, scholars began not to underestimate the agency of the “weak” who under conditions of domination can use different strategies of resistance against development interventions that they define from their own values, identity, worldviews and history.
However, it is misleading to construe local communities’ resistance against development intervention as if the people are against development – despite controversies revolving around the concept itself. Although the term can be given different meanings and manifestations according to the interest, ideology and worldviews of various actors, what local communities often resist is not the conventional understanding of the concept per se – referring to improvement in the overall wellbeing of human society and their environment. Rather, the approach, strategy and consequence of development programs, projects and practices constitute contestable meanings.
3. The “Integrated Urban Development Plan and the Question of the Oromo
3.1. Background
According to the 1995 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Ethiopia (Article 49) Finfinne (Addis Ababa) became the capital city of the Federal government while at the same time it has been the seat of Oromia regional state. Finfinne is adjoined by Oromia region in all directions. Article 49.5 of the constitution gives special right for Oromia to get special benefit from Finfinne as it is the heartland of Oromia besides being its administrative capital. According to the constitution (Article 49.5), “The special interest of the State of Oromia in AddisAbaba, regarding the provision of social services or the utilization of natural resources and other similar matters,as well as joint administrative matters arising from the location of Addis Ababa within the State of Oromia, shall be respected. Particulars shall be determined by law”. Nevertheless, there are critiques that Oromia has not yet benefited from Finfinne. On this topic, because of lack of empirical evidence whether the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization (OPDO) tried to utilize the constitutional rights given to Oromia in getting benefit from Finfinne or not, I would not push this assertion forward.
The plan, according to the government, is intended to create integrated urban development between Addis Ababa city administration and Oromia towns surrounding the capital city such as Burayu, Sabata, Sululta, Bishoftu, Laga-Xafo Laga-dadhi, Galan and other semi-urban centers adjoining these towns. From this perspective, the government tries to disseminate its development programs by presenting to the public the advantages of the plan in terms of infrastructural and social provisions. On the other hand, the Oromo from different walks of life, including some members of the OPDO officials are skeptical whether the Master Plan has been planned for mutual benefit of Finfinne and Oromia regional state or is just a systematic strategy of incorporating Oromia towns into Finfinne. Thus, it is crucially important to analyze some underlying reasons behind Oromo’s resistance and discontent to the Master Plan. In the following section, I will try to discuss it situating within historical experiences, political scenarios and procedural drawbacks in the planning process. However, one should boldly know that no one is against development project that changes the lives of its people if carefully planned and implemented.
3.2. Why do the Oromo Resist the Master Plan?
Memories and experiences of past evictions and dispossessions
Like other nations and nationalities in the country particularly those who faced the brutal conquest under emperor Menelik II during the late 19th century, the Oromo people have lived memories and experiences of ‘development’ induced displacement, dispossession and oppressions under the successive regimes. Moreover, the assimilationist and hegemonic systems in the past have left enduring repercussions on Oromo culture, language and identity with the case in Finfinne more appalling still today. Historical accounts of the establishment of Finfinne city in 1886 illuminate that the territory was inhabited by different Oromo clans until they were eventually displaced by the imperial regimes. The city was built on the ancestral land of the Oromo through policies of land alienation, dispossession and displacement of indigenous peoples in similar approaches to many other urban centers in the conquered regions of the South. It is, thus fair to argue that Finfinne city was established as a garrison town predominantly occupied by war generals and soldiers. There is no need to turn history books or archives to understand the displacement of indigenous Oromo communities from Finfinne and to comprehend the impacts of the assimilationist projects under the imperial and military regimes. It is rather enough to see the current ethnic composition of the Addis Ababa city where one can clearly see that people who identify themselves as Oromo are immensely few in contrast to Finfinne’s being the heartland of Oromia. Therefore, resistance against the Master Plan should be understood within the historical antecedents the Oromo experienced with regards to dispossession of their land, displacement from their ancestral land and the socio-economic, cultural and political repercussions of development interventions.
In response to the constitutional rights
The Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE Constitution 1995: Article 43.2) clearly stipulates the right of each nation, nationality and people of Ethiopia to be fully consulted and involved in development projects that affect their community. In addition, Article 39 of the same constitution gives unconditional rights of self-determination to the nations, nationalities and peoples of Ethiopia that include the right and autonomy to determine which development program to envisage and the right of self-government on territories they historically inhabited. These are a few of the fundamental principles of ethnic federalism that are enshrined in the constitution. In this specific context, Oromia regional state and the Oromo people have constitutional rights to decide on the urban development programs through democratic, transparent, bottom-up and inclusive approaches of participation. They have the right to decide whether they opt to go for the integrated urban development or not. The resistance from Oromo intellectuals, politicians, students, peasants and business people should be understood as a response to interventions that to a large extent violated their constitutional right, particularly Article 43.2 of the FDRE’s constitution – the right to be consulted and involved in development projects.
Mistrust generated from lack of genuine participation
Resistance to state development projects to a large extent reflects the nature of state-society relations, questions of legitimacy and trust. Governments have the leverage of building legitimacy and trust or become victims of legitimacy crisis based on their policies, programs and overall political systems vis-à-vis citizenship rights of the society. It has been evident from discussions during public sensitization programs on the Master Plan that the planning process was top-down and did not involve citizens who will be affected by the project. A higher official from EPRDF presumably acknowledged the importance of involving grassroots communities through bottom-up approaches though he maintained the view that there was no problem with the top-down approach in development intervention. Here comes the fundamental disparity between constitutional promises and practices.
Under such circumstances where citizens are not consulted and involved in the planning process, one should not be surprised if they resist the project because any conscious society does not accept something without knowing its benefits, impacts and implications. Therefore, resistance is a function of procedural incongruity with the constitutional promises.
Anticipated Repercussions on the identity, culture and livelihood of the Oromo
Development projects such as urban expansion, dam projects, large scale agricultural projects, and protected areas conservation have significant repercussions on the livelihood, culture and identity of indigenous peoples all over the world unless critically handled. Because of historical experiences the Oromo faced under successive regimes in Ethiopia – experiences of displacement, suppression, exploitation and dispossession – the current project is also seen by the majority of the Oromo as a continuation of the past trends. Rhetoric and discourses can’t simply convince people who have lived-in scars and experiences in their minds, around their homesteads and in their neighbors that are reflected in their culture, identity, language, economy and politics. The government can rather convince the people on the benefits they would enjoy from the project not by injecting them with high modernist discourses of development but through practical and genuine involvement of the people in the projects.
Still another challenge that awaits the government is whether it has really delivered in other areas of development, whether other development projects didn’t have socio-economic and cultural impacts on local inhabitants elsewhere in the country and whether there is independent judiciary system that citizens can use as a guardian of their human rights in cases any development program threatens their right. I leave this question open to the readers. In practice, according to those who think it would incorporate Oromia towns surrounding Finfinne city, the current Master Plan will adversely affect the Oromo by reducing peasants into landlessness and in exacerbating land expropriation under the guise of investment. Like situations in the capital city, Oromo language, culture and other related rights would be suppressed if these towns are incorporated into the city without clear negotiation on who administers these “integrated” cities.
A way forward?
The development project should not be imposed, rather it should involve stakeholders particularly local communities who will be affected by the project from inception to implementation.
The integrated urban development can serve the interest of all stakeholders if and only if it is participatory and if it doesn’t violate constitutional rights of Oromia regional state and its geographical boundaries.
Finfinne City has the potential to develop by its own given that the city administration makes inward looking to develop a system of modernizing the city not necessarily through horizontal expansion. The unanswered question is: why Finfinne city administration started this integrated plan while there are immense critiques that it is unable to solve its own municipal problems. Therefore, before launching ambitious and ambiguous projects like this, the city administration should have utilized all available opportunities within its administrative boundaries to develop and modernize the city.
The regional government of Oromia has to claim its constitutional right to get special benefit from Finfinne (if not yet).
What guarantee does the regional government of Oromia have as to whether Finfinne administration eventually incorporates the surrounding Oromia towns to its administration or not? This is critical question the federal government, Finfinne city administration and particularly the regional government of Oromia should address. More importantly, the failure to put this agenda on the front line in negotiating with the other actors will be a critical test to the legitimacy of OPDO in representing the Oromo people.
In conclusion, two fundamental issues should be made clear regarding resistance against the “Integrated Urban Development Master Plan” of Addis Ababa City:
1) It has been evident that people are not against development per se. However, where development projects are perceived to be threatening fundamental rights and needs of the citizens, it becomes a policy to be resisted rather than a program to be embraced. On the other hand, under contexts where the people are recognized as rightful citizens whose voices, views and knowledge contribute to the overall development vision through genuine participatory approaches, it would be expected, to a large extent, that development mobilizes the society towards similar goals of the state.
2) Regardless of the power of domination the intervening actor might have, development intervention faces the utmost resistance from the people whose livelihood, culture, language, identity and history will be affected. Therefore, the government should not overlook the potency of local resistance in impacting on its legitimacy and trust.
* Barattooni magaala ginci namooni 80 ol yakka tokko male oromoo ta’u isaanif qofa hidhaman atattaman akka gadi nuf lakkifaman.
Dhaadannoo kan armaa olii fi kan kana fakkatan dhageessisaan. sirboota qabsoo Oromoo jajjabeesus wallisuun. karaa konkolaata baha gara dhiha Asoosatti darbu cufanii gooma konkolaata karaa irratti gubanii hojii boonsa hojjachaa oolani.
Torbaan darbe kana keessa mormii godina Shawaa lixaa aanaa Daandii magaalaa Gincitti jalqabamee tureen, namoonni 80 ol hidhamuu isaanii kan jiraattonni nutti himan gabasuun keenya ni yaadatama.
(OPride) — For energizing and unifying the Oromo public both at home and in the Diaspora, for keeping the beacon of liberty from being extinguished, for selfless sacrifice to advance Oromo rights and for bringing international media attention to the plight of Oromo people, Oromo Student Protesters are OPride’s Oromo Person of the Year.
The Master Plan
In March 2014, the Addis Ababa and Surrounding Oromia Special Zone Integrated Development Plan Project Office organized a workshop for journalists and civil servants in Adama, 90 kms east of Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa. The training, conducted by officials from the Oromia regional state and representatives of the Addis Ababa city administration, continued through mid-April. It was intended to generate momentum before “a joint master plan,” which would ostensibly facilitate efficient resource use, eliminate existing contradictions and link the city’s developmental activities with the Oromia Special Zone, is unveiled.
Established in 2008, the Oromia Special Zone is comprised of eight towns (Dukam, Lagatafo-Lagadadhi, Sandafa Buke, Sululta, Holota, Burayu, Sabata and Galan) and six districts (Walmara, Sabata Hawas, Akaki, Sululta, Mulo and Barak). The zone has a total area of 4,800 square kms and 15 townships.
The special zone was established in response to local concerns over lack of attention and proper planning in the hinterland and the unchecked, horizontal urban sprawl around the capital. The renewed interest in the area, which ironically coincided with rampant land speculation and a chaotic industrial construction boom, was further strengthened by Oromia’s local development plan crafted in 2010.
Founded in 1886 by emperor Menelik II and his wife Taytu Betul on conquered Oromo land, Addis Ababa, which Oromos call Finfinne, has “complete powers of self- administration” with its own police, city council, budget and other public functions overseen by a mayor (appointed by the ruling party). Regardless of the reasons for the creation of the Oromia special zone, the city’s unique place as both a state capital and federal capital— the constitution granting special interest in the provision of services or the utilization of resources to Oromia — has been at the center of the debate over the city’s horizontal spread over the years.Oromo activists have been calling for clarification of the Ethiopian constitution’s special status clause, as well as language instruction and other services for the city’s Afaan Oromo speakers. In theory, the creation in 2011 of a joint project office tasked with fashioning a joint strategy and a master plan was meant to assuage these grievances.
However, as noted by workshop participants in April, the project office not only took an arrogantly top-down approach in crafting the master plan but also expanded the city’s territorial jurisdiction by a whopping 1.1 million hectares, an area more than 20 times the capital’s current size, according toleaked documents. The proposed plan would put 36 Oromia towns under Addis Ababa’s — thereby federal government’s — direct control.
In a rare report by the state-run Oromiyaa TV (OTV), journalists and officials from the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization (OPDO), the Oromo elements in Ethiopia’s ruling coalition, sounded-off about the lack of public consultation and potential violation of Oromia’s autonomy and territorial integrity, as well as threats to the livelihood of Oromo farmers in the areas covered by the proposed plan. The planning office apparently did not even bother to consult with mayors of the affected municipalities and other regional and Oromia Special Zone officials. Moreover, the state’s rubberstamp legislative chamber, Chaffee Oromia, did not deliberate on it, leaving rank-and-file OPDO members deeply disgruntled.
“The issue of Addis Ababa and surrounding Oromia towns is not a question of towns; it is a question of identity,” one speaker said at the workshop in Adama. “When we speak of identity, there are fundamental steps we ought to take to ensure that the plan would incorporate and develop the surrounding towns while also protecting Oromo’s economic, political and historical rights.”
The speaker added: “we are keenly aware of the city’s past spatial growth. We don’t want a city that pushes out farmers and their children but one that accepts and develops with them…more importantly we don’t want a master plan developed by one party and pushed down to us.”
OTV’s segment on the opposition to the master plan came as a shocker to many. Established in 2006, the network has been serving as an unabashed government mouthpiece, giving only lip service to issues of concern to the Oromo other than scant cultural programming. Within days after OTV’s report, thousands of Oromo students at all regional universities in Oromia took to the streetsopposing the master plan (starting at Jimma University and quickly spreading to Haramaya, Ambo, Wollaga, Matu, Bule Hora, Addis Ababa, Adama and Madawalabu universities). In one instance, on April 29, an estimated 25,000 people partook in a citywide demonstration in the flashpoint town of Ambo, 80 miles west of Finfinne. Federal security forces responded as usual, firing live ammunition at unarmed protesters, killing at least 50 people and injuring many others while hundreds were arrested, according to eyewitness reports.
Authorities saw OTV’s report on the master plan as an indirect rebuke of its campaign to unveil the plan. TVO then went mute, apparently per orders from federal authorities, keeping eerie silence as protests spread across Oromia and received significant coverage in the international press. Shortly thereafter, an indoctrination campaign was organized for the OTV journalists, which according to a number of participants, ended without any breakthrough in the form of agreement.This was followed by mass firing of journalists seen as agent provocateurs, including Bira Lagasse, who presented the April OTV report on the master plan.
Marketed as the megacity of the future — complete with a new railway system courtesy of the Export-Import Bank of China — Ethiopia’s sprawling capital faces increased pressures to meet international standards and ongoing urbanization challenges. Half of Ethiopian population, roughly 67 million, is projected to reside in towns and cities by 2040, up from only 18 percent in 2013. Addis Ababa hopes to lead the charge in urbanization and become one of the top ten tourist destinations in Africa by 2025. Even as they insist that the controversial master plan offers a win-win solution for all stakeholders, Addis Ababa city officials say high economic integration and uniform land use and development strategies with surrounding Oromia towns is key to that effort.
Ethiopia’s GenQ: A lethal threat?
Student protests have been a fixture in the contemporary Oromo history. Students have been demonstrating in Oromia since the mid-1990s. The budding Oromo student activism can be likened to the cactus. You cut it down and it would grow back even more luxuriant as if in vengeance. You depopulate it in one place and it would mushroom elsewhere. It is in no need of a nourishing climate or soil; it thrives in the lowlands, the highlands, and anywhere in between. Seeing it as a lethal threat to its continued grip on power, the ruling party has been cracking down hard. However, the protesters grew more and more strident rather than abate. Resilient as they have been over the years, Oromo students have paid hefty prices for their dissent against the regime in Finfinne. That is why the repression by the authorities could hardly dampen the spirit of an increasingly assertive generation of Oromo youth that is just coming of age.
To be sure, one of the positive developments under the current regime is the adoption in 1991 of the country’s federalism, which carved Ethiopia into nine federated and theoretically autonomous states. However, for all its promises of maintaining Ethiopia’s territorial integrity, the constitutional guarantees for decentralization of authority have rarely been applied. Final decision-making power still rests with the central government, with supposedly semi-autonomous states enjoying only a semblance of self-rule. Consequently, EPRDF’s failure to abide by its own constitution, frequent top-down changes in education policy, denial of academic freedom and the government’s misguided development policies have been among the most contentious issues for Oromo students over the last two decades.
Dubbed the Qubee generation, today’s college and high school students in Oromia are like a new species of Oromo. Studied in their mother tongue, Afaan Oromo, and keenly aware of their state’s boundaries and the Oromo people’s longstanding misgivings about the Ethiopian state, the average Oromo protester personifies the indomitable spirit of Oromo nationalism and a steely determination to see to it that the injustice against the Oromo becomes a thing of the past. Such open national consciousness was hitherto unthinkable in Ethiopia, which remained a unitary state in large part by harshly suppressing Oromo self-expressions.
Oromo student protests through the years
The heightened Oromo student activism of the late ‘90s and early 2000s coincided with widespreadhuman rights violations and mass expulsions of student leaders from various universities and colleges. Based on available record, from 1999 to 2004 alone, more than 1,000 Oromo students were dismissed from Addis Ababa, Jimma, Adama and Haramaya universities. Tens of students disappeared without trace while hundreds have been forced into exile — some still languishing in refugee camps across neighboring East African countries.
After a brief lull, sustained protests began in early 2000 in response to massive forest fires in Bale and Borana zones of Oromia. Amid apparent neglect and allegations of federal government’s involvement in setting the forests ablaze, students across Oromia took to the streets demanding swift action. Authorities responded by rounding up the students, firing live ammunition at peaceful protesters and detaining those suspected of organizing the protests.
In early 2001, Oromo students at Addis Ababa University began protesting after authorities blocked their efforts to publish a student newspaper and organize a student union. The students also opposed the stationing of uniformed police and undercover security agents on college and university campuses. High school and university students around the country joined the strike calling for academic freedom. Protesters were further angered by the killing in Tigray of Oromo student Simee Tafara by unidentified security agents. More than 3,000 Oromo students were arrested. “Government forces responded to the protests with extreme brutality, killing more than thirty people, wounding some four hundred, and arresting thousands,” the Human Rights Watch reported at the time. “Academic life ground to a halt for one month around the country, and most AAU students who participated in the strike did not return to class for one year. About 250 students fled to Kenya; others went to Djibouti or Sudan.”
Again in early 2002, following sustained Oromo student protests over economic depression and rising cost of fertilizers, the federal Rapid Deployment Forces killed at least 10 students and injured many others in Shambu, Naqamte, Gedo, Ambo, Gimbi, Najo, Dembi Dolo, Guder, Robe and Kofele towns. In May 2002, authorities arrested more than 320 students from various institutions of higher learning in and around Addis Ababa. Tens of students were dismissed from Adama, Haramaya and Addis Ababa universities.
Following a year of tensions, in 2004, Oromo student protests returned in response to the government’s attempt to relocate Oromia’s capital from Finfinne to Adama. More than 350 Oromo students were expelled from Addis Ababa University alone. Hundreds of students, teachers and Oromo intellectuals were arrested throughout Oromia in a move seen as an effort to eliminate educated and politically conscious members of the society. Schools across Oromia were closed for most of the year. “In some places, police used live ammunition to disperse demonstrators, killing several school students,” according to Amnesty International’s report. “Demonstrators were detained for several months; some were beaten and made to do strenuous physical exercises while in custody.” Thousands of protesters, including leaders of the Oromo welfare organization, the Macha Tulama Association, remain in prison or are serving lengthy sentences under trumped up charges.
Oromo students took to the streets once again in 2006 following disputed parliamentary elections. In fact, as UC Berkeley’s Leonardo Arriola rightly noted, while international media reports focused almost exclusively on the opposition protests in Finfinne, post-election “protests in Oromia resulted in more than 15,000 detentions and 80 reported deaths.” The trend continued in the year with yet another killing of innocent Oromo student, Shibiru Demissie, at Mekelle University. While there have been sporadic protests over the last half decade, the 2014 #OromoProtests were a watershed — not just in their size and duration but also in the participation of other sectors of society, urban dwellers, bureaucrats and rural folk, including members of the ruling party.
All in all, since 2000, Ethiopian security and military forces have killed hundreds of peaceful protesters. Despite the recurring and perennial protests the storyline remains the same: Peaceful protesters shot at close ranges; significant numbers injured; hundreds dismissed from high schools and universities and many more fleeing the country to seek safety.
Implications for Ethiopia’s future
The names of some of those indiscriminately gunned down by security forces such as Diribe Jifar, Getu Diriba, Jagama Badhane, Gammachu Hirphaasa, Alsan Hassan and many others or those who died in prison from torture such as Alemayehu Gerba and Tesfahun Chemeda, have become household names, their struggles forever ingrained in the consciousness of the ever vibrant Qubee generation as well as the wider Oromo public. Still, these are but few whose names entered the public domain. Many more perished without due recognition or remain unjustly imprisoned with their fates and future hanging in balance. One thing is certain: Killing, imprisonment and forced exile have thus far failed to discourage or undermine Oromo student activism.
Ethiopia continues to be haunted by an age-old problem: the unaddressed Oromo question. Despite making up close to half of the country’s 96 million population, the Oromo continue to face political repression, social marginalization and social alienation. Instead of addressing Oromo grievances, controlling Oromia’s resources and the suppression of Oromo dissent has been a constant preoccupation for successive Ethiopian rulers.
It doesn’t take a political scientist to realize that addressing the Oromo question is tantamount to removing the albatross from Ethiopia’s neck. As the Horn of Africa country prepares for yet another sham election in May, calls to democratically address gapping deficits in governance, rule of law and respect for human rights would grow louder. The specter of more student protests and violent suppression would continue to sour state-society relations. Despite the rising risk on Ethiopia’s stability, the authorities lack the will to heed calls for any sensible reform and accommodation of dissent.
The Addis Ababa and Surrounding Oromia Special Zone Integrated Development Plan Project Office is reportedly forging ahead with the controversial master plan. Any attempt to impose a widely unpopular proposal on the Oromo guarantees the return of yet another protest by Oromo students—even before the hundreds and thousands of young students rounded up during the 2014 protests were released from incarceration. But if history is any guide, the threat of arrest, beating, torture and exile alone will not quell the protests.
Ethiopia has recently been named to the top ten leading jailers of journalists in the world. While the media blackout has aided the regime to keep the lid on the plight of Oromo prisoners, in 2015, amid growing social media use inside the country, it would be impossible to suppress another anti-government protest. Even by the government’s own admission, tensions are expected to run high in Ethiopia ahead of the 2015 elections. The ruling party’s standoff with the urban opposition is at its peak. Rural support has all but evaporated. Ethiopia’s stability could be put to a severe test should the various grievance-fueled protests link up across ethnic, political and religious cleavages that have emasculated the potency of challenges to the ruling party.
Buoyed by past success at suppression, the authorities have every reason to underestimate the power of the Oromo Student Protester. With a radical shift in strategic thinking on the part of protest organizers, a new round of protests would not stop at simply re-energizing and unifying the Oromo public. It can become a catalyst for a countrywide pro-democracy movement. The selfless sacrifices of the Oromo Protester cannot forever remain fruitless. It has already drawn international media attention to the plight of Oromo people. The Oromo Student Protester, OPride’s Person of the Year, through sheer determination in the face of mortal and physical danger, through its capacity to rebound, and its irrepressible yearning for freedom is destined to write and right not only Oromia’s but also Ethiopia’s history.
Read more @ http://www.opride.com/oromsis/news/3783-opride-s-oromo-person-of-the-year-2014-oromo-student-protesters
The local coverage of the protests offer a best case study to look at Ethiopian media’s inherent, institutional bias toward Oromo stories. Given the foregoing discussion on Ethiopia’s challenging media environment, the dangers of balanced coverage are not contested. The government’s choke-hold on the media and fear of repercussions have discouraged journalists from visiting the scenes of protests and accurately reporting on the events. Ethiopia’s independent press is saturated in Finfinne, and many simply don’t have credible regional sources, especially in Oromia, who can feed them with the news of the protests. Besides, media institutions and some journalists consider approaching the protesters or contacting the victims’ families almost existential.
There is also an ideological bias toward “ethnic” based activism. In part this explains the reluctance among many journalists to visit some of the 15 towns included in the master plan and interview local residents and farmers. However, speaking to government officials and opposition politicians about the master plan, the protests and violent crackdown could have been done with minimum effort.
A closer look at reports by six web-based publications and three international correspondents reveals much not only about Ethiopia’s handcuffed press but also the deficiency of the so-called independent press itself. It took almost a month for most local outlets to offer basic, even if lopsided coverage on the cause of the protest and the causalities. Even considering the grim media environment, there were many missing links in those reports.
Others completely disregarded the matter and kept to their business as usual. For example, Addis Fortune, a weekly English newspaper with 10,000 monthly circulations, devoted only one singlesentence to the protests its May 11 report about the master plan.
Awramba Times republished a video and text from EthioFirst blog. To his credit, the EthioFirst reporter went to the scene of protests in Ambo town. The online only publication provided coverage supported with text and videos of what it said were destroyed properties. It also interviewed residents of Ambo, students of the Ambo University and chief of the university all denouncing the destruction of property. The report’s focus on the damage caused to properties as opposed to the loss of lives and arrests of hundreds gives us a reason for pause. Besides, the reporter made no attempt to speak with protesters, victims or their families.
Others recycled government statements and news releases from opposition political parties. For example, both the English and Amharic editions of The Reporter made its first coverage based on government statements. The English edition of the newspaper tried to balance the story by asserting“independent observers and those who claim to be eyewitnesses say that the death toll and injuries might be higher than what has been officially admitted.”
Sendek Amharic newspaper, which gave its reporting five days after the protests began, referred to a press release from the opposition Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) and later conducted interviews with the party’s leaders.
Addis Admas, another local Amharic daily, also did its initial coverage using government statement and anonymous sources from Ambo, Robe and Haromaya, where the protests took place. In a subsequent report on May 10, the paper reached out to a farmer residing in Sabata, one of the 15 towns included in the master plan, and offered local grievances over issues of compensation and threat to the farmer’s livelihood. Addis Standard, a local English magazine, also did its “best” by relying on sources from the universities where protests were reported, otherwise largely toeing the line from government statement.
Unfortunately, Finfinne-based foreign correspondents also kept to the official line. The Associated Press carried a police statement, and even went a step further linking the protests to secession andOromo Liberation Front. Bloomberg News also repurposed the government statement, with a passing reference to opposition leaders. Reuters simply ignored the news.
Other newspapers offered sensationalized stories that reflect their bias more than journalistic inclinations. For example, on May 2, Addis Guday wrote, ‘Oromia: Gize Tebikiwu Yeminfeneda Bomboch-Yetameku ye politika bisotoch. Ye tebab bihertenynet tosoch’ roughly translated as ‘ Oromia: a ticking time bomb waiting to explode and a concealed political dissatisfaction. The scar of narrow-minded ethnicity” In all, almost no attempt was made to contact to the protesters or the farmers and residents affected by the master plan. And none of the aforementioned outlets treated the incident as a breaking news item.
Ethiopian journalism is still at its infancy stage. Restrictions against the press and physical harassment of journalist make it impossible to cover issues of public interest. The reliance on government press statement reveals the challenges of obtaining first-hand reports from the scene of the incident. The country’s ethnicized politics confounds the lack of impartial coverage. In a country where there is no single Oromo media outlet and given the jamming of diaspora-based websites, the Oromo are left with no voice so to speak. Dozens of Oromo newspapers and magazines that existed in the 1990s were either banned or forced out of business when Oromo journalists fled the country.
With a varying degree, both private and government media outlets share a common hostility toward Oromo interests. While some of the private media practitioners are in government pockets, others cater to non-Oromo political groups. The rest are far more concerned with making money and they know what their audience wants. “There is little independent media in Oromia to monitor these events, and foreign journalists who have attempted to reach demonstrations have been turned away or detained,” the HRW said. A case in point is the four-hour detention of Bloomberg’s William Davison on May 1, after attempting to report on protests that took place at Addis Ababa University.
In a nutshell, independent, objective journalism has essentially become a crime in Ethiopia. Given the highly restrictive media environment, Ethiopia’s “independent” press continues to teeter on the edge of death and survival. Under the circumstances, a lot of journalists have begrudgingly embraced the “developmental state” storyline. For others, strict self-censorship has become more of a norm. As a result, the professionalism and quality of Ethiopian journalism has been significantly compromised. Still more concerning is the inherent ideological and institutional bias toward coverage of “ethnic” stories, particularly stories about Oromo activism. The role of a journalist is to report on events as objectively and truthfully as possible. Journalists should act as non-participating spectators of events. When reporters become part of a story or offer their opinions, they are expected be transparent and issue a disclosure. These ethical values are rare in Ethiopia. However, if there’s any hope for future of Ethiopian journalism, Addis Ababa-based media houses should start checking their ethnicized and detached coverage of events outside of the capital. -To read the full article, visit OPride, original source @http://www.opride.com/oromsis/news/3756-ethiopia-s-besieged-press-and-the-oromoprotests
OromianEconomist 
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