The Oromo Liberation
Front (OLF) is ready to go an extra mile in search
of peaceful resolution of the political crisis in
Ethiopia. The OLF will contribute towards any meaningful
peace effort, as it did in the past, to reach at a
comprehensive settlement to achieve just peace for
the Oromo and other peoples caught in the political
conflict of the Ethiopian empire state. However, it
should be understood, at the outset, that the current
conflict and resultant crisis in the Horn of Africa
has its roots in the colonization of the Oromo and
other southern peoples by Abyssinians over 105 years
ago. This colonial domination still persists.
And the current
crisis in the Horn of Africa is, on the one hand,
a struggle between oppressed people who are fighting
for self-determination and, on the other hand, the
regime of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF)
that is trying to impose its rule by force. The regime
has set loose war, hunger, poverty, and disease to
ransack the country. In particular, the regime has
been and is systematically violating human rights
of the Oromo and other peoples. The enclosed brief:
-
defines the geocultural
settings of inhabitants of Ethiopia and the strategic
significance of Oromia and its people, because
of their huge land-mass with close proximity to
all cultural groups, their democratic cultural
heritage, abundant natural and human resources;
-
describes Ethiopia’s
political landscape dominated by successive autocratic
regimes promoted and maintained in power by external
forces;
-
explains
how oppressors are currently destabilizing the
Horn of Africa by promoting war with Eritrea,
by incursions into Kenya and Somalia to intimidate
governments and terrorize their citizens to perpetuate
domination over the Oromo and other peoples;
-
reveals that the
ruling regime is committing gross and systematic
violations of basic human rights and fundamental
freedoms in order to remain in power in Ethiopia;
-
exposes that abject
poverty, hunger, and environmental degradation
in Ethiopia are by-products of policy of domination
and plunder pursued by successive minority regimes,
particularly, the TPLF;
- shows that liberation
of the Oromo people from oppression and exploitation
is essential to secure stability, peace, and development
in the Horn of Africa;
- outlines how multilateral
and bilateral grants coordinated by the World Bank
and IMF have created TPLF oligarchy that plunders
resources without reducing the poverty level in
the country; and,
- summarizes OLF’s
proposals to achieve just peace and prosperity for
the Oromo and other peoples of Ethiopia through
promotion of voluntary union among peoples to advance
joint benefits.
The OLF believes
in peace. As the main organ that is championing the
right of self-determination of the Oromo people, it
fully realizes the present day global reality. It
affirms that the international community does have
legitimate concern and interest in political stability
and economic development of the Horn of Africa. Moreover,
the OLF is cognizant of the fact that the day of carving
spheres of influence and promoting clients in superpower
rivalry has given way to globalization. Further,
the OLF firmly believes in the immediate termination
of the vicious cycle of political conflicts, economic
backwardness, environmental degradation, natural and
man-made disasters that today ravage the peoples of
the Horn of Africa.
Conflicts
and wars should come to an end. Destabilizing causes
should be removed from the Horn of Africa. Peace should
prevail. In order to pave the way for that, it is
suggested that, among other significant issues for
the Oromo people, the international community and
its leadership:
The OLF is certain
of one thing: a lasting stability and development
cannot be achieved in the region until and unless
the tyranny of current Ethiopian regime is brought
to an end. The OLF is ready
for a dialogue to seek solutions for the foregoing
issues and other matters highlighted in the attached
brief. Our dream and ultimate goal is to help usher
peace, stability, basic human rights and fundamental
freedoms, and democracy into the Horn of Africa.
I.
Objective of the Brief
The Horn Africa
is currently being destabilized by the regime of the
Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) that has
superimposed its tyrannical rule over Ethiopia during
the last nine years. War, hunger, poverty, infectious
diseases, and denial of human rights and fundamental
freedoms are ransacking the life of the inhabitants
of Ethiopia. The Oromo people are particularly the
most abused victims of the tyranny. The objective
of this brief is to:
-
demonstrate that
the Oromo people and their land, Oromia, are essential
factors that impact the political stability,
social well-being, and economic development of the Horn of
Africa;
- expose how the
oppressors of the Oromo people are destabilizing
the Horn of Africa to perpetuate oppression of the
Oromo and other peoples under their domination;
and,
- show that liberation
of the Oromo and other peoples from oppression and
plunder is a key factor to secure stability and
development in the Horn of Africa.
The Oromo Liberation
Front (OLF) fully realizes the present day global
reality. It affirms that the international community
does have legitimate concern and interest in political
stability and economic development of the Horn of
Africa as in any other parts of the world. Moreover,
the OLF is cognizant of the fact that the day of carving
spheres of influence and promoting clients in superpower
rivalry is giving place to globalization. Further,
the OLF firmly believes that the vicious cycle of
political conflicts and the accompanying abject poverty
and natural disaster that simultaneously ravage the
peoples of the Ethiopian empire and the rest of the
Horn of Africa should come to an end as soon as possible.
However, this cannot be
achieved without probing into the underlying causes
of these problems and understanding the real issues.
And the overall political problem of the empire, the
denial of basic human rights and fundamental freedoms,
the current Ethiopian‑Eritrean conflict, the
frequent incursions by the Ethiopian army into Kenya
and Somalia, and similar regional problems emanate
from the same underlying causes. This brief probes
the underlying causes and exposes the core problems
within the Ethiopian empire. It also highlights what
the Oromo people want and their pivotal position for
achieving stability, peace, and development in the
Horn of Africa.
II.
Geocultural Settings
II.1 Geographic
and Cultural Context
The Horn of Africa
comprises primarily the countries of Ethiopia, Eritrea,
Somalia, Djibouti, and the Sudan. The region is punctuated
by diverse climatic zones ranging from arid to semi-arid
and wetland, from shrubs to savannah woodland and
lush forests. The region exudes variety and diversity
of flora and fauna.
The rainfall is variable and seasonal. Desertification
has been making inroads into, and is currently threatening,
parts of the region due to natural as well as man-induced
environmental degradation.
The arid and semi-arid zones where rainfall
is too low and/or unreliable are often drought-prone
exacerbating poverty and hunger.
The Horn of Africa
is the primordial home of homo sapiens
and an early outpost of human civilization as recent
archeological findings attest. It is the ancestral
home of the Cushites to which the Oromo belong. The
Oromo people are the largest Cushitic group and the
second largest nation in Africa. They have a distinct
cultural and linguistic identity of their own. They
have inhabited a separate and well-defined territory
in the Horn of Africa throughout the millennia (see
Map of Oromia next page). Today their population is
approximately 30 million—a good half of the total
population of the present Ethiopian empire. Oromia,
the country of the Oromo people, is 375,000 sq miles
(600,000 sq km). It is larger than France, Italy,
Switzerland, Belgium, and the Netherlands combined.
The Oromo people
who are a fiercely egalitarian people have lived under
a remarkable and complex indigenous
democratic system known as Gada before
their colonization by Abyssinia. Asmarom Legessa,
a leading African anthropologist, who has thoroughly
studied the Oromo ways of life, has this to say in
his book, Oromo Democracy: An Indigenous African
Political System:
Oromo democracy
is one of those remarkable creations of the human
mind that evolved into a full-fledged system of government,
as a result of five centuries of evolution and deliberate,
rational, legislative transformation. (p. 95)
The Oromo egalitarian
culture, their Gada democratic government,
and other institutions have continuously endured the
last 105 years of continuous open and clandestine
war by foreign occupying forces. This remarkable endurance
is a testimony to the deeply inculcated Oromo cultural
identity and democratic heritage. The Oromo people
follow three major religions: Islam, Christianity,
and Waqefachaa—indigenous Oromo religion. Because
of their democratic heritage, there is no religious
extremism or intolerance among the people. True to
their democratic heritage, independent Oromo political
organizations are coordinating their liberation struggle
under one umbrella organization.
The second cultural
group in Ethiopia, the Habasha (Abyssinians), consisting
of the Amhara (approximately 16% of the Ethiopian
population) and the Tigreans (less than 5%) are of
Semitic origin. The Abyssinians have a distinct culture
and language of their own. Unlike the Oromo and other
peoples of the south, their national ethos is characterized
by hierarchic social stratification and authoritarian
tradition.
The third and fourth
groups, known as Omotic and Nilotic respectively,
are indigenous inhabitants just like the Oromo. These
groups who occupy southern Ethiopia constitute over
25% of today’s Ethiopia.
II.2
Oromo’s Wide Outreach
Oromia shares borders
with all cultural groups in Ethiopia and across the
internationally recognized boundaries adjacent to
its territory—Sudan in the west, Kenya in the south,
and Somalia in the south-east. Consequently, the cultural
tie and economic interaction that the Oromo people
have with diverse
peoples, living adjacent to Oromia’s huge land-mass,
give them a unique opportunity to cultivate peace,
social harmony, and economic interdependence. This
geographic position of the Oromo is highly significant
for mutual benefit of the peoples of the region as
well as for the benefit of the international community
having interest in the region.
II.3
Oromia’s Huge Resources
Oromia is a “water-tower”
of a drought-prone region that is constantly threatened
by desertification. It has 16 major rivers with a
total length of about 4,700 km with approximately
366, 907 sq km of catchment area.
It has also ten lakes with a total area of
about 2,000 sq km. Oromia's average annual rain fall
amounts to 1,101 millimeters.
Most of the arable
land of
the entire Horn of Africa is located in Oromia.
Coffee, which generates about 60% of Ethiopia's foreign
exchange earnings, grows mainly in Oromia. Oromia
accounts for about 80% of the total coffee export
of the country. Other major exportable agricultural
products such as hides and skins, pulses and oil‑seeds
are also produced mainly in Oromia.
If properly managed, Oromia can supply most
of agricultural products needed for all the urban
population, people in the arid areas, and drought‑affected
regions. From the estimated 27.2 million cattle population,
about three-quarters of it is found in Oromia. Oromia
also has the potential to provide hydroelectric power
to the Horn of Africa. The total energy supply of
Ethiopia is generated by Oromia river system. In addition,
Oromia is a mother lode of geothermal power particularly
in the Great Rift Valley section which passes through
the heartland of Oromia. Most significantly,
Oromia has large reserve of gold, platinum, nickel,
tantalum, iron, marble, and other non-metallic and
construction minerals. All the mineral exports of
Ethiopia are produced in Oromia.
With a huge land-mass,
the second largest population in Africa, long standing
democratic cultural heritage, and enormous natural
resources, it is evident that the Oromo people hold
a pivotal position in the Horn of Africa. Yet, as
colonized people they remain politically
marginalized, economically deprived, and culturally
oppressed in the land of their origin. We will next
briefly explain why it is so.
III.
The Political Landscape of Ethiopia
III.1 Conquest
and Subjugation by Absolute Monarchs (1889-1974)
Ethiopia is an
empire state. It consists of the core Abyssinian state,
which was first founded by the Tigreans and then consolidated
over centuries by the two ethnic groups of Abyssinia—Amhara
and Tigreans. Emperor Menelik II (1889-1913) of the
Amhara ethnic group is the creator of present day
Ethiopia. First as a vassal king under emperor Yohannes
IV (1871 - 1889) of Tigray, and later on as an emperor,
Menelik conquered the Oromo and other non-Abyssinian
peoples during the era of “scramble for Africa”. In
conquering and incorporating these peoples’ territories,
he transformed the core state of his ancestors into
an empire state increasing its size by two-thirds.
Menelik sought
and obtained acceptance by European powers as the
only black partner in the “scramble for Africa”. The
Abyssinians denied their identity with any black
people. They gave their empire the name “Ethiopia”
to claim legitimacy based on antiquity and divine
authority of biblical proportion. At the same time,
the idea of Abyssinia/Ethiopia as a Christian outpost
and that the Abyssinians “have a much higher form
of intelligence than do the purely Negro peoples of
Africa” was strong among the colonial powers.
Menelik accomplished
his colonial conquest by heavily investing in contemporary
European weapons in a region where spear reigned.
He also acquired advisers skilled in military science
from European powers.
He employed the strategy of divide-and-conquer
to mobilize tribe against tribes, people against peoples.
Menelik and his
successors, once defeated the Oromo people, targeted
their national integrity by employing the strategy
of divide and rule. Hereditary leaders were promoted
from among the subjugated peoples to serve as intermediary
between the myriad members of the colonial administration.
The colonizers consisted of warlords, militias known
as "naftenyas", and the clergy all of who were organized
into decentralized feudal hierarchies subsisting on
levies, slaves, and personal servitude of the subjugated
peoples.
It is a historical
fact that, on the one hand, the subjugated peoples
suffered devastation of genocidal magnitude.
On the other hand, slave trade, feudal levies
and personal servitude of the peoples provided
good life for the conquerors.
Sadly, European
powers who were Menelik’s partners condoned the atrocities
perpetrated against the Oromo and
other victims of genocide. The major powers of the
time were interested in opening up the region for
trade and the Abyssinian emperor was considered as
a partner in the “mission of civilizing pagans and
barbarians.”
Emperor Haile Selassie
(1930 - 36, 1941 - 1974) consolidated Menelik’s empire
by utilizing the art of modern state machinery. With
encouragement and technical assistance of foreign
patrons, he introduced laws that institutionalized
violence against the subject peoples. He ensured that
state power was defined and differentiated. Military
and civil administrations were rationalized. And he
put them all for implementation under a central control
to maintain absolute power mainly over the subjugated
peoples of the empire. He abolished personal servitude
and slavery; but he compensated the colonists for
lost feudal rights and privileges—he gave them, by
law, property rights over land originally confiscated
by Menelik from the colonized peoples. He introduced
modern educational system to produce man-power for
the state apparatus as well as to serve as an instrument
of cultural genocide against the subjugated peoples.
He intensively and systematically promoted Abyssinian
history, language, culture, and values to the detriment
of the colonized peoples.
Unfortunately for
the subjugated peoples, Haile Selassie regime’s cultural
genocide disguised by the euphemism “social engineering,”
was accorded all-round, enthusiastic support by the
regime’s foreign allies. In the world then divided
into western and eastern blocs, the western powers
used the emperor’s regime to contain the expansion
of communism in Africa. In return, the powers cooperated
to give priority for his security concern, which was
essentially the threat of resistance by oppressed
peoples against his authority. They assisted him to
organize a strong intelligence system as well as build
and maintain the strongest military forces in sub-Sahara
black Africa.
While members of
the royal family, the nobility, and high ranking public
officials and their cronies enjoyed life of luxury
under Haile Selassie, the country suffered the evils
of economic stagnation and natural disaster. Liberation
struggles by the oppressed peoples, disillusions among
the Abyssinian elites, disaffection by intellectuals
in general about the performance of the empire, particularly
poor development performance compared to those of
newly independent African states, brought the downfall
of the emperor’s regime.
III.2
Socialist Regimentation (1974-1991)
The Dergue, a military
junta led by a group of Abyssinian inner core, came
to power (1974-1991) after Emperor Haile Selassie’s
fall. Discouraged by lack of support from western
powers, with intellectual pressure from members of
the intelligentsia, the new regime adopted a radical
ideology. Thus, to allay counter offensive from supporters
of the deposed regime, in desperate effort to stave
off liberation movements that were gathering momentum,
and to save the empire from disintegration by general
upheaval, the military junta joined the eastern bloc
by embracing socialism.
At the behest of
intellectuals as well as to avert uprising by peasant
farmers, it inaugurated a fundamental land-reform
program and promised to address the "national question"
through a Leninist model. A program of "national democratic
revolution" was introduced and the principle of national
self‑determination was declared. The program
promised, in principle, the rights of each nation
and nationality to develop its own language and culture.
However, the Amhara military clique that formed the
core of the Dergue gradually transformed itself into
a tightly‑controlled, repressive totalitarian
party with the support of the Amhara elite. The party
took monopoly of
state-power and dictated socio-economic policies.
It took ownership of enterprises in all economic sectors.
It exercised absolute control of all social and political
organizations. In short, the regime established its
control over the empire’s political, economic, and
social life.
As soon as it consolidated
its power, the Dergue regime abrogated the “nationality
question” declarations and began to label any advocacy
of national rights as "narrow nationalism." It took
unprecedented action against thousands of reform‑minded
intellectuals and eliminated them as "bourgeois elements."
As an answer to the "national question", instead of
adopting self-determination, it introduced a heinous
scheme called "resettlement." Under this scheme over
a million settlers were forcibly transferred from
the north to the south. This action was underpinned
by a political motive and security considerations
to change the demographic composition of the non-Abyssinian
oppressed peoples of the south. The program had no
objective of improving the economic well-being of
the multitudes of the destitute people of northern
Ethiopia.
In another scheme,
with similar objective, it uprooted some ten million
people of the rural south and moved them into "strategic
hamlets" under a policy of "villagization." This scheme
had a double‑pronged objective of resource control
and surveillance of liberation forces.
The Dergue regime,
like its predecessors, maintained huge military and
security forces. It used these forces to suppress
resistance by the Oromo and other oppressed peoples
who were opposed to its continuation of national oppression
under autocratic Amhara regimes. Political repression,
wars of liberation, natural disaster, distorted economic
policy, and mismanagement of resources were malignant
causes of human sufferings during the Leninist Dergue
rule. The combination of these factors and the disintegration
of the eastern bloc that maintained it in power ushered
in its collapse.
III.3
TPLF as Successor to the Empire State (1991- present)
The Tigrean People’s
Liberation Front (TPLF), also known as Wayanne, was
promoted in 1991 by its foreign supporters
to fill the
power vacuum created by the fall of the Dergue
regime. This led to the replacement of the Amhara
regime by
a Tigrean power as was evident to those familiar with
the Ethiopian political landscape. With the full approval
of the US government, the TPLF marched into the Ethiopian
capital in May 1991 and exclusively formed an interim
administration.
The TPLF needed
a transitional period to consolidate its power. In
faithful compliance with the political culture of
its predecessors, the TPLF targeted the national integrity
of the Oromo people by creating an Oromo surrogate
party known as the Oromo People’s Democratic Organization
(OPDO). After usurping majority voice
through appropriation of voting powers by its surrogates,
it signed a transitional charter of July 1991 that
recognized in its Article 2 that “nations, nationalities,
and peoples” in Ethiopia have the right to self-determination
including independence. The preamble of the charter
used an oxymoron to describe the beginning of a Tigrean
era of subjugation and oppression as “the end of
an era of subjugation and oppression” in Ethiopia.
The charter served as a camouflage for the
TPLF hidden agenda of domination. The TPLF initially
posed as having accepted the US condition: “No democracy,
no assistance.” However, that pose was a false posturing.
In fact, it was simply a springboard to state power.
The TPLF had no genuine desire to democratize the
country. What it needed was a transitional period
to consolidate its power.
Under the pretext
of opening the country for world market as well as
assist democratization and structural adjustment,
traditional patrons of the Ethiopian empire used the
World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) to
pump substantial amount of money into the coffer of
the TPLF. Under
the code name of rehabilitation and development, during
the last nine years, the TPLF regime received billions
of dollars in multilateral and bilateral assistance.
The regime used this indispensable bilateral and multilateral
assistance to dismantle Amhara-centric state-apparatus
and replace it by a more tight Tigrean ethnic controlled
institutions. To-day, there is no public institution,
be it the military, the judiciary, the civil service,
the regulatory agencies, and financial institutions
outside the control of the TPLF and its surrogate
parties.
The regime cannot
claim democratic legitimacy under a situation where
it has suppressed political competition and no meaningful
participation in the political process exists. Professor
Christopher Clapham of University of Lancaster wrote
in a book titled Ethiopian 2000 Elections,
published by Norwegian Institute of Human Rights:
To those accustomed
to the uninflected authoritarianism that has been
Ethiopia’s fate in the past, it may well seem remarkable
that [the Ethiopian 2000 elections] could have taken
place at all ... . To those accustomed to states even
in Africa, with better established traditions of electoral
democracy, they will fall so far short of the standard
required as to amount to little more than a travesty.
The TPLF social
base is the people of Tigray who are less than 5%
of the total population of Ethiopia. That base is
fractured by the serious rift that has surfaced within
the rank of the leadership of the party. Surrogate
parties created by the TPLF do not have legitimacy
among the constituency they were supposed to rally
for their master. With lack of democratic legitimacy,
the TPLF regime is compelled to use force to perpetuate
its political power. The following section describes
this aspect of the current problems in the region.
IV.
Destabilization of the Horn to Perpetuate TPLF Domination
IV.1 TPLF Violence
and Absence of Peace and Security
The institution
of violence built by the TPLF regime, through the
assistance of unwitting major world powers and international
financial institutions controlled by them, are mobilized
to effectively destabilize the Horn of Africa.
Employing the political
culture of divide and rule pursued by its progenitors,
the TPLF regime is using its institutional capacity
to incite people against peoples. The fact that Oromia
shares borders with almost all peoples in Ethiopia
makes the Oromo people vulnerable victims of the strategy.
Constant attempts are being made by the regime, with
some success, to create conflict between the Oromo
and Amhara, Somali, Gedeo, Benishangul, Gambela, Afar,
Gurage, Kambata and others. This act has denied the
Oromo and other peoples the right to live together
in peace and security.
In order to encircle
and destroy Oromo liberation fighters, the TPLF regime
has been trying to enlist the support of neighboring
countries in addition to the conflicts that it has
incited within Ethiopia. Those countries that do not
cooperate are intimidated by false accusations of
giving shelter to “rebel” forces. And frequently it
carries out incursions into their territories under
a pretext of “hot pursuit” of imaginary rebels. Inter‑Governmental
Authority for Development (IGAD), which was established
to promote development and security has also been
used as a launching pad for the Ethiopian government’s
security agenda. When IGAD mandated the Ethiopian
prime minister to use his good offices to resolve
the problems in Somalia, he went about to set-up a
client regime. In fact, he flagrantly undertook invasion
of part of that country under a guise of serving as
a facilitator of peaceful resolution of the internal
conflicts. This subversive act did not go un-noticed
by the Arab League, which mandated Cairo to facilitate
reconciliation of Somali forces to which the Meles
regime was bitterly opposed.
The Ethio-Eritrean
war demonstrates another international dimension of
the problem of autocratic rule in Ethiopia. The TPLF
regime has embarked upon external adventures to divert
attention from its internal problems and to win legitimacy
as a protector of Ethiopian sovereignty. Its absolute
power over the affairs of the state is conducive to
undertake adventures of war without any accountability.
It is not only a matter of an evil intention by one
faction or another within the TPLF, but it is a matter
of absence of institutional mechanism to ensure accountability
in the exercise of state power in the country.
IV.2
Violations of Human Rights
The right of self-determination
is a synthesis of individual rights that has been
accepted by the international community. And it is
protected by the International Bill of Human Rights
which, in Article 1 (1) of both Covenants, which says:
All peoples have
the right of self-determination. By virtue of that
right they freely determine their political status
and freely pursue their economic, social, and cultural
development.
Hence, like any
other people in the world, the Oromo and other oppressed
peoples in Ethiopia are endowed with the right to
self-determination. They are seeking and entitled
to freely exercise the options inherent in the right
which ultimately belongs to them, and to them alone.
The TPLF regime has recognized this right in its own
constitution. It has, however, failed to honor its
own constitutional pledge as well as its international
obligation. It has further
resorted to forcible denial of peaceful exercise
of the individual and collective rights.
Enjoyment of individual
rights, which presupposes the realization of the collective
right of self-determination of the people to which
the individual belongs has been scuttled by the TPLF.
Because of that reality, members of the oppressed
people like the Oromo have not been really free to
exercise their basic rights and freedom under the
policy of the Ethiopian regime. In fact, the regime
has unleashed acts of terror against the Oromo middle
class in recent years. In one of its Leninist jargons,
Hizbawi Adara, the inner strategy document
of the TPLF, calls this systematic violence visited
on the Oromo elite a move against “petty bourgeois
narrow nationalists."` Violations of human rights
of persons of Oromo origin is part of the regime's
policy to destroy the Oromo people's social fabrics
in forcible denial of their right of self-determination.
Reports by credible
human rights groups, including International Commission
of Jurists, Amnesty International, and Human Rights
Watch/Africa, confirm that there is no rule of law
in Ethiopia today. According to the ICPJ report of
1997, about 76 judges were purged by the TPLF regime.
All members of the supreme court of Oromia were expelled
in 2000. The regime is among the top five countries
in the world for violation of judicial independence.
Needless to add that an independent judiciary is an
essential institution for the protection of human
rights. The TPLF has amply demonstrated that it does
not believe in judicial independence.
Extra-judicial
killings, "disappearances", illegal arrests, torture,
gang-rape, confiscation of property, detention for
a long period are systematic and pervasive especially
against persons of Oromo origin. The US Country
Reports on Human Rights Practicesreleased in February
2001 by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and
Labor for year 2000 confirms these inhuman acts. The
introduction of the report on the situation in Ethiopia
bluntly states:
The Government's
human rights record remained poor; although there
were some improvements in a few areas, serious problems
remained. Security forces committed a number of extrajudicial
killings and at times beat and mistreated detainees
....
According to the
Oromo Support Group (OSG), an independent human rights
group, established in the UK by human rights activists
interested in following violations of Oromo human
rights, over 2,500 extra-judicial killings and 800
disappearances of civilians suspected of supporting
the OLF were reported from 1992-99. According to Amnesty
International’s report on human rights in Ethiopia
of June 2000, there are 10,000 persons detained, mostly
on suspicion of support for Oromo and Somali armed
resistance. This is a very conservative estimate and
the true figure may be many times higher because human
rights violations are more pervasive in rural area
where liberation forces are more active. The regime
itself has admitted that prisons in Oromia are unable
to cope up with the flood of thousands of Oromo men
and women detainees.
The TPLF regime
is one of the top ten violators in the world and the
number one in Africa in suppressing the freedom of
expression. Many hundreds of
Oromo refugees have fled and are fleeing the country.
The exact number of Oromo refugees in neighboring
countries is difficult to know as the refugees do
not want to be identified out of fear for the safety
of their family and their own. Many refugees have
been killed or kidnapped by murder-squads organized
by the regime in Djibouti, Kenya, Somalia, and South
Africa. Others have been
subjected to forced repatriation particularly
by Djibouti.
IV.3
Hunger, Environmental Degradation, and Diseases
While billions
of dollars are poured into the country, the fundamental
right to be free from hunger is not respected in Ethiopia.
This is happening simply because of TPLF’s commitment
to only its own people, the Tigreans.
Over eight million people who are non-Tigreans
are currently suffering from starvation in Ethiopia.
For example, in the Borana region of southern Oromia,
where the means of livelihood is mainly pastoral, there have
been three years of continuous drought-induced famine
before 2000. Consequently as no support was forthcoming,
115,000 families lost their cattle and were forced
to leave their area in search of food. Many children
and adults died from hunger and related causes. When
this tragedy was taking place the regime was heavily
spending money and other resources on military ventures
into its neighbors (Eritrea and Somalia) and liberation
forces fighting it at home.
TPLF’s cruelty
is not limited to its heartless act against hunger
victims of non-Tigrean origin. It herded tens of thousands
of able-bodied persons, mostly youth in their teens,
against their will. Most brutal of it all is that
TPLF officers drove theses indentured youth over minefields
as mine-sweepers. This is a
criminal disregard for the lives of the hapless
victims. In some instances, semi-starving non-Tigrean
people were forced to give contributions for the war
from their meager resources desperately needed to
buy food for their own survival.
Experts repeatedly
point out that vulnerability to famine is rooted in
both human and natural causes. In Ethiopia, while
drought has been one factor for hampering food sufficiency,
the mismanaged socio-political dimension is the major
cause for it in recent years. The country’s productivity
of land decreases by 2% annually due to the absence
of proper soil conservation policy; forests have been
rapidly decreasing to 3% of the land area from 40%
a few decades ago.
Systematically
set fires, without regard for the environment, devoured
virgin forests, coffee plantations, homes, and rare
animals and plants in Oromia, Ogaden, and Sidama in
April 2000. These fires were set off in territories
where the regime fears presence of liberation forces.
Added to the loss of unique flora and fauna, the destruction
of the forests accelerates soil erosion and eventual desertification
of an already fragile ecology of the region.
The TPLF regime
has been pursuing environmentally harmful policies
since it seized power in 1991. With total disregard
for the long-term environmental consequences, the
government has been awarding contracts to investors.
These investors are undertaking unregulated mining
and mechanized farming in ecologically sensitive and
vulnerable areas. The regime has also adopted from
its predecessor, the Dergue, the policy of massive
resettlement of armed northerners on Oromo land. In
addition to imposing their views on the local people
as well as seizing and using local resources by force,
the settlers have shown wanton disregard for the ecosystem.
The “new settlers” have violated the Oromo people’s
culture and tradition of high respect for nature.
The sacred obligation the Oromo people have always
had to protect the environment through balanced use
of resources has been undermined.
The right to the
enjoyment of an attainable standard of physical and
mental health is not respected in today’s Ethiopia.
The most crucial disaster facing the Oromo people
today is the deadly disease, AIDS. Lack of concern
by the regime is understandably frightful for the
Oromo people. They vividly remember that Emperor Menelik
used small pox as a weapon in his war of conquest
against the Arsi Oromo in the 1880's. And today it
appears that the TPLF regime is oblivious about it
although it is confirmed that 8% of the total population
of the country is infected by HIV virus and that every
third person of residents of the capital city carries
the virus. The bulk of the victims are evidently Oromos.
Other prevalent diseases such as TB and malaria are
also rampant. They are attacking the population over
wider areas and no serious effort has been made by
the regime to combat these debilitating and killer
diseases.
It is abundantly
clear that the current political situation in the
Horn of Africa is at a dangerous crossroads. Manifest
confrontations between forces struggling for basic
rights and fundamental freedoms and a regime that
is imposing its domination by a tyrannical rule has
been described in the foregoing pages. It is evident
that the current political situation in Ethiopia has
its root in the political culture and history of the
country where autocratic forces come to power and
maintain themselves in power through violence. The
way the TPLF runs its empire does not allow a democratic
political process even among the ruling clique. The
crisis that just surfaced among the TPLF leadership
clearly shows their lack of capacity to democratically
manage even their internal affairs. The tyranny of
the group is going to further narrow down the circle
of tyrants and their social base.
V.
Economic Consequences of Policy of Domination
V.1 Rampant Poverty:
Policy of Domination and Stifled Development
The root-cause
of Ethiopia's instability today is the commitment
of the ruling regime to perpetuate its domination
by violence. Abject poverty of the country is the
consequence of
political instability and economic mismanagement.
These dual scourges have been aggravated by interventions
of unwitting foreign powers that either maintain autocrats
in power or purposefully manipulate vulnerable weaknesses
of the society to promote their own interests. Foreign
powers including the US need to reassess their relationship
with the current dictatorial and corrupt Ethiopian
regime.
The government
bureaucracy is cynically corrupt. And under the present
regime Ethiopia could not properly develop its human
and material resources. The hallmark of the country
is war, civil strife, hunger, poverty, wrong economic
policy, etc. The political and economic status quo
seriously disrupts not only production, but also the
distribution of the meager commodities available. Food shortage
and famine have become the common feature of the country.
The huge human
and natural resources that can easily alleviate poverty
is rendered useless by the oppressive political order
in Ethiopia. Inability to use available resources
reveals the extent of the seriousness of the problem.
On the one hand, Oromia's large population and abundant
natural resources are considered a political threat
by successive minority regimes to be contained through
manipulation of socio-economic policies. On the other
hand, the Oromo people are engaged today in resistance
against their oppressor. Under these circumstances,
unfortunately there is no peace and security in Ethiopia
to achieve sustainable development.
V.2
International Financial Institutions Promoting TPLF
Oligarchy
Regrettably, intervention
by the international community has failed so far to
positively impact political and economic development
in Ethiopia. It has only strengthened the undemocratic
TPLF regime. This may be illustrated by intervention,
particularly, since the TPLF
regime came to power in 1991. As soon as the
TPLF came to power, the World Bank and the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) were mobilized to pump billions
of dollars into the regime's coffer for "economic
stabilization" and "structural adjustment".
During the first four years of its rule, the
regime received about US$3 billion in bilateral and
multilateral grants. Further, significant debt-cancellations
and rescheduling have been granted by the Paris Club
member countries, coordinated by the IMF and the World
Bank. The US is one of the major bilateral donors
to Ethiopia since the TPLF came to power. The bulk
of the multilateral and bilateral assistance is directly
channeled to Tigray without concern for regional equitable
development. Despite all this assistance the country
is still sinking into an economic nightmare.
As mentioned in
Section III.3
above, the TPLF has used the generous Structural Adjustment
Program as an instrument to make public institutions
appendages of the ruling party. The regime has
also distorted the privatization program by converting
most of government enterprises to party ownership
indirectly. The so-called new “private” enterprises,
almost all located in Tigray, are actually owned by
the party. These enterprises are registered in the
name of third persons to hide their true ownership.
For example, the Endowment Fund For the Rehabilitation
of Tigray (EFFORT), Tigray Development Agency (TDA),
Sur Construction SCo, Guna Trading House SCo, Dinsho,
Tiret, etc., are some of the prime disguised property
of the TPLF. Consequently, the party controls the
market not only by wielding state power but also as
a major supplier of goods and services. There
is no distinction between the state and the ruling
party.
Party enterprises have replaced the Ethiopian
public enterprises with the clear knowledge of the
World Bank and IMF. The creation of a free market
economy will remain an illusion in Ethiopia for as
long as the current regime remains in power. Unfortunately,
international financial institutions, such as the
World Bank, have turned deaf ear to appeals to carefully
assess the negative impact of their economic aid.
They have therefore i
