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The Ethiopian empire was founded not based on the will of its nations and nationalities. It was formed by force by elites from the north with help of the European powers. Since its formation, Ethiopia has never respected the interests of other nationalities in the empire. Today, as in the past, the empire is serving only elites from the Tigray, particularly TPLF and members of its pseudo organizations, while majority of ordinary people from other nationalities, particularly the Oromos, are languishing under its tyranny. Subsequently, the economic, socio-cultural and political exploitations have continued unabated. Tired of such tyranny, the Oromo revolutionaries and the youth has stepped up an uprising that has engulfed the entire nation since 2014. Though the responses of the TPLF security forces were brutal, killing hundreds of peaceful protesters and detaining tens of thousands, the protest has continued and even expanded to the Amhara regional state and to the southern Nations and Nationalities regional state.
Desperate to control the people’s uprising, TPLF first declared a command post rule and then a state of emergency. However, neither of the command post nor the state of emergency has stopped the protest as TPLF hopes. Today, there is no political order in the country especially in Oromia and Amhara regional states. Failed to control the situation in the country, TPLF and its pseudo allies used various strategies to silence people’s quest for freedom and democracy. Since clinch on power, TPLF has been instigating a conflict along national and religion lines. Interestingly, after selfinstigating conflict using its undercover security agents, often it presents itself as a mediator while supporting one group with all sorts of logistics up to militarization. Subsequently, TPLF uses this self-instigated conflict as a propaganda on its statecontrol media to tell the people that TPLF is the best, perhaps the only, remedy for the state to continue as a nation. These are among the strategies that this minority group uses to stay on power. Contrary to this fact the TPLF and its dictatorial rule that are destroying the integrity of the country it claims to maintain.
In Oromia, there are countless instances where TPLF intentionally created a conflict between Oromos and other ethnic groups such as Somali. The current “Oromo -Somali conflict” in East and west Hararge, Bale, Borena and Guji zones seem unique in its nature from previous incidents. A well-trained special police forces (aka Liyu police) solely composed of ethnic Somalis are the fore front of the conflict. This conflict, perhaps a war, has been going on for now three weeks and hundreds of innocent Oromo people have been killed by this special police forces.
Although these special forces are composed of carefully selected ethnic Somalis, it is commanded by a TPLF general Abrhaa Qurater and is also enforced by TPLF Agazi Special Force. The Ethiopian government, as usual, is trying to divert this war as if it is just a conflict between Oromo and Somali farmers. Unlike previous conflicts, this is a large-scale war encompassing East and West Hararge, Bale, Borena and Gujii zones. It is also worth noting here that this Somali special forces are trained by Britain for a so called counter insurgency. The UK- and US-governments also finance the training and supported with all the logistics, which are now murdering innocent Oromo farmers in the East, south-east and southern Oromia bordering the Somali regional state. The TPLF government is using this special police forces, trained supposedly for counter insurgency, to raid just unarmed Oromo farmers. It not a simple conflict to ransack cattle and camels, as TPLF tried to present, however, it a war of ethnic cleansing by a well-trained police forces. Not only those directly involved in the war but also those who trained and armed them will be responsible for such atrocity on hundreds of innocent people.
Our people are fighting back with what they have, but one should note that these are a well-trained and armed forces. Thus, they need support from all Oromos in Oromia and across the globe. This is the time that we standup for the right cause, and show our support for those in dire need, putting aside our little differences. Thus, we call upon all Oromo in Oromia and in diaspora to stand with those who are facing the TPLF special forces with bare hand. The only ever lasting solution we have at stake now is to remove TPLF from power for once and for all. This is possible only when we all united and act as one people for one goal, remove TPLF, the killer of our people. We also call upon all Oromos who are currently serving at various posts in police and military camps of the TPLF to turn their weapons against the enemy of your people.
Those who supported the TPLF killing machinery financially as well as in logistics will not escape from accountability. Thus, we call upon the Western governments, specially the government of USA and UK who financially sponsored the training of such killing machinery should immediately withdraw their support and held the TPLF government accountable for all the killings and destruction. Finally, we would like to call upon all people in Ethiopian to stand together to bring an end to the TPLF tyranny.
Victory to the Oromo people!
Oromo Liberation Front
January 21, 2017
(Ayyaantuu News):There has been frequent, but in fact subsequent, attacks launched by what is called the Liyu Police Force of the Somali Regional State on different districts of Oromia along the South, South east and east particularly along the Hararghe, Bale and Borana lowlands. More than 200 people are estimated to have been killed so far. The Liyu Police, as commanded by the psychopath Abdi Illey did repeatedly commit war crimes and crimes against humanity on civilians in the Ogaden region. Most of the units of the Liyu police are said to have been recruited from Illey’s own clan. After he established the murderous militia group and took the command and control of it, Mr. Illey has literally turned himself into a war lord. He never gives sh* about what the officials at the federal gov’t had to say. It’s even with in the public domain that he spitted on the face of the puppet prime minister HMD in Jigjiga while he was there as a ‘guest of honor’ during the celebration day of what they call “nations and nationalities day” in 2013. While even most of the cabinet ministers of the federal government go on the routine per diem scales on trips to foreign countries, Abdi Illy makes it so differently. The man even contracts and commissions top security guards while reserving hotel rooms in some of the top hotels of the cities he goes for trip to.
It has been a matter of generic knowledge among the public that the Afar-Issa-Somali conflict over land was the cause for the dismissal for three-fourth of government cabinet members in the Somali regional State a couple of years back. At the heart of the conflict lies, as the Afar diaspora network claims, the Somali-Issa militia forces did expand their control into the heart of the Afar land reaching to the banks of the Awash River and the strategic highway linking Addis Ababa to the port cities of Assab and Djibouti. Apparently, the dispute was halted by TPLF’s interventionist deal that favored the position of the Afar. But insider informants had it that the TPLF-imposed decision to seal the deal favoring the position of the Afar asymmetrically divided the 12-membered cabinet of the Somali Regional State into a fiercely fighting group of 4 to 8 members. Accordingly, 8 of the 12 cabinet members including the then vice-president did reject the decision while 4 of them (including the president Abdi Illey) accepted the TPLF-imposed decision. But the whole saga then went astray so much so that the 8 cabinet members in the Somali Regional State who opposed the move had to be all fired out to implement the land dispute deal proposed by the TPLF, at the end of the day. Abdi Illey’s 4-membered group in the cabinet, a minority by any democratic sense, had to turn victorious by firing all the 8 others (including the vice-president) because Abdi Illey & co had the keen supported from TPLF Generals. What is more??
Why the TPLF wanted to favor the Afar in the tribal land dispute/conflict?
For the TPLF, the Afar region is just part of the greater Tigray it envisions. If article 39 of Ethiopia’s facade federalism is to be first invoked by the TPLF (the maker and its breaker) any time it reads greater risk in the wider Ethiopian politics, Tigreay will secede taking Afar along with it — we all know it and they all know it too. Tigreans have not only political and economic supremacy in the Afar areas but they even dominate the urban culture in there – much like the Amhara do in Oromia due to the lingering legacy of the imperial era and that of the derg. Most businesses in the Afar towns are owned by business men of Tigray origin who are affiliates of the TPLF, more often than not. So, for the TPLF, it’s a natural instinct choice for any land dispute deal between the Afar and the Somali being sealed in favor of the former. But more importantly, the TPLF can make sure that the later won’t lose the land it claimed or at least be compensated for it by what could possibly be paid by a party that had no involvement either in the conflict or in the deal to seal it at the end of the day. Here is where Abdi Illey’s attack on Oromia, as supported by the TPLF Generals comes in. He has already been declared as “the best person of the year” by the TPLF’s mouth piece called “Tigraionline.com”. Sooner or later, we will be told that some remote territories disputed among some tribal pastoralists of the Oromo and Somali have been given to the later. And that seals the backdoor deal between Abdi Illey and the TPLF Generals.
It’s conceivable that the OPDO are neither aware of it nor capable of stopping this deal. They are created to contradict the Oromo in the very first place. While the Liyu police not only raids Oromo villages crossing borders but also killing their cadre sitting in office, the OPDO did nothing other than dialing on the old digits of the Arat kilo palace. The response was loud and clear though: ‘the number you calling doesn’t exist’. But they are still calling….so amazing…….
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So, the public should defend itself against these TPLF’s mercenary group called Liyu police by all means possible. We believe semi-organic bodies like the Oromia Police shall stand by the side of the public. We will overcome this dirty war of the TPLF too!
Addis Abeba, Jan. 18/2017 – When Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn indicated last week that a draft law was prepared on the “special interest” of Oromia in Finfinnee (aka Addis Abeba), discussions have resurfaced on the issue of the status of the city and its relations with Oromia. Last week, I had the privilege of discussing the matter in a couple of radio interviews where, inter alia, I was asked what the content of the special interest is, what I anticipate the content of the draft law will be, and whether passing the law would address the concerns raised in the Oromo protests that has rocked the country for over two years now. What follows is a set of reflections on some of these issues.[1]
This announcement about the draft being prepared on the ‘special interest’ comes at a time when the country is under a state of emergency the end of which is indefinite even according to the Prime Minister.[2] The announcement comes at a time when, in the wake of the Oromo protests against the Master Plan, at least over 700 people are killed by the regime and thousands more are injured. In particular, it comes after key Oromo political leaders—such as Bekele Gerba and Dr Merera Gudina–and tens of thousands of protestors have been sent to jail and military detention centers, respectively, for demanding the right to ownership of their Oromo land including Addis Abeba. The announcement comes at a time when the Oromia and Amhara regions are chiefly being administered by the Command Post in charge of implementing the state of emergency law. The Master Plan, which was once said to be repealed, is reportedly being implemented within Addis Abeba. The boundary between the city and its Oromo suburbs that are still within the administrative jurisdiction of Oromia is not delimited. The repression of all forms of dissent continues. This immediate political context is not without a precedent. In fact, one can say that it is only the continuation of a long-drawn historical context.
Before the advent of Art 49(5)…
Historically, it is now a well-known fact that the notion of Oromia’s ‘Special Interest’ entered the Ethiopian legal universe in 1992 through the instrumentality of the Proclamation that established National/Regional Self Governments (Proclamation No. 7/ 1992). This is the proclamation that set the blue-print for what came later to be the constituent units of the Ethiopian Federation. Adopted to give effect to the decentralization that was envisaged in the Transitional Charter – and to valorize the right of ethno-national groups to self-determination – it established 14 self-governing national regions. Accordingly, Oromia became one of the 14 self-governing States. Addis Abeba, like the City of Harar, was also a region in its own right. Oromia’s ‘special interest’ over both cities was first recognized in this piece of legislation (1).In Article 3 (4), it is provided that:
“The special interest and political right of the Oromo over Region Thirteen [Harari] and Region Fourteen [Addis Abeba] are reserved. These Regions shall be accountable to the Central Transitional Government and the relations of these Self-Governments with the Central Transitional Government shall be prescribed in detail by a special law.”
Very much like the provision in Art 49 (5) of the Constitution that came later, it envisaged a ‘special law’ (meant to clarify the relation of accountability to the Central Government), but such a law was never promulgated. It is interesting to observe that, unlike in the constitution, in this transitional period law, the Oromo has not just a “special interest” but also a political right over the two self-government regions. It is also important to observe that there is no attempt to delimit the boundary of the city. As a result, it was not clear as to where exactly the jurisdiction of the government of Addis Abeba ends and that of Oromia commences.
While it looked like a city-state in a federation, Addis Abeba was also seen as a city within a larger state, i.e., Oromia. In other words, administratively, it was an enclave falling outside of Oromia while also housing the Government of Oromia as its capital. In a sense, Addis Abeba is in Oromia, but not of Oromia. Oromia was a State governing from Addis Abeba without, however, governing Addis Abeba itself. While the meaning of ‘special interest’ was understood to mean much more than having a seat for the Oromia government in the city, for the entire period of the transitional times, this remained to be the only ‘interest’ Oromia could obtain.
The concept of Oromia’s special interest was thus injected into the language of public law in the country accompanying the shift away from a formerly unitary state to what was subsequently to become a ‘multinational federation’. Acutely sensitive to the rights of sub-national groups (called ‘Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’) in Ethiopia, this ‘ethno-federalization’ was a reaction, and a push back, to the goings-on in history. We can thus see its immense historical import in its potency to speak both to the past and to the future. The ‘special’ in the ‘special interest’ phrase hails not only from the mere fact of geographic location of Addis Abeba in Oromia but also from the implicit recognition of the essentially Oromo identity of the city. Historians have routinely described the fact that, until it was violently raided and occupied by the forces of the Shoan Kingdom in the 19th century, the city was inhabited by the Oromo.
When it was ‘founded’ as the capital of the modern Ethiopian Empire in 1886, it was set as a launching pad for the campaigns of imperial conquest on the peoples of the Southern, South-Eastern, and South-Western peripheries. With a violent beginning marked by conquest and occupation of the land; raid, massacre, and displacement of the population; and transformation of the cultural and environmental terrain by the soldiers, it started as a garrison town. A cursory glance at writings by William Harris[3], Alexander Bulatovich[4], and even Evelyn Waugh[5], indicates that the State operated in Addis Abeba as an occupying force of settler colonialists bent on pushing out and displacing the indigenous Oromo peoples. Because the settlers generally spoke Amharic and confessed the Ethiopian Orthodox faith and because of the disproportionate concentration of modern urban facilities in Addis Abeba, it became increasingly different culturally from its surroundings.
Consequently, it projected a cultural life that is different from that of the Oromo. The culture, identity, and language of the Oromo became the constitutive outside of the cultural life in the city. In time, the Oromo were effectively marginalized and otherized. For most of the 20th century, the Oromo, although historically the host, was forced to live like the alien and the guest in what was their own homeland. Informed by this memory and propelled by years of national liberation struggles, the politicians that negotiated the Transitional Charter (Proc. 1/1991) and made the law (Proc. 7/1992) sought to emphasize the need to acknowledge the Oromo presence in the city’s affair through the ‘special interest’. The ‘special interest’ package was thus a way of making up for the artificial (created or intentionally produced) absence of the Oromo. In other words, it was a method of presenting the absent, a way of bringing back the Oromo to its own.
What does the Law Say about the Special Interest?: The Legal Context
When the constitution of FDRE was finally adopted in 1995, the ‘special interest’ clause was more or less carried over into art 49(5). To understand the full textual context of the special interest package in art 49 (5), it is important for us to reproduce the entirety of article 49 in full. Accordingly, the provision in art 49 reads as follows:
Addis Abeba shall be the capital city of the Federal State.
The residents of Addis Abeba shall have a full measure of self-government. Particulars shall be determined by law.
The Administration of Addis Abeba shall be responsible for the Federal Government.
Residents of Addis Abeba shall in accordance with the provisions of this constitution, be represented in the House of Peoples’ Representative.
The special interest of the state of Oromia in Addis Abeba 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 Abeba within the State of Oromia, shall be respected. Particulars shall be determined by law.
Owing to the unclarity of the clause in art 49 (5), coupled with the lack, to date, of the law constitutionally envisaged to enunciate the content, it became imperative for people to ask “just what is the ‘special interest’?” And what is so special about it? In this section, we make a close reading of the provision to explore what could be in the package.
Developments: Toward Articulating the Content of the ‘Special Interest’
It is important at the outset to underscore that Addis Abeba is a Federal capital city within a State. In this, it is more like Berne (of Switzerland) or Ottawa (of Canada). It is not a city-state (in the style of Berlin or Brussels). Nor is it a federal capital territory or a federal district (in the style of Abuja, or Canberra, or Washington DC). Once that is recognized, i.e., that Addis Abeba is a city in Oromia, one should have an explicit discussion and mutual understanding about what it means to be a federal capital because that automatically indicates that the Federal Government does not have a ‘natural’ right to be in the city. Unfortunately, that discussion did not happen. That was a historical blunder about a city mired in several historical misdeeds and mistakes.
That it was made accountable solely to the Federal Government was the second big blunder committed at the time of adopting the constitution. Given the fact that the city is Oromia and that it is also a ‘natural’ capital of the government of Oromia, it should have been made accountable to Oromia. Or, at the very least, it should have dual accountability to both the Federal and Oromia Governments. That did not happen. Commanding exclusive say on the administration of the city (in the name of ultimate accountability), the federal government ‘banished’ the Oromia government at will in 2003 and allowed it back into the city in 2005. In this, the federal government expanded and re-enacted the original violence of dispossession and displacement of Oromos from the city thereby perpetrating a new wound before the historical wounds could heal. Had it not been for this contemporary constitutive mistake, this ‘original sin’ of constitutional drafting in 1995, there wouldn’t have been anything special about the special interest of Oromia. If there would be ‘special interest’, it would have been that of the Federal Government or the non-Oromo residents of the city. These twin mistakes of recent history led to events of dire consequence that continue to claim lives and limbs to date.
The Host made a Guest
Having made a guest out of the host through the legal fiction of excision, i.e., by excising the city out of the political and administrative jurisdiction of Oromia, it became necessary for Ethiopia, almost as an afterthought, to ‘concede’ a lame ‘special interest’ to Oromia in Art 49(5). Over the years, the government of Oromia and Oromos in general hung on this provision more as a symbolic rallying point to interrogate Ethiopia for what is actually beyond the specific content of the Oromo interest in the city.
To the Oromo public, the city became the metaphor for what Ethiopia has made of the Oromo in general: an invisible, non-speaking, non-acting other who inhabits the interior of the territory but the exterior of the polity. It became the concentrated expression of the ‘life’ and the agony of the Oromo in the Ethiopian polity: their present-absence and their absent presence at a time.
Today, the Federal State presided over the coalition of four parties that make up the EPRDF became the new empire in a federal form, and the leaders became the new emperors in a democratic-republican garb. This forced the quip from many commentators that in Ethiopia ‘plus ca change, plus c’est la meme chose’ (‘the more it changes, the more it remains the same’).
Hence, the wide Oromo discontent over the whole arrangement with regard to Addis Abeba. Taking advantage of the historic asymmetry in power, the city administration, mostly prompted by the federal government, has consistently acted in complete neglect or wilful defiance of the interests of Oromia and Oromos.
Legal Silence Exploited
Taking advantage of the undefined territorial boundary of the city, the administration continued to expand its competence over the suburbs surrounding Addis Abeba. Routinely, the Federal and the City Governments exploited the legal silence on the matter of special interest. Thus, the Addis Abeba Land Administration office often acted as the authority in charge of land administration in areas such as Labbuu, the Laga Xaafo-Marii continuum, Bole-Bulbula, Buraayyuu, Sabbata, Sululta, and districts beyond the Aqaqii-Qaallittii corridor (such as Galaan, Dukam, etc). The Federal Government continued to implement its industrialization policy by reserving Industrial Zones, Recreation Parks, and designated investment sites (much like Special Economic Zones). In doing all these things, the Federal Government and the city never took the trouble to consult with Oromia, much less the Oromo people. Evictions of farmers with little or no compensation became a routine practice.
Pollutions, Waste, Deforestation, Evictions
Pollutions from industrial emissions were sustained with no sense of accountability from the part of the city. Waste was dumped recklessly causing massive health risks. Deforestation and soil degradation was intensified in the neighboring districts, especially after the rise of investment in flower farms, dairy farms, and poultry farms. Homelessness of the evicted farmers and residents started to be felt among the people.
Oromia and Oromos Respond Resentfully: #Oromorprotests Emerges
The response from the Government of Oromia was late, but it did come in the form of a 2009 Caffee Oromia proclamation that established a Special Zone of 17 districts and 36 towns in the area. Its attempt at legislative articulation of the ‘Constitutional Special Interest of Oromia over Addis Ababa’ remained a draft to date. Its demand for enunciation of the content of the ‘special interest’ by the Constitutional Inquiry Council (CIC) was rejected on the ground that the CIC and the House of Federation do not give an advisory opinion in the absence of litigation.
Also, Oromo residents of the inner city resented the absence of Schools and cultural centers that operate in Afaan Oromo. The fact that the city has become anything but Oromo over the years made Oromo residents lament the complete cultural insensitivity to the needs of the Oromo in the city. Increasingly, the demand for schools in Afaan Oromo and cultural centers began to be vocally expressed in the last decade or two (resulting in efforts to construct an Oromo Cultural Centre and to open public schools that operate in Afaan Oromo)[6].
While such demands were gaining momentum steadily over the years, the Integrated Regional Development Plan (alias the Master Plan) was announced to the public in 2014. Immediately, it provoked a resistance in all corners of the Oromia region.
The day-to-day encroachment of Oromia’s jurisdiction with the informal expansion of the city; the general spill over effects of the city; its becoming the dumping ground for Addis Abeba waste for no gain; the pollution of the rivers, the soil, and the general environment of the surrounding districts and towns; the evictions with ‘compensations’ whose lower limits are legally left unregulated; the insensitivity to the cultural and linguistic needs of Oromo residents; the temperamental behaviour the Federal Government showed vis-à-vis Oromia’s claim to Addis Abeba as its capital city; these and other resentments fed the anger that emerged in the wake of the revelation of the Master Plan.
Apart from its violation of the principles of federalism and a healthy intergovernmental relation that should exist in a working federation, one of the reasons given for resisting the Master Plan was that it liquidates the ‘special interest’ of Oromia. As was noted above, the particulars envisaged to ‘be determined by law’ were never determined.
Giving Content to the ‘Special Interest’
According to art 49 (5), the articulation of the content of the ‘special interest’ is hoped to revolve around the meaning of four broad phrases:
‘Provision of social services’
‘Utilization of natural resources’
‘Joint administrative matters’
‘Other matters’ similar to provision of social services or utilization of natural resources.
In the endeavor to give content to the special interest clause, one is expected to interpret these phrases in a judicious manner that can also satisfy the popular discontent that was ignited into full manifestation in the protest to the Master Plan.
Social Services
In particular, we must identify the kind of social services that Addis Abeba should provide to Oromia. Normally, ‘social services’ connote services such as access to housing, education, health, water, transport, and other matters needed for achieving adequate living standards. From experience, we know that one of the unmet needs of Oromia in Addis Abeba is access to public buildings and properties for their offices and residential places for their officials and civil servants. And the need for designated plots of land on which to build houses for the employees of the state.
Organizing public schools that operate in Afaan Oromo is another kind of social service seen as a pressing need. Related but not often articulated is the need for building or making spaces for public libraries run in Afaan Oromo, exhibition centres, concert halls, theatres, museums, galleries, cinema halls, printing presses dedicated to the nurture and development of Oromo cultural lives, shows, performances, plays, memories, arts/paintings, movies, books, etc. This need to give attention to culture also requires the need for memorializing personalities and historical moments of the Oromo through naming streets, places, squares; and erecting statues. In addition, subsidizing Oromo arts and printing and publications as part of making the Oromo presence felt to anyone who comes to and inhabits the city is an important aspect of social service. In other words, the provision of social services also extends to the cultural representation of the Oromo in the life of the wider city.
Similarly, health facilities and other utilities such as public transport services that operate in Afaan Oromo should be considered part of the social services to be provided to Oromos. One way of addressing this could be making Afaan Oromo the co-equal working language of the City Government. The move to make Afaan Oromo and other languages to become working languages of the Federal Government will also help curb part of the problem of access to social services and facilities such as public transport, celebration and registration of vital events (birth, marriage, death, certification, authentication, licensing, etc).
Natural Resources
The proposed law must also clarify the type of ‘natural resources’ Addis Abeba has, resources that Oromia uses, and identify the modes in which it continues to use them. The effort to give content to this phrase becomes confounding when we note the fact that there is hardly any natural resource that the city offers to Oromia. Anything ‘natural’ in the city is ipso facto that of Oromia because the city itself is of Oromia anyway. The city actually is dependent on the natural resources of Oromia. Water, forest products, hydroelectric supply, minerals, sand, cement products, precious stones, food products, and everything else that Ethiopia (beyond and above Addis Abeba) needs come from outside of the city, Oromia and the other regions.
In the course of articulating this interest, one needs to consider the benefits Oromia should get from the delivery of these resources. One way of doing this is to agree on the percentage of income that should go back to Oromia’s revenue based on what is often called the principle of derivation in federal countries. If the federalism was properly functioning, this would have been handled through a negotiated channel of financial intergovernmental relations.
Joint Administration
The proposed law to be prepared must determine the scope and method of exercise of the envisaged ‘joint administration’. For this, we will first need to identify what tasks are matters for joint administration. Secondly, we need to decide who is responsible for what aspect of the administration. In the area of inter-jurisdictional roads (say maintenance); border management; managing trans-boundary forests, rivers, etc.; inter-jurisdictional legal cooperation (whose police takes responsibility for cross-border criminal activities); these and some such activities need to be spelt out.
One obvious area of joint administration is management of land. Because legislative power over land issues is a matter for the federal government and administration is for the States, issues such as town planning, mapping, cadastre, land redistribution among residents, designing construction regulations, etc should have been a matter for states, districts, and local/municipality governments. And in these areas, local governments of Oromia and the city administration (i.e., sub-cities and districts) could find some collaboration. Accordingly, the government of the state of Oromia and the government of the Addis Abeba City could coordinate their activities as they have overlapping jurisdictions (i.e., Oromia has a territorial jurisdiction while the city has a self-administrative jurisdiction) because the city is also the capital city of Oromia.
Ideally, ‘joint administration’ could have happened if the city was made accountable to the Government of Oromia rather than to the Federal Government. At the very least, joint administration could have been achieved through making the City government accountable to both the Federal and the Oromia governments. Settling on one of these options would mitigate the injustice of the original constitutional arrangement that: a) made Addis Abeba the capital city of the Federal government without the consent of Oromia and Oromos; and b) made the city’s self-government accountable exclusively to the Federal Government.
‘Other issues’
The meaning of the ‘other issues’ over which Oromia has a special interest is to be decided contextually on the basis of issues that rear their head in the course of day-to-day life experience. One cannot be definitive about the list of things to be included in this category.
However, twenty years of experience should have brought forth several such issues that may need to be specified while leaving others to the discretion of administrators subject to judicial review.
Who Takes Initiative?
Even assuming that the content of the ‘Special interest’ is clear, there is another issue left for us to determine: who comes up with the law that “determines” the “particulars”? Is it the Federal Government, the City Government, or the Government of Oromia? So far, the federal government had hesitated to legislate on the matter even in the face of a repeated demand by the government of the state of Oromia. That is of course because the federal government wants to exploit the ambiguity that remains because of the legal vacuum.
Legal silence is strategically deployed by the Federal and Addis Abeba Council to avoid their part of the obligation and to continue to enjoy what doesn’t rightfully belong to them in the absence of a law that proscribes it. Oromia’s attempt in the past (2006) to legislate on the matter could produce only a draft piece of legislation that couldn’t ultimately be presented to and passed by the Caffee Oromia.
Beyond the Content: Reconciled Relationship between the City, the Region, and the Country-Redemption via Relocation?
If there was an inclusive participatory constitutional moment that acknowledges the presence of the Oromo in the polis-to-be between 1992 and 1994, one or more of the following scenarios might have been negotiated:
a) Find a (new) site that is commonly agreed upon by all the constituent members of the Federation to be the Federal District Territory;
b) Designate another city in another State or in Oromia as the seat of the federal government accountable to that state;
c) Designate different cities that can serve as seats for the different branches of the Federal Government;
d) Agree to have a roving capital city for the federal government every decade or so;
e) Designate Addis Abeba as the capital city with a self-governing council ultimately accountable to Oromia—an essentially Oromo city in which the federal government may have some form of ‘special interest’
f) Designate Addis Abeba as a federal capital city whose self-governing council will be accountable to both the federal and the Oromia governments.
Towards a Redemptive Discourse
We all know that the constitution-making process was less ideal than one would hope for. It was marked by lack of legitimacy on procedural and substantive accounts.[7] The work required now, while attending to the immediate needs of giving content to the ‘joint administrative issues’, is to identify potential areas of constitutional amendments that would overcome the problems caused by original flaws in the constitution. This will force us to engage in—and engage the public with–what I called, elsewhere, a ‘redemptive constitutional discourse,’ a discourse that overcomes the deficits in original legitimacy, a discourse that ‘corrects’ the imperfect beginnings of the constitution by also attending to the trauma caused by inaugural violence with which the city was incorporated into, and made the capital of, the modern imperial Ethiopian state.
Relocating the Capital
While that is being done, the search for a lasting solution to the violent Ethio-Oromia relations, especially regarding Addis Abeba needs to begin and continue. In particular, it is imperative that we consider the possibility of relocating the Federal Government elsewhere. Removing the Federal government will help undo the trauma of the violent occupation at the moment of ‘founding’ and subsequent displacement of the Oromo through the ‘settlement’ of others. Relocation has the advantage of:
Dissolving the altercation over ownership of the city;
Securing the socio-cultural interests of the Oromo in the city;
Restoring full jurisdiction of Oromia over its territory;
Rescinding the legal excision of the city from the administrative jurisdiction of Oromia through the provision of article 49;
Enhancing the Oromo’s right to exercise of ultimate political power in the city;
Restoring the host, the Oromo, to its rightful position and securing the rights of the guests, the non-Oromo inhabitants, in a context of mutual recognition;
Arresting the continued lawless expansion of the city and the concomitant land grab, eviction, and ethnocide thereof;
Responding to, and thereby dissolving, the question of the so-called ‘special interests’ within the context of Oromia and Oromia alone;
Comprehensively responding to the demands of the #Oromoprotests whose rallying cry has been “Finfinnee belongs to Oromo” (“Finfinneen kan Oromooti!”).
The legal relocation of the Federal capital has more transformative potential for the entire polity than the obvious advantages outlined above. It is a restoration of Oromo agency and authority over the decision on what matters to their life in their land and in the wider country. The issue of choosing a negotiated site for a federal capital city is an opportunity to help the wider country to agonize over its history, its state system, its capacity to deal with historical injustice, and its hope of re-building the state on a fairer, more just, and more plural foundation. In short, it allows for a redemptive constitutional discourse to emerge.
It has to be explicitly stated however that to remove the Federal Government is not synonymous with removing the inhabitants of the city. The inhabitants will be part of Oromia and like all other people living in the wider Oromia, their rights shall be respected. Yes, there may be some people who work for the federal government institutions that may have to commute to and from work if they choose to continue living in Addis Abeba after the relocation of the capital. Yes, there will also be people who might move to the new capital altogether. But they don’t have to. No one has to. It is important to remember, incidentally, that not all the inhabitants of the city are employees of the Federal Government as such. The federal Government is merely its institutions, agencies, and its workers. That is not the (entire) population of the city.
Pending Redemption…Shift Accountability
Until that is done through constitutional revision or amendment, it may be necessary to consider the shift of accountability of the city government from the Federal to the Oromia government. It may be imperative for the Federal Government to start paying rent to the Oromia government as a token of acknowledgement to their being hosted by Oromia.
The quest for a lasting solution should start with identifying unconstitutional laws and policies that violate Oromia’s rights and special interests. Laws such as the one that promulgated the Addis Abeba Charter of 2003 (Proc. 361/2003, especially its article 5), the Investment Amendment Proclamation of 2014 (Proc. 849/2014, especially its provisions regarding ‘Industrial Development Zones), and projects like the World Bank sponsored Industrial Zone Projects (such as the Resettlement Action Plan [of] the Qilinxo Industrial Zone (April 2015) should all be rescinded.
New laws may need to be issued. An example is a proclamation that governs the lowest threshold for rates and modes of compensation awarded to a farmer in the event of eviction from her/his land. To be sure, there was a 2005 Proclamation (Proc. 455/2005) that provides for expropriation of land holdings and compensation. However, this proclamation, apart from enhancing the dispossessive regulatory and police powers of the Ministry of Federal Affairs, federal and local governments, and of several other agencies, it says little about the substance of the compensation, especially for collective landholdings (about which it says nothing). Needless, to say, as the actual practice of expropriation has routinely demonstrated, even the normative gesture in the law of providing a replacement remains to be more a legal rhetoric than an actual reality, more a juridical promise than a political practice.
Not so Special
Recognition of special interest is exception-making. Through a ‘special interest’ package, a rightful entity extends some rights, as part of underserved acts of grace, to another that cannot lay claim to these rights. To Oromia and Oromos, there is hardly anything special about the ‘special interest’. The city is naturally and intrinsically part of Oromia. As such, Oromos and Oromia have pre-eminence over the city. They lay claim over the city as their own natural territory. Oromo interests are not supposed to be granted to them by others as some kind of favor. They have the more fundamental right of an owner. As such, they do not need others to make exception in their favor in order to guarantee the protection of the interest of the Oromo in the city. If anything, it is the Oromo that should make exception to the other inhabitants in granting them, for instance, the right of self-government at the municipal level. In other words, if anything was to be ‘special’, it was the ‘interest’ of other peoples who live in the city that should have been so designated as to constitute the ‘special interest’ of non-Oromos in this inherently and primarily Oromo city.
However, owing to the legacy of imperial conquest and violent occupation of the city and the consequent dispossession and displacement of the Oromo from the city, it is now the guests that are extending (and so far denying) the ‘special interest’ of the hosts. This is a testament to the total lack of self-awareness on the part of the Federal and City Governments about the land they stand on. It is a testament to their moral blindness and (and the consequent incapacity) to pay attention, to see the original owners of the land, and to recognize their natural rights thereof. The result is the failure to understand the pain of dispossession and relentless quest of the Oromo for restoration.
The more consequential result is that this moral blindness is blocking the redemption of the relationship between the city (Addis Abeba), the Region (Oromia), and the Country (Ethiopia). That is why it comes as no surprise that the contestation over the city is pivotal to the making or breaking of the Ethiopian state in our own time. AS
ED’s Note: Tsegaye R Ararssa, Melbourne Law School. Email: tsegayer@gmail.com.
[1] The substance of most of these reflections were extensively discussed elsewhere. Here, in most sections, I present a rehash of those reflections. See Tsegaye Ararssa, “The Special Interest in Addis Ababa: The Affirmation of Denial,” Addis Standard (Jan 18, 2016) available at http://addisstandard.com/the-special-interest-the-affirmation-of-denial/.
[2] Technically speaking, this government which needed a special—emergency–measures to secure peace and stability, does not have a legal mandate to enact a law before repealing the emergency declaration and calling the army back to its barracks. Nor does it command a moral authority to make a legislation for the people it killed, maimed, arrested, detained, and tortured unaccountably only because they protested.
[3]William Harris, The Highlands of Ethiopia (1844).
[4] Alexander Bulatovic, Ethiopia through Russian Eyes: A Country in Transition, 1896-1898 (Richard Seltzer, Tr), (2000).
Olympic marathon silver medalist Feyisa Lilesa finished second at the Houston Half-Marathon on January 15, 2017, with a time of 61:14 – only a fraction of a second behind the front runner Leonard Korir. The thrilling battle between Lilesa and Korir at the finish line is captured below.
Feyisa Lilesa had, once again, shown the #OromoProtests symbol of “X” (crossing the hands over the head) as he crossed the finish line in Houston. This symbol of the #OromoProtests has been officially deemed illegal by the Ethiopian government since the declaration of the six-month State of Emergency on October 9, 2016 – a week after the Bishoftu Massacre, where hundreds of Oromos were murdered by the Ethiopian army during the UNESCO-recognized Irreecha Oromo cultural and religious festival.
After the race, during a reception thrown by the local community in Houston to honor him, Feyisa Lilesa spoke with Seife-Nebelbal, an online Oromo radio broadcast in Amharic, about his continued use of the symbol of the #OromoProtests at the finish line; Lilesa said he would continue to protest until freedom and democracy dawn in Ethiopia. Below are the interview and some photos from the reception (courtesy of journalist Ebba Abbamurti from the Lone Star State).
Olympics medalist marathoner Feyisa Lilesa lowers his head after being asked about his home country Ethiopia after the Chevron Houston Marathon press conference at the George R. Brown Convention Center, Friday, Jan. 13, 2017, in Houston. ( Marie D. De Jesus / Houston Chronicle )
He’s the loneliest of long-distance runners, a man far removed from his country and his family. These days, Feyisa Lilesa runs not for personal glory but for emotional therapy and for a purpose he believes to be far bigger than himself.
Internet and mobile phone networks were repeatedly disrupted around the country, particularly in the Oromia region during antigovernment protests that began in November 2015(see Restrictions on Connectivity).
Social media and communications platforms were temporarily blocked several times to restrict information about antigovernment protests and police brutality(see Blocking and Filtering).
News websites were newly blocked for reporting on the Oromo protests and a severe drought, adding to a growing blacklist (see Blocking and Filtering).
In May 2016, blogger Zelalem Workagenehu was sentenced to over five years in prison for leading a digital security course (see Prosecutions and Arrests for Online Activities).
Prosecutors challenged the release of members of the Zone 9 blogging collective, after they were acquitted of terrorism charges in 2015 (see Prosecutions and Arrests for Online Activities).
Introduction:
Internet freedom declined in the past year as the government cracked down on antigovernment protests and the digital tools citizens used to organize them.
Starting in the Oromo region in November 2015 as a protest against the authoritarian government’s plan to infringe on land belonging to the marginalized Oromia people, the movement spread across the country in the subsequent months, turning into unprecedented demonstrations seeking regime change and democratic reform.
In a heavy-handed response, the authorities frequently shutdown local and national internet and mobile phone networks to prevent citizens from communicating about the protests. Social media platforms and communications apps such as Facebook, Twitter, Skype, and IMO were also temporarily blocked at different times. In October 2016, the government imposed a six-month state of emergency on October 17, resulting in another internet shutdown lasting several days. Under the state of emergency, accessing or posting content related to the protests on social media and efforts to communicate with “outside forces” are criminal offenses.
News websites and blogs reporting on the protests were permanently blocked in 2015 and 2016. Separately, critical news about the current drought—the worst the country has experienced in 50 years—was systematically censored. Meanwhile, the authorities arrested and prosecuted several bloggers, sentencing blogger Zelalem Workagenehu to five years in prison in May 2016. He was convicted of conspiring to overthrow the government for facilitating a course on digital security. The government’s persecution of the Zone 9 bloggers continued. Though four of the bloggers were acquitted in October 2015, the prosecutor appealed their release to the Supreme Court, and they were repeatedly summoned throughout the year.
The legal environment for internet freedom became more restrictive under the Computer Crime Proclamation enacted in June 2016, which criminalizes defamation and incitement. The proclamation also strengthens the government’s surveillance capabilities by enabling real-time monitoring or interception of communications.
Internet and mobile phone networks were deliberately disrupted in many parts of the country throughout the year, particularly in the Oromia region during largescale antigovernment protests that erupted in November 2015. Meanwhile, poor infrastructure, obstructionist telecom policies, and a government monopoly on the ICT sector make ICT services prohibitively expensive for the majority of the population.
Availability and Ease of Access
Ethiopia is one of the least connected countries in the world with an internet penetration rate of only 12 percent, according to 2015 data from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU).1 Mobile phone penetration is also poor at 43 percent, up from just 32 percent in 2014.2 Low penetration rates stem from underdeveloped telecommunications infrastructure, which is almost entirely absent from rural areas, where about 85 percent of the population resides. A handful of signal stations service the entire country, resulting in network congestion and frequent disconnection.3 In a typical small town, individuals often hike to the top of the nearest hill to find a mobile phone signal.
Access to ICT services remains prohibitively expensive for most Ethiopians, largely due to the government’s monopoly over the telecom sector, which provides consumers with few options. Prices are set by state-controlled EthioTelecom and kept artificially high.4 Price cuts announced in February 2016 mitigated some of the financial strain,5 bringing mobile internet prices to ETB 5 (US$ 0.25) per day for 25 MB of data or ETB 3,000 (US$ 140) per month for 30 GB. Nonetheless, the lower cost 25 MB package is extremely limited considering a standard Google search uses up to 79 KB alone. Regularly loading websites containing 1 GB of multimedia content could cost US$ 9 a day. William Davison, Bloomberg’s Ethiopia correspondent, described the issue on Facebook in March 2016: “It cost me 44 birr ($2.05) to watch Al Jazeera’s latest 3-minute dispatch on Oromo protests using 4G network on my phone, which is not that much less than the average daily wage of a daily laborer in Ethiopia.”6Ethiopians can spend an average of US$85 per month for limited mobile or fixed wireless internet access. Better quality services in neighboring Kenya and Uganda cost less than US$30 a month.
Telecommunication devices, connection fees and other related costs are also beyond the means of many Ethiopians. As a result, Ethiopia has among the lowest smartphone ownership rates in the world at only 4 percent according to a recent Pew survey.7 In April 2016, EthioTelecom proposed a new pricing scheme to charge more for the use of popular Voice-over-IP (VoIP) platforms such as Viber and Facebook Messenger on mobile devices.8 This would make smartphone usage even more expensive.
Consequently, the majority of internet users still rely on cybercafés for internet access. A typical internet user in Addis Ababa pays between ETB 5 and 7 (US$ 0.25 to 0.35) for an hour of access.Because of the scarcity of internet cafes outside urban areas, however, rates in rural cybercafés are higher. In addition, digital literacy rates are generally low.
For the few Ethiopians who can access the internet, connection speeds have been painstakingly slow for years, despite the rapid technological advances improving service quality in other countries. In a test conducted in the capital Addis Ababa,9 the average connection speed during one week in March 2016 was 1.2 Mbps—five times slower than the average 5.5 Mbps connection speed in Kenya. According to Akamai, the average connection speed in Ethiopia was 3 Mbps in the first quarter of 2016, significantly lower than the global average of 6.3 Mbps (Kenya’s average speed was documented at 7.3 Mbps in the same period).10
In practice, such speeds result in extremely sluggish download times, even of simple images. Logging into an email account and opening a single message can take as long as five minutes at a standard cybercafé with broadband in the capital city, while attaching documents or images to an email can take eight minutes or more.11 On mobile connections, Akamai found Ethiopia had the world’s slowest average load time, at 8.5 seconds.12
Compounding Ethiopia’s onerous access issues, severe drought in 2015 and 2016 has had a negative impact on the country’s hydroelectric electricity production,13 resulting in frequent and extended power outages that limit users’ ability to access the internet even further.14
Restrictions on Connectivity
The Ethiopian government’s monopolistic control over the country’s telecommunications infrastructure via EthioTelecom enables it to restrict information flows and access to internet and mobile phone services. In 2015–16, the flow of online traffic into, within, and out of Ethiopia registered a significant decline, likely as a result of network throttling, repeated internet shutdowns, and increased blocking.
As a landlocked country, Ethiopia has no direct access to submarine cable landing stations; thus, it connects to the international internet via satellite, a fiber-optic cable that passes through Sudan and connects to its international gateway, and the SEACOM cable that connects through Djibouti to an international undersea cable. All connections to the international internet are completely centralized via EthioTelecom, enabling the government to cut off the internet at will.
Internet and mobile phone networks were disrupted in many parts of the country throughout the year. Oromia, the largest of the federal republic’s nine regional states, has experienced frequent telecom network since November 2015 saw the start of largescale demonstrations against the government’s plan to appropriate Oromia territory.15 The protest movement escalated and remained ongoing in late 2016, leading the government to declare a six-month state of emergency and shut down mobile internet services nationwide for several days in October.16
In an incident unrelated to the protests, internet services on computers and mobile devices were shut down for 24 hours in July 2016, ostensibly to prevent students from cheating during national university exams.17
The ICT shutdowns have been costly. Network disruptions between July 1, 2015 and June 30, 2016 cost Ethiopia’s economy over US$ 8.5 million, according to the Brookings Institution.18
ICT Market
The space for independent initiatives in the ICT sector, entrepreneurial or otherwise, is extremely limited,19 with state-owned EthioTelecom holding a firm monopoly over internet and mobile phone services as the country’s sole telecommunications service provider. Despite repeated international pressure to liberalize telecommunications in Ethiopia, the government refuses to ease its grip on the sector.20
China is a key investor in Ethiopia’s telecommunications industry,21 with Zhongxing Telecommunication Corporation (ZTE) and Huawei currently serving as contractors to upgrade broadband networks to 4G in Addis Ababa and expand 3G networks elsewhere.22 The partnership has enabled Ethiopia’s authoritarian leaders to maintain their hold over the telecom sector,23though the networks built by the Chinese firms have been criticized for their high cost and poor service.24 Furthermore, the contracts have led to increasing fears that the Chinese may also be assisting the authorities in developing more robust ICT censorship and surveillance capacities (see Surveillance, Privacy, and Anonymity).25 In December 2014, the Swedish telecom group Ericsson also partnered with the government to improve and repair the mobile network infrastructure,26 though ZTE remains the sector’s largest investor.
Onerous government regulations also stymie other aspects of the Ethiopian ICT market. For one, imported ICT items are tariffed at the same high rate as luxury items, unlike other imported goods such as construction materials and heavy duty machinery, which are given duty-free import privileges to encourage investments in infrastructure.27 Ethiopians are required register their laptops and tablets at the airport with the Ethiopian customs authority before they travel out of the country, ostensibly to prevent individuals from illegally importing electronic devices, though observers believe the requirement enables officials to monitor citizens’ ICT activities by accessing the devices without consent.28
Local software companies also suffer from heavy-handed government regulations, which do not have fair, open, or transparent ways of evaluating and awarding bids for new software projects.29 Government companies are given priority for every kind of project, while smaller entrepreneurial software companies are completely overlooked, leaving few opportunities for local technology companies to thrive.
Cybercafés are subject to burdensome operating requirements under the 2002 Telecommunications (Amendment) Proclamation,30 which prohibit them from providing Voice-over-IP (VoIP) services, and mandate that owners obtain a license from EthioTelecom via an opaque process that can take months. In the past few years, EthioTelecom began enforcing its licensing requirements more strictly in response to the increasing spread of cybercafés, reportedly penalizing Muslim cafe owners more harshly. Violations of the requirements entail criminal liability, though no cases have been reported.31
Regulatory Bodies
Since the emergence of the internet in Ethiopia, the Ethiopian Telecommunications Agency (ETA) has been the primary regulatory body overseeing the telecommunications sector. In practice, government executives have complete control over ICT policy and sector regulation.32 The Information Network Security Agency (INSA), a government agency established in 2011 and controlled by individuals with strong ties to the ruling regime,33 also has significant power in regulating the internet under the mandate of protecting the communications infrastructure and preventing cybercrime.
News websites known for their reporting on the Oromo protests joined Ethiopia’s growing list of blocked content, while social media and communications platforms were blocked for periods of time throughout the coverage period for their role in disseminating information about the demonstrations and police brutality. The government manipulates online content, disseminating propaganda to convince Ethiopians that social media is a dangerous tool co-opted by opposition groups to spread hate and violence.
Blocking and Filtering
One of the first African countries to censor the internet,34 Ethiopia has a nationwide, politically motivated internet blocking and filtering regime that is reinforced during sensitive political events. More websites were newly blocked during the Oromia protests that began in November 2015. Targets included the websites of US-based diaspora satellite television stations such as Ethiopian Satellite Television (ESAT) and the Oromo Media Network (OMN), which provided wall-to-wall coverage of the antigovernment protests. Ayyantuu.net and Opride.com, prominent websites also known for their reporting on the protests, were also blocked.35
In an apparent attempt to restrict news about the protests from spreading, social media and file-sharing platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, and Dropbox were repeatedly blocked for periods of time throughout the protests.36 The blocks on social media first impacted networks in the Oromia region but later spread to other regions,37 and eventually manifested in a shutdown of entire internet and mobile networks for days a time (see Restrictions on Connectivity).
Unrelated to the protests, the authorities blocked access to social media and communications platforms, including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Viber, IMO, and Google+, to prevent cheating during university examinations on July 9 and 10, 2016.38 The blocks followed a 24-hour internet blackout for the same reason (see Restrictions on Connectivity). A government spokesperson stated that blocking social media during the exam would help students concentrate. However, some progovernment media organizations and commentators seemed to have exclusive access to social media during the block,39 which reinforced the belief that the government imposes restrictions on citizens while keeping the web open for its own advantage. Viber and IMO, two popular voice-over-IP applications, remained blocked until July 20, according to local sources.40
Separately, coverage of a severe drought—the worst the country has experienced in 50 years—was systematically censored in the past year, with news websites and blogs blocked for reporting on the impact of the disaster that strayed from the government’s official narrative.41
In total, over one hundred websites are inaccessible in Ethiopia.42 A manual test conducted on the ground in mid-2016 confirmed that a large number of the websites tested by Freedom House each year since 2012 remained blocked. Blocked sites include Ethiopian news websites, political party websites, and the websites of international digital rights organizations, such as the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Tactical Technology Collective. Select tools such as text messaging appsand services on Google’s Android operating system on smartphones were also inaccessible, but at irregular intervals and for unclear reasons.43
Notably, several websites that hadn’t been updated for years and appeared abandoned became accessible again in 2016, likely because the authorities deemed them no longer threatening. The social media curation tool Storify—first blocked in July 201244—was also newly accessible during the coverage period,45 in addition to the URL shortening tool Bit.ly.46
To filter the internet, specific internet protocol (IP) addresses or domain names are generally blocked at the level of the EthioTelecom-controlled international gateway. Deep-packet inspection (DPI) is also employed, which blocks websites based on a keyword in the content of a website or communication (such as email).47
Digital security tools are also pervasively blocked in Ethiopia, including Tor, the circumvention tool that enables users to browse anonymously, which been blocked since May 2012.48 As social media platforms were blocked in the past year, diaspora-based activists publicized virtual private networks (VPNs) to circumvent the censorship, but certain VPNs were also subsequently blocked.49 Local sources suspected progovernment commenters were flagging the same tools to be blocked by the authorities. The Amharic translation of the Electronic Frontier Foundations’ “Surveillance Self-Defense” web guide was blocked two weeks after it was published in October 2015.50 One source reported that key terms such as “proxy” yield no search results on unencrypted search engines,51 reflecting the government’s efforts to limit users’ access to circumvention tools and strategies.
Some restrictions are also placed on content transmitted via mobile phones. Text messages to more than ten recipients require prior approval from EthioTelecom.52 A bulk text message sent without prior approval is automatically blocked, irrespective of the content.
There are no procedures for determining which websites are blocked or why, precluding any avenues for appeal. There are no published lists of blocked websites or publicly available criteria for how such decisions are made, and users are met with an error message when trying to access blocked content. The decision-making process does not appear to be controlled by a single entity, as various government bodies—including the Information Network Security Agency (INSA), EthioTelecom, and the ICT ministry—seem to be implementing their own lists, contributing to a phenomenon of inconsistent blocking. This lack of transparency is exacerbated by the government’s continued denial of its censorship efforts. Government officials flatly deny the blocking of websites or jamming of international satellite operations while also stating that the government has a legal and a moral responsibility to protect the Ethiopian public from extremist content.
Content Removal
Politically objectionable content is often targeted for removal, often by way of threats from security officials who personally seek out users and bloggers to instruct them to take down certain content, particularly critical content on Facebook. The growing practice suggests that at least some voices within Ethiopia’s small online community are being closely monitored. For instance, during the various legal proceedings involving the Zone 9 bloggers in 2015, friends and reporters who posted pictures and accounts of the trials on social media were briefly detained and asked to remove the posts.53 During protests in Oromia, activists who wrote messages of solidarity for the protestors on Facebook were also asked to delete their posts.54
Media, Diversity, and Content Manipulation
Lack of adequate funding is a significant challenge for independent online media in Ethiopia, as fear of government pressure dissuades local businesses from advertising with politically critical websites. A 2012 Advertising Proclamation also prohibits advertisements from firms “whose capital is shared by foreign nationals.”55 The process for launching a website on the local .et domain is expensive and demanding,56 requiring a business license from the Ministry of Trade and Industry and a permit from an authorized body.57 While the domestic Ethiopian blogosphere has been expanding, most blogs are hosted on international platforms or published by members of the diaspora community.
Despite Ethiopia’s extremely low levels of internet access, the government employs an army of trolls to distort Ethiopia’s online information landscape.58 Opposition groups, journalists, and dissidents use the contemptuous Amharic colloquial term, “Kokas,” to describe the progovernment commentators.59 Observers say the Kokas regularly discuss Ethiopia’s economic growth in favorable terms and post uncomplimentary comments about Ethiopian journalists and opposition groups on Facebook and Twitter. In return, they are known to receive benefits such as money, land, and employment promotions.
The government also manipulates online content through propaganda that aims to convince Ethiopians that social media is a dangerous tool co-opted by opposition groups to spread hate and violence.60 That characterization has been debunked by research. The University of Oxford and Addis Ababa University analyzed thousands of comments made by Ethiopians on Facebook during general election in 2015, finding that hate speech was a marginal proportion of the total comments assessed.61
Meanwhile, increasing repression against journalists and bloggers has had a major chilling effect on expression online, particularly in response to the spate of blogger arrests that have increased in the past few years (see Prosecutions and Detentions for Online Activities). Many bloggers publish anonymously to avoid reprisals.62 Fear of pervasive surveillance has also led to widespread self-censorship. Local newspapers and web outlets primarily publish reporting by regime critics and opposition organizations in the diaspora. Few independent local journalists will write for either domestic or overseas online outlets due to the threat of repercussions.
Digital Activism
Despite oppressive conditions caused by poor access and the hostile legal environment, online activism has gained considerable momentum and influence in the past year, particularly as traditional media coverage of current events has become increasingly narrow and dominated by pro-government voices. Notably, social media and communications platforms helped tech-savvy Ethiopians launch the widespread antigovernment protests in the Oromia region in November 2015. Online tools have been essential to the #OromoProtests movement, enabling activists to post information about the demonstrations and disseminate news about police brutality as the government cracked down on protesters.63 The use of such tools to fuel the protest movement led the government to block access to several platforms throughout the year, and shut down internet and mobile networks altogether (see Blocking and Filtering and Restrictions on Connectivity).
The new Computer Crime Proclamation enacted in June 2016 criminalizes defamation and incitement; observers say it could be invoked to suppress digital mobilization. The proclamation also strengthens the government’s surveillance capabilities by enabling real-time monitoring or interception of communications. Several bloggers were arrested and prosecuted, with one blogger sentenced to five years in prison, while prosecutors challenged the acquittal of the Zone 9 bloggers.
Legal Environment
Fundamental freedoms are guaranteed for Ethiopian internet users on paper, but the guarantees are routinely flouted in practice. The 1995 Ethiopian constitution provides for freedom of expression, freedom of the press, and access to information, while also prohibiting censorship.64 These constitutional guarantees are affirmed in the 2008 Mass Media and Freedom of Information Proclamation, known as the press law, which governs the print media.65 Nevertheless, the press law also includes problematic provisions that contradict constitutional protections and restrict free expression, such as complex registration processes for media outlets and high fines for defamation.66 The Criminal Code also penalizes defamation with a fine or up to one year in prison.67
Meanwhile, several laws are designed to restrict and penalize legitimate online activities and speech.
Most alarmingly, the 2012 Telecom Fraud Offences Law extends the violations and penalties defined in the 2009 Anti-Terrorism Proclamation and criminal code to electronic communications, which explicitly include both mobile phone and internet services.68 The antiterrorism legislation prescribes prison sentences of up to 20 years for the publication of statements that can be understood as a direct or indirect encouragement of terrorism, which is vaguely defined.69 The law also bans Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services such as Skype70 and requires all individuals to register their telecommunications equipment—including smartphones—with the government, which security officials typically enforce at security checkpoints by confiscating ICT equipment if the owner cannot produce a registration permit, according to sources in the country.
In June 2016, the Ethiopian government passed a new Computer Crime Proclamation that criminalized an array of online activities.71 Civil society expressed concern that the law would be used to further crackdown on critical commentary, political opposition, and social unrest.72 For example, content that “incites fear, violence, chaos or conflict among people” can be punished with up to three years in prison, which could be abused to suppress digital campaigns.73 Other problematic provisions ban the dissemination of defamatory content, which can be penalized with up to 10 years in prison,74 and the distribution of unsolicited messages to multiple emails (spam), which carries up to five years in prison.75
To quell escalating antigovernment protests that began in the Oromia region in November 2015, the government imposed a six-month state of emergency on October 17, 2016 that included restrictions on certain online activities.76 In addition to shutting down the internet for several days, the authorities criminalized the access and posting of content related to the protests on social media, as well as efforts to communicate with “terrorist” groups, a category that includes exiled dissidents. Penalties for violating the state of emergency include prison terms of three to five years.77
Prosecutions and Detention for Online Activities
In the past few years, the authorities have intensified their crackdown against bloggers and online journalists, using harsh laws to arrest and prosecute individuals for their online activities and silence dissent. The most high-profile prosecutions were against six bloggers from the critical Zone 9 blogging collective, who were arrested in April 2014,78 and charged with terrorism under the harsh Anti-Terrorism Proclamation in July.79 The bloggers were accused of intent to overthrow the government, an offense under the criminal code, by encrypting their communications to disseminate seditious writings.80
Despite widespread international condemnation, the detainees were denied bail and brought to court dozens of times for over a year,81 until two of them were unexpectedly released without charge in early July 2015, immediately before U.S. President Obama visited Ethiopia. The four remaining Zone 9 bloggers were acquitted in October 2015,82 though they were barred from leaving the country.83 The prosecutor contested their acquittal and appealed to the Supreme Court, and the four were summoned in December 2015 and in October 2016.84 They were scheduled to return to court in November 2016.85
Several other bloggers were arrested and prosecuted in the past year, including Getachew Shiferaw, editor-in-chief of the online newspaper Negere Ethiopia, in December 2015.86Negere Ethiopia is known for its affiliation with the opposition as well as its coverage of the Zone 9 trials. Shiferaw remained in pretrial detention in mid-2016.87
The prominent opposition member Yonatan Tesfaye was arrested in December 2015 and charged with terrorism based on Facebook posts that criticized the government’s handling of the Oromia protests.88 He remained in prison in mid-2016 and faces the death sentence if convicted.89 Tesfaye’s Twitter handle has been active during his detention, leading to suspicions that the officials have been using his account to bait potential dissidents.90
In April 2016, blogger Zelalem Workagenehu was found guilty of terrorism and sentenced to over five years in prison in May.91 He was first arrested in July 2014 on charges of conspiring to overthrow the government after he facilitated a course on digital security. In the same trial, bloggers Yonatan Wolde and Bahiru Degu were acquitted after spending nearly two years in detention on terrorism charges; they were also arrested in July 2014 for applying to participate in Workaegnehu’s digital security course.92 Workagenehu has appealed to the Supreme Court.93
The ongoing antigovernment protest movement has also led to numerous arrests, some for digital activities, including posting or “liking” social media content about the protests. In October 2016, police arrested Seyoum Teshome, a well-known academic and blogger for the Ethiothinktank.com website who had published an article about the Oromia protest movement inThe New York Times.94
Meanwhile, the well-known dissident journalist and blogger Eskinder Nega is serving an 18-year prison sentence handed down in July 2012 under the draconian anti-terrorism law for criticizing the law itself in an online article.95
Surveillance, Privacy, and Anonymity
Government surveillance of online and mobile phone communications is pervasive in Ethiopia and was strengthened under the new Computer Crime Proclamation enacted in June 2016, which enables real-time monitoring or interception of communications authorized by the Minister of Justice and obliges service providers to store records of all communications and metadata for at least a year.96
There are strong indications that the government has deployed a centralized monitoring system developed by the Chinese telecommunications firm ZTE to monitor mobile phone networks and the internet, according to a 2015 Human Rights Watch report.97 Known for its use by repressive regimes in Libya and Iran, the monitoring system enables deep packet inspection (DPI) of internet traffic across the EthioTelecom network and has the ability to intercept emails and web chats.
Another ZTE technology, known as ZSmart, is a customer management database installed at EthioTelecom that provides the government with full access to user information and the ability to intercept SMS text messages and record phone conversations.98 ZSmart also allows security officials to locate targeted individuals through real-time geolocation tracking of mobile phones.99 While the extent to which the government has made use of the full range of ZTE’s sophisticated surveillance systems is unclear, the authorities frequently present intercepted emails and phone calls as evidence during trials against journalists and bloggers or during interrogations as a scare tactic.100
Meanwhile, exiled dissidents have been targeted by surveillance malware. Citizen Lab research published in March 2015 said Remote Control System (RCS) spyware had been used against two employees of Ethiopian Satellite Television Service (ESAT) in November and December 2014. ESAT is a diaspora-run independent satellite television, radio, and online news media outlet, based in Alexandria, Virginia.101 Made by the Italian company Hacking Team, RCS spyware is advertised as “offensive technology” sold exclusively to law enforcement and intelligence agencies around the world, and has the ability to steal files and passwords and intercept Skype calls and chats.102
While Hacking Team has said that the company does not deal with “repressive regimes,”103 the social engineering tactics used to bait the two ESAT employees made it clear that the attack was targeted. Moreover, analysis of the RCS attacks uncovered credible links to the Ethiopian government, with the spyware’s servers registered at an EthioTelecom address under the name “INSA-PC,” referring to the Information Network Security Agency (INSA), the body established in 2011 to preside over the security of the country’s critical communications infrastructure.104 INSA was already known to be using the commercial toolkit FinFisher to target dissidents and supposed national security threats. FinFisher can secretly monitor computers by turning on webcams, record everything a user types with a key logger, and intercept Skype calls.105
Given the high degree of online repression in Ethiopia, political commentators use proxy servers and anonymizing tools to hide their identities when publishing online and to circumvent filtering, though the tools are also subject to blocking (see Blocking and Filtering).
Anonymity is further compromised by strict SIM card registration requirements. Upon purchase of a SIM card through EthioTelecom or an authorized reseller, individuals must provide their full name, address, government-issued identification number, and a passport-sized photograph. EthioTelecom’s database of SIM registrants enables the government to terminate individuals’ SIM cads and restrict them from registering for new ones. Internet subscribers are also required to register their personal details, including their home address, with the government. During the antigovernment protests in 2016, state-owned ICT provider EthioTelecom announced plans to require mobile phones to be purchased from Ethiopian companies and to create a tracking system for all mobile devices in Ethiopia. Observers believe the plan aims to allow the government to track and identify all communications from subscribers on its network.106
While the government’s stronghold over the Ethiopian ICT sector enables it to proactively monitor users, its access is less direct at cybercafés. For a period following the 2005 elections, cybercafé owners were required to keep a register of their clients, but the requirement has not been enforced since mid-2010.107 Nevertheless, some cybercafé operators have reported that they are required to report “unusual behavior” to security officials, who also visit cybercafés (sometimes in plainclothes) to ask questions about individuals or monitor activity themselves.108
Intimidation and Violence
Government security agents frequently harass and intimidate bloggers, online journalists, and ordinary users for their online activities. Independent bloggers are often summoned by the authorities to be warned against discussing certain topics online, while activists report that they are regularly threatened by state security agents.109 Ethiopian journalists in the diaspora have also been targeted for harassment.110
Amidst escalating antigovernment protests in 2015 and 2016, the authorities reportedly harassed, detained, and abused several people who used their mobile phones to record footage of demonstrations.
Meanwhile, imprisoned bloggers reported being held in degrading conditions and tortured by prison guards seeking to extract false confessions.111 Yonatan Wolde and Bahiru Degu were re-arrested shortly after their acquittal in April 2016 and released the next day, reporting that officials had threatened their lives.112
Technical Attacks
Opposition critics and independent voices face frequent technical attacks, even when based abroad. Independent research has found that Ethiopian authorities have used sophisticated surveillance malware and spyware, such as FinFisher’s FinSpy and Hacking Team’s Remote Control Servers (RCS), to target exiled dissidents.113
There were no reports of technical attacks against human rights defenders or dissidents during the coverage period, though hacktivists launched attacks on government websites, including the Ministry of Defense, as a form of digital protest alongside the largescale Oromo demonstrations.114 Meanwhile, the Information Network Security Agency (INSA) reported that they had foiled at least 155 cyberattacks in 2015. Critics said they used the data to justify cracking down on the internet.115
Notes:
1 International Telecommunication Union, “Percentage of Individuals Using the Internet, 2000-2015,” http://bit.ly/1cblxxY
2 International Telecommunication Union, “Mobile-Cellular Telephone Subscriptions, 2000-2015,” http://bit.ly/1cblxxY
3 Endalk Chala, “When blogging is held hostage of Ethiopia’s telecom policy,” in “GV Advocacy Awards Essays on Internet Censorship from Iran, Venezuela, Ethiopia,” Global Voices (blog), February 3, 2015, http://bit.ly/1OpDvzz
4Ethiopia – Telecoms, Mobile, Broadband and Forecasts, Paul Budde Communication Pty Ltd.: June 2014, http://bit.ly/1ji15Rn
9 Test conducted by Freedom House researcher in March 2016. While the speed test should not be interpreted as a standard speed for the entire EthioTelecom network speeds, the data we gathered from a repeated speed tests over a span of a week from March 16 to March 21, 2016 suggest that Ethiopia’s average speed lags behind the average speed of the region. Nearly same figures were reported by speed-test services such as http://testmy.net and http://www.dospeedtest.com.
10 Akamai, “Average Connection Speed,” map visualization, The State of the Internet, Q1 2016, accessed August 1, 2016, http://akamai.me/1LiS6KD
11 According to tests by Freedom House consultant in 2016.
19 Al Shiferaw, “Connecting Telecentres: An Ethiopian Perspective,” Telecentre Magazine, September 2008, http://bit.ly/1ji348h.
20 “Ethio Telecom to remain monopoly for now,” TeleGeography, June 28, 2013, http://bit.ly/1huyjf7
21 Paul Chapman, “New report explores the Ethiopian – telecoms, mobile and broadband – market insights, statistics and forecasts,” WhatTech, May 1, 2015, http://bit.ly/1L46Awu.
24 Matthew Dalton, “Telecom Deal by China’s ZTE, Huawei in Ethiopia Faces Criticism,” The Wall Street Journal, January 6, 2014, http://on.wsj.com/1LtSCkD.
25 Based on allegations that the Chinese authorities have provided the Ethiopian government with technology that can be used for political repression—such as surveillance cameras and satellite jamming equipment—in the past. See: Addis Neger, “Ethiopia: China Involved in ESAT Jamming,” ECADAF Ethiopian news & Opinion, June 23, 2010, http://bit.ly/1LtSYI9; Gary Sands, “Ethiopia’s Broadband Network – A Chinese Trojan Horse?” Foreign Policy Blogs, Foreign Policy Association, September 6, 2013, http://bit.ly/1FWG8X1.
26 ENA, “Ericsson to take part in telecom expansion in Ethiopia,” Dire Tube, December 18, 2014, http://bit.ly/1PkZfvA.
30 “Proclamation No. 281/2002, Telecommunications (Amendment Proclamation,” Federal Negarit Gazeta No. 28, July 2, 2002, http://bit.ly/1snLgsc.
31 Ethiopian Telecommunication Agency, “License Directive for Resale and Telecenter in Telecommunication Services No. 1/2002,” November 8, 2002, accessed October 20, 2014, http://bit.ly/1pUtpWh.
32 Dr. Lishan Adam, “Understanding what is happening in ICT in Ethiopia,” (policy paper, Research ICT Africa, 2012) http://bit.ly/1LDPyJ5.
33 Halefom Abraha, “THE STATE OF CYBERCRIME GOVERNANCE IN ETHIOPIA,” (paper) http://bit.ly/1huzP0S.
34 Rebecca Wanjiku, “Study: Ethiopia only sub-Saharan Africa nation to filter net,” IDG News Service, October 8, 2009, http://bit.ly/1Lbi3s9.
42 Test conducted by an anonymous researcher contracted by Freedom House, March 2015. During the test, some websites opened at the first attempt but were inaccessible when refreshed.
51 A 2014 report from Human Rights Watch also noted that the term “aljazeera” was unsearchable on Google while the news site was blocked from August 2012 to mid-March 2013. According to HRW research, the keywords “OLF” and “ONLF” (acronyms of Ethiopian opposition groups) are not searchable on the unencrypted version of Google (http://) and other popular search engines. Human Rights Watch, “They Know Everything We Do,” March 25, 2014, 56, 58,http://bit.ly/1Nviu6r.
52 Interview with individuals working in the telecom sector, as well as a test conducted by a Freedom House consultant who found it was not possible for an ordinary user to send out a bulk text message.
55 Exemptions are made for foreign nationals of Ethiopian origin. See, Abrham Yohannes, “Advertisement Proclamation No. 759/2012,” Ethiopian Legal Brief (blog), September 27, 2012, http://bit.ly/1LDQf5c.
56 “Proclamation No. 686/2010 Commercial Registration and Business Licensing,” Federal Negarit Gazeta, July 24, 2010, http://bit.ly/1P3PoLy; World Bank Group, Doing Business 2015: Going Beyond Efficiency, Economy Profile 2015, Ethiopia, 2014, http://bit.ly/1L49tO6.
57 Chala, “When blogging is held hostage of Ethiopia’s telecom policy.”
58 “Ethiopia Trains Bloggers to attack its opposition,” ECADF Ethiopian News & Opinions, June 7, 2014, http://bit.ly/1QemZjl.
59 The term “Koka” is a blend of two words: Kotatam and cadre. Kotatam is a contemptuous Amharic word used to imply that someone is a sellout who does not have a respect for himself or herself.
68 Article 19, “Ethiopia: Proclamation on Telecom Fraud Offences,”legal analysis, August 6, 2012, http://bit.ly/1Lbonjm.
69 “Anti-Terrorism Proclamation No. 652/2009,” Federal Negarit Gazeta No. 57, August 28, 2009.
70 The government first instituted the ban on VoIP in 2002after it gained popularity as a less expensive means of communication and began draining revenue from the traditional telephone business belonging to the state-owned EthioTelecom. In response to widespread criticisms, the government claimed that VoIP applications such as Skype would not be considered under the new law, though the proclamation’s language still enables the authorities to interpret it broadly at whim.
80 Endalk Chala, “What You Need to Know About Ethiopia v. Zone9 Bloggers: Verdict Expected July 20,” Global Voices (blog), July 17, 2015, http://bit.ly/1jTDO9b.
81 Ellery Roberts Biddle, Endalk Chala, Guardian Africa network, “One year on, jailed Ethiopian bloggers are still awaiting trial,” The Guardian, April 24, 2015, http://gu.com/p/47ktv/stw; “Nine Journalists and Bloggers Still Held Arbitrarily,” Reporters Without Borders, “Nine Journalists and Bloggers Still Held Arbitrarily,” August 21, 2014, http://bit.ly/1P3TW4I.
95 Such trumped-up charges were based on an online column Nega had published criticizing the government’s use of the Anti-Terrorism Proclamation to silence political dissent and calling for greater political freedom in Ethiopia. Nega is also the 2011 recipient of the PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award.“That Bravest and Most Admirable of Writers: PEN Salutes Eskinder Nega,” PEN American Center (blog), April 13, 2012, http://bit.ly/1Lm89Y7; See also, Markos Lemma, “Ethiopia: Online Reactions to Prison Sentence for Dissident Blogger,” Global Voices, July 15, 2012, http://bit.ly/1OpKaKf; Endalk Chala, “Ethiopia: Freedom of Expression in Jeopardy,” Global Voices Advocacy, February 3, 2012, http://bit.ly/1jfIEO3.
100 Committee to Protect Journalists, “Ethiopian Blogger, Journalists Convicted of Terrorism,” January 19, 2012, http://cpj.org/x/47b9.
101 Bill Marczak et al., Hacking Team Reloaded? US-Based Ethiopian Journalists Again Targeted with Spyware, Citizen Lab, March 9, 2015, http://bit.ly/1Ryogmr.
103 Declan McCullagh, “Meet the ‘Corporate Enemies of the Internet’ for 2013,” CNET, March 11, 2013, accessed February 13, 2014, http://cnet.co/1fo6jJZ.
104 Marczak et al., Hacking Team Reloaded? US-Based Ethiopian Journalists Again Targeted with Spyware.
105 Fahmida Y. Rashid, “FinFisher ‘Lawful Interception’ Spyware Found in Ten Countries, Including the U.S.,” Security Week, August 8, 2012, http://bit.ly/1WRPuap.
106 Endalk Chala, “Ethiopia Locks Down Digital Communications in Wake of #OromoProtests.”
107 Groum Abate, “Internet Cafes Start Registering Users,” The Capital republished Nazret (blog), December 27, 2006, http://bit.ly/1Lm98aX.
108 Human Rights Watch, “They Know Everything We Do,” 67.
(Nairobi) – Ethiopia plunged into a human rights crisis in 2016, increasing restrictions on basic rights during a state of emergency and continuing a bloody crackdown against largely peaceful protesters, Human Rights Watch said today in its World Report 2017. The state of emergency permits arbitrary detention, restricts access to social media, and bans communications with foreign groups.
Ethiopian security hold back demonstrators chanting slogans during Irreecha, the thanksgiving festival of the Oromo people, in Bishoftu town, Oromia region, Ethiopia, October 2, 2016.
Security forces killed hundreds and detained tens of thousands of protesters in Ethiopia’s Oromia and Amhara regions during the year. Many of those who were released reported that they were tortured in detention, a longstanding problem in Ethiopia. The government has failed to meaningfully investigate security forces abuses or respond to calls for an international investigation into the crackdown.
“Instead of addressing the numerous calls for reform in 2016, the Ethiopian government used excessive and unnecessary lethal force to suppress largely peaceful protests,” said Felix Horne, senior Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Vague promises of reform are not enough. The government needs to restore basic rights and engage in meaningful dialogue instead of responding to criticism with more abuses.”
In the 687-page World Report, its 27th edition, Human Rights Watch reviews human rights practices in more than 90 countries. In his introductory essay, Executive Director Kenneth Roth writes that a new generation of authoritarian populists seeks to overturn the concept of human rights protections, treating rights as an impediment to the majority will. For those who feel left behind by the global economy and increasingly fear violent crime, civil society groups, the media, and the public have key roles to play in reaffirming the values on which rights-respecting democracy has been built.
Government limitations on free expression and access to information undermine the potential for the inclusive political dialogue needed to understand protesters’ grievances, let alone address them, Human Rights Watch said.
The tens of thousands of people detained in 2016 include journalists, bloggers, musicians, teachers, and health workers. Moderates like the opposition leader Bekele Gerba have been charged with terrorism and remain behind bars, education has been disrupted, and thousands have fled the country.
The Liyu police, a paramilitary force, committed numerous abuses against residents of the Somali region in 2016, and displacement from Ethiopia’s development projects continued, including in the Omo valley.
The crackdown during 2016 followed years of systematic attacks against opposition parties, nongovernmental organizations, and independent media, effectively closing political space and providing little room for dissenting voices.
Fears Of War Increase As South Sudan Replaces Vice President
Like much of the world, 2016 has been a struggle for sub-Saharan Africa.
The region recorded its slowest overall growth in more than two decades, as low commodity prices and political uncertainty elsewhere put the brakes on economic progress. Civil conflicts have continued raging in countries including South Sudan and the Central African Republic, while extremist and Islamist groups have posed significant threats in nations including Nigeria, Somalia.
As 2017 approaches, Newsweek looks ahead to six stories that could shape the next year on the continent.
The Risk of Genocide in South Sudan
“The stage is being set for a repeat of what happened in Rwanda.” That was the stark warning from Yasmin Sooka, the head of a U.N. human rights commission that reported at the end of a 10-day fact-finding mission to South Sudan in November. Sooka was, of course, referring to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, when extremists from the Hutu ethnic majority killed more than 800,000 members of the Tutsi minority and moderate Hutus.
Since fighting broke out between President Salva Kiir and former vice-president Riek Machar’s forces in December 2013, South Sudan’s civil war has had a devastating impact on the world’s youngest nation. Thousands have been killed; 3 million have been displaced; the economy has gone into freefall. The signing of a peace agreement in August 2015, and the return of rebel leader Machar to the capital Juba in April, provided tantalizing glimmers of hope. But these were washed away as fresh blood was spilled in July; Machar and his troops fled, and the country reverted to a situation of war, alleged human rights abuses and large-scale displacement.
South Sudanese government soldiers celebrate while standing in trenches in Lelo, outside Malakal, South Sudan, October 16. Tens of thousands of people have been killed since civil war broke out in the country in December 2013, and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has urged the country’s leaders to avoid a possible genocide.ALBERT GONZALEZ FARRAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
In Rwanda in 1994, the international community looked on as extremist Hutus carried out ethnic cleansing on a scale not seen before in Africa. The outgoing U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, writing in Newsweek, urged the world not to let the same thing happen in South Sudan. “Time is running out as the warring parties ready themselves for another vicious cycle of violence,” said Ban. “If [the South Sudanese leaders] fail [to restart an inclusive dialogue], the international community, the region, and the Security Council in particular, must impose penalties on the leadership on both sides. We owe this to the people of South Sudan, who have suffered far too much, for far too long.”
The African National Congress Reinvents Itself
Nelson Mandela, South Africa’s first black president, was vigilant about putting party loyalty to his African National Congress (ANC) ahead of justice for South Africa’s people. “If the ANC does to you what the apartheid government did to you, then you must do to the ANC what you did to the apartheid government,” Mandela told a trade union congress in 1993.
It has been 22 years since the ANC came to power, bringing to an end decades of racial segregation and heralding a liberated South Africa. 2016 must rank as one of the party’s worst years since that pivotal moment. South African students have risen up against the party, accusing it of marginalizing them with expensive tuition fees; the party leader, Jacob Zuma, has been dogged by seemingly endless scandals; and in August’s local elections, the ANC lost control of key metropolitan areas, including the commercial hub Johannesburg, as urban voters made clear their disillusionment with the party.
Those results gave rise to factional infighting within the party and calls for Zuma to resign before the expiration of his second, and final, presidential term in 2019. The ANC is due to hold its elective conference in December 2017; if he survives until then, Zuma is expected to bow out at the conference. There are several prominent candidates to succeed him—his deputy Cyril Ramaphosa, and outgoing African Union chief Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who happens to be Zuma’s ex-wife, seem the most likely.
South African President Jacob Zuma attends a luncheon at the U.N. General Assembly, New York, September 20. A series of scandals and poor election results have heaped pressure on Zuma to step down as ANC leader.PETER FOLEY – POOL/GETTY IMAGES
The ANC is far from being on the brink of defeat: it still took 53.9 percent of the national vote in August, way ahead of the Democratic Alliance (DA) on 26.9 percent. But the choice of its next leader, and how the party negotiates a difficult economic climate and deals with tense protesters, will be important ahead of 2019. Both the DA and left-wing Economic Freedom Fighters are fronted by charismatic, if diametrically-opposed, leaders—Mmusi Maimane and Julius Malema—who will be keen to pounce on any further mistakes South Africa’s liberation party makes.
Leaving a Dictator Behind in Gambia
2016 was a year of shock results in elections and referenda. While Brexit and Donald Trump’s victory grabbed the headlines, perhaps just as astounding was the presidential election held on December 1 in the smallest country on the African mainland.
After 22 years of authoritarian rule by Yahya Jammeh—or His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr Yahya A. J. J. Jammeh Babili Mansa, as he prefers to be known—Gambians threw off their shackles and voted for Adama Barrow, a property developer with next to no political experience.
But now comes the hard part. After graciously accepting the result on December 2—“this is the will of Allah,” Jammeh said—the outgoing president pivoted a week later and announced he was annulling the result. Regional and international leaders went into uproar, demanding Jammeh immediately step aside.
But the former army officer, surrounded by a military whose loyalty he has cultivated for more than two decades, dug himself in. “I am not a coward. My right cannot be intimidated and violated. This is my position, Nobody can deprive me of my victory except the Almighty Allah,” he said.
Gambian President-elect Adama Barrow (C) arrives at a hotel in Banjul for a meeting with four African heads of state, December 13. Gambia’s outgoing president Yahya Jammeh is refusing to leave his post despite losing an election to Barrow.SEYLLOU/AFP/GETTY
What happens next is somewhat unclear. Jammeh has submitted a petition to Gambia’s Supreme Court, which hasn’t sat in over a year and would need to be reconstituted before hearing the appeal. The president of regional body ECOWAS has threatened military intervention if Jammeh refuses to relinquish power. The region and the international community seems set on making an example of Jammeh, an archetypal African strongman leader, but he appears unlikely to go without a struggle.
Ethiopia’s State of Emergency
Ethiopia has been one of sub-Saharan Africa’s economic success stories in recent years; the Horn of Africa state has averaged 10.8 percent growth between 2003/04 and 2014/15, double the regional average of 5.4 percent. But such rapid expansion has masked a delicate situation in a country with clear ethnic divisions and where much of the population still lives in poverty.
Tensions exploded in November 2015 with the outbreak of the so-called Oromo protests—led by members of the majority Oromo ethnic group—against government plans to expand the capital, Addis Ababa, which protesters said would result in forced evictions of Oromo farmers. The government abandoned the plans in January, but the fuse had been lit: security forces were heavy-handed in dealing with the protests, killing and injuring demonstrators, while the government accused protesters of damaging private property and outside forces, including Eritrea, of fueling the discontent. Amnesty International estimates that at least 800 people have been killed since the protests began, thousands have been detained, and authorities have cracked down on media freedom.
Demonstrators chant slogans while making the Oromo protest gesture during Irreecha, the thanksgiving festival of the Oromo people, in Bishoftu town, Oromia region, Ethiopia, October 2. Hundreds of people have been killed since November 2015 and Ethiopia’s government has implemented a restrictive state of emergency.TIKSA NEGERI/REUTERS
Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn imposed a six-month nationwide state of emergency on October 9, hoping to defuse the protest movement. The government has began releasing thousands of detained protesters, but this may simply be a way of papering over the cracks in the country. The ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), in power since 1991, is dominated by the Tigrayan ethnic minority; Oromos and other ethnic groups have complained of being discriminated against and deprived of socioeconomic opportunities. The country’s parliament is also 100 percent-controlled by the EPRDF and a coalition partner, leaving little room for opposition voices. The state of emergency may be simply a sticking plaster, rather than an antidote, for the country’s problems.
Burundi’s Increasing Isolation
A tiny, landlocked country with the lowest GDP per capita in the world, it’d be reasonable to think that Burundi would want all the friends it could get. But since President Pierre Nkurunziza’s controversial decision in April 2015 to run for a third term in office, Burundi has increasingly withdrawn from international organizations and severed regional ties.
The country has rejected attempted interventions by the United Nations, including the sending of an almost-300 strong police force; the European Union has suspended aid worth 432 million euros ($451 million) over six years to the country; and Nkurunziza announced in October that he was pulling Burundi out of the International Criminal Court, despite the court’s chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda opening a preliminary investigation into the country’s situation in April.
Closer to home, Burundi has consistently accused neighboring Rwanda of arming refugees—83,000 of the almost 330,000 Burundians who have fled the country have gone to Rwanda—in a bid to topple Nkurunziza. Rwanda has denied these allegations and expelled some Burundian refugees.
Members of Burundi’s National Assembly vote to withdraw from the International Criminal Court, Bujumbura, October 12. Burundi, under the leadership of President Pierre Nkurunziza, has increasingly withdrawn from international organizations.ONESPHORE NIBIGIRA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
According to the United Nations, almost 500 people have been killed in clashes between security forces and anti-Nkurunziza protesters since April 2015. Burundi has been accused of muzzling its media and cracking down on free speech: pupils have been sent home from school for allegedly defacing pictures of Nkurunziza. The concern for Africa and the international community is, as Burundi withdraws further within itself, the conflict and human rights abuses may continue without any independent observers to record them.
Holding Things Together in Nigeria
Things are never quiet in Nigeria. But 2016 has been a busy year even by its hectic standards: the country has made huge gains in fighting Boko Haram, but a seemingly endless whack-a-mole of insurgencies and protest movements have arisen elsewhere.
Militants in the Niger Delta decimated oil production, a major factor that pushed the country into recession; government forces continued clashing with a Shiite group in northern Nigeria; roaming Fulani herdsmen have clashed with settled farmers in the Middle Belt; and separatists in the southeast kept up their campaign for an independent republic of Biafra.
At present, Muhammadu Buhari and his government seem to have a tentative grip on some of the crises. Nigeria’s military is pressing into Boko Haram’s dark heartland of the Sambisa Forest; the Niger Delta Avengers, the main aggressors in the oil-rich Delta, have not claimed an attack on oil pipelines since November. But there are still big challenges. Various states have banned the country’s main Shiite group, the Islamic Movement in Nigeria (IMN), an action that could force it underground; and human rights groups have demanded investigations into the killing of pro-Biafra activists.
Nigerian soldiers prepare a heavily armed convoy in Maiduguri, northeast Nigeria, March 25. The Nigerian military has made big gains against Boko Haram in 2016, but threats have emerged elsewhere in the country.STEFAN HEUNIS/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
While one of the richest countries in Africa, its resources are also limited: the military has been stretched in recent months after having to deploy to the Niger Delta while keeping up the tempo against Boko Haram. One false move by the security forces—take the clashes with the IMN in December 2015, in which almost 350 people were killed—can open up a new frontier that may push the administration beyond its limits.
And in a country with a melting pot of often-competing ethnicities, religions and political groups, things can quickly fall apart.
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia — Ethiopia said Monday it will not release a leading opposition figure detained under the country’s state of emergency after meeting with European lawmakers in Belgium.
Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn told reporters that Merara Gudina of the Oromo Federalist Congress party instead will face justice.
“Individuals in the European Parliament who are harboring anti-peace elements cannot save those who trespass the law of the country,” the prime minister said.
Merara is one of 22,000 people the prime minister said were detained under the state of emergency declared in October after widespread, sometimes deadly anti-government protests. The government has said several thousand have since been released.
Merara was arrested immediately after he returned from Belgium, where he met with the lawmakers about the state of emergency. He was accused of meeting with members of an armed Ethiopian opposition group in Brussels, an act banned under the emergency law.
Photos posted on social media show him sitting next to Birhanu Nega, leader of the armed opposition group called Ginbot 7 that mainly operates from Eritrea, and Feyisa Lilesa, the Ethiopian marathon runner who crossed his wrists in a sign of protest while crossing the finish line at the Rio Olympic Games.
The Association for Human Rights in Ethiopia said the state of emergency’s wide-ranging restrictions have severely affected freedoms of expression and assembly. “Tens of thousands of individuals have been arrested arbitrarily” and dissent and independent reporting have been quashed, it said.
The state of emergency is set to end in May. The prime minister did not indicate it would be extended, but he told reporters that “as far as the date of lifting the state of emergency is concerned, it should be seen in the perspective that we have to consolidate the gains that we have made so far.”
ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia – Ethiopia says it will not release a leading opposition figure detained under the country’s state of emergency after meeting with European lawmakers in Belgium.
Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn told reporters on Monday that Merara Gudina of the Oromo Federalist Congress party instead will face justice.
The prime minister says “individuals in the European Parliament who are harboring anti-peace elements cannot save those who trespass the law of the country.”
Merara is one of 22,000 people the prime minister says were detained under the state of emergency declared in October after widespread anti-government protests.
Merara was arrested immediately after he returned from Belgium. He was accused of meeting with members of an armed Ethiopian opposition group in Brussels, an act banned under the emergency law.
Nearly three months into the state of emergency declared by Ethiopia, the atmosphere on the streets of its bustling and impressively modern metropolis and capital, Addis Ababa, feels tense.
At 2 355m above sea level, the climate is pleasantly mild most of the year. Its broad thoroughfares are studded with magnificent cultural attractions. These are infused with the glow of an ancient yet resilient civilisation that could withstand both Jesuit and Wahhabi encroachment.
Yet, at present, tourists are understandably few and far between. There have been reports of hundreds of deaths in districts surrounding the capital in recent weeks. But these have been played down as an exaggeration by Prime Minister Heilemariam Desalegn.
Violence broke out during an Oromo religious festival, and in some instances foreigners seem to have been targeted. In response, the predominantly ethnic-Tigrean government clamped down on social media, took a few TV channels off the air, and restricted the movement of the opposition leader and foreign observers.
For the past few years, Ethiopia has been able to partly shed its association with abject poverty and famine. Arguably inspired by China, the country became a developmental success story and one of the fastest-growing countries in the world. At much the same time, Addis Ababa was able to capitalise on being the gateway to the politics of the African continent and foreign aid.
It is evident just how rapidly China’s stakes here have grown over the past few years. Just as evident is China’s different approach to development as compared with the West. It is also easy to see why the recent instability in Ethiopia is a real test to China’s approach.
Behind the veneer of Ethiopia’s parliamentary federalism lies an authoritarian system of state-led development that is preferred by Beijing over the country’s ragtag opposition forces. The question is whether the fruits of fast economic growth can be distributed sufficiently effectively in Ethiopia so as to forestall ethnic rural unrest.
Showcase infrastructural projects
Rather than providing grants directly aimed at poverty alleviation or promoting civil society, Chinese state-owned enterprises have been busy erecting showcase infrastructural projects. The aim is to attract further private business investment and to boost tourism.
The new sparkling African Union conference centre in Addis was fully funded by China. A new six-lane 87km highway to Adama has cut travel time from three hours to just one hour. And the international arm of China State Construction will soon give the capital a state-of-the-art stadium and upgrade its airport.
But perhaps a more persuasive productivity-booster is Addis Ababa’s new light-rail network completed in 2015 by China Railway Engineering Corporation. Often, the Chinese developmental approach is portrayed as construction frenzy ahead of genuine consumer demand.
Yet, far from being at risk of becoming a white elephant, it is already heavily used by local commuters just over a year after inauguration. In a city where taxi fares are exorbitant and buses are often in bad repair, the network is making a real difference to ordinary people’s lives.
But Beijing also runs a real risk here. In 2007, for example, 65 Ethiopians and nine Chinese expatriates were murdered by Somali separatists in an attack on a Sinopec-run oilfield in the east of the country. There is clearly a strong case for Heilemariam to broaden his government’s ethnic support base and heed various regional and rural concerns about disenfranchisement as a result of foreign investment.
No zero-sum game between the US and China
Unlike the Chinese Foreign Affairs ministry, the US State Department has expressed concern over the imposition of the state of emergency.
But the Ethiopian government is likely to remain in the US’s good books. This is primarily because of its role in countering the spread of fundamentalist terrorism in the Horn of Africa. In fact, it is that role that has helped endear Ethiopia to the world, and facilitated Western relief aid.
On the other hand, it would be a mistake to conclude China’s growing stakes in Ethiopia immediately offset Western interests. For one thing, Ethiopia’s recent troubled history suggests the enemies of government often denounce oppression. But they do not necessarily champion human rights when they seize power themselves.
In addition, Western aid is still far greater and more vital to the running of the country than anything China provides. For all the speculation about the Chinese currency replacing the US dollar as global reserve currency soon, most hotels here do not seem to readily exchange China’s currency for Birr yet.
There is, in short, no zero-sum game between the US and China over Ethiopia, at times quite to the contrary. Neither power is interested in Ethiopia purely for exploitative colonial-style mineral extraction, or is purely motivated by altruism. The budding, somewhat desultory Chinatown in Addis Ababa’s Rwanda Vegetable Market hardly comes across as an insular colonial outpost. And the Chinese embassy compound is vastly outsized by the American one.
What plays out instead are perhaps different approaches to the low-income world where the US has prized the diffusion of individual freedoms and human-rights norms and China has prized collective economic betterment. And both the US and China are set to lose out if chaos spreads in the Horn of Africa.
China’s approach may be benefiting Ethiopia
Amid capital scarcity, China’s different approach seems to benefit Ethiopia. Put simply, it opens up another avenue for development where the World Bank and IMF doctrines have until recently been the only show in town.
In concrete terms, it means Chinese companies nowadays bid for projects often with concessional terms – where, in the past, only Western companies had the technological capacity to deliver.
Hydro-electricity is perhaps the best example for that: a healthy competition seems to be building up between Italy’s Salini Impregilo and Sinohydro when it comes to damming Ethiopia’s rivers. Local and foreign NGO oversight would still be vital in order to minimise the dislocation and environmental degradation that both companies can cause.
But, at the same time, with better planning, the untapped potential of hydro-power might mean cleaner and lower-cost energy in a part of the world where power cuts are all too common.
Feyisa Lilesa caught the world’s attention when he raised his arms in solidarity with the Oromo people as he crossed the finishing line at the Rio Olympic games. He tells Julian Keane what the gesture has cost him.
Violence Against Free Media and Knowledge Dissemination in Ethiopia: An Analysis of the Mechanisms of Restrictions on Information Flow
By Habtamu Dugo, Visiting Professor of Communications,
University of the District of Columbia
hab.dugo@gmail.com
Abstract
This article examines multiple mechanisms the Ethiopian state has been using to implement information blackout throughout the country in order to distort, misrepresent, hide and deny massive human rights infractions perpetrated by the military against citizens demanding self-government, basic rights and justice across Oromia state and Ethiopia. The data for this research were obtained through multiple research approaches, which included reviewing three relevant Ethiopian laws that justify information blackout; reviewing reports by human rights organizations; reviewing news stories on the topic in multiple languages; and reviewing audio-visual materials containing press releases from Ethiopian authorities. The study finds that the Ethiopian government has used a mixture of mechanisms to restrict the free flow of information by: introducing a slew of draconian proclamations, resorting to suppressing and removing communications applications and hardware and engaging in robust local and global misinformation and denial campaigns in times of unprecedented domestic political upheavals.
Key words: press freedom, freedom of speech, media control, social media control, information blackout, state-led violence, Oromo, Ethiopia, East Africa, Horn of Africa.
Introduction
In the summer of 2014 Ethiopian government police, security forces and commando units shot live ammunitions into crowds of peaceful protesters killing at least 100 (OP, 2014). The protesters were opposed to a city planning scheme known as the Addis Ababa Integrated Development Master Plan (IDMP). By the time this plan was released, Addis Ababa’s expansion had already displaced 150, 000 families of Oromo farmers and was set to displace millions more across Oromia (Legesse, 2014).
Demonstrators demanded that the IDMP be halted immediately and the Oromo people’s constitutional right to self-rule be respected. The Ethiopian government did not respond to the popular demands. Instead, authorities promised massive violence against civilians in an attempt to continue the implementation of the draconian plan (Biyyaa, 2014), characterized by the Oromo as “master killer.”
In a compressive study released in 2014, Amnesty International (2014) reported that between 2011 and 2015, “at least 5000 Oromos have been arrested based on their actual or suspected peaceful opposition to the government.” The popular understanding of the IDRP among the Oromo is that it will continue to uproot millions of Oromo farmers from their land and lead to the eventual splitting of Oromia into two halves—the east and the west. This will separate the Oromo people who share the same language, identity and a regional state from each other. Even families would be separated as they have been in North and South Korea.
None of the perpetrators of the April and May 2014 massacres were brought to justice nor was there an independent investigation into the mass killings by government security. Instead,some government officials such as Abay Tsehaye, the former Minister of Federal Affairs, threatened to take more actions against anyone who is opposed to the plan (OMN, 2014).
Oromia-wide protests against the IDMP recurred in mid-November 2015 in small town west of the capital city “when the government transferred the ownership of a school playground and a stadium to private investors, in addition to clearing the Chilimo natural forest to also make way for investors,” (AI, 2015). In just over a few weeks, the protests spread to all parts of Oromia, involving people from all walks of life. The government responded with lethal force which resulted in the death of more than 200 people, including children, women and the elderly (HRLHA, 2015). Thousands of Oromos were wholesale labeled as “terrorists”, giving a blank check to government officials and commanders of the security forces to act with impunity. Hundreds were killed, thousands maimed and several thousand imprisoned. The government placed a ban on domestic and international human rights organizations, media, journalists, bloggers and citizen journalists to cover up the use of lethal force to suppress the protests and the staggering number of casualties.
Human Rights Watch noted the government’s tight chokehold on information as follows: “Ethiopia’s pervasive restrictions on independent civil society and media mean that very little information is coming from affected areas although social media are filled with photos and videos of the protests,” (HRW, 2016). This has left the global community in the dark about the real magnitude of the crimes security forces have committed. This paper analyzes the different facets of the Ethiopian government’s restrictions on information flow focusing on actions taken during the Oromo protests of 2015-16.
I contend that the government’s endeavors to create an information blackout was designed to avoid responsibility for the mass killings, maiming, detentions, rape and other crimes that the federal police, the Agazi Special Forces, and other state security units have committed against unarmed Oromo civilians. The study also reveals that the government has used a number of ‘legal’ and coercive strategies and tactics to exercise monopolistic control over information.
Disinformation
One of the ways in which the government uses to conceal its atrocities is the state-controlled media and crackdown on alternative media. With near monopoly on media outlets in the country, top government officials appear on state-controlled television (formerly ETV) and make statements that cannot stand to simply scrutiny. On December 15, 2015, for instance, Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn threatened to take “merciless actions” against Oromo protestors whom he labeled “terrorists,” “anti-peace forces” and “destabilizing “forces”. He indicated that the government’s Anti-Terror Task Force will take swift measures to restore order. While the security forces have indeed carried out the orders, the purpose of the threats was to cow people into submission. In other words, the media is used to carry out disinformation battles that parallel the real actions.
New Year’s Message from HRLHA“It always Seems Dark Until the Sun Rises”December 31, 2016
The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) is delighted to be closing 2016. The organization is deeply grateful to its valued Board members, reporters, members, and supporters for their extraordinary efforts to help the HRLHA continue to be the voice for the voiceless in the Horn of Africa in general and in Ethiopia in particular this year.
In 2016, the Horn of Africa Region remains one of the most volatile regions in the world. The civilian unrest in Ethiopia, the civil war in S. Sudan, and Somalia, the mass exodus from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia to neighboring countries away from executions and famine, were some of the notable crucial problems in the region.
The year of 2016 has been a year of sorrows and chaos for nations and nationalities in Ethiopia, due to the deplorable evil actions taken by Ethiopian government killing agents against peaceful Oromo, Amhara and Konso protests in which the Oromo, Amhara, Konso and other nations and nationalities simply tried to exercise their fundamental rights to present their grievances. During the peaceful protests in Oromia, which have been going on for over one year in Amhara regional states and Konso Zone, a number of citizens have been massacred, incarcerated, tortured and disappeared. Due to its mistreatment of its citizens, the government lost control over the country as a whole and then declared a state of emergency to quell the dissent. Since the state of emergency was declared on October 8, 2016, many gross human rights violations have been registered- killings, abductions, and imprisonments. These continue to the present day among Oromo and Amhara nationals.
The staff members and reporters of HRLHA have worked tirelessly to expose the government of Ethiopia’s tyranny and defend and promote human rights in 2016; their work this year has been at its most intense than any of the past nine years. We gave maximum efforts to bring to light the atrocities in Ethiopia in a challenging environment characterized by administrative sanctions on mass media, including social media, email, telephone, sanctions designed to hide the atrocities the government killing agents were committing.
We are greatly indebted to HRLHA members, reporters and supporters who have shown courage and stood with us on this front to deliver their responsibilities of monitoring and reporting human rights abuses in Ethiopia under such difficult situations.
The HRLHA believes that 2016 was the darkest year in the history of the Oromo nation. To give just one example, a mother and father lost their three sons in one night in their home to the government killing squad Agazi force. The mother was forced by the killers to sit on her son’s dead body. In other cases, women were raped in front of their husbands. These are just to mention a few of the crimes known to have been perpetuated against Ethiopians by the dictatorial TPLF/EPRDF government crime groups. The HRLHA believes, however, that behind the darkness there is light for which we must continue fighting “It always Seems Dark Until the Sun Rises”. It might seem that the fight for our basic and fundamental rights is over, due to the repressions by the dictatorial TPLF/EPRDF government for over the past twenty five years since its formation in 1991. But it is not yet over, we should not give up, we must continue fighting for our rights until we win.
Therefore, in 2017, we must redouble the fight to protect human rights, democracy and equality by exposing the dishonesty of the Ethiopian government to its ordinary citizens, and also to its political party members and government authorities.
The biggest fight of all, however, is the struggle for the well-being of all Ethiopians, for equality, and for the elimination of all forms of discrimination. It is also the most difficult because the present reality still hits hard at those who live through the anxiety and anguish of poverty and violence.
Finally, the HRLHA urges all peace, democracy and human rights lovers, governments, government and non-government agencies to work together, so that the core values of peace, democracy, human rights, security and development will be restored in the Horn of Africa region in the incoming year of 2017.
“Let us strive together to make all expectations and goals for each day be fulfilled on the day itself, to remove the darkness in the past and to bring a brighter future in the incoming year of 2017 “
Al Jazeera: #OromoProtests, the defining moments of 2016
My Oromo Personalities and Athletes of the Year 2016 Olympian Feyisa Lilesa and Paralympian Tamiru Demisse….These two Athletes Defied the Ethiopian Regime at a World Stage With Courage #OromoProtests.- Journalist Yassin Juma
My Most Influential Eastern Africa Personality of the year 2016 goes to Jawar Mohammed. When the regime blocked the world from observing the reality on the ground he together with many of the foot soldiers defied and fed us with the Truth. With 1M + followers on Facebook he has been able to influence the direction of “The Course” #Respect. – Journalist Yassin Juma
For inspiring and moving the world with their disciplined courage and bravery in the face of relentless state brutality, for bringing the dream of freedom ever closer to being realized, for their bold commitment to a cause greater than self, for finally forcing the world to pay attention to the plight of Oromo people and for rejuvenating and energizing the Oromo movement and bringing it to the cusp of victory, the Qubee Generation is OPride’s Oromo Person (s) of the year 2016.For over a year, Ethiopia teetered and tottered to contain protests roiling the Oromia state, home to the Oromo people, the country’s largest ethnic group. The grim year not only tested the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front, EPRDF’s, quarter-century stranglehold over the country but also the limits of human perseverance against determined state action.
Although similar demonstrations have taken place in the Amhara state, Oromia remained the epicenter of the widespread and sustained anti-government protests throughout 2016. Few, if any, of Oromia’s 560 towns and 180 districts, escaped the growing anger and revolt of ordinary citizens against the central state.
From Ginchi to Ajje, Guliso to Nekemte, Awaday to Dallo Mana, and anywhere in between, students, parents and teachers as townsfolk and farmers fought side by side to challenge the social, economic and political marginalization of the Oromo people in Ethiopia. The Oromo constitute nearly half of Ethiopia’s 100 million people, but they remain marginalized.
For the first 10 months of 2016, millions across Oromia took to the streets, demanding an end to forceful dispossession of their ancestral land, the land grab, the release of political prisoners, and the rule of law as opposed to the rule by the gun and prison. Ethiopian security forces responded to peaceful protesters as they always do: Using an excessive and disproportionate force, including live bullets as a standard crowd-control tool. But the state’s extraordinary measures only engendered more anger and inspired more street protests.
In fact, both the protests and the official brutality were unprecedented, even by EPRDF’s checkered history of violence. Security forces killed more than 1,000 people in Oromia alone in 2016. Hundreds were wounded. And the besieged state saw record levels of arrests with legions disappearing in the maze of military training facilities acting as a concentration-like prisoner holding camps. Tens of thousands, including nearly all top leaders of the only “legal” Oromo opposition party, the Oromo Federalist Congress, remain incarcerated on dubious terrorism charges.
The protests began in November 2015, initially over opposition to an urban master plan that sought to expand the boundaries of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, gobbling up Oromo towns, farmlands, and villages.
Sheer horror
The year’s biggest tragedy took place on the sacred grounds of Hora Arsadi, in Bishoftu, about 25 miles southeast of Addis Ababa. On Sunday, October 2, an estimated 2 million people made the annual pilgrimage to Bishoftu’s ancient crater lake to observe Irreechaa, a premier Oromo thanksgiving holiday that has become the symbol and celebration of Oromummaa (the Oromo identity) itself.
On the millennia-old Irreecha celebration, the Oromo give thanks to their creator (Waaqa) for the bountiful harvests of Birra (spring) and to renew their hopes and aspirations for future after a dark, rainy winter season.
But 2016 was not an ordinary year for the Oromo. The mood ahead of this year’s Irreechaa was predictably tense. Staying true to tradition, the youth arrived in Bishoftu from across Oromia fervently singing resistance songs and chanting anti-government slogans. The protesters’ impatience was palpable even the night before Irreechaa. While there were no major incidents for much of the morning, it was clear that the sea of youth came to Arsadi to make a stand — a statement. Early in the afternoon, as the chorus of protests grew louder, a standoff ensued near the main stage where officials give speeches and traditional leaders offer blessings.
Image: The Guardian
What happened next was tragic beyond words: sheer horror ensued as security forces fired tear gas and live bullets into millions gathered in a confined space. The crowd was surrounded by heavily armed security forces, a lake, deep gorges and ditches. As shots began to ring out from above the crater, festival goers ran for their lives. But they had no way out, encircled as they were by gun-toting officers from the left and shrub-covered ditches on the right side, and a deep lake from below.
At least 678 people died in the ensuing stampede, according to OFC officials and hospital sources. It’s the darkest hour in contemporary Oromo history. Innocent lives were lost on a day they came to celebrate their culture and heritage. The day will forever be remembered as the “Irreechaa massacre,” an extraordinarily savage and horrific tragedy in which the Ethiopian security forces caused the death of hundreds of Oromos.
The bravest act at the Rio Olympic
Unsurprisingly, the turmoil in Ethiopia received marginal media coverage for much of the year. That changed in August. No other event — not even the Irreechaa massacre — had the effect of mainstreaming and raising global awareness about the repression of the Oromo people than Feyisa Lilesa’s defiantly heroic Olympic protest.
On Sunday, August 21, as he approached the finish line, winning a silver medal in the men’s marathon, Feyisa crossed his wrists over his head, forming an X, a popular gesture of protest used by the Oromo youth in Ethiopia. With that simple protest, dubbed “the bravest act at the 2016 Olympics,” which he repeated at the post-race press conference, Feyisa both inspired and implored the world to pay attention to the horrific tragedy taking place in Ethiopia.
Feyisa faced a potential loss of his medal and a grave danger to his life as well as family. But he gave no hoot. “I don’t want to look at my children any different from the children of other people in my country who are being killed,” he later told reporters. “They face the same fate and the same destiny like all other children in Ethiopia.”
Feyisa, 26, was born in West Shewa, Jaldu District in 1990, a year before the EPRDF regime took power in Ethiopia. Growing up in Jaldu about 120km west of Addis Ababa near the border of Macha and Tulama, Feyisa witnessed the injustices and indignities faced by Oromo people. As an elite athlete, he faced a significant dilemma. “I could not join my peers in the streets if I were going to have the chance to compete at all,” he told reporters in September. “I had to leave the country a lot in order to compete overseas, so I knew that if I protested with the ordinary citizens, I would be blocked from ever leaving the country again.”
But the country’s political troubles and blatant violations of human rights affected him deeply for a long time. He recalls visiting friends, former classmates, and acquaintances in prisons. In Addis Ababa, he helps young people from Jaldu and other places who run away from home to escape arrest and have become homeless. This is why his Olympic protest did not come as a spur of the moment decision. It was informed by his own lived experiences. He quietly but meticulously planned and prepared for it months in advance. “I made the decision to protest in Rio three months before the Olympics,” he said. “As soon as the Ethiopian Athletics Federation selected me for the marathon, I decided to work hard and make a stand if I won and got a good result.” The rest, as they say, is history.
The fact that the Oromo, a nation that gave birth to some of the finest long-distance runners in the world, including the great Abebe Bikila, Mammo Wolde, Darartu Tulu, Almaz Ayana and what not, had to wait until 2016 to savor such a demonstration by one of its sons speaks volumes that the current generation had it enough with the marginalization of the Oromo in the Ethiopian state.
Feyisa knew it would be the biggest moment of his life. He anticipated it to be one of the most-watched sporting events in the world. But, he admits, he did not expect the outpouring of the global support he received and the remarkable impact his gesture had in creating awareness. Feyisa’s protest in Rio and his subsequent press conference in Washington, DC, where he spoke to more than 30 journalists from 25 media organizations, generated far more press coverage than the year-long protests in which over 1,000 innocent lives were savagely cut short.
His name will forever be mentioned alongside two legendary African-American athletes —Tommie Smith and John Carlos — who made history by raising the black power salute during the U.S. national anthem at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City. Other notable comparisons include Muhammad Ali, who famously denounced the Vietnam War, and Billie Jean King, who championed women’s equality long before it was in vogue.
Feyisa has already won international recognition for his defiant protest. Earlier this month, the Foreign Policy magazine named him among the 2016 top 100 global thinkers. He was recognized as a challenger, “for breaking the rules of the games in order to call attention to the brutal actions of his country’s security forces.” Feyisa was also included in the Huffington Post’s list of “athletes who inspired off the field in 2016.” Deutsche Welle featured him in its top ten stories that moved Africa in 2016.
Down, Down Wayane
Feyisa’s was not the only uncommon act of courage by an Oromo in 2016. The defiant protest at Irreechaa in October was the clearest evidence yet of a generation that’s determined to end the Oromo people’s marginalization. As if Feyisa’s wasn’t enough, the generation’s resolve and defiance of authoritarianism were illustrated in one courageous act by Gemeda Wario Wotiye.
Gemeda, 20, came to Bishoftu the morning of the Irreechaa festival with his friends from Shashamane. He was angry, like all of his peers, about the killings of peaceful protesters, the endless arrests of Oromo leaders, the hegemonic domination of ethnic Tigrayans over the country and EPRDF’s deepening authoritarianism. But Gemeda had no special plans other than being part of the Irreechaa festivity and the protests. It was his first time attending the annual event.
The native of Siinqillee town in the restive West Arsi zone grew up in Shashamane. He helped organize protests at his preparatory school. He was detained and held at Sanqallee military camp for more than a month. But until then he was still like any ordinary 11th-grader. Nothing, except his uncommon courage, could have prepared him for what transpired next. As the standoff between the protesters and the attending officialdom heated up that afternoon, Gemeda made a spur-of-the-moment decision and jumped onto the stage. Video footage from the scene shows Gemeda snatching a microphone from one of the emcees who was unsuccessfully pleading with the protesters for calm.
Microphone in hand, Gemeda stretched out his arms toward the sea of protesters gathered below, and started shouting, “down, down Woyane, down, down TPLF.” (Woyane is a moniker for the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the kingmakers in the hodgepodge EPRDF coalition.) Gemeda’s neck veins bulged as he led the crowd in the now famous chant. The crowd went wild with jubilation responding to his chant with earth shattering chants of their own and by repeating it numerous times over, with wrists crossed above their head, and finally breaking out into a pandemonium of cheers and jeers.
Gemeda was quickly booted off the stage but his extraordinarily brave act boosted the protesters’ morale, much to the chagrin of the officials and security forces. This provoked the trigger-happy federal security forces to unleash their brutal massacre. Gemeda’s chant, which he blurted out almost accidentally, and the resounding response by the protesters made one thing unmistakably clear: that the only remaining source of legitimacy for the EPRDF government was its monopoly of the forces of violence.
Gemeda’s courageous act quickly gained attention on social media, becoming the most widely shared rallying cry of protesters in the aftermath of that tragic day. The regime simply stepped up its repression. In retaliation, protesters began torching government buildings and gutting foreign-owned business installations. Among the casualties was an American researcher.
The changes in the protesters’ tactics made the region virtually ungovernable, prompting EPRDF to declare a six-month state of emergency on October 9. Following a massive manhunt, Gemeda fled to Egypt after weeks of hiding. He crossed the Sahara desert on foot, retracing a treacherous route increasingly being used by hundreds of young Oromos looking for a safe haven and better opportunities. It is worth noting here that, for the Oromo, the calamity at home in the past year was compounded by the loss of more young lives at the high waters of the Mediterranean, where in one April boat tragedy alone some 180 Oromos perished.
Our rationale: #OromoProtests is a generational revolt
Without a doubt, both Feyisa and Gemeda qualify to be OPride’s Oromo Persons of the Year. They were disruptive to unjust power; they challenged both our assumptions and the status quo, and they became instant heroes to millions of young Ethiopians by defying the odds and gods. Praise songs have been written to extol their bravery and honor their courage.
All told, we initially set out to write an individual profile of Feyisa and honor his once-in-a-generation protest. But a common thread emerged as we researched our much-anticipated, year-end feature story. It was a difficult decision indeed, but in recent years we have also made a tradition of honoring those whose names and selfless deeds are known only unto God. 2016 gave us too many such unsung heroes. The list includes Mustefa Hussein, Adam Dima, Haji Guye Dula, and countless others. But, in the end, we settled on Qubee generation because the Oromo protest is, by and large, a generational revolt.
“If you suffocate people and they don’t have any other options but to protest, it breaks out,” Ambo University lecturer and now certified torture survivor, Seyoum Teshome, told the New York Times in August. “The whole youth is protesting. A generation is protesting.”
Seyoum was right. Gemeda’s defiant protest at Irreechaa 2016 and Feyisa’s brave act at the Rio Olympics epitomize the valor and gallantry of a generation revolting.
Even in a grim year that saw such an unspeakable tragedy, the remarkable Qubee Generation provided hope, to young and old, that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and “freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
Even in a grim year that saw such an unspeakable tragedy — from a mother in Burayu who, after losing her newborn child, had to bury alone because the father was detained in Qilinto prison and she couldn’t rally her neighbors because of the state of emergency; to a wedding party in Ajje that was shot at for simply playing a music that authorities did not approve of; to the devastated parents in Sirka, East Arsi, whose three children were lost to a senseless and random execution by the Agazi force — the remarkable Qubee Generation provided hope, to young and old, that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and “freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
Who are the Qubee Generations?
There is no standardized age range to define this generation, but the term generally refers to those born in the early 1980s onward. In terms of age, the Qubee generation is what a millennial is in the United States. It takes the prefix Qubee from the Latin alphabet that’s adopted in the 1990s for writing in Afaan Oromo. In 1991, when Qubee was formally adopted and Afaan Oromo became the official language of Oromia, the 80s kids were entering middle school, becoming the first generation of Oromos to go to school and learn in their native language.
The Qubee generation now consists of college students, recent graduates, and students in high school and middle schools. Unlike their parent’s generation, the Qubee generation studied in their mother tongue, Afaan Oromo. They are keenly aware of Oromia’s boundaries. This is true in Oromia as it is elsewhere in Ethiopia’s nine linguistic-based pseudo-federal states. This generation grew up singing their respective region’s anthems as opposed to the national anthem. Few, if any, can actually recite Ethiopia’s national anthem by heart. In Oromia, informed by long-standing national grievances toward the central state, the Qubee generation exhibits a pure and unadulterated allegiance to the Oromo question, a demand for the end of Oromo people’s marginalization in the Ethiopian state.
An estimated 71 percent of the Ethiopian population is under the age of 30. In 2014, Ethiopia had a total of 19,382,000 pupils enrolled in primary and secondary education. In the 2013/14 school year, some 627,452 students were enrolled in Ethiopia’s higher education system. More than half a million students enroll in public secondary schools across Oromia every year. This means that the overwhelming majority of today’s protesters are members of the fierce and fearless Qubee generation.
This generation is also acutely aware of their basic rights, as enshrined in the country’s little-practiced constitution — rights that are so callously trampled upon by the EPRDF regime. This is in part because they were taught civic education at an early age. The Qubee generation is by far the most connected thanks to the proliferation of mobile phones.
The adoption of Qubee is one of the enduring legacies of the struggle and sacrifices of the preceding generations. They blazed the trail with blood, literally, so that the Qubee generation can, even with the absence of the full freedoms they fought for, can proudly and unapologetically proclaim, I am Oromo first and I am proud of it. The pioneer generation should also be celebrating as this is in away the fruits of their hard labor. Waqo Gutu, Tadesse Birru, Elemo Qilxu and their contemporaries must all be smiling, even from beyond the clouds.
The soundtrack of the revolution
Artists and singers have long been the vanguard of Oromo nationalism. However, the indomitable spirit of the Qubee generation is best gleaned from the plethora of music singles released over the past year. The incumbent regime has exiled more Oromo singers and artists than any other professional group, including journalists, for which it is often censured. Until recently, there were more professional Oromo singers in the diaspora than inside the country. Oromo singers are known for embracing the principle that, in the words of Toni Cade Bambara, “the role of the revolutionary artist is to make the revolution irresistible.”
The Oromo singer is at once a provocateur, social critic and an inspiration and outlet to a generation suffocated by a deep state hell-bent on clinging to power through the barrel of the gun.
Oromo musicians released more than 100 #OromoProtest singles in the past year alone. One common thread that runs through all of these songs: A disdain and nonexistent fear for authority and a call for an end to Oromo people’s marginal status. The Oromo singer is at once a provocateur, social critic and an inspiration and outlet to a generation suffocated by a deep state hell-bent on clinging to power through the barrel of the gun.It’s worth noting here that female singers had been at the forefront of this lyrical fight, bucking established norms that deem Geerarsa is the sole domain of male artists, which in and of itself is a form of protest. The list is long but it includes moving clips by Hawi Tezera, Seenaa Solomon, Mulu Bekele, and Keeyeroon Darajjee to mention only a few. These and many other artists, including Haacaalu Hundessa, Caalaa Bultume, Jafar Yusuf, Galaana Garoomsaa, Jireenya Shiferaw, Ittiqa Tafarii, Teferi Mokonnen and Jambo Jote, provided the soundtrack for the revolution.
Hawi, Seenaa, Jireenya, Teferi and many other artists, too many to list here, have been in and out of prison. Caalaa Bultume and a handful of other artists including Shukri Jamal, Kadir Martu, Zerihun Wodajo, Addisu Karrayyu and Yanet Dinku were forced into exile.
Again and again, a thread that binds these disparate protests — on the streets, at the Olympic stage, on social media, and through music — is their membership in the fierce and fearless Qubee Generation. They share a universal disdain and mistrust for authority, a desire to be free, respect for their basic rights and an acute ethnic self-awareness.
Economic grievances
To be sure, as with young people all across Africa, the Qubee generation also has real and everyday economic grievances. Youth unemployment continues to run high. The lowest paying public service job requires party membership or deep connections to those in power. Even the lucky few who are employed lack avenues for upward mobility. The hundreds of thousands of yearly college graduates lack well-paying quality jobs. The gap between the rich and the poor keeps widening. The cost of living continues to soar amid persistent inflation. The youth loathe EPRDF’s suffocating Orwellian model of surveillance — known as one to five — which has made life unbearable, reaching down to the village level.
Endemic corruption, cronyism and a heightened focus on ramping up school enrollment to meet global millennial development goals, rather than improving instructional quality, has wrecked the educational system. This is evident in Ethiopia going from having only a handful of universities two decades ago to now boasting more than three dozen public universities. The effects of the plummeting quality of education may not be apparent just yet. But as Ethiopia looks to become a regional manufacturing hub and amid continental efforts toward more regional integration, Ethiopian students are likely to have difficulty competing for jobs and other opportunities. The signs are beginning to show already. Recent college graduates report growing stigma for having spent 16 years going through the school system to only end up working in road construction, breaking cobblestones for Chinese investors.
The way forward: ‘Organize, organize, organize’
Ethiopia’s main challenge today is not corruption or the lack of good governance as the regime often alleges, but its inability to meet the aspirations and grievances of an increasing assertive generation and a new breed of youth, made up mostly of middle and secondary school students, who are determined to decide their fate and shape the destiny of their communities.
The Oromo protests have proved far more disruptive than anything done in the past to address longstanding Oromo grievances. Using social media as an outlet, in a nation where only 4 percent of the population is online, no less, Oromo activists forced the cancellation or postponement of Ethiopia’s secondary school exit exams by leaking test answers to diaspora-based agitators. Official meetings have been recorded and leaked to the media, creating mistrust at the highest levels of government to a point where authorities felt compelled to mandate government ministers, parliamentarians, and regional officials to turn off their cell phones during important meetings.
In spite of all these developments, the EPRDF regime continues to ignore the writing on the wall, instead choosing to play an embarrassing game of cat and mouse with an unpredictable and a horizontally organized movement. The cosmetic changes at the top of the pyramid, including the recent cabinet shuffle, and promises of “deep reform” continue to sidestep the very real issues that are pushing an entire generation toward the edge.
Every day that the EPRDF regime tries to explain away popular, grassroots revolt as machinations of few bad actors from abroad, the tide continues to turn against its brutal and repressive rule. For every athlete or activist that’s forced into exile, there are hundreds more determined to expose the regime’s excesses, promising to keep the story in the media limelight. It will only be a matter of time until rank and file Oromo bureaucrats, the Oromia police, merchants and Oromo members of the armed forces join the budding revolution — for they too belong to the gallant Qubee Generation. Ethiopia’s history suggests that that would herald the end of EPRDF and yet another bloody transition in a country that has never seen a single peaceful transfer of power.
Ethiopia continues to run headlong into the abyss at a fast pace. Its phony federalism, promises of self-governance, and claims of economic miracle have been exposed as a sham from beginning to end. The state of emergency may have temporarily quelled the street protests but the deeper discontents remain. The Qubee generation appears ready to fight on until, in the words of Oromo leader Bekele Gerba, either all Oromos are jailed, killed and exiled, or until everyone is free.
Global trends such as the shocking Brexit vote and the election of Donald Trump as U.S. president suggest that the establishment in Addis Ababa will have a hard time prevailing against Oromo protesters. But in our view, much remains to be done to dislodge the entrenched EPRDF regime. The loose coalition appears shaky. It is badly wounded from within and without. But it is still the biggest and even formidable obstacle blocking the winds of change in Ethiopia.
One thing is for sure: Unlike previous generations of Oromo revolutionaries, the Qube Generation has outwitted the ruling party time after time. Thanks to its resourcefulness and resilience, the regime had to retool itself from time to time simply to catch up with the speed and creativity of the protesters. It is not doubted that Oromo activists are using the remaining months of the state of emergency to ponder next steps.
This holiday season, as we celebrate the visions and victories of Feyisa’s generation, both big and small, we must remain mindful of the incessant need for a broad-based and multi-prolonged campaign to create a durable peace in Ethiopia. Beyond individual acts of heroism, transformative change comes communally from the ground up. Diaspora activism has been key in echoing and amplifying the voices of the protests. But our storytelling — in words, songs and art — must continue to be grounded not in our grandiose political ambitions or positionings, but in the real, everyday grievances of those at home who are staring down the barrel of a gun.
In his keynote address at the 2016 Oromo Studies Association annual conference in August, imprisoned veteran Oromo leader, Merera Gudina, recalled a popular slogan from his student days. At the inauguration of the last leadership of the University Students Union of Addis Ababa, Eshetu Chole, veteran student activist and later professor of Economics there, now deceased, shouted out three slogans to the roaring sound of thousands of university staff and students:
One organize
Two organize;
Three organize
In Merera’s words, “in this regard, there is a clear gap we (the Oromo) should fill.”
Will the Qubee Generation finally bridge this gap?
A luta continua, vitória é certa. Happy Holidays to all!
In his interview with VOA, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor, Tom Malinowski discussed the current Ethiopian situation and his concerns regarding human right protection. He said, “It’s a very difficult situation. The country is under a state of emergency, and a state of emergency by definition means that certain rights are suspended. Due process is suspended. And however much the government may feel that the state of emergency has brought calm temporarily to the country, it also brings with it certain risks. It risks adding a new layer of grievances to those grievances that initially led people in Oromia and Amhara to come out onto the streets. At first they were concerned about land seizures and lack of jobs and representation, all of which the government has acknowledge to be real and legitimate. But now they’re also upset about the arrests and the violence. And the longer this continues, the more those grievances are likely to build. At the same time, it risks giving greater power to the security apparatus in a way that could delay the introduction of the reforms that the Prime Minister and the government have, to their great credit, said are necessary.” Listen the first part of VOA interview at: http://bit.ly/2h3kmYO https://www.facebook.com/us.emb.addisababa/posts/1372399152802454
An Ethiopian government directive under a state of emergency contains overly broad and vague provisions that risk triggering a human rights crisis, Human Rights Watch said in a legal analysis. The government should promptly repeal or revise all elements of the directive that are contrary to international law. 31 October 2016.
“Internet mobile irrati fayadamuuf mali argameera… akkas agodhani qeeroon Setting..more network….mobile network… access network name…. harka mirgara + kan jedhu tuqu… name kanjedhu … et.wap… APN… et.wap…. proxy…10.204.189.211… port…9028…. authentication… PAP or CHAP kan jedhu guutu… kana booda qeerroon mirgaan galte Mobile jam Tplf irraa hanu… sanan fayadama jira amaan kana.” #OromoRevolution.
The construction cranes towering above the building sites on Ras Abebe Aragay Street in central Addis Ababa are tangible evidence of Ethiopia’s lofty ambitions to transform its capital into a modern hub.
In two years’ time this should become a boulevard of gleaming skyscrapers, home to leading banks and others attracted by Ethiopia’s state-led development model. And with sub-Saharan Africa’s only electric light rail network outside South Africa passing nearby, Addis Ababa will be able to project a much more developed image than any of its regional rivals.
Foreign investors, notably from China, have this year ploughed $2.5bn into an economy that has experienced double-digit annual growth over most of the past decade. But behind the façade, cracks are appearing in the model that helped Ethiopia become one of Africa’s star economic performers.
The consequence for the authoritarian government, which derives much of its legitimacy since taking power 25 years ago from delivering development in the absence of many basic freedoms, is unprecedented uncertainty, analysts say.
Ethiopia is in the third month of a state of emergency imposed to quell demonstrations against the regime, with hundreds of people killed in a brutal crackdown on protests that began more than a year ago. Foreign-owned businesses, particularly in textiles and flower farming, have been targeted in attacks that have caused tens of millions of dollars of damage.
By sacrificing rule-of-law and predictability to achieve short-term stability, the Ethiopian government has damaged its reputation
A few companies have left while others have put expansion plans on hold. Government promises of compensation for the damage have been extremely slow to materialise, adding to investors’ wariness.
Diplomats warn that the government, dominated by the Tigray ethnic group which comprise just 6 per cent of the population, is not addressing the protesters’ underlying grievances of inequitable growth, lack of democracy and perceived rampant nepotism.
“By sacrificing rule-of-law and predictability to achieve short-term stability, the Ethiopian government has damaged its reputation by reinforcing the perception that it is more authoritarian than democratic,” said a western diplomat who engages with foreign companies.
For visitors to Addis Ababa, the most noticeable impact of the crackdown is the complete lack of mobile internet and severe disruption to online services. Deloitte, the global advisory firm, has estimated the shutdown is costing the economy $500,000 a day.
“It has become more than annoying, my business is suffering,” says an engine oil salesman in Addis Ababa, who asked not to be named because of his criticisms of the government. “I like to do a lot of sales on the move, but it’s now very inconvenient. Does the government realise the effect of what it’s doing?”
The country’s growing tourism industry has also been hit, with tour operators reporting lost earnings of $7m in the weeks after the state of emergency was imposed in October. Western governments have lifted travel advisories for most of the country but people in the hospitality industry predict it will take time for visitors to return.
“We have some foreign tourists staying but far fewer than usual,” says the manager at an Addis Ababa hotel who asked not to be named. “And there are practically no western business travellers. The Chinese are still coming though.”
Roger Lee, chief executive of TAL, a Hong Kong-based company which produces clothes for brands such as Banana Republic, says despite the unrest, he would not be reversing the decision to open a factory in Hawassa, 275km south of Addis Ababa.
“It’s not the first time it’s happened in a country we work in,” he says, adding: “It’s very hard to find a developing country with no issues.”
The Ethiopian economy is still growing strongly — by 8 per cent this financial year according to official data. Although three percentage points lower than previously forecast it has come against the backdrop of a bad drought.
The International Monetary Fund also predicts continued robust growth, driven by an industrial base that is set to expand as more infrastructure and low-cost manufacturing, much of it financed by China, come on stream.
But there are also myriad worrying signs. The IMF warned in October that Ethiopia’s current account deficit, the amount by which imports exceed exports, “is not sustainable” at more than 10 per cent of gross domestic product for a second successive year. The resulting pressure on foreign exchange availability is adding to investors’ concerns.
David Cowan, Citi’s chief Africa economist, believes the reality is worse and questions an IMF prediction that foreign direct investment will be $4.45bn in 2016-17, nearly $1bn more than its previous estimate.
“I don’t see where the increase in FDI is going to come from,” he says. “I don’t see it from the multinationals, many of which are in a consolidating mode.”
Many are also pessimistic about how the country can create enough jobs when non-Ethiopians continue to be banned from investing in the banking, telecom and retail sectors.
“Successful economies have deep and diverse private sectors and Ethiopia’s just isn’t there,” said one investor, who asked not to be named. “It’s doing some things well but the gaps in its strategy — both economic and political — are glaring and I don’t see any inclination to address them.”
Merera Gudina is a professor and politician in Ethiopia. He is the leader of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) and opposition coalition – Dr. Merera was arrested on October 30 upon his return from a trip to Brussels where he spoke to members of the European parliament about the situation in Ethiopia. Since his arrest, Merera has not been brought to court or officially charged. We demand the immediate and unconditional release of the good professor.
Merera Gudina is a professor and politician in Ethiopia. He is the leader of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC), and an opposition coalition Medrek.
Merera began his college education at Addis Ababa University (AAU), but was imprisoned for seven years due to participating in protests against the dictatorship of Mengistu Haile Mariam. After his release, Merera went to Egypt to complete his education at the American University in Cairo.[1] Merera received his PhD in Political Science July 2002 from the Institute of Social Studies, at the Hague in the Netherlands
Merera founded the Oromo National Congress (ONC) in 1996, which became the largest Oromo opposition group by parliament seats after the 2005 national elections. His OFC had allied with several other parties to form the United Ethiopian Democratic Forces. Due to a court decision in 2007 which awarded the name of the ONC to a splinter group, the original ONC assumed a new name, the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) .
Leading opposition leader Merera Gudina after he returned from a trip to Europe. Gurdina was arrested upon his arrival at the airport in the capital Addis Ababa, according to the English private magazine Addis Standard. Gudina had travelled to Brussels where he alleged, during a hearing at the European Parliament, that Ethiopian security forces had committed human rights violations during recent unrest in the country.
Image copyrightAFP. Image caption The Oromo style of protest, arms crossed above the head as if handcuffed, has become famous
Ethiopia’s two largest ethnic groups, the Oromo and Amhara, were using these hashtags for months to bring attention to their protests over economic and political marginalisation.
They accused the government of killing hundreds of demonstrators and arresting thousands in brutal crackdowns.
But in August, when Ethiopia’s Olympic marathon silver medallist Feyisa Lilesa, himself an Oromo, crossed his hands above his head in a gesture of protest as he crossed the finish line in Rio, the world’s media sat up and took notice.
“The Ethiopian government is killing my people so I stand with all protests anywhere as Oromo is my tribe. My relatives are in prison and if they talk about democratic rights they are killed,” he said.
One Ethiopian activist on Twitter compared Lilesa’s actions to the famous black power salute made by two American athletes at the 1974 Olympics, when they staged a silent protest against racial discrimination:
Image copyrightTWITTER
Lilesa was named in Foreign Policy Magazine’s top 100 global thinkers for 2016, which praised him for “breaking the rules of the games” by staging a protest at the Olympics.
He is now living in exile in the US, having said he feared he would be killed or imprisoned if he returned home.
But protests have continued in his home country, with more than 24,000 people arrested since the government introduced a state of emergency in October – half of whom remain in custody.
Verfolgt, geflohen und aufgenommen. In Oberkotzau trifft sich regelmäßig eine Gruppe junger Menschen der Oromo-Ethnie aus Äthiopien.
Junge Oromo mit der verbotenen Flagge ihres Oromo-Landes: Sie sehnen sich nach einem friedlichen Leben.
Oberkotzau– Eine große, bunte Gruppe junger Menschen ist diese Woche Gast im Bürgertreff Oberkotzau gewesen. Leiter Peter Braun hatte erfahren, dass sich in Hof die Gruppe Oromo Family unter der Obhut von Monika Lauterbach zusammengefunden hat. Seit etwa einem Jahr und beginnend mit einem Sprachkurs begleitet die Hoferin Monika Lauterbach die jungen Leute auf ihrem Weg der Integration in eine für sie völlig neue Welt.
In Oberkotzau wurde vor einigen interessierten Jugendlichen und Erwachsenen eingangs die geografische Lage Äthiopiens und der Hochebene Oromo gezeigt; ergänzend dazu berichteten die jungen Oromo von der politischen Situation. Das berichteten sie: Das fruchtbare Ackerland auf der Hochebene ist begehrt, die Rechte der dort ansässigen Bauern und Arbeiter spielen keine Rolle mehr. Es soll an ausländische Investoren verkauft werden, manches ist schon verkauft. Es werden lieber Blumen und Ölsaaten angebaut und keine Grundnahrungsmittel und Kaffee. Wer sich gegen Übergriffe wehrt, wird erbarmungslos verfolgt, eingesperrt, gefoltert und verprügelt. Viele Menschen verschwinden einfach. Dagegen gehen die Menschen auf die Straße und halten Demonstrationen ab, die aber blutig niedergeschlagen werden.
Die äthiopische Regierung achtet die Rechte der Bevölkerung nicht, so der Bericht, und verfolgt die Ethnie der Oromo, sie setzt mit Gewalt und Willkür ihre Ansprüche durch. Das sind die Gründe, warum viele junge Menschen ihre Heimat verlassen müssen, wenn sie überleben wollen. Wenn sie an Demonstrationen teilgenommen, sich gegen die Wegnahme ihrer Farmen gewehrt haben, werden sie gesucht, eingesperrt, getötet. Die Farmen haben die Menschen von ihren Eltern übernommen oder geerbt, das Land, das sie bebauen, gehört dem äthiopischen Staat.
Auf abenteuerlichen und gefährlichen Wegen sind die Oromo vielfältigen Gefahren ausgesetzt, ehe sie in Europa ankommen. Unterwegs haben sie viele Menschen sterben sehen. “Deutschland – das bedeutete für uns Gerechtigkeit, Demokratie und Freiheit”, berichtete einer der Oromo-Jungen. Wir sind von Land zu Land geflohen auf der Suche nach Sicherheit und Leben.
“Erst in Deutschland haben wir eine menschenwürdige Behandlung erfahren. Selbst in Italien mussten wir – Jungen wie Mädchen wie Kinder – auf der Straße schlafen, ohne Decke, ohne Essen und Trinken. Wir wollen hier lernen, und wenn es möglich ist, zurückkehren in unsere Heimat, um unser Wissen weiterzugeben.” Für die Frauen allerdings bedeutete Italien einen ebenfalls schwierigen Teil der Reise – sie waren allen Angriffen schutzlos ausgeliefert und hatten kaum eine ruhige Nacht.
Monika Lauterbach lernte die Gruppe als “freundlich, wohlerzogen und sehr höflich” kennen. Einmal wöchentlich trifft man sich. Als Dolmetscher hilft ein Landsmann, der schon länger in Hof ist und die deutsche Sprache gut beherrscht.
Inzwischen begleitet Lauterbach die jungen Menschen auch zu den Anhörungen nach Zirndorf. “Es ist gut, wenn jemand dabei ist, der Beistand leistet und bestimmte Dinge erklären und klären kann,” betont sie. Wie kann man erklären, dass ein Oromo keinen Pass besitzt? “Nicht viele Menschen in Äthiopien besitzen Pässe, Oromos bekommen Pässe zu den gleichen Bedingungen wie Ausländer – sie werden diskriminiert. Sie erhalten Pässe erst nach dem 18. Geburtstag, Geburtsurkunden gibt es in den seltensten Fällen.”
Gute Erfahrungen macht Lauterbach in der Zusammenarbeit mit der Stadt Hof, der Arbeitsagentur und der Volkshochschule in Hof. Vereinbarungen auf Regierungsebene zwischen Deutschland und Äthiopien sind ihrer Meinung nach höchst gefährlich, weil nicht mit offenen Karten gespielt wird. Die äthiopische Regierung hat nicht vor, die Rückkehrer beziehungsweise die ausgewiesenen Landsleute freizulassen und ihnen ihr Land zurückzugeben. Sie würden in Gefängnissen verschwinden.
Fast alle in der Gruppe haben in Äthiopien die Schule besucht. “Aber es reichte, dass ein Familienmitglied an einer Demonstration teilgenommen hat oder in der Freiheitsbewegung war, schon wurde die ganze Familie verfolgt”, berichtet einer der jungen Männer. Nun sind bereits zwei Kinder in Deutschland geboren. Eines besucht in Hof einen Kindergarten, das zweite ist noch ganz klein. Einige Gruppenmitglieder absolvieren Praktika, sind in der Berufsschule, manche haben bereits feste Arbeitsplätze, sie spielen Fußball in Vereinen. Sie sprechen Deutsch und sind auf der Suche nach Frieden und Normalität, wollen arbeiten und lernen und in Handwerksberufen Lehren machen.
People from the Oromo group block a road in Ethiopia after protesters were shot dead by security forces in Wolenkomi, about 35 miles west of Addis Ababa in December 2015. (AFP/Getty Images)
METI, Ethiopia — Earlier this month, hundreds of high school students in the small Ethiopian town of Meti gathered for a demonstration.They were supposed to be celebrating the country’s Nations and Nationalities day, which commemorates the much-vaunted equality of Ethiopia’s 80 ethnic groups. Instead, they defied a two-month-old state of emergency to voice their anger over stalled political reforms and endemic corruption.
The protest was quickly dispersed and arrests were made, locals said, and calm returned to the village. But the incident is a sign of the simmering resentment that threatens to shatter Ethiopia’s enforced quiet.
The United States, one of Ethiopia’s biggest backers, is urging the government to address the widespread dissatisfaction and open up the country’s politics before it is too late.
“We feel it has reached an inflection point where some hard decisions are going to have to be made,” said Tom Malinowski, the assistant secretary of state for human rights, in an interview during a recent visit to the capital, Addis Ababa. “Otherwise, a lot of the achievements could be jeopardized, and we know from the country’s history what a true crisis could look like.”
It is difficult to overstate the importance of Ethiopia to Africa’s stability. It has the continent’s second-largest population — nearly 100 million people — one of its fastest growing economies and a powerful military that helps stabilize a string of troubled countries around it.
The United States — and many other countries — have invested extensively in aid programs to help the Ethiopian government wrest the country out of poverty and bring it to middle-income status. If it succeeds — and becomes a democracy as well — it could be a model for developing nations everywhere.
Ethiopia has witnessed double-digit growth in the past decade. But this rapid economic expansion has resulted in strains, especially when new factories and commercial farms are being built on land taken from farmers. The central Oromo region, which has historically felt marginalized — despite having the largest segment of the population and some of the richest farmland — has been particularly hard hit.
Protests erupted there in November 2015 over the land grabs, corruption in the local government and lack of services such as running water, electricity and roads. The demonstrations later spread to the northern Amhara region, which has grievances of its own with a government that residents maintain is dominated by the Tigrayan minority group.
It has been the worst unrest in Ethiopia since Tigrayan-led rebels overthrew the Marxist government in 1991. Amnesty International estimates at least 800 people have died in the suppression of protests over the past year.
People have also increasingly singled out Tigrayans for their woes, accusing them of getting the best jobs and dominating the economy. There have been cases of attacks on Tigrayans in the north of the country, and there are fears the unrest could take on a more ethnic dimension.
After dozens were killed during a botched attempt to disperse a crowd at an Oromo religious festival in October, mobs attacked factories and commercial farms across the country and the government declared a state of emergency. Violence has since dropped off, and the government has said it is addressing grievances and has already made significant progress, especially in the Oromo region.
“The reform in Oromia has been far ahead when compared to other regions,” insisted government spokesman Negeri Lencho in a recent news conference. “Ethiopia is in a state of reform — the reform began at the cabinet level . . . and is now continuing at other government levels to the lowest levels.”
But a dozen people interviewed by The Washington Post in the Oromo region said there have been no changes.
“The previous officials are still in office,” complained an old man walking with a cane from a weekend market in the town of Ejere. Like everyone else interviewed, he spoke on the condition of anonymity because of concerns for his safety.
He paused under an acacia tree overlooking his village to complain how nothing had improved. There had been no effort to address calls for paved roads and the installation of electricity, he said.
“The people are resentful of the local officials and don’t want to discuss things with them,” he said. The local administrator also had not shown much interest in talking to the people, he said, although he admitted a potential reason: Villagers burned down his house last year.
A middle-aged woman dressed in a floral print dress and white shawl interrupted. “We need the government to respond to the demands of the people,” she said, her voice rising. “What we need is for the killings and imprisonments to stop.”
Villagers described a climate of fear, with late-night raids targeting young people who had been accused of protesting. Few doubted that demonstrations will resume once the state of emergency is lifted. The government has promised a new electoral system with proportional representation so that opposition politicians have a chance to be elected. Currently, the opposition has no seats in the parliament or on local councils.
“What the government says is simply astonishing, what they are saying is totally different from what we see on the ground,” a young Oromo said in a village not far from the capital.
“On one hand, they talk about a dialogue with the opposition. But on the other hand, they are arresting the head of the main opposition party,” he added, referring to the Dec. 1 arrest of the country’s most prominent Oromo opposition leader, Merera Gudina.
Most of his party’s top and midlevel leaders have also been imprisoned over the past year despite the government’s talk of the need for dialogue with all political parties.
“The effect of the state of emergency counteracts the aspirations they have articulated,” Malinowski noted. He acknowledged that while the Ethiopian government is suggesting reforms, little has materialized. “The problem is they haven’t done any of it yet, and even with unqualified commitment and speed, these things are going to take quite some time to achieve.”
As the countryside seethes, time is not on the government’s side. The United States has urged a number of confidence-building measures such as releasing opposition figures.
The government may be starting to respond. Following Malinowski’s visit in mid-December, it released 9,800 of the nearly 25,000 people detained during the state of emergency.
But years of overwhelming election victories by the ruling party and its allies have left people deeply cynical about the possibility of change.
“During the past elections, those that came to power were not the ones chosen by the people,” said a 32-year-old farmer standing by the side of the highway near the town of Ambo. “We don’t know where the ballots of the people go.”
With opposition groups in the Ethiopian diaspora often preaching violence, Malinowski said the people must be shown that peaceful change within the political system is still possible.
“If they lose faith in that, they are not going to stop asking for change; they will just be more likely to listen to people who seek more extreme goals by more extreme means,” he warned.
By Amy Braunschweiger, Senior Web Communications Manager, Human Rights Watch, 14 December 2016
The gunning down of peaceful protesters in Ethiopia. Animations depicting the devastation of Saudi Arabia’s male ‘guardianship’ system on women’s lives. From these to child brides and LGBT rights, here are the year’s most-watched videos on Human Rights Watch’s YouTube Channel.
1. When we pieced together cell phone footage showing the deaths of peaceful protesters in Ethiopia, it became by far our most-watched video this year – both in English and Amharic.
Ethiopian security forces have killed more than 400 protesters and others, and arrested tens of thousands more during widespread protests in the Oromia region since November 2015.
2. Under Saudi Arabia’s guardianship system, women need a male guardian’s permission to marry, go to school, work, or even undergo certain medical procedures. This holds true even if a guardian – a father, husband, or even son – is abusive.
Saudi Arabia’s male guardianship system remains the most significant impediment to women’s rights in the country despite limited reforms over the last decade.
3. People who don’t conform to traditional ideas of gender in Sri Lanka face discrimination and abuse.
Transgender people and others who don’t conform to social expectations about gender face discrimination and abuse in Sri Lanka, including arbitrary detention, mistreatment, and discrimination accessing employment, housing, and health care. These abuses take place within a broader legal landscape that fails to recognize the gender identity of transgender people without abusive requirements; makes same-sex relations between consenting adults a criminal offense; and enables a range of abuses against LGBTI people by state officials and private individuals. The Sri Lankan government should protect the rights of transgender people and others who face similar discrimination.
4. Thirty-seven percent of girls in Nepal marry before age 18, and 10 percent are married by age 15.
Many children in Nepal are seeing their futures stolen from them by child marriage. Nepal’s government promises reform, but in towns and villages across the country, nothing has changed.
5. In Saudi Arabia, the permission of male guardians is required for women to be released from prison.
Saudi Arabia’s male guardianship system remains the most significant impediment to women’s rights in the country despite limited reforms over the last decade.
6. … and to travel.
Saudi Arabia’s male guardianship system remains the most significant impediment to women’s rights in the country despite limited reforms over the last decade.
7. How LGBT students are bullied in Japan…
The Japanese government has failed to protect lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students from school bullying.
8. A victim shares how he escaped Boko Haram, and talks of those who couldn’t…
9. This man tells how he was tortured in a CIA-run detention center.
A Tunisian man formerly held in secret United States Central Intelligence Agency custody have described previously unreported methods of torture that shed new light on the earliest days of the CIA program. Lotfi al-Arabi El Gherissi, 52, recounted being severely beaten with batons, threatened with an electric chair, subjected to various forms of water torture, and being chained by his arms to the ceiling of his cell for a long period.
10. And at number 10, how tobacco companies make money off the backs — and health — of Indonesian child workers.
Thousands of children in Indonesia, some just 8 years old, are working in hazardous conditions on tobacco farms.
The main purpose of this article is to provoke discussions on the “sacred”, yet very important issue of this country-the Question of Nationalities. The article as it was prepared for a special occasion (where detailed analysis was due time and other inconveniences impossible) suffers from generalizations and inadequate analysis. But I still feel it is not mediocre for a beginning. I expect my readers to avoid the temptation of snatching phrases out of their context and capitalizing on them. Instead every point raised here should be examined in the light of the whole analysis.
We have reached a new stage in the development of the student movement, a level where Socialism as a student ideology has been taken for granted, and reaction with all its window dressing is on the defensive. The contradictory forces are no more revolution versus reform, but correct scientific Socialism versus perversion and fadism.
The Socialist forces in the student movement till now have found it very risky and inconvenient to bring into the open certain fundamental questions because of their fear of being misunderstood. One of the delicate issues which has not yet been resolved up to now is the Question of Nationalities-some people call it ridiculously tribalism-but I prefer to call it nationalism. Panel discussions, articles in STRUGGLE and occasional speakers, clandestine leaflets and even tete-a-tete groups have not really delved into it seriously. Of course there was indeed the fear that it may alienate certain segments of the student population and as well the fear that the government may take advantage of an honest discussion to discredit the revolutionary student movement.
Starting from last year, a small minority began to discuss this delicate issue for the most part in secluded places. Discussions, even private, leak out and because they were not brought into the open they normally led to backbiting, misunderstanding and grossly exaggerated rumours. I think students are mature enough to face reality even if they are very sensitive. And the only solution to this degeneration, as witnessed from some perverted leaflets running amock [amok] these two weeks, is open discussion.
What are the Ethiopian peoples composed of? I stress on the word peoples because sociologically speaking, at this stage, Ethiopia is not really one nation. It is made up of a dozen nationalities with their own languages, ways of dressing, history, social organization and territorial entity. And what else is a nation? It is not made of a people with a particular tongue, particular ways of dressing, particular history, particular social and economic organization? Then, may I conclude that, in Ethiopia, there is the Oromo Nation, the Tigrai Nation, the Amhara Nation, the Gurage Nation, the Sidama Nation, the Wellamo [Wolayta] Nation, the Adere [Harari] Nation, and however much you may not like it, the Somali Nation.
This is the true picture of Ethiopia. There is, of course, the fake Ethiopian Nationalism advanced by the ruling class, and unwillingly accepted and even propagated by innocent fellow travelers.
What is this fake Nationalism? Is it not simply Amhara and to a certain extent Amhara-Tigre supremacy? Ask anybody what Ethiopian culture is? Ask anybody what Ethiopian language is? Ask anybody what Ethiopian music is? Ask anybody what the “national dress” is? It is either Amhara or Amhara-Tigre!!
To be a “genuine Ethiopian” one has to speak Amharic, to listen to Amharic music, to accept the Amhara-Tigre religion, Orthodox Christianity and to wear the Amhara-Tigre Shamma in international conferences. In some cases to be an “Ethiopian”, you will even have to change your name. In short to be an Ethiopian, you will have to wear an Amhara mask (to use Fanon’s expression). Start asserting your national identity and you are automatically a tribalist, that is if you are not blessed to be born an Amhara. According to the constitution you will need Amharic to go to school, to get a job, to read books (however few) and even to listen to the news on Radio “Ethiopia” unless you are a Somali or an Eritrean in Asmara for obvious reasons.
To anybody who has got a nodding acquaintenance with Marxism, culture is nothing more than the super-structure of an economic basis. So cultural domination always presupposes economic subjugation. A clear example of economic subjugation would be the Amhara and to a certain extent Tigrai Neftegna system in the South and the Amhara-Tigre Coalition in the urban areas. The usual pseudo-refutation of this analysis is the reference to the large Amhara andd Tigrai masses wallowing in poverty in the countryside. For that matter during the heydays of British imperialism a large mass of British Workers had to live under inhuman conditions.
Another popular counter argument is that there are two or three ministers of non-amhara-Tigre Nationality in the Cabinet, one or two generals in the army, one or two governors and a dozen balabats in the countryside. But out and out imperialists like the British used to rule their colonies mainly by enlisting the support of tribal chiefs, who were much more rich than the average citizen of the British Metropolis. The fact that (Houphet) Boigne and Senghor were members of the French National Assembly and the fact that they were even ministers did not reduce an iota of Senegalese and Ivory Coast [Ivoirians] loss of political independence.
Of course the economic and cultural subjugation by the Amharas and their junior partners the Tigres is a historical accident. Amharas are not dominant because of inherent imperialist tendencies. The Oromos could have done it, the Wellamos [Wolaytas] could have done it and history proves they tried to do so. But that is not an excuse for the perpetuation of this situation. The immediate question is we must declare a stop to it. And we must build a genuine national- state.
And what is this genuine national-state? It is a state in which all nationalities participate equally in state affairs, it is a state where every nationality is given equal opportunity to preserve and develop its language, its music and its history. It is a state where Amharas, Tigres, Oromos, Aderes [Harari], Somalis, Wollamos [Wolaytas], Gurages, etc. are treated equally. It is a state where no nation dominates another nation be it economically or culturally.
And how do we achieve this genuine democratic and egalitarian state?
Can we do it through military? No!! A military coup is nothing more but a change of personalities. It may be a bit more liberal than the existing regime but it can never resolve the contradiction between either classes or nationalities. The Neway brothers and Tadesse Birus could not have done it. Talking about Mengistu and Tadesse, one cannot fail to remember the reaction that the Mengistus coup though a family one and at that by a sector of Shoa Amharas (with few exceptions, of course among the Workeneh) was very popular just because it was staged by “Ethiopians”-Amharas. With Tadesse, it was automatically a tribalist uprising. Why? Tadesse an Oromo cannot stage a nationalist coup but Oromo Supremacist.
I am not equivocal in condemning coups, but the Tadesse coup had at least one significant quality and a very important one too. It gave our Oromo Brothers and Sisters self-respect. And self-respect is an important pre-requisite for any mass-based revolution. Even the so-called revolutionaries who scoffed at the coup just like the mass of the student body, could not comprehend this quality. You can clearly see in this instance the power of the Amhara-Tigre supremacist [supremacist] feelings. They clearly proved that they were nothing more than the products of government propaganda on this question.
Can the Eritrean Liberation Front and the Bale armed struggle achieve our goal? Not with their present aims and set-up.
Both these movements are exclusive in character, led by the local Bourgeoisie in the first instance and the local feudal lords in the second. They do not have international outlook, which is essential for our goal. They are perfectly right in declaring that there is national oppression. We do not quarrel with them on this score. But their intention is to stop there. They do not try to expand their struggles to the other nationalities. They do not attempt to make a broad-based assault on the foundations of the existing regime. They deliberately try to forget the connection of their local ruling classes with the national oppression. In short these movements are not led by peasants and workers. Therefore, they are not Socialists; it would only be a change of masters for the masses. But for the Socialists the welfare of the masses comes first.
The same can be said for the Gojjam uprising. But I would like to take this opportunity once again to show how much Amhara supremacism [supremacism] is taken for granted in this Campus.
To applaud the ELF is a sin. If anything favorable is written out, it is automatically refuted by both USUAA and NUEUS. But the Gojjam affair was different. Support for it was practically a show of identity to the so-called revolutionaries.
Mind you, I am just saying that these movements are not lasting solutions for our goal-the set-up of a genuine Nationalist Socialist State. I am all for them, the ELF, the Bale movements, the Gojjam uprising, to the extent that they have challenged and weakened the existing regime, and have created areas of discontent to be harnessed later on by a genuine Socialist revolution.
One thing again is certain. I do not oppose these movements just because they are secessionists. There is nothing wrong with secessionism as such. For that matter secession is much better than nationally oppressive government. I quote Lenin, “…People resort to secession only when national oppression and national antagonisms make joint life absolutely intolerable and hinder any and all economic intercourse. In that case the interests of the freedom of the class struggle will be best served by Secession. I would also like to quote the resolution on the question of nationalities from the London International Socialist Congress of 1896 attended, supported and adopted by the Bolsheviks who brought about the October revolution, “This Congress declares that it stands for the full right of all nations to self-determination and expresses its sympathy for the workers and peasants of every country now suffering under the yoke of military, national or other absolutism.”
As long as secession is led by the peasants and workers and believes in its internationalist obligation, it is not only to be supported but also militarily assisted. It is pure backwardness and selfishness to ask a people to be partners in being exploited till you can catch up. We should never dwell on the subject of secession, but whether it is progressive or reactionary. A Socialist Eritrea and Bale would give a great impetus to the revolution in the country and could form an egalitarian and democratic basis for re-unification.
To come back to our central question: How can we form a genuine egalitarian national-state? It is clear that we can achieve this goal only through violence, through revolutionary armed struggle. But we must always guard ourselves against the pseudo-nationalist propaganda of the regime. The revolution can start anywhere. It can even be secessionist to begin with, as long as led by the progressive forces-the peasants and the workers, and has the final aim the liberation of the Ethiopian Mass with due consideration to the economic and cultural independence of all the nationalities. It is the duty of every revolutionary to question whether a movement is Socialist or reactionary not whether a movement is secessionist or not. In the long run Socialism is internationalism and a Socialist movement will never remain secessionist for good.
To quote Lenin again, “From their daily experience the masses know perfectly well the value of geographical and economic ties and the advantages of a big market and a big state.” From this point of view of the struggle as well, a regime like ours harassed from corners is bound to collapse in a relatively short period of time. But when the degree of consciousness of the various nationalities is at different levels, it is not only the right but the duty of the most conscious nationality to first liberate itself and then assist others in the struggle for total liberation. Is that not true of Korea? We do support this movement, don’t we? Then, what is this talk of tribalism, secessionism, etc…..?
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Wallelign Mekonnen Kassa was born on March 22, 1945 in Debresina Woreda, Wollo, Ethiopia.
In 1965, he joined the Haile-Selassie I University and studied political science. He was one of the devoted university students who struggled to emancipate the Ethiopian workers and peasants from tyranny. Wallelign and his comrades were imprisoned by the Ethiopian government and released after five months. Wallelign was suspended from university by the administration.
The articles he wrote include, “The Question of Nationalities in Ethiopia”, which states the national repression and the solution for this problem, “Le Awaju Awaj”, an article in response to the emperor’s address in the radio regarding the university students, “Ye Azinaraw Eseregan” (Prisoner’s Azinara ) and “Message to Professor Afework Gebereyesus”.
Walelign acquired the love for his country from an early age, and he dedicated his life to Ethiopia until the moment he was assassinated, December 9, 1972.
The irresponsible and minority regime in Finfinnee/Addis Ababa that had declared the scrapping of the so-called ‘Addis Ababa Integrated Master Plan’ a year ago is again doing its best to test the strength of the Oromo people by making another systematic move to implement the deadly ‘Master Plan’ that has caused the death of more than 2,000 Oromo protesters in all over Oromia since Nov. 2015.
TPLF and its puppet OPDO, had been forced to scrap the plan months after the outbreak of Oromia wide protest against the ‘Master Plan’ and the mufti-faceted subjugation against the Oromo people for over a century. The Oromia wide protest that was the first in its kind in Africa, had a profound and shaking impact on the failing Ethiopian empire as it was a revolution that originated from rural grass root Oromo farmers that have been highly affected by the corrupt TPLF led regime.
Even if the Master Plan was declared scrapped a year ago, the Oromo protest has been going on opposing the systemic political, economic, social and cultural marginalization of the Oromo people by the successive Ethiopian rulers.
Due to the indiscriminate and disproportionate attack by Agazi force against the Oromo protesters simply because they have been requesting legitimate and basic rights, more than 2, 000 Oromos have been killed, more than 10, 000 injured, and close to 250, 000 are detained and are being tortured by the TPLF security forces in different detention centers in Oromia.
The current move by TPLF is another round of attempt to implement the ‘Master Paln’ to displace Oromo from their ancestral land with the help of a UN agency called UN – Habitat; However, this must be the last call for all Oromo to renew their resolve to get ride of this brutal minority regime once and for all.
On Saturday Dec. 17, Siraj Fegessa, Ethiopia’s minister of defense and the secretariat of the command post tasked to implement the country’s sweeping six-month state of emergency (SOE), had news that should have come as a relief to tens of thousands of Ethiopians. Minister Siraj, a civilian, told journalists mostly drawn from state-controlled and state-affiliated media houses that some 9, 800 individuals who were detained under the SoE will be released by Wednesday Dec. 21 while 2, 449 others “will be brought to justice.”
But the mood among Ethiopians following the announcement is not that of a celebration; for many, the damage their loved ones have sustained while held at one of the half dozen detention facilities (referred to by many as ‘concentration camps’) is too deep to have been undone by the announcement of their release, and rightly so.
By the government’s account, a total of 24,799 individuals were arrested in two rounds under the SoE since October this year. However, this figure doesn’t mention whether those who were detained prior to the decreeing of the SoE on October 9 are accounted for. And, informed by previous brutalities of the security apparatus, Ethiopians are under no illusion that this figure is much higher than what’s being admitted by the government.
Even one is to take the government’s figures to account, it simply means that thousands of university students have missed this academic year’s attendance; thousands others who were the breadwinners of their families and extended family members have failed to deliver on their promises; and thousands have lost their jobs.
But for some, the cost is too personal to recover from. One such Ethiopian is Alemayehu Merga, (name changed upon request), a former clerk at a private Bank in Awash town some 91 km south east of the capital Addis Abeba.
In a letter sent to Addis Standard a few weeks ago, Alemayehu says when he was arrested from his hotel room (name of the hotel withheld) in Merkato, an open market hailed as the largest in Africa, he was preparing for his wedding scheduled to take place on Sunday September 16 in Adama, 100k south east of Addis Abeba.
The intense crackdown by the police that led to Alemayehu’s arrest followed a massive anti-government protest on August 06, 2016. The weekend protest was called by online activists of the #OromoProtest and was dubbed “Grand Oromo Rally”. It ended when regional and federal police have brutally suppressed the protesters, killing hundreds and detaining thousands. But instead of receding, thousands more of protesters raged through the Special Zone of the Oromia Regional State, eight neighboring towns mostly located within 25k radius from the capital Addis Abeba.
The bedrock of these protests was a 10 month persistent anti-government protest that began in Oromia regional state, the largest regional states in federated Ethiopia, in November 2015; it was followed, several months later, by another anti-government protest in Amhara regional state in the north.
The protests in these two regional states have quickly escalated into a large scale anti-government protest that posed the ultimate challenge to the hitherto unchallenged quarter century reign of the ruling TPLF-dominated EPRDF regime in Ethiopia.
A pre-wedding trip gone dreadful
Almayehu’s arrest happened at a time when, reeling from uncontrollable protest flare ups in most parts of the country, the federal and city police began conducting random stop and search and have arrested unknown numbers of individuals from the city. Low-cost hotels throughout Addis Abeba have also received letters from their respective Kebele administrations ordering them to declare the identities of their guests who come from the countryside.
“I came to Addis Abeba from Awash to buy some household materials and pick my wedding suit which was ready at a tailor’s shop in Piassa. But I was arrested on September 10,” his letter narrates.
Alemayehu was then held at a police station commonly known in Addis Abeba as “Sidistegna” Police station located in the heart of the city. He was kept there incommunicado for about a month. No one from his family knew what happened to him. And he missed his wedding.
“I kept telling the police officers that I was only in town to prepare for my wedding, but they kept telling me I was in town to organize young people to protest. I had a few invitation cards that I was planning to give out to my friends and relatives living in the city. I never managed to give them as I was arrested the very next day after I arrived in the city. And even if I kept showing my wedding invitation cards to the police officers, no one wanted to believe me.”
Alemayehu joined hundreds of others detained under similar circumstances. Most of them are young Ethiopians and all of them were held incommunicado at several police stations in the city.
On October 02, the unthinkable happened when police fired shots at a gathering of millions of Oromo who came to celebrate the annual Ireechaa festival in Bishoftu town, 40 km south of the capital.
For many, the death by stamped of yet unverified numbers of Ethiopians at this sacred, otherwise peaceful festival was the turning point of the almost year-long anti-government protests that gripped the nation. A ‘five-day rage’ was called by online activists of the Oromo protests following what was quickly hashtaged as “IreechaaMassacre. It resulted in protesters attacking foreign owned businesses in several parts of the country. It also led to the near collapse of the country’s tourism industry, forced the government to declare the current SoE and to reshuffle the Prime Minister’s cabinet only a year after it was sworn in to the office.
But for Alemayehu and thousands of others detained pre and post the SoE, the ordeal has just began.
Three days after the decreeing on Oct. 9 of the sweeping SoE, which practically suspended most parts of the constitution, Alemayehu and “roughly 2000 others” held in police stations in Addis Abeba were transported to Awash Abra Military camp, not far away from Alemayehu’s birth place in Awash.
The military camp is one of the dozen camps throughout the country where tens of thousands of Ethiopians detained under the SoE are currently held.
The 2013 country report by the US Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor describes these camps as “unofficial detention centers throughout the country, including in Dedessa, Bir Sheleko, Tolay, Hormat, Blate, Tatek, Jijiga, Holeta, and Senkele. Most were located at military camps.”
“None of my family members, including my bride-to-be, knew I was there,” Alemayehu’s 3-pages letter recounts. All of them were told they were arrested by the “orders of the command post”, after they were transported to the camp. By now, the government announced that the command post was led by defense minister Siraj and was comprised of other unnamed senior officials.
“Hell breaks loose”
“Once inside the military camp, we were told we would undergo an ideological training on the current federal arrangement and we will be taught about the illegalities of the protests.”
According to Alemayehu’s letter, in the beginning, there were about 3,000 detains who came from the Oromia regional state. “But after a week, and the weeks that followed our numbers grew, in my estimate, to about 6000. We were told we would only be there for two weeks’ training and be released afterwards.”
Describing the situation inside the military camp, Alemayehu wrote: “It was the moment I experienced how hell breaks loose.”
“The heat is unbearable during day time, and at night the temperature drops to a freezing cold. There was only one meal a day (often bread) and the temporary corrugated iron shacks we were held inside had no running water, no toilets no sleeping places. Sometime in mid-October what looked like a cholera outbreak spread. We have seen many dead bodies being transferred out of the camp at night times.”
“I never wanted to see tomorrow”
The said training didn’t begin during the first week, Alemayehu’s letter further said, “but every night dozens of us would be called for investigations. I was lucky to not have been called for the night time investigations, but many of those who did often come back limping after being tortured beyond words.”
When the training began, it involved hours-long lectures given mostly by military officials on the legacy the late Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, the history of the party he co-founded, TPLF, and the 17 years sacrifices its members had paid to overthrow the military Derg in 1991. It also included the ruling party’s economic ideology of building a developmental state, the concept of federalism and multi-party democracy, according to the letter.
“But most of the time, we would just sit there in the blazing sun, hungry and thirsty, waiting for the officials to arrive. Sometimes, nobody shows up and we would be told to return to the barracks and come back tomorrow morning. But I never wanted to see tomorrow. All I wanted was to die and end my misery.”
Two weeks into his ordeal at the military camp, Almayehu was released after a “police officer who knew who I was and what I did for living in Awash spotted me there.” “After what I think was this police officer’s attempt to help me, I was called one morning and told to pack up and be ready. There will be a car ready to transport me to Adama. That was it; no one to ask for justice; no one to ask for a letter to my employees, nothing.”
Alemayehu is back in Awash, from where he e-mailed us his letter. He is unemployed after the bank he was working for refused to take him back on “administrative grounds. I am now looking for a job.”
And he has since learned the devastating news of the disappearance of his fiancé. “Like me, no one knows where she is at now. I was told that after my mysterious disappearance she was struggling to face the possibilities that I may have simply deserted her. The last time she was seen in the town, where she was living with family members, was on Oct. 13, after that she has simply vanished; it is like she never existed.”
Alemayehu’s story of families torn apart and the hopelessness that follows resonates with hundreds and thousands of others who have been detained and still remain in one of the seven temporary detention facilities throughout the country.
A brief report released yesterday by the Ethiopia Human Right Project sampled 24 individuals, mainly opposition party members, bloggers, and journalists, who are currently detained under the SoE.
The three salient circumstances all the 24 detainees share in common are, according to the report: almost all remained detained without due court process; some have been informed of the reasons for their arrests after they were taken to the detention facilities; and some have not even been informed of the reason for their detention.
By all accounts, it is a story of the human cost in a country under a sweeping State of Emergency; a country where the news of the release of thousands would come too little too late to restore the hopes that were dashed, for some, forever. AS
The African Union has expressed concern about Ethiopia’s current State of Emergency against the upcoming Heads of State Summit in the capital Addis Ababa in January 2017.
The concerns were raised by the Chairperson Dr. Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma who met with the newly appointed Ethiopian Minister of Foreign Affairs at the AU Headquarters on Tuesday.
The minister Dr. Workneh Gebeyehu allayed the fears of the AU chairperson by assuring that “the situation had now calmed down substantially and nothing untoward was anticipated to occur that could disrupt the Summit proceedings”.
“The Government was fully engaging the people, with a view to find solutions to the teething issues, such as the persistent problem of youth unemployment which gives way to the exploitation of idle hands,” a statement from the AU quoted the minister.
He also expressed hope that the relationship between Ethiopia and the African Union to remain solid and assume its position as the capital of Africa.
Dlamini Zuma praised the cooperation of the Ethiopian government.
Ethiopia declared a state of emergency on October 9 to curb the unrest which turned violent leading to damage of properties including those of local and international businesses.
Before the State of Emergency was imposed, over 50 people died on October 2 in a stampede at a festival in Bishoftu after police fired teargas and warning shots to disperse protesters at the event.
At least 500 people have been killed and thousands arrested in the wave of anti-government protests in the Amhara and Oromia regions over the past months.
International bodies including the United Nations and the European Union have called on the Ethiopian government to exercise restraint against protesters.
The European Parliament (EP) has officially written to the Ethiopian government seeking clarification on the arrest of an opposition leader, Dr. Merera Gudina.
The EP President, Martin Schulz, in a letter to President Mulatu Teshome said they were disturbed about the arrest of the Chairman of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) leader. The EP also reiterated its call for the charges against Gudina to be made known.
‘‘It appears that Dr Gudina was arrested by Ethiopian authorities upon his return from a short stay in Brussels in early November, during which he also met with Members of the European Parliament,’‘ the letter read.
I would like to remind you, that the European Parliament is a House of democracy, where different voices can be heard, from foreign governments as well as representatives of opposition groups.
The letter stated that the Ethiopian ambassador in Brussels had said the Gudina’s detention was connected with contacts he had with individuals Addis Ababa deemed as ‘terrorists.’ It added that it was ‘rather unfortunate that his arrest is linked to meetings he had with the European parliament.
‘‘I would like to remind you, that the European Parliament is a House of democracy, where different voices can be heard, from foreign governments as well as representatives of opposition groups,’‘ the letter added.
Late last month, Ethiopian security forces arrested the academician who is the chairman of the OFC, shortly after his arrival in the capital Addis Ababa.
Prof. Merera was returning from Brussels where – together with other Ethiopian activists and the Olympian athlete Feyisa Lellisa – he had had a meeting with Members of the European Parliament on 9 November 2016.
The state-affiliated FANA broadcasting corporate however quoted authorities as saying that Gudina was arrested because he had flouted the State Of Emergency currently being enforced nationwide.
According to FANA, the Secretariat of the Command Post said Gudina violated an article of the law which prohibited any communication with banned terrorist organizations and anti-peace groups. “He is under investigation for violating this article,” the Command Post said.
The European Parliament adopted an urgency resolution on the violent crackdown on protesters in January 2016, which requested that the Ethiopian authorities stop using anti-terrorism legislation to repress political opponents, dissidents, human rights defenders, other civil society actors and independent journalists.
Since January 2016 the human rights situation in Ethiopia has not improved at all. Human Rights Watch reports that security forces have killed more than 500 people during protests over the course of 2016.
Google transparency report shows dramatic drop in internet traffic out of Ethiopia on two days when at least 100 people were killed by security forces during protest
16 news sites and access to WhatsApp blocked between June and October
“As far as the Ethiopian government is concerned, social media is a tool for extremists… The reality, though, is very different” – Michelle Kagari
The Ethiopian government systematically and illegally blocked access to social media and news websites in its efforts to crush dissent and prevent reporting of attacks on protesters by security forces during a wave of protests over the last year, a new report released today shows.
Research conducted by Amnesty International and the Open Observatory of Network Interference shows that between June and October this year during times of heightened tension and protests, access to WhatsApp and at least 16 news outlets was blocked, especially in the Oromia region.
Since November last year, thousands of people from Oromia have taken to the streets to protest against possible land seizures under the government’s Addis Ababa Masterplan, which aims to expand the capital’s administrative control into the region. The government declared a six-month state of emergency in October this year in response to the protests.
The study was conducted to investigate whether and to what extent internet censorship was actually taking place after contacts of Amnesty and the Open Observatory of Network Interference in Ethiopia consistently reported unusually slow internet connections and inability to access social media websites.
Testimonies gathered by Amnesty from different parts of Oromia found that social media mobile applications such as Facebook, WhatsApp, and Twitter, have been largely inaccessible since early March this year, especially in the Oromia region where residents were waging protests against the government since last November.
The Ethiopian government is also reported to have blocked access to Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Viber during the National University Exam week (9 – 14 July 2016) so as “to prevent students being distracted from studying during the exam period”.
Amnesty contacts also reported that internet access on mobile devices had been completely blocked in Amhara, Addis Ababa and Oromia in the lead up to protests in the three regions on 6 and 7 August.
This was confirmed in Google’s transparency reports for the period between July and November this year, which showed a dramatic drop in internet traffic out of Ethiopia on the two days when at least 100 people were killed by security forces during the protests.
Amnesty International’s Deputy East Africa, the Horn and Great Lakes Director Michelle Kagari said:
“It’s clear that as far as the Ethiopian government is concerned, social media is a tool for extremists peddling bigotry and hate and therefore they are fully justified in blocking internet access. The reality, though, is very different. The widespread censorship has closed another space for Ethiopian’s to air the grievances that fuelled the protests.
“The internet blocking had no basis in law, and was another disproportionate and excessive response to the protests. This raises serious concerns that overly broad censorship will become institutionalised under the state of emergency.
“Rather than closing off all spaces for people to express their concerns, the authorities need to actively engage with, and address the underlying human rights violations that have fuelled the protests over the last year. “We urge the government to refrain from blocking access to internet sites and instead commit its resources to addressing its citizens’ legitimate grievances.”
Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology used to filter websites
The report also found that the Ethiopian government uses Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology to filter access to websites. DPI is a technology that can be bought and deployed on any network. Though it has many legitimate functions, it can also enable monitoring and filtering of internet traffic.
The Open Observatory of Network Interference’s Maria Xynou said:
“Our findings provide incontrovertible evidence of systematic interference with access to numerous websites belonging to independent news organisations and political opposition groups, as well as sites supporting freedom of expression and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex rights.
“Tor Metrics data illustrate that more and more people were trying to access censorship circumvention tools, such as TOR, which indicated that the internet was inaccessible through the normal routes. This all paints a picture of a government intent on stifling expression and free exchange of information.”
Background
Ethiopia has been hit by a wave of protests since November 2015 when ethnic Oromos took to the streets to protest against possible land seizures under the government’s Addis Ababa Masterplan, which aimed to expand the capital’s administrative control into Oromia.
The protests later spread to Amhara, with demands for an end to arbitrary arrests, as well as respect for regional autonomy rights enshrined in the constitution.
Most of the protests were met with excessive force from the security forces. The worst incident involved the death of possibly hundreds of protesters in a stampede on 2 October at Bishoftu.
Protest groups say the stampede was caused by the security forces’ unnecessary and excessive use of force. The government has denied this, instead blaming the deaths on “anti-peace forces.”
The long distance athlete became famous during the just ended Rio Olympic games after he made an anti-government gesture at the end of his track event. He crossed his arms above his head as he finished the event as a protest against the Ethiopian government’s crackdown on political dissent.
He won the silver medal in the men’s marathon after finishing the 42 kilometer race. He later claimed that his life was in danger. He sought for asylum in the United States and has been living there since leaving Rio.
Given the fact that the Olympic Charter bans political propaganda, demonstrations are a rarity at the games. Nevertheless, Ethiopian runner Feyisa Lilesa snubbed the rulebook in order to call attention to the brutal actions of his country’s security forces.
Under the title, ‘‘For breaking the rules of the games,’‘ FP wrote about Feyisa: ‘‘Given the fact that the Olympic Charter bans political propaganda, demonstrations are a rarity at the games. Nevertheless, Ethiopian runner Feyisa Lilesa snubbed the rulebook in order to call attention to the brutal actions of his country’s security forces.
‘‘As the marathoner approached the finish line in second place, he crossed his arms over his head—an attention-grabbing gesture to show solidarity with his Oromo tribe. In the weeks before the race, the Ethiopian government had cracked down on protests by the embattled indigenous group and killed dozens.
They went on to quote him in an interview with AP news agency as saying, “If I would’ve taken my medal and went back to Ethiopia, that would’ve been the biggest regret of my life.” Adding further that “I wanted to be a voice for a story that wasn’t getting any coverage.”
Feyisa like the twelve others listed in his category were recognized for challenging the status quo in order to put their views across. ‘‘These individuals showed that agitation takes myriad forms,’‘ the FP said.
Aside Feyisa, another African was listed in the same category. Pastor Evan Mawarire of Zimbabwe who championed the #ThisFlag protests through the use of social media platform, Twitter. The FP listed him ‘‘For initiating a democratic movement.’‘
60 Evil Days In Oromia: Two Months of Everyday Murders, Tortures, Abductions, and imprisonments under the State of Emergency in Ethiopia
HRLHA Press Release, December 11, 2016
The TPLF/EPRDF’s hidden agenda, under a democratic facade in the past quarter century, has been challenged by Oromo youth for freedom against subjugation “Qeerro Bilisuma” ever since March 2014. The Oromo youth for freedom against subjugation has been supported by Oromos from all walks of life; the cause was reignited in November 2015 up until the TPLF/EPRDF declared the State of Emergency on October 8, 2016.
Since the State of Emergency was declared, human rights violations in Oromia have intensified on a daily basis, specifically targeting Oromo youths and elites. In the past sixty days since the State of Emergency was declared, several Oromo youths, students of universities, colleges and high schools were targeted and oppressed. The HRLHA monitored the TPLF/EPRDF atrocities against humanity through its reporters and will continue to share them with the world.
According to these reports, the TPLF/EPRDF government killing squad Agazi force has committed all sorts of human rights violations, including killings, rapes, abducting and detaining of Oromos on a daily basis.
Among the eight students who were abducted from Wollaga University in Nekemt Town in the first week of December 2016 are Sabona Chalshisa (4th year Civil Engineering) , Keraji Motima (2nd year Civil Engineering), and Nabuli Misgana Workneh (2nd year Accounting) from Rift Valley University. In the same way, an economics teacher Abebe Angassa was abducted from Hibrest school in the Tulu Bollo District, South West Showa Zone on December 1, 2016.
The HRLHA also received from its informants in south Oromia, Bale zone, in Adabba district, Gadedo community and Daraba Town information that a number of Oromo youths and elites had been picked up on December 6, 2016 at night and had been taken to an unknown destination
The following are among the many Oromos in Adabba district who have been abducted by TPLF forces
In the same month-December 2016- over 53 Oromos were taken from the southern Oromia Guji Zone,Saba Boru district. Their names are below:
The TPLF/EPRDF has turned Oromia Regional State into a state of mourning every day. Citizens are crying, no one appears to be helping, even though the world community is aware of what is happening. The world community is in a state of silence and is refusing to take concrete actions to stop the crimes against humanity taking place in the country. How many people have to be murdered before there is an intervention?
The HRLHA again expresses its deep concerns and calls on the world community to show solidarity with the Oromo people by taking concrete action against the TPLF/EPRDF dictatorial government.
Background:
Under remembering from the past, the HRLHA highlights the human rights violations reported by HRLHA and other human rights organizations against Oromo youths in the past ten years which continue to the present.
The TPLF/EPRDF government has targeted Oromo youth since the Oromo youth peaceful revolt against subjugation started in Oromia in 2005. The following is a summary of Oromo students killed, imprisoned, and disappeared by TPLF/EPRDF security forces in different universities in school year 2007
. January 1, 2007, Dembi Dollo, W. Wollega: Two Students KilledOne Oromo student, and perhaps two, died as a direct result of police beatings, and other students were severely injured and hospitalized in Dembi Dollo. Between 30 and 50 have been detained and remain detained without charge in the central Dembi Dollo jail and in two district police stations. (Human Rights Watch, February 20, 2007)· January 4, 2007, Ghmbi Wollega: Two Brothers Murdered
Two cousins, Gemechu Benesa Bula and Lelisa Waqgari Bula, were killed by members of the militia and police officers. On the evening of January 4, police and militia members were on patrol near Guyi High School when they came upon several students walking together. Unlike previous incidents, where security force patrols had been used to break up student demonstrations, there was no demonstration, but several students fled as the police and militia members approached. The patrol shot at the fleeing students, severely wounding Gemechu. Lelsa returned and covered the fallen Gemechu with his body. The patrol ordered Lelsa to leave. When he refused, he, too, was shot. Both cousins died shortly after. (Human Rights Watch, February 20, 2007
· January 18, 2007, Ghmbi, W. Wollega: Two Students Died Due to Severe Beating
In its appeal Letter to Ethiopian Ministers on Human Rights Violations Against Students, February 20, 2007, the Human Rights Watch stated “as students were gathering at school to march to the zonal administration headquarters to present a petition to the zonal administrators concerning the arrests and beatings, a squad of police broke into the school and beat yet more students and arrested others. According to reports from credible sources, dozens of students and some adults were injured in these two incidents. Eight students were hospitalized. A tenth-grade student was beaten so severely that he died a few days later. Human Rights Watch received an unconfirmed report that a second student also died as a result of the beatings.” (emphasis mine)
· January 18, 2007, Dembi Dollo, W. Wollega: at Least 27 Detained and Tortured
OSG report No. 43 stated that the following students have been detained without charge and beaten in Dembi Dollo jail : Mitiku Abdisa; 2. Mezgebu Bekele; 3. Dawit Warati;m 4. Binyamin Zerihun; 5. Amana Ayale; 6. Amanuel Magarsa; 7. Cali Kebede;8. Worku Tamrat; 9. Amanuel Degefu; 10. Gamachu Ligaba; 11. Waqgarri Habte 12. Bacha Yadesa; 13. Ashenafi Degefa; 14. Ishetu Getaneh; 15. Amanuel Aklilu; 16. Kedir Suleiman; 17. Wakshira Jabessa; 18. Geremew Mitiku; 19. Abraham Hora Gusa …
· January 25, 2007, Ganalle, Bale: at Least 11 Students Detained
OSG report No. 43 stated that the following students from Bale, most of whom were reportedly associated with Ganelle Secondary School, were detained. 1. Adan Mohammed, 2. Abdulahi Anajo
3. Ahmed Aliyi, 4. Ahmed Yaqub, 5. Aliyi Mohammed, 6. Hamza Mohammed, 7. Ibrahim Mohammed
8. Jamal Hussein, 9. Kalil Sheik Hassan, 10. Mohammed Abdulahi, 11. Tajudin Badru
. February 21, 2007, Gaara Suufi, Hararge: Ayisha Ali, 14, Murdered and Her Body was Eaten by Hyenas
A 14 year-old girl, Ayisha Aliyi, was taken by security forces at night in February, wearing only her nightgown. Local police later denied knowledge of her whereabouts, but government officials announced that dissidents would be killed on nearby Mount Sufi. When the news that some 20 people had been killed and thrown into a mountainous area known as Gaara Sufi, Ayisha’s mother, along with local people, went to the jungle and found some of Ayisha’s hair, clothes and body parts among the remains of 19 people who had been taken to Mt. Sufi and shot. Their bodies had been left there to be consumed by hyenas – leaving few remains for grieving relatives to bury. Even then, mourners were interrogated and funerals interrupted by security forces challenging relatives who had collected remains from Mt. Sufi “without authorisation.” (OSG report No. 43, VOA Afan Oromo. (2007 report will continue)
Olympic silver medalist Feyisa Lilesa (Fayyisaa Leellisaa) finished fourth in his first debut after Rio Olympic protest. He clocked 2:15:57 in Honolulu men’s marathon, December 11, 2016. Feyisa walked the last 100 meters with his famous hands in ‘X’ in silent protest. His compatriot Oromo athlete Deribe Roba finished third clocking 2:13:43.
Lawrence Cherono set a course record of 2:09:39 to win ahead of fellow Kenyan Wilson Chebet (2:10:48), who was also under the previous course record.
Kenya’s Brigid Kosgei won the women’s race in 2:31:11 ahead of American Lindsey Scherf (2:34:05) and pre-race favourite Oromo athlete Buzunesh Deba from Ethiopia (2:35:34).
The official result:
Men
1. Lawrence Cherono – 2:09:39 – RECORD
2. Wilson Chebet – 2:10:50 – RECORD
3. Deribe Roba – 2:13:43
4. Feyisa Lelisa – 2:15:57
5. Tatsuya Itagaki – 2:19:24
As the state of emergency in Ethiopia continues, the East African country remains a powder keg and unrest is brewing, particularly in Oromia, where the central government crushed down most brutally on anyone who dares voicing dissent. Some of the failures of the government to respect and integrate minorities are historical, while others are linked to the current leaders’ refusal to accept dissenting voices. Despite a positive economic and development track record – at least on paper – Ethiopia shuns diversity in political opinion by cracking down on opposition parties and jailing it members. The 2015 election, for instance, produced a parliament without any opposition, partly due to freedom of expression being strictly curtailed, leaving opposition groups hardly any room for manoeuvre.
No longer are bands of young men marauding on the outskirts of the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, trying to set fire to foreign-owned factories. Nearly two months into Ethiopia’s six-month state of emergency, it appears to be having the desired effect: protests rocking its two most populous regions have subsided.
It remains to be seen, though, whether this is the beginning of a sustained period of calm or a temporary break in the most persistent and widespread protests this country has seen since the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) ruling party came to power following a revolution in 1991.
At that crucial juncture Ethiopia embarked hopefully on a struggle to emerge in the modern world on its own terms. It succeeded in doing so by employing a unique political model that is “an alloy of revolutionary theories, pragmatic neoliberalism and intrinsically Ethiopian customary practices”, says historian and long-term Horn of Africa expert Gérard Prunier.
While that political experiment has brought significant economic growth to the country, many claim it has failed the Ethiopian people, who are now voicing that fact.
“This government came into being with the support of the rural poor,” says Abebe Hailu, a human rights lawyer who was in college during the student movement that precipitated the 1974 downfall of emperor Haile Selassie, and who lived through the ensuing military dictatorship that eventually fell in 1991 to the rebel-founders of the EPRDF. “Now it is the rural poor that is against them – this is the irony,” he says.
When Ethiopian marathon runner Feyisa Lilesa crossed the finishing line in the Rio Olympics in August he crossed his forearms above his head in a widely adopted gesture to protest his government’s violent crackdown on ethnic protests seething since November 2015, leaving upwards of 600 dead, according to rights groups.
Those protests went against the grain of Ethiopia’s hermetic history, which has long seen numerous uprisings dealt with internally, away from prying eyes.
Ethiopia has long been a land of contradictions. On the one hand, the EPRDF has the most impressive economic and development-driven track record of any Ethiopian government in modern history.
But set against that, during the past two decades it has shunned diversity of political opinion, repeatedly cracking down on opposition parties, putting their politicians in jail or forcing them into exile. The 2015 election produced a parliament without a single opposition representative. Freedom of expression in Ethiopia is strictly curtailed, and as a result an independent civil society no longer exists.
At the same time, Ethiopia’s citizenry is increasingly angry at seemingly never-ending government corruption, while a mushrooming youthful population means the number of young unemployed men across the country irrevocably rises. Many sit idly on streets, their thoughts and frustrations turning toward the centre of power that is Addis Ababa.
“The immediate causes for the various groups protesting are different but they have the same demands: deliver the right kind of leadership,” says Yilikal Getenet, chairman of the opposition Blue Party.
Initially months of protests remained largely within the Oromia region, home to Ethiopia’s largest ethnic group, the Oromo, constituting about 35 percent of the country’s nearly 100 million population.
But then in August [2016] violence broke out among the Amhara – at 27 per cent, Ethiopia’s second largest ethnic group – in northern Ethiopia’s famed city of Gondar, a popular tourist attraction because of its ancient castles.
Violence even came to the usually serene lakeside Amhara town of Bahir Dar, another popular tourist destination and weekend getaway known for its palm-lined avenues and island monasteries. An initially peaceful anti-government demonstration there on August 7th escalated to violence after a security guard fire into a crowd, leaving at least 30 gunned down by security forces.
At the same time as the Amhara protests, co-ordinated demonstrations occurred in more than nine towns in Oromia, resulting in about 100 deaths, according to Human Rights Watch.
The most recent tragedy came a week before the state-of-emergency declaration on October 9th [2016], when more than 100 people drowned or were crushed to death during a stampede following clashes between police and protesters at a traditional annual Oromo festival at the volcanic lake town of Bishoftu, about 50km southeast of the capital.
Together the Oromo and Amhara represent more than 60 per cent of Ethiopia’s population, hence their resentment of an EPRDF perceived as having been usurped for 25 years by one of its key founding entities, the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which is drawn from an ethnic group that makes up only 6 per cent of the population, and which in addition to government dominates business and the security services.
“The TPLF has manipulated the multi-ethnic federation to divide and rule forever,” says Birhanu Lenjiso, an Ethiopian research fellow at Radboud University in the Netherlands. “The people are now asking for genuine multi-ethnic federation in the country.”
Addis Ababa, the hub of political power and the engine of Ethiopia’s economy, which exists as an autonomous city state within the federation, is surrounded by Oromia. Overall, the city has remained relatively cocooned from the tumult. But that hasn’t stopped some talking of its iconic Meskal Square in the heart of the city waiting to serve as its Tiananmen Square.
Ethiopia has long been a development darling in the eyes of the international body politic. After the world was shaken by images of Ethiopian famine in 1984, the country turned around its fiscal fortunes and it now has one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
Against the abject failure of international assistance in Somalia, Ethiopia is often held up as a heartening example of indigenous government and international partners succeeding in reducing poverty and mortality rates.
But many critics say the statistics that have wowed the international community have hidden the more complex reality in which most Ethiopians, while not as susceptible as in the past to famine and disease, are still utterly stifled in their lives’ endeavours.
“The oppressed stay silent but eventually you reach a critical mass and then it boils over,” Yilikal says. “Hundreds have been killed but they keep protesting. They go to protests knowing the risks. So what does that tell you?”
Ethiopia, famously described by historian Edward Gibbon as the country that slept a thousand years while the world ignored it, has now firmly plugged itself into the global network. Satellite dishes dotted all over residential areas in towns and cities beam in news from around the world – including from Ethiopian diaspora news channels that are potently anti-government – while mobile phone ownership and access to the internet follow a steep upward curve.
“More than 50 per cent of the Ethiopian population was born under this government,” says Robert Wiren, a French journalist writing about the Horn of Africa for the last 15 years. “This young population does not compare the present system with its predecessors but receives news from abroad which contradicts the governmental rhetoric. People in the street know that journalists and opponents are jailed, that the security forces kill demonstrators. There is a real danger of ethnic hatred against the Tigrayans.”
Matters aren’t helped by the fact that wealth from the surging economic numbers has failed to trickle down to the vast majority of Ethiopians, who eke out the daily grind while wages stagnate, and inflation and living costs rise.
All the while, rank corruption results in a select few monopolising lucrative deals in the economy, to be then observed splashing out on oversized shiny pick-up trucks and drinking bottles of Black Label whiskey in the capital’s swanky new hotels, which seem to pop up daily.
“Since Ethiopia’s economic growth is due to a centralised driven process, a lot of non-Tigray people suspect the Tigray elite to be the only beneficiary of the economic boom,” Wiren says.
History always matters, but especially in Ethiopia, where people take the long view. Ethiopians cherish their history – one of the world’s oldest Christian traditions; the only African country that wasn’t colonised – and recall and tell the associated stories spanning the centuries; at the same time they remember the tragedies and atrocities committed among the country’s various ethnic groups, all of which exerts a powerful influence on the present.
“What’s happening [now] is a combination of everything: historical marginalisation and present marginalisation,” says Merera Gudina, chairman of the opposition Oromo Federalist Congress Party. “It’s a revolt against minority rule and its policies.”
The EPRDF was preceded by two authoritarian centralised regimes: emperor Haile Selassie and then military dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam. Both were viewed as Amhara-centric, and the federal constitution created by the EPRDF in 1991– and held by many, including critics of the government, as an effective fit for Ethiopia’s more than 80 ethnic groups – was meant to mitigate that fact, accommodating Ethiopia’s diversity and competing claims.
But from the start, the EPRDF has been criticised for allowing the TPLF to hog the limelight and power in the new Ethiopia that has existed since 1991.
“The TPLF has trapped itself by ethnicising political life without accepting a real autonomy for every regional state,” Wiren says. “It is an open secret that behind each regional state leader there is a kind of unofficial political supervisor.”
This style of governance has alienated especially the Amhara (who recall when they used to call the shots) and the Oromo (who feel they have always been excluded, first by the Amhara, and then by the Tigrayans).
“They only know how to talk, they never listen,” says one Addis Ababa resident. “You have a group of Tigrayans in government deciding the fate of 100 million people who aren’t allowed to say anything.”
A major problem for the country’s protest movement is the lack of an organising body to guide it and of a central leadership to engage on its behalf with the EPRDF.
The political opposition in Ethiopia is in disarray. It has suffered and been weakened through government harassment, but has also been criticised for not matching its anti-government rhetoric with discussions of effective policy.
“What does the Ethiopian public want? Firstly peace, secondly stability, thirdly prosperity,” says one Addis Ababa-based foreign politico. “In most cases the Ethiopian opposition have conflated opposition with opposite. When asked for details of the programme for achieving those three needs they revert to type and complain about how difficult it is to be in opposition.”
To compound matters, ever since opposition MPs squabbled in the aftermath of Ethiopia’s crucial 2005 election – the country’s first genuine contest – with some choosing not to take their seats due to allegations of vote rigging, the opposition has remained split among myriad parties that appear unable and unwilling to coalesce into a single effective voice for today’s protests.
At the same time all sides, from government to opposition, whether in Ethiopia or acting overseas, appear hobbled by how the vocabulary of Amharic, the lingua franca of Ethiopia, doesn’t lend itself to terms such as negotiation and compromise. The polarisation of US politics pales in comparison to the mire found in Ethiopia: here you are either with the government or against, there can be no middle ground.
Nevertheless, many point out that it is the EPRDF, as the holders of power, who need break the deadlock.
“They must bring all concerned Ethiopian opposition political groups both home and abroad to the negotiation table,” says Endalk Chala, a prominent Ethiopian blogger studying in the US, who is unable to return to Ethiopia following the arrest in Addis Ababa of his fellow Zone 9 bloggers. “That is what I call a reform and all the rest is nonsense.”
Geopolitical considerations mean Ethiopia is held by the likes of the UK and US to be an important peace and security bulwark in the Horn of Africa, a region troubled by failing states.
Ethiopia also provides large numbers of troops to the internationally funded African force battling al-Qaeda-linked militants in Somalia, as well as to peacekeeping forces in South Sudan and Sudan. Then there’s Ethiopia’s crucial economic role in the region.
“Ethiopia is the region’s locomotive,” says Dawit Gebre-Ab, senior director of strategic planning for the neighbouring Djibouti Ports and Free Zones Authority. “With its expansion in manufacturing, Ethiopia could become the China of Africa.”
Djibouti, another key part of the West’s anti-terrorism apparatus in the region, in addition to guarding one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes between the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, relies for a significant proportion of its GDP on business with Ethiopia.
To Djibouti’s south, Somaliland is banking on a €400 million refurbishment of its underused and underdeveloped Berbera port to alleviate its economic woes, with the next-door market of Ethiopia’s continually growing population – Africa’s second largest, and set to reach 130 million by 2025 – forming a key part of its ambitions to keep it safe from the fate of Somalia to its south.
Were Ethiopia’s internal fissures to worsen, its hitherto economic juggernaut might well be impeded – unsettling the region’s hitherto stabilising process of economic integration – or even derailed.
“Ethiopia has been the only reliable country in the Horn of Africa,” says Lidetu Ayele, founder of the opposition Ethiopia Democratic Party. “If Ethiopia is not strong, other countries will suffer. This government has used the threat of regional terrorism to its own advantage, but that threat is very real.”
“People need to be calm and patient,” Abebe says. “And we need acceptance by the government about making real reforms.”
The government conducted a significant cabinet reshuffle at the end of October, bringing in non-party-affiliated technocrats to deliver change, while promising reforms. But for a country with millennia of centralised, autocratic rule, that’s much easier said than done.
Since 1991 western observers and governments have been calling on the Ethiopian government to deepen its commitment to democratic reforms, but it hasn’t previously shown much interest in listening. Hence many aren’t convinced of either the government’s sincerity or ability to make this happen.
“This government has failed the people not once but 1,000 times, and they’ve broken promise after promise,” says Merera, who, like many others, notes the left-wing revolutionary genesis of the EPRDF. The prevailing accusation is that this ideology still guides the party, which as a result remains fundamentally anti-democratic, believing in a Leninist single-party approach, and is thereby unable to countenance reform.
Opinions about where Ethiopia is heading cover a range of scenarios. It is feasible that a renewed uprising could prove successful, or its attendant pressures result in the internal disintegration of the EPRDF. Both appear unlikely, however, certainly in the short-term. Honed by decades of experience fending off rebellions, Ethiopia’s security apparatus is ruthlessly effective – hence the apparent success of the state of emergency. If judged necessary, an even more blistering government crackdown can’t be ruled out.
Ethiopia doesn’t have to fear, according to observers, a military coup: the army is professional, well trained and its higher echelons respect the constitution and harbour no ambitions to rule. But how they might react to some of the worst-case scenarios predicted – Ethiopia descending into civil war or a failed state torn by ethnic strife – is another matter.
Most observers suggest the best way to avoid the worst case scenarios would be to, at a minimum, release all political prisoners, unshackle the media and allow freedom of expression, and begin reforming key institutions that have been found wanting, such as Ethiopia’s judicial system.
When it comes to the EPRDF’s future role in all this, opinions vary. Some say it has lost every shred of legitimacy and must immediate make way for a transitional government. Others say is not feasible nor in Ethiopia’s best interests. Rather, the EPRDF should, in addition to carrying out meaningful reforms, establish a new electoral commission that would guarantee the next local elections in 2018 and national elections in 2020 were freely contested.
“That is the best course of action as it would provide a solution that isn’t orchestrated by the government but which is chosen by the Ethiopian people,” Lidetu says.
It is now more than a year since the Oromo Protest for justice and democracy began in Ethiopia. It reverberated throughout Oromia and exposed the regime’s use of brutality to suppress and silence dissenting voices. But instead of waning, the struggle gained momentum when the Amhara youth in Gondar and Bahir Dar came out not only to demand justice for themselves but also carrying slogans asking the regime to stop the killings, arbitrary imprisonments, the torture and forced disappearances of innocent Oromo civilians.
Such protest is not only the first of its kind to vehemently challenge the quarter century uncontested rule of the TPLF dominated EPRDF in Ethiopia, but also has significantly shifted the overall power balance, mindsets and political dynamics in the country. It also inspired other peoples of Ethiopia to rise up for their rights and engaged all Oromo from east to west and from south to north irrespective of age, gender or religion. (The streets in Oromia were overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of protesters including a 77-year-old grandmother who went out with her stick in a brave act of defiance against the regime’s brutality.)
Because the protest has, beyond its initial call against land dispossession, evolved into a struggle for freedom, a resistance against injustice, and a longing for a dignified life, no amount of force or of coercion was able to suppress it, let alone stop it. A year on, it is now safe to conclude that this nationwide protest has already planted itself in the hearts and minds of millions of oppressed people as the most significant event of the year.
The protests and the public debates that followed have also impacted others’ views on the long-standing plights of the Oromo and the Amhara, the two largest ethnic groups in Ethiopia. Prior to these protests hardly anyone understood, much less publicly recognized, the sacrifices paid by the Oromo and the Amhara to live a dignified life in their own country. Above all, it exposed how successive regimes in Ethiopia have marginalized, denied and robbed these two groups of their ability to develop and flourish as human beings in their own country.
What a demanding public exposed
Inspired by these protests, currently, Ethiopians all over the country are asking their government to protect and respect their economic, social and cultural rights as well as their civil and political rights. But at the same time, the government’s response is helping the people of Ethiopia to realize that it has almost no leadership capacity to respond to their demands. Ethiopians now see that their government is dysfunctional and its leadership in crisis; what exists and functions is a dissonant leadership that exacerbates conflict, driving the society into a downward spiral from frustration to resentment, and perpetuates antagonism and hostility.
Throughout the year, the ruling party has demonstrated no notable leadership capacity; not one political leader has spoken authentically to the hearts and the minds of the people in order to solve the common problem amicably. Instead of making an effort to lead through this crisis and face the challenge by creating an accommodating environment for all Ethiopians, the ruling party cliques have remained empty demagogues who keep on sending divisive messages and wielding their power by fear-mongering techniques.
Beyond the call for freedom and justice, the Oromo and Amhara protests, as well as the defiance in various parts of the country including from the people of Konso in the south and Tigray in the north, have exposed the truth about EPRDF’s leadership capacity, which was mystified by ‘*seventeen years of relentless struggle and tested leadership to defeat the largest military in Africa*’. It is now clear that it is nothing more than an empty ideological rhetoric and a means to frighten, belittle and silence people who ask difficult questions and challenge the system. But that doesn not mean than the rest of Ethiopians do not recognize and appreciate the sacrifices and the agony the Tigray people have paid for seventeen years to oust the military dictatorship. However, it is not hard to see that the TPLF, which was born out of this struggle and had led this protracted war to victory, and the regime it dominates, have turned out to be an authoritarian regime.
There for good or bad
Although the yearlong nationwide protests led by the Oromo and the Amhara, as well as others to various degrees, have exposed the regime’s inability to bring in meaningful political leadership, for good or bad, the TPLF dominated EPRDF is the government in power which, for now, will determine the course of actions to respond to the current struggle for justice and democracy.
There is a possibility that the TPLF dominated EPRDF might take one of the following two courses of actions. Both have a potential to direct or misdirect the current call for democracy and justice in two mutually exclusive directions.
First course of action: road to democratization and peace
The first direction and course of action the TPLF dominated EPRDF may consider is the road to democracy and sustainable peace. However, reversing the current dire political condition and responding to the needs of the people requires it to recognize and understand the need for change; it requires embracing the change and transformation the people want to realize through a democratic process.
Hard as it may be, the following course of actions should precede any other course of action to start the democratization process.
Restore the constitution – build trust and confidence of citizens around the constitution by making it a practical document. Arguably, this means the regime itself should begin respecting the constitution and lead by example.
Scrap laws and policies which are against the constitution and which prevent citizens from exercising their democratic rights enshrined in the constitution. These include, but not limited to, scrapping the Anti-Terrorism Law, which is so far mainly used to silence citizens and violate their rights than persecute suspected terrorists; amending the draconian press law, which is so far used to violate citizens’ right to freedom of expression and access to information; scrapping the Civil Society and Charities Law, which is prohibiting the growth of independent civil society organizations which are the pillars of non-state actors in the development of democracy and human rights in the country.
Release all political prisoners unconditionally. Obviously, once the laws and procedures, which often undermine the constitution, are lifted there is no reason to keep people in prison.
Reform, among others, the justice system, the police, security forces and prison administrations as well as the election board, the anti-corruption commission, the human rights commission, and the state-controlled media.
Possible impact
The ruling party would lose nothing for taking this revolutionary action. In fact, it would help it to breath; to objectively address its current leadership crisis and reemerge as a legitimate political force. It would also provide it with the opportunity to think strategically.
Change is a natural state, which we cannot completely control or make predictable. It is overwhelming and chaotic, but rewarding at the end. The most important step to start the process of change is by being bold, letting go of the old and rigid ways of thinking and governing. The regime in Ethiopia has to come out of its fear of change and see the bigger picture; it should relax its grips on old practices, which did not contribute to its own growth or to that of the rest of the country for the last 25 years.
There is no question that by taking such bold actions, the TPLF dominated EPRDF has a comparative advantage over other political groupings currently operating in the country. As it has shown in the past it can rehabilitate itself quicker than others and appear as a viable political organization in the years to come.
Above all, this action ensures the continuity of the democratization processes by engaging citizens to determine their own future and relieves the existing state-citizen tensions. If this is done, the healing process, as well as the peace and reconciliation process will be relatively easier. Ultimately, this approach also guarantees the existence and continuity of Ethiopia as a nation home to all its citizens.
Implications for a protesting nation
This peaceful democratization process can bring change and transformation to the people of Ethiopia in general and the Oromo in particular, who are the largest ethnic group in the country and have been the driving force of the nationwide protests. As a result, the Oromo struggle for democracy and justice might fall under one of the following two scenarios.
First is the scenario in which Oromo elites, by the virtue of being a middle class, by affiliation to any Oromo-related organization, or by their prior personal experience come together and create a consortium, a democratic front, or a party to lead a meaningful struggle. This may, in turn, render irrelevant disorganized struggles, which often hamper or even take hostage the Oromo struggle for freedom and justice.
The physical and emotional separation and distance of the Oromo elites from the struggle on the ground may at times prevent them from sensing and living the struggle itself. Unless the democratic process on the ground creates room to accommodate all dissenting voices both from within and abroad, those who have the leadership capacity and the necessary political know-how cannot provide adaptive leadership or have the empathetic capacity to connect to the mass, particularly with the young generation that is both leading and shouldering the brunt of the struggle.
The second is a scenario in which the need to phase out the old and replace it with the new thinking and political organization both within the country and abroad takes precedence. The Oromo Protest and the current awakening is a painful form of labor to give birth to a new dynamic and profound political organization fit for the 21st century.
For this new Oromo organization to be born and to become the vanguard of the struggle, all old Oromo organizations, which were and still are trying to contribute under different names and ideologies, have to die a natural death and give way to new thinking and new possibilities. The new will have the energy and capacity to unify and transform the Oromo to a higher level and lead the struggle to victory. Like the TPLF, all Oromo organizations which existed for decades and have tried to contribute, albeit less successfully, have reached their maximum limit and are in need of reform.
The struggle between the old and the new is natural – even our cells are continually dying and being reborn. The Safuvalue, which is unique to Oromo culture and psyche, reaffirms this natural process, which urges the old to peacefully pass the scepter to the new.
Qeerro, the emboldened youth (as the name implies) is currently filling the leadership gap and taking the responsibility of leading the resistance against the current government, even as they are met with brutal responses. The Qeerro is successful in amplifying the struggle to all corners of Oromia and beyond, as well as inspiring all Oromos irrespective of age, religion, gender, class and locality. It has also unified the Oromo under the motto of ‘Tokkummaa’ (oneness or unity) and the ‘Say No’ or ‘Diidnee’ slogan.
Above all, by flying the resistance flag (not the OLF flag) the Qeerro demonstrated that the flag is the sign of freedom for which all revolutionary Oromos sacrificed their lives even long before OLF was created. It has raised this flag because it embodies hope and reminds all Oromos about those beautiful young people who died flying it. Therefore, to lead the struggle to its final destination, the current Qeerro movement is in the stage of development to come out with the new leadership and organization from within its rank and file. Many think that Qeerro is just the network of youth from colleges, high schools, and elementary schools who are just driven by social media. But the fact is there are engineers, professors, medical doctors, businesspeople, and other professionals who are part of the rank and file of the Qeerro.
When the situation is ripe and there is a favorable political environment, the Qeerro can easily transform into a political organization. It is this organization and leadership of the Oromo which can navigate the ship towards freedom through the storm and onto its final destination. It is time this passion gets a new leadership it deserves.
Status quo: The second course of action for TPLF/EPRDF
The above scenario is in the event that the ruling party takes the course to democratize through reform. The second course of action is about maintaining the status quo. But it is a dangerous choice; a choice of war. It is about TPLF/EPRDF refusing to bring change from within itself and the country as a whole.
This is also a choice that looks for easy answers; but it is not the easy way out of the current quagmire. It is easy because it does not require critical thinking and having difficult conversations. This course of action is a decision to repress and silence the current cry for democracy and human rights through the barrel of the gun. It is about war and involving its armed force, intelligence, federal police and militia in the internal issues of the country to brutally suppress the uprising. By doing so, it will only intensify the conflict to a higher level and bring human and property losses to the level the country and the people of Ethiopia can no longer endure.
Unfortunately, this is what we are witnessing today; military forces killing, arresting and torturing citizens on behalf of a regime in power. The impending consequence is that they will never be regarded as a national army delegated to protect the constitution, and will be labeled only as the enemy of the people.
In addition to its military solution to the conflict, TPLF/EPRDF is getting into its age-old habit of manipulating and drawing other nations and nationalities into a civil war; perpetuate religious conflict in different places by pitting one religion against the other; and create conflicts between rural people/farmers and urban dwellers. But it should be known that this will benefit no one, including the ruling party itself.
What is next?
Inspired by the yearlong Oromo and Amhara protests the rest of Ethiopians have made it loud and clear that they need a fundamental change; they have been saying so for 25 years, too. Ethiopians have tried with all their might and used every means possible to make their voices heard and have time and again proclaimed a moment of reckoning for a paradigm shift. Alas, instead of objectively and purposefully responding to this popular demand, the government is stuck into its old tactics of blaming, accusing, and intimidating people.
Now in a frantic act to quell and pacify the protests and silence the voices of the oppressed, in October this year the government declared a state of emergency for six months. However, the state of emergency is doing more harm than good and its implementation is driving millions to the edge of bitterness. The sooner the ruling party realizes that such techniques are only good to temporarily pacify rising public demands, the better. The only road to bring lasting solution is the road that begins by protecting the constitution and striving to build a democratic country with respect for human rights and the rule of law. This is also true for opposition political organizations, which are operating both in the country and abroad.
The underlying cause for the current protest and uprising is the struggle between the old and the new. The old is trying to do everything in its capacity to extend its life while the new is striving to shape and realize the new world it is envisioning.
For the good of all, the old (self and system) has to be courageous enough to accept and let go of its old organization, thinking, and power; it has to accept the inevitable.
The people of Ethiopia in general and the Oromo youth in particular, are determined to leave the past behind and move forward. They don’t want to be chained to and distracted by the past, which contributes less for the wellbeing of today and humanity of tomorrow.
Only when the old gives way to the new do citizens develop trust and confidence in a political system and themselves to take the responsibility of contributing to a democratic society and prosperous nation.
A painting of Silver Olympian Feyisa Lelisa crossing the finish line at Rio Olympics showing the symbol with crossed arms.It’s symbolizes the oppression of the Oromo people showing how their hands are tied without the need of handcuffs. This courageous act done by Lelisa has brought attention to the protest that is going on in Ethiopia by the Oromo and Amhara people. This painting was by the Oromo Student Union at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities Washington Avenue Bridge. Photo: Asanti Bekele
Oromo and Ethiopian Oromo South students are in grief and sadness over the government corruption that is going on back home. Some have migrated here only a few years ago and some have been born here, but the impact breaks the heart either way. It’s a devastating time in the history of Ethiopia, as the long time hidden oppression has been revealed to the world.
It was November of 2015, and the Oromo people of Ethiopia said enough and started to protest. Oromo people are the biggest ethnic group in Ethiopia and they have been the oppressed region over land, politics and even language since the start of the current government. According to BBC News, as of August 2016, over 500 people have been killed by the government and more than 10,000 have been arrested.
Ethiopia is a country located in the horn of Africa with 9 different regional states and with over 80 different ethnic groups. The main participants in this protest are in the Tigray and Oromia region. Tigray is located in the northern part of Ethiopia and is the 5th most populated region with over 5,000,000 people. This region has a government party named Tigray Peoples Liberation Front.
Oromia is located in the west and central part of Ethiopia. The capital city of Ethiopia which is called Addis Ababa is located in the heart of Oromia. The land of the city is owned and controlled by the government of Ethiopia. Although it’s the biggest ethnic group in the country, the people don’t have much say in the government actions.
As an Oromo student in America that lived in Ethiopia for more than half of my life, I have not been able to voice my opinions about the government until I came here. Part of the problem was that I never knew that the government was corrupt until I was 12 years old. In school, my classmates and I were always taught about the constitution, what rights we have and how we were free to practice them.
The things I learned in school and the things I saw in my community didn’t correspond. I used to go to a k-8 school and the high school students were protesting and the security forces were beating and nearly killing the students. I was taught that people can protest about anything and were free to address their worries about the government, but when I asked why isn’t anybody protesting or voicing their worries the response I got from my teacher was “because the people don’t see any wrong in the system, they are happy,” and I believed it.
I was taught to believe that the system was perfect but there was no way to find out if it’s really true. Every time there would be an anti-government event going on, the news would report that the civilians were the one who did wrong. The government controls anything and everything that is released to the public. Among other things, the government controlled any opposing parties too.
Oromia also has a government party named Oromo Liberation Front. This party was banned in 1992 by the government, to prevent and discourage the voices of the Oromo people in the parliament. The government then created a different party called the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization. Although this party was supposed to represent the Oromo people, events show that they have not been successful.
The anti-government demonstrations started when the government announced that the so-called “Master Plan”. This “Master Plan” concept was to expand the capital city, without the consideration of the Oromo people’s lands. This plan could have displaced many people and would have taken the farm lands that are essential to the people’s survival. According to The Guardian, in January 2016, two months after the protest, the government called the plan off after talking with representatives and stated that they have “huge respect” for the protesters who were opposed to the plan.
“They have a constitutional right to protest but the government started shooting at these people,” said Sophomore Ayantu Hundessa.
Hundessa is an Oromo student at South. She was born and raised in Ethiopia and only came to America in middle school. Hundessa has been interested in the problems back home and has tried acting on it by creating a humanities project focused on this topic to inform her peers and teachers and to bring attention to this injustice.
The violence in Ethiopia has had a strong impact on Hundessa and her family.
“There are times when we watch little 5-year-old kids covered with blood on the news and cry,” said Hundessa.“I mean looking at any kid, no matter his identity covered with blood is very disturbing. My family would give up their life to stop this genocide.”
Although the “Master Plan” was called off, there were bigger problems that were the root cause of the protests. There was still questions about the actions the government took while the protests against the plan. Before they called it off they had already killed and arrested over 140 people. They didn’t address that in the statement they made when canceling the plan. After a while, the second ethnic group, the Amhara joined the demonstration.
The bigger problem in the country of Ethiopia is that the same government party called Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front has been in power for over 20 years. This particular party is the second edition of the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front party, so that makes the majority of the government officials, the Tigray people. With the Oromo people making up 34.4% of the population and the Amhara people making up 27%, the Tigray people are still in power of the whole country despite only making up 6% of the population.
Although Ethiopia is recognized as a country which has democracy, the actions of the government says otherwise. Every time a civilian has tried to practice their human rights that are also written in the country’s constitution, they face unacceptable consequences.
According to a Humans Rights Watch report, since 1992 the security forces have arrested 10,000 of Oromo people accusing them of supporting or being a member of the Oromo Liberation Front. These prisoners are now known as terrorists, since the former Prime Minister passed the draconian anti-terrorism law in 2011.
Most of the world has only been hearing about this issues since the summer of this year during the summer Olympics in Rio. After crossing the finish line in 2nd place, an Ethiopian marathon runner Feyisa Lilesa held his hands in a crossed sign. Crossed hand signs have been the symbol that is used for the Oromo protest. Lilesa is considered a hero to speak about this topic while knowing what kind danger he’s in.
Lilesa has stated in various interviews that he will not plan to go back to Ethiopia because people like him who speak out, get killed or arrested. “I know I can’t go back to Ethiopia after this,” said Lilesa in a Washington Post interview. “The government has said I would be safe if I return, but I know I will be killed, arrested, or blocked from leaving the country ever again.”
The family and friends of the South students are still living in Ethiopia and are being killed in their fight for survival. “I’m so worried for the people. I’m so sad that protesting is costing people their lives,” said Senior Tinsae Mekonnen. “The government has such little respect for their people and are willing to be reckless with lives. It also makes me mad that they can’t exercise their rights to speak freely on issues that concern their own homes and families.”
Mekonnen is a first generation immigrant, meaning her parents have come to America before she was born here. Mekonnen identifies as Amhara, and Ethiopian. She has visited Ethiopia several times.
Although the reasons to for the government to act this way toward its own people is complicated, some experts think that the government will do anything to not lose the power they once won over. The opinions of the South students deliver much deeper reasons.
In my opinion, the reason to why the government keeps acting this way is because they have been bloodthirsty for power before and still are. They think they are somehow superior to the people of other tribes than Tigray. They think if they won once, they deserve to be entitled to win each time. They have set their goal once will never stop until they reach it. Whether they have to destroy every single body in front of them or even destroy a whole group.
The killings in Ethiopia have been just an everyday occurrence to the government. “It’s become dirtier and I feel like they’ve become desensitized to the killings and serious damage they’ve done to their people,” said Mekonnen.
The government has been using the resource found in the Oromia region and have not given any kind of benefits to the Oromo people. Even before the protest “the government has been using resources found in the Oromo region and [the] Tigray Liberation Front has been leading for 25 years, so the Oromo people didn’t really have a voice in the government,” said Hundessa. “After this happened I think abusing their power and their actions are very cruel and brutal.”
Recently, according to Al Jazeera, nearly 100 people were killed in the Oromia and Amhara region in a recent three-day protest by security forces and over 50 people killed at a religious celebration in Oromia on October 2. Over 20 prisons, were dead because of a fire accident as reported by the government. Critics say it’s just a cover up for the actual group responsible, security forces.
The biggest platform for the movement in Ethiopia has been social media, especially Facebook. Many participants in the protest who are currently living in and outside Ethiopia have used the #oromoprotest to spread awareness. As of August,2016 another ethnic group has joined the protest and has been known with the #amharaprotest.
Ethiopia declared a state of emergency on October 9, 2016. Since then, internet access has been banned, people cannot watch certain TV channels, especially the ones that are about Ethiopia but are created in another country. The government has also has banned most forms of protest, and people are not allowed to show a political gesture as Lelisa did at the Olympic finish line, along many other restrictions.
Having these restrictions has made it harder now to shine attention on the genocide in Ethiopia.This historical event in Ethiopia has just begun and there still is much to do before it’s resolved.
This topic at South has not been discussed nor brought up in anyway. Having nobody noticing what is going on back home, what our families back home are dealing with is sad. Hopefully after this article, the student body and the staff can take time to recognize that their classmates are grieving inside while showing a normal face in class.
“Our social media outlets are a big tool, when I talk about it out loud, I see that not really that many people care,” said Mekonnen.
“It feels like such an ignored topic and since it doesn’t concern America, it’s been put on the burner. We need to let our friends know then let those friends talk about it more and spread our ideas through that way.”
The State Department continues to warn U.S. citizens of the risks of travel to Ethiopia due to the potential for civil unrest related to sporadic and unpredictable anti-government protests that began in November 2015. The U.S. Embassy’s ability to provide consular services in many parts of the country may be limited without warning due to the government’s restrictions on mobile and internet communications and the unpredictable nature of the current security situation. This replaces the Travel Warning of October 21, 2016.
The Government of Ethiopia declared a State of Emergency effective October 8, 2016 that includes provisions allowing for the arrest of individuals without a court order for activities they may otherwise consider routine, such as communication, consumption of media, attending gatherings, engaging with certain foreign governments or organizations, and violating curfews. Additionally, the Government of Ethiopia routinely does not inform the U.S. Embassy of detentions of U.S. citizens in Ethiopia. The full text of the decreeimplementing the State of Emergency is available on the U.S. Embassy’s website.
Internet, cellular data, and phone services have been periodically restricted or shut down without warning throughout the country, impeding the U.S. Embassy’s ability to communicate with U.S. citizens in Ethiopia. You should have alternate communication plans in place, and let your family and friends know this may be an issue while you are in Ethiopia. See the information below on how to register with the U.S. Embassy to receive security messages.
Avoid demonstrations and large gatherings, continuously assess your surroundings, and evaluate your personal level of safety. Remember that the government may use force and live fire in response to demonstrations, and that even gatherings intended to be peaceful can be met with a violent response or turn violent without warning. U.S. citizens in Ethiopia should monitor their security situation and have contingency plans in place in case you need to depart suddenly.
If you are living in or intending to travel to Ethiopia, please refer to the Safety and Security section of the Country Specific Information for Ethiopiafor additional useful information.
Due to the unpredictability of communication in the country, the Department of State strongly advises U.S. citizens to register your mobile number with the U.S. Embassy to receive security information via text or SMS, in addition to enrolling in the Smart Traveler Enrollment Program (STEP).
Contact the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia, located on Entoto Street in Addis Ababa, at +251-11-130-6000 from 7:30 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. Monday-Thursday. After-hours emergency number for U.S. citizens is+251-11-130-6911 or 011-130-6000.
Call 1-888-407-4747 toll-free in the United States and Canada or 1-202-501-4444 from other countries from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Monday through Friday (except U.S. federal holidays).
By David H. Shinn, Adjunct Professor, Elliott School of International Affairs
George Washington University
The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) is experiencing its most serious governance and security challenge since it took power in 1991. It dealt successfully with the Eritrean-Ethiopian war from 1998 to 2000, managed to avoid destruction during an internal party schism at the beginning of this century, and papered over a serious political crisis in the aftermath of the 2005 national elections.
The current situation is different. It is a grassroots protest movement centered in Oromia but with manifestations in other parts of the country. Unlike the 2005 post-election crisis, the protests are not being driven by opposition political parties but mostly by individuals with local grievances and, in some cases, long-standing concerns that the EPRDF does not allow sufficient space to express dissent. Today, there is less freedom of the press and openness in Ethiopia’s political system than when I served as ambassador from 1996 to 1999.
The protests in 2016 have occurred in spite of impressive economic growth and infrastructure improvements orchestrated by the EPRDF over the past fifteen years. However, this raises the question whether these achievements in the economy are benefiting the peasant farmer and urban laborer. Part of the problem is that any government, irrespective of its success in managing the economy, begins to wear out its welcome after 25 years in power. There is also the perception of growing corruption in the political system, another common characteristic of parties that remain in power for so many years.
Ethiopia’s high population growth rate, which adds each year to the population between one and two million people, also creates strains in society. The massive expansion of primary, secondary, and, especially, tertiary education, which should be considered an EPRDF success story, has led at the same time to significant youth unemployment or under employment. Even the rapidly growing economy has not been able to employ many of these young people. Each year, an estimated 600,000 Ethiopians enter the work force. That is more than the population of Luxembourg and not a whole lot less than the population of Djibouti.
The diversity and size of Ethiopia add to the governance challenges. The second most populous country in Africa, Ethiopia has some 85 ethnic groups and important religious divisions among Orthodox, Protestants, and Muslims. While religion does not seem to be a significant factor in the 2016 protests, it has contributed to outbreaks of violence in recent years. In the minds of some, ethnic federalism has played a role in the protests, although others argue that ethnic federalism is a positive force. At a minimum, it is clear that ethnic identity continues to be important in Ethiopia’s political process.
You can add to these challenges the fact that Ethiopia is undergoing a generational shift. This development has a potential positive side because the younger generation appears to be less influenced by the prejudices and shibboleths of the older generation. The question is, however, whether enough new blood can move into positions of power before the political system unravels.
The EPRDF response to the crisis so far has been largely the historical Ethiopian response of repressive security measures. The EPRDF announced in January that it would scrap the Addis Ababa master plan that called for expanding the capital into surrounding farms. This was one of the demands of the Oromo protesters but was seen by many as too little, too late. As the protests expanded, the EPRDF increased the number of detentions and arrests, announced a state of emergency in October, and then released 2,000 detainees at the end of October. A cabinet reshuffle took place at the beginning of November.
In mid-November the EPRDF acknowledged that it was still holding 11,000 persons while one of the opposition political parties claimed the number of detainees was 60,000 and deaths had reached 1,500 over the past year. The response to the protests by the EPRDF has been piecemeal, erratic, and disjointed.
All of these issues are exacerbated by several cultural characteristics that I believe are common in the Ethiopian highlands. The concept of compromise appears to be nearly anathema to highlanders. There is a tendency to believe that you must be 100 percent for a position and, if not, you are by definition against it. There is little or no middle ground. This makes it exceedingly difficult to resolve differences. The EPRDF leadership also operates under a high degree of secrecy. There is little transparency in the decision-making process. This contributes to miscalculations by those who mistakenly interpret what the EPRDF is doing.
The question is where does the EPRDF go from here. This is obviously a question for Ethiopians to answer. The EPRDF says it is ready to reform the electoral process. As an outside observer and friend of Ethiopia, I would encourage both supporters and detractors of the EPRDF to take the EPRDF at its word and pursue vigorously electoral reform. A place to start is the municipal elections in 2018. A completely revamped political process that levels the political playing field would, I believe, go a long way to defuse the current crisis. While accommodating the concerns of the large Oromo and Amhara populations, it is also imperative to take into account the fears of the eighty plus smaller ethnic groups in Ethiopia.
(EP) DROI, Elena Valenciano (S&D, ES), made the following statement:
“On 30 November Ethiopian security forces detained the chairman of the Ethiopian opposition party ‘Oromo Federalist Congress’ (OFC), Professor Merera Gudina, shortly after his arrival in
Addis Ababa.
Prof. Merera was returning from Brussels where – together with other Ethiopian activists and the Olympian athlete Feyisa Lellisa – he had had a meeting with MEPs on 9 November 2016.
I urge the Ethiopian Government to make public any charges it has brought against Prof. Merera and I will continue to follow his case very closely.
The European Parliament adopted an urgency resolution on the violent crackdown on protesters in January 2016, which requested that the Ethiopian authorities stop using anti-terrorism legislation to repress political opponents, dissidents, human rights defenders, other civil society actors and independent journalists.
Since January 2016 the human rights situation in Ethiopia has not improved at all. Human Rights Watch reports that security forces have killed more than 500 people during protests over the course of 2016. Moreover the state of emergency has led to further significant restrictions on freedom of expression, association, and assembly. I therefore reiterate Parliament’s demands as set out in its resolution.
The European Parliament is aware of the difficult situation in Ethiopia and stresses the need to continue to support the Ethiopian people.”
International Oromo Lawyers Association (IOLA) Press Release on the Arrest of Professor Merera Gudina
5 December, 2016
The International Oromo Lawyers Association (IOLA) expresses its deepest concern over the detention of prominent Oromo/Ethiopian opposition leader professor Merera Gudina, a Chairman of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) and Vice-Chairman of the Coalition of Ethiopian Federal Democratic Unity Forum (MEDREK)).
The Ethiopian government detained prof. Gudina, upon his arrival from Europe where he was addressing the European Parliament in Brussels. He was invited by the EU parliament to brief the MPs on the current situation in Ethiopia in general and the effect of the recently declared state of emergency in particular.
According to the information available to us from the official government media outlet, prof. Gudina was arrested because of his violation of Article 1 of the country’s two-month old State of Emergency decree which, in total contradiction to the nation’s constitution, seriously curtailed citizens’ fundamental right to freedom of expression and assembly. Allegedly, Prof. Merera, was accused of meeting at the EU with official of the so called “terrorist organization” namely Ginbot-7, who was also invitee of the EU MPs.
IOLA is of the opinion that Prof. Merera committed no crime but exercised his fundamental freedom to movement, freedom of expression and assembly as guaranteed in the Constitution of Ethiopia. But invoking terms of the Martial law to detain and subsequently prosecute a citizen is contrary to letters and sprits of international Human Rights Conventions governing aspects of state behaviors during emergency situation.
The imprisonment of Prof. Merera is not an exception. Almost the entire party officials of Oromo Federalist Congress – OFC, has already been imprisoned including the Deputy Chairman of the party, Mr. Bekele Gerba who is in his second round of detention for no other reason than exercising his fundamental human rights as guaranteed in the Constitution.. During his speech at the European Parliament, Prof. Merera also indicated that over 60,000 innocent Oromo civilians are currently detained in several military camps in different parts of the country, following the declaration of state of emergency.
It is with this in mind that IOLA calls on the Ethiopian government to immediately release prof. Merera without any precondition unless otherwise it is proven that he indeed committed a common crime, in which case, the government has to officially charge him with such a crime and bring him to justice.
IOLA calls on friendly government and the international community to intervene in whatever possible means to ensure that prof. Merera’s fundamental human rights are respected as stipulated in the nation’s Constitution of 1995 and demand his release without delay.
OLA stands ready to provide necessary professional support needed in this respect.
Ethiopia: Murders and Mass Incarcerations Cannot Fix the Deep Human Rights Crisis
HRLHA Press Release
December 4, 2016
The TPLF/EPRDF government boldly demonstrated its dictatorial behavior by arresting the Oromo Federalist Congress Leader Dr. Merera Giddina on Wednesday, November 30, 2016 under the pretext that he had met with the other opposition political party-G7 leaders that the TPLF labeled as a terrorist group. Dr. Merera Gudina has been taken to Maikelawi investigation Center with the other two men , Taye Negera and Kumala, both of whom live in the same home, according to HRLHA Informants. The Maikelawi Investigation Center In Addis Ababa is the TPLF Torture – House known as “Ethiopian Guntanamo”
Dr. Merera Guddina
The Government spokesman Negeri Lencho said in his briefing to journalists on December 2, 2016 “Dr. Merera Guddina has been arrested because he violated the State of Emergency rules by contacting outlawed opposition party leaders in Brussels”. Dr. Merera Guddina and Professor Berhanu Nega, the G7 Leaders had been invited by the EU parliament to Brussels to attend the Conference on the Ethiopian current political crisis sponsored by the European Parliament. In the conference, many stakeholders participated and shared their views on the current Ethiopian political crisis. The TPLF/EPRDF has no legal grounds on which to criminalize Dr. Merera Guddina- unless the TPLF government labelled the conference sponsor, the EU, as a terrorist group.
Meanwhile, the TPLF/EPRDF government of Ethiopia continues terrorizing the people of Oromia and Amhara Regional States by murdering and detaining them. Since the mass movement began in Oromia in November 2015 and later spread to Amhara Regional state, thousands have been killed, tens of thousands detained and other thousands have disappeared. The TPLF government mishandled the peaceful protests in both regional states where both nations demanded their rights to fair treatment, stopping the land grabs and marginalization.
After ten months of unrest in the country, the TPLF/EPRDF declared a state of Emergency on October 8, 2016. The TPLF killing squad Agazi force was deployed with full authorization into Oromia and Amhara Regional States to commit killings, incarcerations, rapes and steal money and valuables. Although there has been no single section of society that the Ethiopian TPLF/EPRDF regime has spared in the past one year, since last November Oromo youths in particular have become the prime targets of TPLF killing squad attacks. Several Oromo youths from universities, colleges and high schools have been disappeared by the TPLF killing squads. As a result, Oromia is losing many brilliant young men and women at the hands of TPLF murderers every day. This is putting future generations at risk.
HRLHA informants report that the TPLF/EPRDF killing squad Agazi force continues to abduct Oromo youths from universities, colleges, highschools, homes and workplaces on a daily basis. The HRLHA has received from its informants In south Oromia, Bule Hora District, Guji Zone and Ada’a Berga District East Showa Zone information that a number of Oromo youths have been picked up at night and have been taken to an unknown destination by the Agazi force.
The following are among the many Oromo youths abducted by TPLF forces on November 29, 30, 2016 and taken to an unknown destination
Under remembering from the past, the HRLHA will try to highlight the human rights violations reported by HRLHA and other human rights organizations against Oromo youths in the past ten years which continue to the present.
The TPLF/EPRDF government has been targeting Oromo youth since the Oromo youth peaceful revolt against subjugation started in Oromia in 2005.
The following is a summary of Oromo students killed, imprisoned, and disappeared by TPLF/EPRDF security forces in different universities in 2006
June 2006, Mekele, Tigrai: 44 Oromo Students of Mekele University Were Denied Certificates After Graduation Reason – In April, 2006 a Tigrean student, who was attending Adama University, committed suicide. However, Tigrean residents of Mekele were told that he was murdered by Oromo students of the university
August 2006, Haromaya University, E. Hararge: at Least 42 Detained and Then Dismissed Reason – In August 2006, following clashes between Oromo and other students caused by a student wearing a t-shirt carrying a derogatory anti-Oromo slogan, security forces attacked Oromo students at Haromaya University, E. Hararge. Only Oromo students were held for two months and dismissed from the university. At least 42 were detained and then dismissed, (OSG Report, No. 43)
August 2006, Adama University: Clash Among Students Spread to Adama University and more Oromo Students Dismissed Reason – The clash has spread to Jimma University. In this clash, which was clearly instigated to pit Oromo students against Amhara students, at least 10 lives were lost, at least 30 students from Adama, and 23 from Jimma University, were expelled. (IOYA report, November 2006
September 17, 2006, Ginchi, W. Shoa: Two Students Abducted and Disappeared
Students Bakala Dalasa and Habirru Birru were taken at night from their residence in Ginchi, W. Showa, around 7:00 PM local time, and have disappeared. (OSG report No. 43)
November 7, 2006, Mekele, Tigrai: A 3rd Year Student Strangled to Death
Shibiru Demisse Bati, a 24 year-old Oromo third-year history student, was strangled to death at Mekele University in Tigrai. Shibiru, from Siba Yesus Peasant Association, Homa, near Gimbi, Wallega, was attacked on November 4, 2006, after being dragged out of his room when the power was turned off at the university. Tensions had been growing between security forces and Oromo students in Tigrai since graduation certificates were denied to those students who had been vocal about the government’s disregard of human rights in Oromia Region.(Ethio-Tribune, November 7, 2006, and Oromo Menschenrechts- und Hilfsorganisation (OMRHO), December 2006)
December 2006, Harar, Eastern Hararge: at Least 6 Students Detained
The following Secondary School students were detained in September 2006 in and around Harar, E. Hararge. Known to be held in Harar were Murad Ahmedand Ramadan Abdella, whereas RamadanGalile, Abdi Amma, Kadir Rabsa and Dhakaba Bakar were taken to an unknown location.(OSG report No. 43)
The HRLHA tirelessly continues to express its deepest concerns regarding the human misery taking place in Ethiopia in general and in Oromia and Amhara Regional States in particular and appeals to the world community to take tangible action to stop more bloodshed in Ethiopia by putting pressure on the TPLF- led Ethiopian government
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Internet freedom in Ethiopia declined as government cracked down on tools used for digital activism #netfreedom2016 http://freedomhou.se/2g40lmP
Feyisa, 26, was born in West Shewa, Jaldu District in 1990, a year before the EPRDF regime took power in Ethiopia. Growing up in Jaldu about 120km west of Addis Ababa near the border of Macha and Tulama, Feyisa witnessed the injustices and indignities faced by Oromo people. As an elite athlete, he faced a significant dilemma. “I could not join my peers in the streets if I were going to have the chance to compete at all,” he told reporters in September. “I had to leave the country a lot in order to compete overseas, so I knew that if I protested with the ordinary citizens, I would be blocked from ever leaving the country again.”
Microphone in hand, Gemeda stretched out his arms toward the sea of protesters gathered below, and started shouting, “down, down Woyane, down, down TPLF.” (Woyane is a moniker for the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), the kingmakers in the hodgepodge EPRDF coalition.) Gemeda’s neck veins bulged as he led the crowd in the now famous chant. The crowd went wild with jubilation responding to his chant with earth shattering chants of their own and by repeating it numerous times over, with wrists crossed above their head, and finally breaking out into a pandemonium of cheers and jeers.
Every day that the EPRDF regime tries to explain away popular, grassroots revolt as machinations of few bad actors from abroad, the tide continues to turn against its brutal and repressive rule. For every athlete or activist that’s forced into exile, there are hundreds more determined to expose the regime’s excesses, promising to keep the story in the media limelight. It will only be a matter of time until rank and file Oromo bureaucrats, the Oromia police, merchants and Oromo members of the armed forces join the budding revolution — for they too belong to the gallant Qubee Generation. Ethiopia’s history suggests that that would herald the end of EPRDF and yet another bloody transition in a country that has never seen a single peaceful transfer of power.
Under remembering from the past, the HRLHA highlights the human rights violations reported by HRLHA and other human rights organizations against Oromo youths in the past ten years which continue to the present.
Oromian Economist 
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