Mata duree kanaan barreeffama gabaabaa kana akkan dhiyeessu kan na taasise, gaafii fi deebii BBC Afaan Oromoo dhihoo kana Oromoota lama, Dr Ittaanaa Habtee fi Dr Birhanu Leenjisoo, waliin godhee tokko dha. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qx0Aoyn4n4A Asirratti yaada kiyya osoo hin ibsin dura, gaafii dhiyaate fi deebii namootni lamaan kun kennan kunoo akkana ture.
GAAFIIN: MM DR ABIYYI, SABBOONUMMAA OROMOO GARA SABBOONUMMAA BIYYA BULCHUUTTI CEESISAA JIRU JETTEE YAADDAA?
Deebii Dr Birhanu Leenjisoo:
“Eeyyen, Maaliifii? fakkeenyaaf Inni amma fakkeenyaaf carraa biyya bulchuu yeroo duraatiif namni Oromoo ta’ee, ani Oromoo dha jedhee sadarkaa sanatti oldhufee, Sabboonummaa Oromoo amma tokko naannoo sanatti calaqqisiise isuma. Seenaa kana dura hin turre sanaa fi seenaa har’aa kana walitti fiduudhaaf namoota kan akka nagatiiv naashinaalizimii ofirraa dhiibu sanatti ofirraa dhiibatee achi taa’uu hin danda’u. Accommodate godhuu danda’uu qaba; compromise godhuu danda’uu qaba. Karaa saniin yoo laalle, naationaalisimi Oromoo gara naationaalisimi bulchinsa biyyattiitti ceesisaa jira jedheen amana, dhugaa dha.”
Deebii Dr Ittaanaa Habtee
“Calqaba, Namni kun Sabboontummaa Oromoo beekaa’ii? Isa jedhurraan ka’a ani. Dr Abiyyi akka hubannaa kootittii, Sabboontummaa Oromoo yeroo namootni jedhan dhaga’e malee, maal akka ta’eeyyuu hin beeku. Wanta inni hojjetu, dubbii inni dubbaturraa yeroo hundumaa kanan dhaga’e maalii innii? Dr Abiyyi mana Oromoo keessatti, kaampii Oromoo keessatti, kaampii sabboonummaa Oromoo keessatti keessummaa dha, hin beeku, yaadota achi keessa jiran. Kanaafiitu utuu hin beekin fakkeenyaaf utuu Oromoo kana loluu utuu hin barbaadin takka takka dhaqee wanta itti bu’uun irra hin jirretti dhaqee ittibu’a.”
Duraan dursee, akka yaada fi laalcha ykn hubannoo kiyyaatitti, deebii Dr Birhanun kenne fi kan Dr Ittaanaan kenne walbira qabee yoon laalu, kan Ittaanaa guutumaa guututti quubsaa fi waan dhugaarratti hundaa’e yommuu ta’u, kan Birihanu garuu tokkoffaa quubsaa miti; lammaffaa waan inni ibsuu yaale tokko tokko gaafii dhiyaate wajjin hin deemu. Birhanun gaafii dhiyaateef sanaayyuu waan hubate natti hin fakkaatu jechuu kooti. Gaafii dhiyaateef dhiisee isa kanaa ala haasa’a waan jiru fakkaata. Akkamitti? Mee deebii inni kenne keessaa tokko tokkoon haa laallu.
1)“… carraa biyya bulchuu yeroo duraatiif namni Oromoo ta’ee, ani Oromoo dha jedhee sadarkaa sanatti oldhufee, Sabboonummaa Oromoo amma tokko naannoo sanatti calaqqisiise isuma.”
kan jedhu haa laallu:
Eeyyen, dhugaa dha. Carraa biyya bulchuu keessatti namni Oromoo ta’e tokko taayitaa guddaa kana argachuun yeroo duraa ti. Haa ta’u malee, MM Dr Abiyyi akka dhuunfaatti taayitaa olaana kana haa argatu malee; yookaaniis cimina Sabboonummaa Oromootiin carraa kana haa argatu malee, Sabboonummaan Oromoo sadarkaa kanaan isa gahe kun guddatee fi dagaagee gara Sabboonummaa biyya bulchuutti akka ce’u taasisuun hafee kanuma jiru kanaayyuu qancarsuuf yaalii godhaa akka jiru dhugaa lafarratti mula’tuu dha. Kanaafuu, deebiin Birhanu kun akka hubannoo kiyyaatitti sirrii miti.
2) “Seenaa kana dura hin turre sanaa fi seenaa har’aa kana walitti fiduudhaaf namoota kan akka nagatiiv naashinaalizimiin ofirraa dhiibu sanatti ofirraa dhiibatee achi taa’uu hin danda’u. Accommodate godhuu danda’uu qaba; compromise godhuu danda’uu qaba…”
kan jedhu yoo laalle immoo,
Tokkoffaa, kun sirumaa deebii gaafii dhiyaate sanaa ta’uu hin danda’u. Waan godhuu qabu ykn irraa eegamu waan ibsu fakkaata malee, Dr Abiyyi Sabboonummaa Oromoo gara Sabboonummaa biyya bulchuutti ceesisuuf yaalii akka godhu hin agarsiisu. “…Accommodate godhuu danda’uu qaba; compromise godhuu danda’uu qaba” kan jedhu kana cuunfanii laaluun gahaa dha. Kuni gorsa fakkaata. Haa ta’u malee, amanamus amanamuu baatus, akka hubatamaa jirutti, Dr Abiyyi isa kana godhaa hin jiru; faallaa kanaatu mul’achaa jira.
Lammaffaa, “akka nagatiiv naashinaalizimiin ofirraa dhiibu sanatti ofirraa dhiibatee achi taa’uu hin danda’u.”kan jedhu kun haala amma jiru wajjin hin deemu. Dr Abiyyi wanti inni kallattiidhaanis ta’ee al-kallattiidhaan hojjechaa jiru isuma kanaa bar!!! Maaltu kan dur sanarraa adda godha?? Kun hubannoo dhabuu ykn osuma beekuu dhugaa jiru jallisuu fakkaata.
Walumaagalatti, deebiin Dr Birhanun kenne quubsaa ta’uu dhiisuu qofaa osoo hin taane waan dhugaarraa fagaate dha jedheen amana. Namni tokko dhimma tokko akka hubannoo fi laalcha isaatitti ibsuun mirga abbaa sanaa ti. Haa ta’u malee, dhugaa har’a biyyattii tana keessatti lafarratti mul’achaa jiru haaluun hin danda’amu. Jaalannus jibbinus, amannus amanuu baannus, fudhannus dhiisnus, dhugaan lafarra jiru fi ifaa ifatti mula’achaa jiru waanuma Dr Ittaanaan ibsee dha jedheen yaada, amanas. Akkuma Ittaanaan jedhe, Dr Abiyyi Sabboonummaa Oromoo dhugumatti hubatee jiraa??? Kanuma dubbiin!!!
Children of Hope: Journey of Oromo slaves from Ethiopia to South Africa
Sandra Rowoldt Shell, writes about the enslaved Oromo children for Independent Turkish
Sandra Rowoldt Shell -Tuesday, June 11, 2019 0:45
In August 1890, the three bridges crossed the wooden bridge to the Lovedale Institute in Eastern Cape, South Africa – the foremost missionary school in South Africa. The passengers of these three cards were children, but not South African. In the Horn of Africa they were children who endured the brutality of slavery and the slave trade. Oromo kids. Who were these Oromo children and what were they doing in South Africa?
In February 1972, I started working at the Cory Historical Research Library in the Eastern Cape of the University of Rhodes. Within weeks, I became familiar with the library’s manuscript archive collections. As I was browsing through various card (pre-computer) catalogs, I came across a series of cards that read “Galla slaves” on it. I was surprised. Who were these “Galla” slaves? What were their connections to the Eastern Cape? As I questioned and researched further, I discovered that the cards refer to a pile of documents in the archives of the Lovedale Institute, run by the Free Church of Scotland. These documents belonged to 64 Oromo children enslaved in the Horn of Africa in 1888-1889. All of these children, each with a different history of enslavement, were put on sailboats to the Arab slave markets across the Red Sea.
Today, Oromos make up 40 percent (41 million) of the Ethiopian population, which is 102 million 374 thousand 44 people. The Oromos, who have a distinctive language and belong to the Eastern Kushitic peoples, have been marginalized as an internal political and economic minority in present-day Ethiopia, as in the past centuries, though numerically the dominant population. Speaking of Oromca, their own Eastern Kushitic languages; they were forbidden to have their own literature, let alone their own history. The majority of Oromo people live in the Oromian administrative region.
Although the Oromo people occupied a series of principals in the late nineteenth century, these communities were united under a common language, religion, political culture – most importantly their democratic system called ”gadaa i- and in particular the collective Oromo identity.
Although the Cory Library and other libraries and archives in South Africa have rich documents of these children, the Lovedale story of the liberated Oromo children has not been studied for more than a century. As I went deeper, I felt a shiver of speculative expectation. Here is proof and documentation of a unique nature. There were potentially important personal narratives of slavery and slave trade that had been overlooked for a long time. This fire that sparked a lifetime of admiration and admiration for the Oromo children köken and their origins and consequences 40 flared up there 40 years ago at the Cory Library.
My passion, however, was softened by the influence of pragmatism and living conditions. I was a graduate of social sciences and did not have a history of education. With the power of this never-extinguishing flame, I had to work full-time and senior at Rhodes and then at the University of Cape Town for many years to gain the foundations for history. The first thing I did was to photocopy the children’s narratives and take them home. Years later, I showed them to my wife, Robert Shell, a leading expert on Cape slavery and now separated. My wife was an expert in the use of quantitative methodology as one of the few clinometers in the field of history (historian using quantitative methodology). Robert read the stories with great enthusiasm. He stated that these stories were obtained through clearly stable interviews as well as a rare series of individual mini-biographies of slave children, thus presenting themselves ready for systematic analysis. He said that if I could codify them, as well as allowing each child to tell his own story, the children’s stories would at least give an opportunity to look at trends in the slavery and slave trade model in the Horn of Africa. His narratives were the authentic voices of Africa, describing his first transitional experiences within a few weeks of their liberation.
Moreover, the quality of the documents points out that a longitudinal prosopography has been developed based on supporting the documentation of Oromo children’s own first pass records by a large number of various primary sources. Although biography is known as a tool to study the lives of individuals, prosopography is a collection of biographies that allows the study of groups of people through systematic analysis of their collective characteristics. Prosopography provides the historian with a tool that explores common features within a group and emphasizes diversity. And historical information is generated from this variation. The prosopographic technique applied to the narratives of Oromo children provides a very different and more complex picture of the first transitional experience that emerged as a longer, intricate and variable ordeal than ever known. The nature of prosopography
Early prosopographies were focused on the lives of the upper tier of society because of their written traces. They had written letters, kept diaries, and had important roles in political or other influential positions that appeared in published sources. Thus, it was possible to follow their lives, make quantitative examinations and perform prosopographic group studies.
There’s one or two upset prosopography. In a special study published by Ghada Osman (obviously a name of Turkish origin), VI. century, the situation of foreign slaves in Mecca and Medina were examined. For this purpose, the author examined the slaves used by the Prophet as a “teacher”, those who were considered masters in the construction of the Kaaba, and a number of slaves from Byzantine, Abyssinian, Egyptian, Persian and Mesopotamian. While listing the names of slaves, he included as much biographical information as he could from the available sources. Oromo slave boys
Over the years following the abolition of the Slave Trade Act in 1807, the British parliament brought the royal navy the obligation to intervene in ships engaged in ocean slave trade and the right to search for suspicious ships.
In September 1888, the Royal Navy’s HMS Osprey stopped three sailboats suspected of carrying Oromo slaves off the Mocha Point of the Red Sea. When one of the sailors, Kathora, insisted on failing to obey calls, the captain of Osprey ordered the ship to be fired with a newly deployed Gardner machine gun. Katora’s captain Ali Kira Muhammad and 4 slaves were killed. When the remaining Oromo slaves were taken to the Osprey deck, they automatically gained their freedom.
Osprey went to Aden, the missionary shelter near Sheikh Osman, where the Free Church of Scotland accepted some of the children (the rest were owned by Muslim families and Roman Catholics in Aden or sent to Zanzibar or Bombay). Before the end of 1888, one fifth of the group lost their lives to the difficulties of the first passage and numerous new diseases, particularly the new malaria epidemic in Yemen. Rescued Oromo children in Yemen, September 1888 / Photo: Cory Library of Humanities Research, University of Rhodes, PIC / A 1320
In August 1889, the number of children at the institution rose to 64 with the participation of 14 Oromo children, who were similarly rescued by the Royal Navy (but without mercy this time).
What makes the Oromo children group particularly important is that the missionaries in Sheikh Osman conducted interviews using a structured questionnaire on their experiences, with the assistance of three Oromian interpreters, shortly after their arrival. These are the 64 short but detailed first transcripts I’ve discovered in the Cory Library. Specifically, these interviews did not only cover the process of the capture (from children) to the shore, but the time from the cradle to the shore. Two of the missionaries interviewed each child, dedicating themselves to learning the children’s language, and with the help of three people who spoke Oromian fluently. Through structured questions, they asked children about their experiences from their earliest memories to the moment they reached the Red Sea coast. What do we learn from children’s stories?
The Children of Hope show that the Horn of Africa bears serious differences from the Atlantic slave trade norm. This difference is not only due to the completely different target population of slave traders (the African Horn trade rather than the strong men needed for transatlantic fields, but rather children). It also shows that our knowledge of Atlantic trade, in particular due to the coast-to-coast transition, is almost absent from the Red Sea trade. The Oromo children had no experience of middle-crossing (coast to coast trade). The time they were held in the sailboats was a few hours before they gained their freedom. The unique contribution of this study to the literature is that deaths on Atlantic slave ships show not only the difficult mid-pass experience, but primarily the long and strenuous first-pass ordeal. In the interviews, the children describe their names, the identity of their parents and whether they are alive, the number of siblings, the names of their villages, towns, regions or countries, their family occupations, the size of their animals and properties. They can tell who the prisoners are, who sell themselves until they reach the Red Sea coast. Accordingly, the largest captive group was “Sidama”: a reference to the “Ethiopians” living in the north, not to the equally vulnerable people of Sidamo, who live in the south of the Oromo territory. The word ama Sidama da means “Abyssinus da in Oromca.
A close look at the land of Ethiopia and Oromo (marked for the humiliating “Galla” term used for Oromos) / Image: John Bartholomew, Africa, 1885
In the 1880s, at the beginning of the children’s narratives, the Oromos were found in the south and southwest of Abyssinia. Sahle Mariam, an emperor by the name of menelik, lived in the lands, including the kingdom of Sheva. In pursuit of the Imperial crown, Mariam had to expand her territories, as well as increase her material wealth and firepower. For this reason, he expropriated the Oromo lands in the south and southwest. Menelik’s ambitions were not limited to these successful regional and hegemonic advantages. At the same time, he headed to raid the Oromo territory for all kinds of looting and taxes, including livestock and slaves. Menelik benefited greatly from the slave trade during the period when he was King of Sheva. He may even be regarded as “the greatest slave entrepreneur in Ethiopia”, referring to historian Harold Marcus. He demanded tax on every slave who passed through his kingdom and / or sold in his kingdom. Menelik was able to meet not only his tactical needs, but also his passion for personal weapons with the money he earned from the slave trade. Efforts gave fruit. On November 3, 1889, the Emperor was crowned Second Menelik, and most of the children’s narratives reflect Menelik’s role in their capture and enslavement.
At the same time as Menelik came to power, the southern regions emerged at the summit of Baraa Balliyyaa, meaning “brutal days” or “time of suffering.” This meant the greatest drought and scarcity in Ethiopian history from 1887 to 1892. The crops perish, the food came to a privileged location. Grasshopper, caterpillar and mouse invasions spread all over the country, and cattle died from cattle plague (transmitted by a small number of cattle imported by a group of Italian soldiers from Massawa). Scarcity, cholera, bubonic plague, diseases and hunger related to them continued; thousands died. When the drought ended in 1892, between one-third and one-half of the Ethiopian population, people died and many children became orphans. A little under one third of the Oromo group of 64 children gradually lost one or both of their parents due to hunger and illness.
In addition, the first passageway from the house to the shore was not fast, nor did it follow a direct route. No child had followed the same route. The itineraries were long and difficult. Children had suffered numerous trauma from hunger, fatigue and whipping, from stiffness to hand and / or foot tying with rope or chain, to severe stigma. One of the children, Gilo Kashe, was so traumatized physically and mentally that he was irreparable and in need of care for the rest of his life. Their long and punitive first pass had further aggravated by the severe drought and the shortage of food and water. When the children reached the beach, he was emaciated. They were weak and most of them were dying. Shortly thereafter, in Sheikh Osman’s first transitional experience, it became clear that the immune systems of the weakened children were seriously compromised. They became an easy target for epidemics, especially a fatal malaria epidemic that recurred when the body’s immune system weakened in the elderly, especially after entering the bloodstream. Soon after the death of many children, the missionaries decided to find a healthier institution for care. They wanted the children to remain on the African continent and at the same time believed that they should be looked after at one of the mission schools of the Scottish Independent Church. The Lovedale Institute in the Eastern Cape, besides being the Church’s foremost institute, was also the best missionary education institute in southern Africa, possibly on the continent at that time. Children from neighboring African countries, particularly from what is now known as Malawi, Zambia and Botswana, were educated there.
After medical treatment and another year of recovery and primary school education, the missionaries were ready to embark 64 Oromo children on board the ship to Aden on the east coast of South Africa and ultimately to the Lovedale Institute.
Journey to the Eastern Cape At the time, the Germans were the only dominant naval power along the Indian Ocean coast of Africa, from Somalia to Cape Cape of Good Hope, as well as the sole maritime trade along this coastline. For this reason, there were no British ships traveling from Aden to South Africa. The journey would have two stages.
On July 24, 1890, Oromo’s children (accompanied by clergy Alexander Paterson and Matthew Lockhead) boarded the Rio Grande postal ship of the French ship line Messageries Maritimes to Port Louis in Mauritius. To reach the eastern coast of South Africa from Mauritius, it was necessary to cross from Port Louis to Conway Castle, the steamer of the British Castle Line. This was the first voyage of a new Franco-British mail ship venture alliance.
When Conway Castle approached East London (South Africa) on Wednesday, August 20, 1890, Revendend William Moir from Lovendale met the children and accompanied them on the final part of the journey to Lovendale. On the afternoon of August 22, 1890, they arrived at Lovendale. His long journeys and days of slavery were finally over. But in reality, they had been subjected to forced migration.
Yemen Aden to South Africa East London by sea / Visual: Author, GIS Laboratory, Cape Town University
Director Dr. Under the auspices of James Stewart, the nature of Lovendale education evolved from the original academic program organized on the liberal arts line to a professional program for African students. Under the program, the majority of black female students would study household skills such as cooking, cleaning, washing and ironing. However, two of the Oromo girls had different plans: they insisted on being trained as teachers. Their intellectual competences emerged at the beginning of academic school work and were successful in their goals. Similarly, some of the young Oromo men passed the written and oral proficiency exam and attended the academic program at Cape University of Cape of Good Hope (1916).
The rest of Oromo was scattered throughout South Africa and was employed wherever they could. But some, at that time, wanted to go home. Some of the young Oromo men joined the British army (mostly as a driver) during the South African War of 1899-1902. At least two of them, in their letters to Lovedale, described in detail the dangerous and pathetic war experiences. When allowed, he left his troops to return home, independently of each other. Like many of his peers in civilian affairs, he used the money they earned to finance his journeys to Aden. There were eight men, all men.
The self-financed return of these 8 volunteers symbolizes the first liberation and reconstruction of the adult Oromo group. Free will, determination and surprising courage lie behind these migrations towards home. Even though there was too much risk on the way back, and their future was by no means certain, they left. The return – and unaided return – points out that the last traces of the passivity imposed on them by slavery have been successfully erased. Each decisively took on the personal responsibility of their own lives.
In 1903, David Hunter of Lovedale conducted a survey among young Oromo adults in South Africa: would they want to return home if a assisted transition had been proposed? There was an equal distribution between respondents who were absolutely interested, those who were indecisive, who had found a good job in South Africa, or who were married and decided to set up their home in the country in which they were accepted.
Among the consenting Oromos, there was a high expectation that Lovedale would move quickly and make an early return home, according to survey results. Their responses, however, did not attract the attention of the missionaries as they had hoped. For years, the Oromos have only enjoyed silence from Lovedale. A young man, Liban Bultum, who came to the fore as a remarkable student and natural leader in his early days at Lovedale, took the initiative. He wrote to David Hunter and requested a response. But the answer was still silence. Lovedale was in crisis. The principal, clergyman James Stewart was seriously ill and died in 1905. Stewart was replaced by clergyman James Henderson, who had no prior knowledge of the offer to Oromo children and young adults. In fact, both sides – Menelik’s reign in Addis Ababa (which would naturally play a role in returns) and Lovedale – were in administrative turmoil due to adverse health conditions. In Addis Ababa, the Emperor II. Menelik was increasingly weakened by syphilis during his youth. Successive strokes, epileptic attacks and signs of old age weakened her control of the state administration, causing her to become increasingly attached to her advisers, most of them German. Tired, Liban took matters into his own hands and in desperation applied to the German Consulate in Port Elizabeth. Liban II. The contacts at Menelik’s palace managed to persuade the sick Emperor’s advisers to finance the journey of the Oromos. Eventually, on July 3, 1909, the Oromo group embarked on the German Kronprinz ship in Port Elizabeth, despite British reluctance.
Kronprinz / Photo: Witthöft
In 1909, about a third of Oromo returned home. Another third of them found profitable jobs or married and preferred to settle in South Africa. On the other hand, the last three thirds have lost their lives, sadly falling into the violent legacy of the physical trauma of the first transition they experienced during the capture and enslavement at the end of the 19th century. Today, Oromos fleeing to other countries, including South Africa, are experiencing manifestations of xenophobia throughout the country. While Oromo has been seeking protection from immigrants and refugees in other African countries, including South Africa, for decades, Ethromian authorities have triggered the defective Add Addis Ababa Master Plan O Oromo protests in 2016 by the Ethiopian authorities. The government’s severe response has given Ethiopia the worst internal turmoil of the last 10 years – and increased immigration. As the city of Addis is surrounded by Oromia, the expansion of the Ethiopian capital means the expropriation of its territory for the majority of farmers and nomadic shepherds. Oromo protests against the implementation of the Plan Master Plan güç gained strength and reached great heights. Hundreds were killed, and many more were injured, arrested or detained.
The Master Plan was shelved after that, and an apology for the deaths was issued. In April 2018, Dr. Oromo has been a member of the Ethiopian Parliament since 2010. Abiy Ahmed was elected as the 12th prime minister of Ethiopia.
Ethiopia’s new Oromo Prime Minister. Abiy Ahmed, April 2018 / Photo: Reuters
This, of course, at least in part was a strategic move to appease the Oromo people. Although it was believed that his vision did not coincide with the Oromo people’s demand for self-determination in the Oromian regions without federal intervention, he issued a statement that could indicate hope towards the end of 2017:
“[Ethiopian citizens] expect a different discourse from us … We must discuss the issues openly and respectfully. It is easier to bring people into democracy than to drag them into democracy. This can only be achieved through peaceful and political participation. ”
Like the children of this work, we just hope that the oppression is over. However, according to the observers’ reports from the field, even though the Prime Minister’s office of the excellent measures explained, infantry soldiers in the Ethiopian regions. They are unaware of Abiy Ahmed’s message, do not hear it or fail to apply it.
Resources: Sandra Rowoldt Shell, Children of Hope: The Journey of Oromo Slaves from Ethiopia to South Africa (Ohio: Ohio University Press, 2018; (South African paperback edition) Cape Town: UCT Press / Juta, 2019).
Ghada Osman, Yabancı Foreign Slaves in Mecca and Medina in the Formative Islamic Period ”Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations 16, 4 (October 2005)
Harold Marcus, II. Life and Period of Menelik: Ethiopia, 1844-1913 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994) “Ethiopia: Who is the new Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali?” DW: Made for Minds [online source] https://www.dw.com/…/ethiopia-who-is-new-prime-minister-ab…/ a-43180360
* The ideas contained in this article are the property of the author and may not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Independent Turkish. Independent for Turkish
Tsegaye Ararssa Yes, it is a sad day in Ethiopia. But what day wasn’t a sad day for Oromos in Ethiopia for the last 150 years?
What day wasn’t a sad day for Oromos when, only in the last four years,
over 5000 peoples were killed; thousands were wounded; tens of
thousands arrested, detained, and tortured; hundreds of thousands were
evicted; and millions were displaced?
What day was not a sad day
for Oromos when, only in the last one year, the worst and meanest
insults and racist slurs were hurled at Oromo persons on virtually every
Ethiopian(ist) media, social and conventional?
What day wasn’t a
sad day for Oromos when the people’s demands for social justice were
ignored, sidelined, ridiculed, and/or denied and erased otherwise?
What day wasn’t a sad day for Oromos when every passing day was a day
of violence and war mongering against anyone and anything Oromo in
Ethiopia and beyond?
What day wasn’t a sad day when, virtually
every day, Oromos are subjected to overt violence (discursive and
physical) in the face of a government that has nothing better to do than
appeasing Amhara supremacist forces?
What wasn’t a sad day when
lawlessness has been enacted by para-statal operatives who occupy poor
farmers’ lands at whim only to displace them and, eventually, claim the
land as part of the measures taken to satisfy their ambitions of
territorial expansion?
What day wasn’t a sad day when demanding
for equality and justice was framed as ‘extremism,’ ‘tribalism,’
anti-ethiopianism, etc, if only to deny, contain, and silence the pain
and suffering of the oppressed peoples of Ethiopia?
Yes, it has always been a sad day for Oromos and the entire Southern half of the country.
Any day has been a sad day of mis-recognition, erasure, invisibility, inequality and injustices of all sorts.
Any day has been a sad day when Amhara supremacists of a long
frustrated empire take it out on Oromos, always considering them as an
object, and a target, of their genocidal predilection.
And yet,
as a voice of the people of hope and redemption, ours was the voice
calling for some semblance of legality, for some sort of legal restraint
on the basest of instincts unleashed onto the political sphere.
Ours was a voice against the hatred, prejudice, bigotry, and violence of supremacists.
To dramatize the incident of today and portray it as the saddest day,
as if it is the single most important pain felt in the polity, is to
quietly erase and invisibilize the temporally and spatially much wider
pain and suffering written into the very core, to the material body, of
the Ethiopian body politic.
It is important that we begin to
speak explicitly about the violence emanating from supremacist (and a
resurgent imperial) politics. It is necessary to pick on them and expose
the utter indefensibility of their politics, the moral hollowness of
their logic, and the ethical bankruptcy of their practice. Unless we
pick on these instincts, unless we name them for what they are, and
unless we shame and punish them otherwise, the violence we saw today
will continue untill the country becomes a bloodbath.
It’s
tragic that this hatred has started to manifest itself today by claiming
the lives of senior military and political leaders in the country. For
ordinary Oromos and the wider South of Ethiopia, this tragedy was an
everyday experience at once singular and regular, incidental and
structural (i.e., built into the structure of relations between them and
the state).
It is ironic (in part) that, this time, the tragedy claimed persons (also) from the same group that foments the violence.
Tragic? Surely. Sad? Yes. Singular? No.
Singular or regular, incidental or structural, one can’t help wondering
if this is perhaps the case of the proverbial “chickens coming home to
roost”, or if it is only the beginning something worse?
The role of Debteras in spreading Amharic: Settler-
Colonial Language
Inapt to think and to understand about the Habesha (Tigre and Amhara mainly) what later on called Abyssinia by the Europeans after the Portuguese, as individual or as an entity, and the authentic Gafol-system (thepredatory-prey relationship ) without the knowledge of the Coptic-Orthodox-Debteras and their Institution “ቤተክርሥትያን ;Betekristiyan”- backed by the Neftaynas is comparable to think and to understand about the establishment of the Roman Empire, and its expansions in three continents and maintenance without the knowledge of the role of the Catholic-Christian Popes and their legitimized institutions “Churches” backed by the Roman-infantries called Legions. Betekristian (a loan word literally means “The house of Christians.”
The term Neftaynas is also an Arabic loan word that literally means Gun carriers (These were indeed a collection of arrogant bi-pedals, an alphabet infantry, fanatic bare-foot militias troops, who was trained to kill, like trained police dogs with guns made and proved by the Europeans invaders, scramblers and colonizers of Africa. The establishment of the Gafol System of the Habeshas goes back to the 4th century CE known as the Era of Ezana -the converted Tyrant and the Genociders of the Aborigines in the Horn of Africa. The coming of the Scripts of the Hebrew Myth, Torah also known as Old Testament by “Christians” until two accidentally captured slave Monks of Tyre by the name Frumentius and Adesius brings the script with them and convert the Tyrant named Ezana to “Chrstainity” mentored, butressed him to widespread it by violnces.
As the Noble laureate, and one of the iconic figures of Anti-apartheid regime of South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu said: “When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said ‘Let us pray.’ We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.”
Neither the barbaric and backward Abyssinian Empire that currently trades with stolen name of “Ethiopia” nor the so-called the “Holy Roman Empire” could have never existed without institutionalizing their own versions of plagiarized Hebrew myth “Christianity” and its operations under the mantra of the “only true faith, and the ultimate scripts of the true words of God” as they both claimed to their own versions, to be defended and expanded by all means possible.
The script called “Bible-Gods Word” as they said is /was indeed known to be the collections of the fanciful, legends, oral traditions of Near-East Asia called-Talmud, in Hebrew language and its extensively emended, edited or censored, plagiarized in written form called Torah or the book of Moses. Its altered versions, by many generations, was translated to the Greek language called the Septuagint, the “Old Testament” of Christianity which is going to arrive by accident during the so-called Ezana’s period, who we do not find any eye witness account but scribes, who said that account by itself was written at least centuries later by anonym “clerics” and installed in the heads of the Abyssinian Coptic Orthodox.
Henceforth, it turned to the major weapon, a silent killer move with the logic of eliminations of the Aboriginals; history, culture, traditions, and worldviews of the people with whom they settled. From here departs the imported the Orthodoxy of so-called “Christian” religion was deployed by as a weapon by all series of Habesha Shiftas, over warlords and tyrants who catapulted to the political saddle tinted with that indeed hold true to the very date.
Now lates as begin to ferret out the 5W1H of the Hebrew Bible Torah or the five book of Moses where it began and further disseminated to the world beyond its original terra; Canaan-Near East Asain. Lets us leave aside for minutes about the Habeshas, as an entity, or as the primitive settler-colonialists of the horn of Africa whom later on designated by the Europeans as the so-called “the only Christian highland, the other–brothers that we are obliged to help” in the northern fringes of the Horn of Africa surrounded by “heathens” in cursing the authentic Aboriginal faith of the entire African people in the region who supplanted the third hand imported ideology tinted with religious myth that contemporary trades with a stolen name “Ethiopia” and their adopted identity of loan culture. Thes must at least wait up to the 4th century CE.
What is the Bible? Who Wrote It? Why? Where? When? And How?
This extract from seminal work of Prof. Isreal Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman, the leading archaeologist and the author of the book entitled as The Bible Unearthed Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts published in 2002. Courtesy to the Authors, the book is available to download for free for those who trust science, the power of archaeology, the power reasoning, logical thinking and searching for facts the 5W1H to purify history from its myth and debris even if the subject is for living using modern technological advanced tools enabled to draw a red line between legends and historiography.
History is investigative, interrogative, and belongs to the study of the institutions, including an account of the rise and fall of nations, as well as of other great changes which have affected the political and social conditions of the humankind. It must ferrets out the dynamics that gave the possibility to events that happened independent of time and space and distinguished from legend primarily.
Isreal Finkelstein and Neil Asher Silberman defined:
When we speak of the Bible we are referring primarily to the collection of ancient writings long known as the Old Testament–now commonly referred to by scholars as to the Hebrew Bible. It is a collection of legend, law, poetry, prophecy, philosophy, and history, written almost in Hebrew (with a few passages in a variant Semitic dialect called Aramaic which came to be the lingua franca of the Middle East after 6000 BCE. That is the basic definitions of the Hebrew Bible.
The Hebrew Bible is the central script of Judaism, the part of Christianity cannon, and a rich source of allusions and ethical teachings of in Isalm conveyed through the text of Quran. The world in which the Bible was created was not a myth in the realm of greater cities and saintly heroes, but a tiny down-to-earth kingdom where people struggled for their future against the all-too-human fears of wars, poverty injustice, disease, famine, and drought. The historical saga contained in the Bible–from Abraham’s encounter with God and his journey to Canaan to Moses’ deliverance of the children of Israel from bondage to the rise and fall of the kingdom of Isreal and Judah-was, not a miraculous revelation, but a brilliant product of human imagination.
The Torah–also known as the Five Books of Moses, or the Pentateuch (“five books” in Greek)-includes Gcnesis~ Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy. These narrate the story of the people of Israel from the creation of the world, through the period of the flood and the patriarchs, to the Exodus from Egypt, the wanderings in the desert, and the giving of the Law at Sinai. The Torah concludes with Moses’ farewell to the people on Israel.
The next division, the Prophets, is divided into two main groups, of scriptures. The Former Prophets-Joshua, Judges, I and 2 Samuel, I and 2- Kings-.rell the story of the people of Israel from their crossing of the river Jordan and conquest of Canaan, through the rise and fall of the Israelite.kingdoms, to their defeat and exile at the hands of the Assyrians and Babylonians. The Latter Prophets include the oracles, social teachings, bitter condemnations, and messianic expectations ‘of a diverse group of inspired individuals spanning a period of about three hundred and fifty years, from the mid-eighth century BCE to the end of the fifth century BCE.
The Writings are a collection of homilies, poems, prayers, proverbs, and psalms that represent the most memorable and powerful expressions of the devotion of the ordinary Israelite at times of joy, crisis, worship, and personal reflection. In most cases, they are extremely difficult to link to any specific historical events or authors. They are the products of a continuous process of composition that stretched over hundreds of years. Although the earliest material in this collection (in Psalms and Lamentations) may have been assembled in late monarchic times or soon after the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE, most of the Writings were apparently composed much later, from the fifth to the second century BCE- in the Persian and Hellenistic periods. Between 640 and 630 BCE, when the Assyrians withdrew their forces from Philistia, Phoenicia, and the area of the former kingdom of Israel, Egypt took over most of these areas, and political domination by Egypt replaced the Assyrian yoke.
In Judah, this was the time of King Josiah. The idea that YHWH would ultimately fulfill the promises given to the patriarchs, to Moses, and to King David-of a vast and unified people of Israel living securely in their land was a politically and spiritually powerful one for Josiah’s subjects. It was a time when Josiah (639-609) BCE embarked on an ambitious attempt to take advantage of the Assyrian collapse and unite all Israelites under his rule. His program was to expand to the north of Judah, to the territories where Israelites were still living a century after the fall of the kingdom of Israel, and to realized the dream of a glorious united monarchy: a large and powerful state of all Israelites worshiping one God in one Temple in one capital Jerusalem and ruled by one king of Davidic lineage. He saw the first seed of the myth that is going to grow and widespread and invade the world behind its original terra.
Keep an eye on, David, which is going to be the beginning of the plagiarized Habesha or Abyssinian version of “Dawd” (ዳውድ) and his son Solomon to be injected in the Gafol system of Abyssinia to be installed in the 4th century CE accidentally in a mystified and in hyper-bloated superstitious fashions.
Just before David’s death, the priest Zadok anointed Solomon to be the next King of Israel. The Bible account in 1 Kings 7 to 1 King 11, decorate and glorifies Solomon, to whom God gave “wisdom and understanding beyond measure”’ consolidated the Davidic dynasty and expanded his empire, stretched from the Euphrates to the land of the Philistines and to the border of Egypt.
From a historical perspective, these territories were what was known as the Eastern or Oriental part of the Roman Empire in Asian and Africa. The Bible further narrates about his immense wealth that came from a sophisticated system of taxation and forced labor required of each of the tribes of Israel and from trading expeditions to exotic countries in the south.
In recognition of his fame and wisdom, the fabled queen of Sheba visited him in Jerusalem and brought him a caravan of dazzling gifts. She brought with her a large group of attendants as well camels loaded with spices, jewels — She presented to King Solomon the gifts she had brought such as more than four thousand kilograms of Gold—etc. and summarizes his reputation until his death that King Solomon excelled all the kings of the earth in riches and in wisdom, and the whole earth sought the presence of Solomon to hear his wisdom, which God had put into his mind.
To answer the question, If David and Solomon that turned to such central religious icons to both Judaism and Christianity. The scholars considered as radical biblical critics come to the conclusion that King David is “no more a historical figure than King Arthur.” and Biblical historians such as Thomas Thompson and Niels Peter Lemche, considered as “Biblical minimalists” by their detractors, have argued that David and Solomon, the united monarchy of Israel, and indeed the entire biblical description of the history of Israel are no more than elaborate, skillful ideological constructs produced by priestly circles in Jerusalem in post-exilicor even Hellenistic times.
Neither David nor Solomon is mentioned in a single known Egyptian or Mesopotalnian text. And the archaeological evidence in Jerusalem for the famous building projects of Solomon is nonexistent. Nineteenth and early twentieth-century excavations around the Temple Mount in Jerusalem failed to identify even a trace of Solomon’s. A close reading of the biblical description of the days of Solomon clearly suggests that this was a portrayal of an idealized past, a glorious Golden Age.
The reports of Solomon’s fabulous wealth (making “silver as common in Jerusalem as stone,” according to 1 Kings 10:27) and his legendary harem (housing seven hundred wives and princesses and three hundred concubines, according to I Kings II:3) are details too exaggerated to be true. Moreover, for all their reported wealth and power, neither David and Solomon are mentioned in single known Egyptian or Mesopotamian text for the famous building projects of Solomon is nonexistent.
Nineteenth and early twentieth-century excavations around the Temple Mount in Jerusalem failed to identify even a trace of Solomon’s fabled Temple or palace complex. And while certain levels and structures at sites in other regions of the country have indeed been linked to the era of the united monarchy, their dating, as we shall see, is far from clear. To sum up the long story short, our current knowledge about biblical writings, narratives, and claims which were taken as ultimate truth i.e. history for centuries most vividly by Theologists that raised equally more questions than answers by historians, archaeology other fields of science.
Today, leading experts of biblical archeology, unanimously argue most of the David and Solomon narratives have been proved by archeology to be fictitious, even those elements within tenth century before common era origins could not be have been written down until the late eighth-century BCE when literacy in the land became widespread so do historian and and even critical Theologist.
They proofed that David ca. 1005- 970 BCE as biblical testimony narratives that he conquered Jerusalem and makes it his capital; establishments of a vast empire covering most territories of the Land of Israel’s turned out by archeological findings that there is no evidence for David’s conquest or for his empire. In the valleys of Canaanite culture continues uninterrupted. In the highlands continuation of Iron I settlement system. Is son Solomon ca,970 -931 BCE as biblical testimony narratives, builds the Temple and the palace in Jerusalem and also active in Megido, Hazor and Gezer archeological finds found out that there is no sign of monumental architecture or important city in Jerusalem. No sign of grand-scale building activity at Megiddo, Hazor and the north, Canaanite material culture.
Did Moses wrote the Pentateuch “five books of Moses”
Thanks to the power of reasoning, searching for facts purifying history from legends and myths by deploying modern technological tools, scholars who doubted and questioned, and if at all Moses had any hand in the writing of the Pentateuch and dug deep to its root ferret out the truth and finally come to the conclusion that:
“The book of Pentateuch is not a single, seamless compositions but a patchwork of different sources, each written under different historical circumstances to express different religious or political viewpoints.”
Furthermore,the Authors find out what for centuries, Bible readers-took it for granted that the scriptures were both divine revelation and accurate history, conveyed directly from God to a wide variety of Israelite sages, prophets, and priests. Established religious authorities, both Jewish and Christian, naturally assumed that the Five Books of Moses were set down in writing by Moses ‘himself-‘just before his death on Mount Nebo as narrated in the book of Deuteronomy.
In fact, logical thinking in time and space no health mind trust for a second that one individual can write such a complex subject that govern human civilization in all spheres of life, ridiculously as it was narrated by the biblical scribes in Exodus that God called Moses, spoke to him in the desert at Mount Sinai “The Ten Commandments, Gods Word,” gave him miraculous power of opening the Red Sea, by cleaving the water of a lake in to two and setting the one part on top of the other. Next day Moses turned the river to blood. He brought plage after plage to the land of Egypt, lists with no limits.
What is at the stake here. Let us get rid of the schizophrenia of all supernatural force, miracles, dramatic descriptions, heroic figures first. Second, Moses, as biblical scribers portray, can and did not exist in fact. One who does not exist can not write. Even if we took for granted that there was a “Hebrew Man” called Moses as biblical Exodus 1:2 describes During this time a man from the tribe of Levi married a women of his tribe, and she bor him a son (no date or place of birth) … She hides him for three months (Why?not know). But when she could not hide him any longer, she took a basket made of reeds and covered it with tar to make it watertight. She put the baby in it and then placed it in the tall grass…the king’s daughter, (no name of the king as well as his daughter mentioned) who adopted the “Hebrew” baby boy as her own son, and said to herself, “I pulled him out of the water and so I named him Moses.” It further narrates that Israelites lived in Egypt for 430 years. As the day 430 ended all the tribes of LORDS people left Egypt. Finally, he freed the Israelites from slavery led them to their “Holy land” as a result he was crowned as the Prophet of Israelites.
Sacred scholars, such as Prof. Finkelstein and Silberman, proved unanimously concluded that:
“There was no mass exodus from Egypt. There was no violent conquest of Canaan. Something clearly does not add up when the archeological evidence and the Egyptian records are placed side by side.”Furthermore, there is no tribe late alone “Holy people, Nation) by the name of Isreal in Egyptian scripts in the African continent, but in Canaan Near East Asia.”.
Then what is the task of the biblical scribes as a whole so-called five books of Moses?
The basic idea of the whole package of theologized ideological jingoism tinted with religion grammar is to promote and to convene the absolut an alphabetic traditional people in the Near east primarily even the whole world to be ruled under the command of one family lineage i.e of Abrahams blood One faith, One King indeed (a tyrant) legitimized to take care of the guardianship of their God, while “HE-God (Male) -Said it.” None of the scribes in biblical writings said “I said it” at this junction of history, But, he the invisible one, for which there will be no question to be raised, but accepted, and swallowed raw without being digested and turn to Pavlov’s dog.
The incidence of genocide as a social phenomenon can be traced to Biblical times. Foremost among these are the Hebrews who in their quest for a foothold in Palestine engaged and battled many Biblical peoples and in the process. Isreal defeats King Sihon, “we killed him, his sons and all his men, captured every town, and put everyone to death, men, women, and children left no survivors. We took the livestock and plundered the town” (Deuteronomy 2:32-35). King Menahem of Isreal on his way from Tirzah, completely destroyed the city of Tappuah, its inhabitants and the surrounding territories. He even ripped open the bellies of pregnant women (2 King 16).
This idea of the invention of “One Man-rule-One Religion and One nation” that lead to tyranny was redacted, censored, emended, plagiarized from one to the next generations throughout the biblical story writings suited to their needs, profits and psych by spin masters from the day a spot of ink was dropped on scrolling papyrus to animal skins and finally on papers as it is today throughout biblical story writings, rewritings.
As a British academic Theologian Prof. Robert Beckfords important documentary film that sums up the long story with less than two hours and finds out who exactly wrote the Bible. The scribes of the book called bible were masters of spin, in writing and rewriting, editing and reediting, adding or deleting as it suites them. He called them the Spin-Doctors who shaped reshaped the mind of the mass of the illiterate in time and space. These masterminded individual or groups who had prevailed to read and write in the world of absolute illiteracy to write and teach their fiction in the name of “god” and mesmerize the mass to fulfill their personal or group ego, authority, and legitimacy by all means possible. He begins the ego that may lead to tranny.
The book of “Religion” of GOD-MAN (gender-neutral) as it was in most parts of the oldest civilizations of the world of egalitarianism such as in Africa or Asia turned to the book of MAN (Male)-GOD by completely losing its original meaning and duties what meant Religion. Since its e birth, the book was used as the most effective tool of chauvinistic–muscular ideology and politics tinted with religious grammars that hold to the very date.
The concept of Region was born where humankind born, and without a shadow of a doubt, we know today that is the region in northeastern Africa, the home of Cushitic, Omotic and Nilotic families is proved to be the cradle of human civilization. As what was called Monotheism which the western and their tutelages awarded a patent to the so-called “Hebrew prophet Moses, the descendant of Abraham was already in Africa at least for about thousands of years before the birth of Abraham, David, Moses, etc.
For instance, the belief in one Supreme God called Waaqaa by the Oromo people, the majorities within the Cushitic families, and the Supreme God Magano by theSidama people go back to at least 10,000 years before the birth of five books of Moses.
The Oromo and the Sidama people believed and commit to it in daily life, from birth to death guided in the principles of:
Waaqaa Tookkicha kan hunda Uummee!!
(The Supreme God! The creator of everything in the world!!);
Waaqaa Tookkicha kan hundabeeku!!
(The Supreme God! The Omniscient!!);
Waaqaa Tookkicha kan hundaa toluu!!
(The Supreme God! The Omnibenevolent);
Waaqaa Tookkicha kan hundadanda’uu !!
(The Supreme God! The Omnipotent!!);.
Waaqaa qulqulluu kan dhuga jalatuu!!
(The Supreme God! God the pure, who loves the truth, who is intolerant of injustice, crime, sin, and falsehood).
It is from where here the cradle of human civilizations that it moved in all sides of African content toward the south, the west and the north. It nurtured, for instance, the entire civilizations along the great Abaya (the Nile in foreign) Hapi in KMT, and along its long journey on its way to Nubia and her civilizations dated ca. 3800 to 3100 BCE and followed by the civilization of KMT (Ancient Egypt)-the flower of African civilizations and finally drains in to the Mediterranean sea after 6,650 Km flow. After over 400o years KMTs colossal civilizations of which we still know very little yet, collapsed by foreign invaders and the conquerors led by the man named “Alexander the Great” of Macedonia in 332 BCE. The suffix “great” attested to Alexander may make sense only when adding Tyrant to it indeed .i.e. Alexander the Great Tyrant.
Accidentally Captured Monks of Tyre. Frumentius and Adesius
The migrating Habeshat nomadic tribes, who continuously flew from the arduous -dry desert of the southern Arabian Peninsula to the richest and highly civilized north-eastern part of Africa to save their life from famines, dying of hunger. Various studies trace that most of the migrants to the Horn of Africa plausible come from today’s Yemen. From where the Arab word Habeshi or Habeshat; and the term Abyssinia of Europeans was derived. These were “collection of people” without known genealogy, who indeed cannot trace their lineage beyond their grandfathers that hold crystal true and embedded in their nomadic mobile and backward culture nurtured from one to the next generation.
As result, they installed their backward system beyond their terra that ends up in three generation that beings with person’s name, followed with his father and ends up on their grandfathers in case one owes a pass-port. When they are asked your family name please? They will be stacked, and little later either they call their Father or their grandfather, as their family names an indication they did not know their linage at all and led to confusions.
Munroy-Hay (1991) said: “Later in the mid -1st millennium B.C. the southern Arabian immigrants or Sabaens appeared in Ethiopia, a Semitic speaking who maintained contacts with the country of their origin for centuries.”They settled and lived isolated for centuries between the burning shores of the red sea in the east and the high mountain ranges between Tekeze and Beehelo on one side and Eeju in the west that is often impassable. They gradually admixed with the indigenous Cushitic people of the region.
Ullendorff (1998) stated that to put the binary narratives and the conundrum of defining Ethiopia could be resolved by distinguishing “Abyssinia,” the original Semitized nucleus and “Ethiopia,” in its present political and much expanded ethnical and geographical configuration.
Today more than ever we are in the position to ferret out the truth of historiography. Thanks to novel methods and technic of scientific endeavors, such as carbon-dating, advanced digital and software tools, DNA-Tracing, in comparing and contrasting various methods, in deploying multidisciplinary scholastic approaches, such as Linguistic, Anthropology, Sociology, Theology, Genetics, Archaeology, etc, just to name some among many others.
We are in a position to unearth the remains of the past studies, proofs, and reproof even if it was perceived to be true in the past, to distinguish historiography from legends primarily, and brings to the light by purifying it from its myth and debris of the past perceptions. We are in a position to unveil what was yet veiled by deploying the current technological and methodological endeavors and advancements available in various scientific disciplines currently in all spheres of science. We are in a position to find out Needle in Haystack within a short period of time and space and affordable coasts.
The nitty-.gritty of “Kebre Negest” book of Myth
This part of the article explores the coming of the third hand imported Hebrew Bible, called Old Testament by the Christian, and the Habesha version of(መጽሀፈቅዱስ) means “Holy Book” a misnomer by itself indeed and the book called “Kebre Negest(The Glory of the Kings) that come with request of the Abyssinian warlord Tyrant called Yikuno Amlak in (1270s-1285) from the Alexandrian Coptic’s of Egypt.The article analysis the nitty-gritty of the Book, the 5W1H (Who, What, Why,Where When, and How) of it.The first historical episode took place after two brothers, Frumentius and Adesius of Tyre (region of modern Lebanon), who accompanied their uncle, the merchants of Meropius in the 4th century of Common Era (CE) were planned to navigate to India via the Red Sea were captured by Aksumites coast guards.
Ruffini described;
The ill-fated vessel of a Tyrian Christian philosopher named Meropius bore the brunt of the Axumite powers defiance of imperial Rome. Pulling into port for lack of freshwater at some point in the 320s, the passengers and crew were captured and killed, Meropius included, the angry Ethiopians sparing only his two young relatives, Frumentius and Edesius. The act of mercy was one of providence as well, for even today. Frumentius is regarded as one of the pivotal figures in the history of Ethiopia the story of the remarkable career the two boys e enjoyed at the Ethiopian court would probably be dismissed as my shift had not come first-hand from Edesius himself. EllaAmida, king of the Ethiopian ruling house, seems to have taken quite a liking to the two young boys. Poor Edesius had the dubious honor of becoming their royal cupbearer .Frumentius, however, must have so impressed his hosts with his financial acumen that he was eventually given complete control over the royal treasury.When Ella Amida passed away in 325, leaving behind Ezana, a son yet too young to rule, the young Roman’s role at court became even more prominent.
Schaff (1892) also stated.
A native of Tyre, acquainted with Greek philosophy, desiring to penetrate into the interior of India, set off for this purpose with his two young nephews. When he had accomplished the object of his wishes, he embarked for his own country. The ship being compelled to put in to land in order to obtain a fresh supply of water, the barbarians fell upon her, drowned some of the crew, and took the others, prisoners. The uncle was among the number of those who were killed, and the lads were conducted to the king. The name of the one was Ædesius, and of the other Frumentius. The king of the country,in course of time, perceiving their intelligence, promoted them to the superintendence of his household.
It was told that the young Ezana can speak Greek language, lingua franca in the region parallel to the pidgin language called Geez at this junction of history. Thus plausibility his indoctrinations must take the path in greek language. Frumentius finally converted Ezana to “Christianity of the Oriental Version who was considered as “pagan” who believed in greek deities. Frumentius was finally appointed by Athanasius of the Alexandrian Coptics to become the first Abuna (Bishop) renamed to “Aba selam”; the highest religious ranking given by the Habesha Coptic-Orthodox’s ruled by synodos whose head had been in Alexandria-Egypt for over one-and-half-millennium, until 1959. Ezana the converted tyrant….. continues in the next article more in depth.
Ezana the converted Tyrant –Script &Gun
The converted Ezana deployed his new “faith” as the best ideological tool to control the political power and territorial expansions of the region and empire-building. He committed a crime against humanity erased aboriginal-meaningful names of the territory of the Cushitic stocks, cultural norms and symbols throughout her wider expansion from the north toward the south by killing and displacing for solid twenty-six years during his barbaric rule in the region from about the year 330-356 century of Common Era (CE) established the Aksum empire and what the historian Kobischanov (1988) quoted by Bulcha (2011) called the Gafol System; a system of tributary collection, looting resources of the invaded people, riding slaves, all sortes of domestic animals of the local farmers that come on their way. His troops of, an arrogant, fanatic absolute illiterate of predatory nomadic infantry militias and their civil descendant followers were considered as human locust that plagued the peasants to the level that nothing was left to feed their hungry children let alone to feed themselves.
Ezana vanquished their culture, language and erased their history. He imposed forced assimilations, displacements of the indigenous people from their ancestral soil. One must also keep in mind that the Geez (Creole language) and the Greek language was known to be used as lingua franca in the region the Aksum Empire until its death, Geez (dead) – but continued to be used in caves, Church huts, only by the Debtras as “lingua sacra.” What was later called Tigrian and Amharic languages were to be born out of it later on. The creole language called Amharic as the youngest, gradually developed by gabbling up, contorting and deforming loan words from the oldest and most popular spoken language in eastern Africa such from Afaan Ormoo (the language of the Oromo people and other Cushitic languages.
Camouflaged with the Hebrew Bible of the greeks version called Old Testament and the Habesha version of Orthodoxy the Debtras established an institution called ቤተክርሥትያን (Betekristiyan-means the house of Christians) without a shame.They took the task of guardianship and disseminator roleof the Settler-Colonial Language (SCL), Amharic. and one of the barbaric, backward settler-colonialempire backed by Neftanysa (Safries) killer hordes maintained their authentic Gafol-System since the era of Aksum Empire to the 20th century the era of the military junta rule in 1974 to 1991.
They took their lion’s share of the empire in all sphere of walk of life. They grabbed the land of occupied colonial territories settled in each and every corner built huts under the mantra of Betekristiyan and preyed upon their resources.They established the precarious system of exploitation called the (ሢሶ) Siso (owner of one-third of the occupied land) system. They turned the shareholders of slave enterprise, established serf-dom, exploited agricultural products, natural and human resources. Since 1991 the TPLF-brigands clad with garb of EPRDF took the political power out of the barrels of guns and ruled with barrel of guns. They returned back to their authentic predatory–prey relations with the whole south to Habesha proper continued grabbing land and moved with premies of eliminations and expropriation of the land of the whole south.The so-called “Orthodox Church” turned to the shareholder by using the opportunity given by the TPLF-tyrant-Stalinist policy and competed in grabbing lands that ing exponentially grew years to years.
The Abyssinian Empire, established on Gafol-System ass the mirror image of the European Colonizers designed in Beril 1884/85 were always backed Europeans under their unanimous motif “that all European countries would be obliged to make a place for this “new brother” who stepped forth ready to play in the Dark Continent the role of Japan in the Far East.”
She established the most precarious, backward System, turned to the house of the prison of the vast majority of the people of entire south incarcerated within it. The so-called “quasi-state” turned burden, the problem and never ever know and seen a solution in her history.
She preserved her deep-rooted backward culture of riding slaves for field works, for house works, for commerce, as sex objects riding domestic animals, looting resources were her art of life enshrined in her art of life, since the era of Aksum empire that continued increasing from centries to centries to the era of despotic Monarchy, Haile Silasse (slaveholder, in thousands and the whole land of the South) who was finally forced by the western powers ( his mentors, firearm, advisors and finance providers) to sign the treat act to abolish slavery in 1942 at least on paper, if he wants to gain all that he needs and to be accepted as membership in the League of Nation and be backed.
Debteras- the Masters of Intrigues and plagiarism
The Debteras (Clergies) the counterpart to the Catholic popes were considered the “Intellectual elites (ሊቆች), liqoch,” of the Habeshas, more erroneously religious leaders, who have washed their hands in every sphere of the empire, except that the Catholic popes evolved, and adopted themselves to the societal needs and development in time and space. Whereas the Coptic Debtras stuck to where they were in their middle ages like a crocodile.
They are allergic to any progressive changes by nature and in their upbringings. They see changes as “suicide mission to their myth they cemented and privileges the got in their life Living on the shoulder of the nominal–helpless poor people who in most cases forced to be called “Orthodoxes” without even pronouncing it correct let alone to know it. The over warlords institutionalized it. The major task of forced proselytization by thousands of the poor –an alphabet mass of the people was given to the Habesah Debtras they inject their myth nurtured their offsprings from one to the next generations and turned them to their Pavlov’s-Dogs.
Behind every Habesha settler (ሰፉሪ-, Sefari-or Neftanya, Arabic loan words literally means settler or gun carrier respectively) colonialists as they called themselves. There have been always bunches of Debteras (Clergies) who have been officially operated under the masked clad with religious grammars, a loan of political and ideological tools camouflaged with the myth of Orthodox-Christianity of the oriental version of Byzantine Empire that accordantly introduced to Aksum–Tigray in the 4th century of Common Era (CE); the birthplace of what was called the Gafol System, (predatory state) by the historian Kobischanov (1988) quoted by Bulcha (2011). A system of tributary collection where the predatory-over warlords who triumphed in butchering his rival brigands, crowned, renamed and blessed by their corresponding Debtars “King of Kings, Atse, etc.) that holds to 1974, the coming of the military junta in power by killing the despotic monarchy.
The Cultural Markers of the Debtras
Debtars are/were known as the masters of intrigues, denials, hypocrisy, arrogance, ignorance, myth, miracles, superstitions tinted with fanatical racial grammar. They owe the acculturations of dishonesties, chauvinistic masculine mannerism and most often blasted liars and lazy horses, work is taboo. They owe the gratitude of making an Elephant out of Mice when it suits them, and vis-a-vis when not. They singularly positioned themselves as a bridge, an intermediary between their “God,” the invisible one, and the only one who knows “Gods language” as they deadly claim propagate and portray themselves from their birth to their death, even in “heaven.”
Blanc (1869) described:
Except for the working peasants, there is nothing in them to praise or extol. Beggars infest the land; the priests are ignorant and bigoted.”
Annesley and Salt (1809) provided and figured out who were /are these Habesha “Intellects” the Debteras, they stated:
During our visit in Tigray, we meet only a few Debteras, considered as “intellectual elites” of Habesha people, we looked for someone who can read their Bible and found that not one in twenty could understand the characters they read ”Ge’ez-dead language.” It is as a French-speaking person might seek to understand Latin.”
About three and half decades later another eye witness W.Harris (1843) described Abyssinia cited here in length and breadth, so that readers can digest and ferret out the truth from myth and legends without being baised;the whole truth that stands with its own feet alone.
Harris stated:
The Abyssinian possesses no idea of more salutary doctrine of Christianity. Polluted faith is her reflected in the mirror of depraved manners and long severe fastings constitute the essence of his degenerate religion. The idol worship of saints has made a rapid progress in the land; and the ignorance of the clergy is only to be equalled by the impurity of the lay classes. Their belief in Christianity, if that term can be applied, is strange, childish and inconsistent, and bigoted…. They abhor and despise all who refuse acquiescence in this their absurd confession:
That the Alexandrian faith is the only true belief.
That unchristened children are not saved.
That faith, together with baptism, is sufficient for justification; but that God demands alms and fasting, as amends for sin committed prior to the performance of the baptismal rite.
That the baptism of water is the true regeneration.
That invocation ought to be made to the saints, because sinning mortals are unworthy to appear in the presence of God, and because if the saints be well loved, they will listen to all prayer.
That every sin is forgiven from the moment that the kiss of the pilgrim is imprinted on the stones of Jerusalem; and that kissing the hand of a priest purifies the body in like manner.
That all sins must be confessed to the priest—saints invoked—and full faith reposed in charms and amulets, more especially if written in an unknown tongue.
That prayers for the death are necessary and absolution indispensable, but that the soul of departed do not immediately enter upon happiness, the period being inexact accordance with alms and prayers that are expended upon earth.”
All ideas regarding salvation are thus vague and indefinite; and vain, foolish doctrines have taken entire possession of the shallow thought of Christianity of Ethiopia.
Schartz and Schwarz-Barcot (1976) in his review article of Levine’s (2014) “Greater Ethiopia,” who made an Elephant out of Mice, stated:
In spite of the fact She was known with images of a forbidden refuge of savages, the only nation “civilized without wearing trousers and shoes,” and, of course, a grossly underdeveloped country. Undaunted by an old proverb about Ethiopia as a place “of which it is impossible to speak the truth.
Messing (1976) further summed up, her authentic Gafol (predatory -prey relationship) System that turned to the pathognomonic (unique) sign of the establishment, and maintanance of the primitve-barbaric empire that turend the burden of the whole of the entire South from Habesah proper since they left Aksum by stating:
The “ruling clan” and their subjects through ought her history and her establishment and expansions to the era of Military junta who deposed the despotic monarchy.The social model prior to 1974 will be characterized as a situation in which power and property were concentrated in the hands of the emperor, the church, and small groups of land Owners
Their troops of, an arrogant, fanatic un alphabetized predatory nomadic infantry militias and their civil descendant followers were considered as human locust that plagued the peasants to the level that nothing was left to feed their hunger children let alone themselves. Henceforth the Gafol system of the Saferies, or Neftanyas (Amhara-settler) enclaves turned to the authentic art of life of the Abyssinian fanatically are within the entire south as the in the whole south as we all destined to witness the facts on the soli as daily facts on the soil.
Religion and politics turned to be two faces of the same coin that holds true to the very date. Debtras and Abyssinian warlords were/ are two sides of the same coin clad with the garb of “religion,”whose main object indeed was/is to serve as an engine for territorial expansions, acquisitions, occupations, and settlements who moved with logic of wipeout of the oldest civilizations of the Autochthonous folks like the Oromo people, the Sidama people, and many other Cushitic,Omotic and Nilotic families,they cursed and deviled them targeted to eliminate.
Since their feet held on the soil of Oromia and the entire south to Abyssinia proper the Habesha warlords and their mentors, the Debtras left no stone unturned to wipe out the Aboriginal history, religion, language, culture, societal norms, taboos, rites, and festivals. The committed cultural genocides by cursing, deviling, and in giving execution orders and capital punishments of those who stood firm against the genocide and ethnocide.They murdered the poly-maths religious leaders and teacher, like Warra Qaalluus, Ayyaantuus, Hadhaa Siiqqees, Abba Bookuus, etc. They burned their house all religious artifacts, symbols like Caaccuu, Caallee, Kallacha, Bokkuu,etc.
They were the architects of the imprisonment and execution of Prince Iyaasu, the legitimate throne follower of Menelik, waged war on architects and Tuulama organizations execution massacred Oromo poly-math leaders of the follower and Tuulama Association’s cold-blooded killing by hanging, like a wild-cat and shooting them all. They looted their properties and band the association. The crimes noted here are only tips of the Iceberg that happened in Finfinne alone.
They cursed the rites and absolutely forbidden Piligram to Irreecha (Thanksgiving Holiday).
The Abyssinians subjected marked to wipe out the Gadaa-Siiqqee System of the Oromo people, the Luwa System of the Sidama people socio-political system that was served the people before the Habeshsa’s feet held on African soil, late alone to talk about “Abyssain religion and civilization.”
They uprooted Odaa (Sycamore tree) the symbol of Life, Wisdom, Enlightenment, Peace, Love, Consciousness, and Reconciliations celebrated at least thousand years before the coming of the book of Moses to Aksum.The Safaries left no stone unturned to erase the oldest human civilization of the Oromo people and other alike to supplant it by their third hand plagiarised Hebrew myth, whom they themselves indeed know-nothing except rote learning, like a cassette recorder,trined as Pavlov dogs.
They escorted their over warlords blessed their fanatic killer militia hordes throughout all war waged and massacred the Oromo people on their ancestral soil. They committed, evicted, eliminated, turned to slaves and serfdom as a result, the Debtras, predatory nomadic killer militias infantry troops led by loyal Shiftas (chief-bandits) and Shum’s or Haleqas (military leaders were all billeted Oromo Land by massacring the Oromos. The Debtras who operated under the mantra of their institution called “ቤተክርሥትያን Betekristiyan” become the lion’s shareholders called the ሢሶ,Siso (one-third of the land) system of the occupied territories and colonial-settlements and encampment sites called (Sefer) means garrison that turned to what was known as “Ketemas” quasi-city, and the settlers called Safaries (Arabic loan word).
For instance, the largest hills around Finfinnee like Entoto was billeted and allocated to the most loyal Shum’s “infantry militia leaders, Heleqas around the over warlord the “King” and to the “Orthodox quasi Christain Church” to build their huts what they always portray as “sign of civilization” a blasted lie. Civilization is never measured by building Huts for Debtras. Development and progress are measured with the number and quality of Schools quality of teaching applied science, in building Clinics, Colleges, Universities, infrastructure research centers, etc., but not by mushroomed so-called “Church-Gods-House” huts that infested Oromia and their alakies to the last corner of the land.
The Habesha settlers empire maintained her status quo as an obligate permanent burden of the Oromo people. Where every the foot of Safaries held the wiping out of the Autochtuonus Oromo people and allocating it to the settlers continued to the very date indeed. The become the fat of Oromia soil and the whole south, Monopoly on all agricultural cash crops and products like Coffe(Buna) ranking export good without knowing if Coffe is a tree or a grass, , Caat (Jimaa), Tea or Life Animal exports, Hide and monopoly on almost all mineral natural resources drilled and exploitations of cheap-human labors and resources and the only beneficiary and the transistor of hard currency in exports and imports to and from foreign countries throughout her establishment turned the master of firearms importer to suppress the formidable resistance forces with in the empire:the prison-house of the whole south people.
Get rid of the schizophrenia of “Amharic-a civilized &lingua Franca”
One must be crystal clear and get rid of the schizophrenia of giving credits for settler colonialists handicapped language called Amharic for themselves that kept them where they were as its is vividly known, let alone to be considered lingua franca “a civilized, and unique language. It is the most invisible or silent killer deployed as the powerful tool of all Habesha Tyrants and patronized to the very date since their and its arrival to the soil of the whole south.
What was called Amharic language is indeed a creole langue of militias that was developed by gabbling up, by contorting and deforming loan words from the oldest and most popular spoken language in eastern Africa such from Afaan Ormoo; the language of the Oromo people and other Cushitic languages. It was/is scientifically proved as a handicapped language that could not fit about 100s of Aboriginal languages spoken in this prison house such as Afaan Oromoo, Afaan Sidaama, Afaan Somaalee, Afaan Afar etc, just to note some among other non-Semitic languages and culture and worldview
Did we not yet know that we are dealing with some Genes of the offspring of divers and invaders who moved with the premise of wipe out the history, culture, rituals, symbols, norms, and taboos, etc, the whole Orommuumaa (Oromoness), the identity of the Oromo people from our mind and our memories. Did we not yet the genocides they committed and attempted to supplant with the Sefaries (settlers world) in deploying and employing their backward handicapped creole language called “Amharic” with all toxic ingredients they poisoned our mind and our soil for over centuries and yet continued to erase Afaan Oromoo as their ancestors for centuries through our bewitched historical anomalous interactions
Is not the proclamation of the Habesha Debtera right near Finfinne who showed their hidden -real face of fascism, and deep-rooted cultural racism and outrages hatred who can not even give a resting peace of the Mother who thought Afaan Oromoo in Qubee by saying “her Coffin can not move, because she was teaching the language of Oromos with a shaitan alphabet (Qubbee) or their proclamation that we all know that said “Afaan Oromo can explode a radio, etc.) is a recent memory that we all know the markers of Debtras who claim as“Religious fathers.”In fact the second largest language of Africa, next to Hausa and the oldest language Afaan Oromoo can explode the brain of Settler (Safries) Habeshas Mind and the most beautiful language in all spheres credited by experts and those who enrolled to study it via seas and ocean, and erase from your mind comparing a Mice (Amharic) with an Elephant (Afaan Oromoo) and beg for it to use on the Placenta land of Oromia in Finfinne. As a rule thumb remember that: No greater injustice can be committed against a people than to deprive them of their own language.
Blanc, H. (1869). The Native Races of Abyssinia. Transactions of the Ethnological Society of London,7, 291-298. doi:10.2307/3014359:
Bulcha, M. (2011). Contours of The Emergent and Ancient Oromo Nation: Dilemmas in the Ethiopian Politics of State and Nation-building. Cape Town: Center for Advanced Studies of African Societies.
Finkelstein, I. &Silberman N. A.,.(2001)The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts. https://archive.org
Hassen, M. (2007). Conquest, Tyranny, and Ethnocide against the Oromo: A Historical Assessment of Human Rights Conditions in Ethiopia, ca. 1880s–2002. Northeast African Studies,9(3), 15-49. doi:10.1353/nas.2007.0013
Hassen, M. (2017). The Oromo and the Christian Kingdom of Ethiopia, 1300-1700. Rochester, NY: James Currey.
Hassen, M. A. (2015). Unbewusstheit in der Macht und negative Dialektik des sozialen und politischen Reglementierungszwangs: Fallbeispiel Äthiopien und Ägypten. Berlin: Logos Verlag Berlin.
Hertslet, E. (1894). Abyssinia to Great Britain (Colonies) Nos. 1 to 102. W. num. Maps. London: Print. for H.M.s Station Off.
Holcomb, B. K., & Ibssa, S. (1990). The invention of Ethiopia:. Trenton N.J.: The Red Sea Press.
Jalata, A. (2008). Being in and out of Africa. Journal of Black Studies,40(2), 189-214. doi:10.1177/0021934707307833
Messing, S. D., & Levine, D. N. (1976). Greater Ethiopia: The Evolution of a Multiethnic Society. ASA Review of Books,2, 76. doi:10.2307/532334
Ruffini G. (Ethiopia and Rome:The Birth of Byzantine Religious Diplomacy
Schwartz, T. P., & Schwartz-Barcott, D. (1976). Greater Ethiopia: The Evolution of a Multiethnic Society. By Donald N. Levine. Social Forces,54(3), 707-708. doi:10.1093/sf/54.3.707
Ullendorff, E. (1998). The Ethiopians (The Peoples of Africa series) by Richard Pankhurst. Rassegna Di Studi Etiopic, Istituto per l’Oriente C. A. Nallino, 42, 176-180. Retrieved August 18, 2019, from https://www.jstor.org/stable/41299969.
Statement of the Board of Trustees of the Oromia Media Network (OMN) on the reckless action seriously endangering the life and safety of OMN’s Executive Director Jawar Mohammed
For Immediate Release October 24, 2019
Founded in exile in March 2014, in a context of extensive government
control of the media in Ethiopia, the Oromia Media Network (OMN)
provided an alternative platform to voice the concerns of the Oromo
people and the oppressed peoples of Ethiopia. It is indisputable that
OMN has had a remarkable contribution to Ethiopia’s hoped-for transition
from authoritarianism to democracy. Through its balanced, responsible,
and inclusive journalism and reporting, it has highlighted the
implications of government policies, thereby framing the debates and the
issues for the public. As a result of, and to further contribute to,
the ongoing changes and widening of the political landscape of the
country, OMN was invited by the new leadership of Ethiopia to operate
from within the country. We warmly welcomed the government’s invitation
and promptly opened an office and registered OMN in Finfinnee, and
started operating since last year under the laws of Ethiopia.
After opening its Finfinnee office in August 2018, OMN has maintained
its commitment to ethical and balanced journalism. However, to our
disbelief and dismay, there has been a systematic and relentless
campaign against OMN on private and public media as well as on social
media, not least for covering the plights of minorities in other
regional states. One of the few independent media serving over 45
million Oromos as well as other nations and nationalities, OMN has been
operating under growing challenges that have taken an alarming turn on
October 22, 2019. What happened during the day in the Ethiopian
Parliament was disturbing, and we suspect that it set the tone for what
was to follow. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed responded to a question about
media responsibility raised from a member of the parliament, where he
threatened to take decisive measures to those he called “media-owning
foreign citizens that hold a non-Ethiopian passport.” Sadly, the Prime
Minister resorted to threats and intimidations just less than two weeks
after being awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.
Following that, Jawar
made it clear on his Facebook page that he sought foreign citizenship
under persecution, when the former leadership of the Ethiopian
government denied renewing his Ethiopian passport. What followed in
action during the same night around the residence of Jawar Mohammed is
more alarming than the intimidation that transpired in the parliamentary
speech. Unless proven otherwise, there seems a clear connection between
the parliamentary speech and the reckless action taken during the
night.
After midnight, there was an attempt by authorities to
remove security personnel assigned to Jawar for his safety without
Jawar’s knowledge. After a long standoff between Jawar’s security guards
and the security personnel trying to dislodge the former through a
gravely suspicious procedure, Jawar gave a briefing of the sequence of
events in the morning of October 23, 2019, and later that day to various
media. There is credible evidence, including a recorded conversation
between Jawar’s security guards and their commander, suggesting serious
procedural flaws and criminal intents. For now, this situation is
partially diffused because the security assigned to Jawar refused to
leave their post until their replacements arrived.
Shortly after
the incident, we have witnessed a widely shared public outrage and
protest in various cities and towns. The short press conference given by
the Federal Police Commissioner is dishonest and inconsistent with the
available evidence. The press release of the President of Oromia
Regional State is yet to be confirmed through concrete actions.
The implications of such an attack are far beyond Jawar as an individual
and OMN as an organization, potentially jeopardizing the anticipated
transition to inclusive and participatory democracy. It is highly likely
to ignite a constellation of damaging events that are difficult to
control.
Therefore, after a serious deliberation in response to
last night’s incident and in solemn concern for OMN’s freedom of
operation, the safety of Jawar, the people of Oromia, and the stability
of the country at large, the Board of Trustees of OMN:
1. Condemns the grave security infractions that seriously endangered the safety of Jawar in the strongest terms possible.
2. Rejects the briefing given by the Federal Police Commissioner and
demand a credible explanation from the government in the shortest time
possible.
3. Demands that the Ethiopian government holds a credible investigation and explains its results as soon as possible.
4. Urges the government to hold a credible investigation and all
responsible bodies to account for their actions and inactions. The
source and chain of the command should be identified.
5. Demands
that OMN and its employees be allowed to operate in a climate free of
intimidation and urges the government of Oromia Regional State to play
its part in ensuring a safe working environment.
We strongly
believe that the steps that should be taken to serve justice and rectify
the situation must be transparent and reflective of the seriousness of
the problem. OMN has persisted in the service of the people and remains
to be an independent source of news for the voiceless, while abiding by
the law of the land. Let it be clear to all that we at OMN take our
responsibility seriously and recommit to undertake our activities
ethically and in the interest of the people.
Media cannot operate
constructively under repressive conditions. To require any media to
operate according to the law of the land is understandable. What we do
not understand is the relentless media campaign against OMN and
government-sponsored intimidation of this media, which the Oromo people
count as its own. As we renew our commitment to the advancement of
democracy, freedom, and development in Ethiopia, we strongly urge the
government to carry out a credible investigation and hold all
responsible bodies to account for their actions and inactions. Finally,
we call upon our people to continue their unwavering support for their
media.
Jawar Mohammed Kitaabaa Magarsaa Feleke Bogale Oromia Media Network
Kitaba Megersa Chairman, OMN Board of Trustees Oromia Media Network
Two years ago, the state branded him a terrorist. Now, after years in
exile, activist Jawar Mohammed is back – and determined to see
democracy in his country
Global development is supported by
About this content
Mon 20 Aug 2018 09.00 BST
Last modified on Thu 24 Oct 2019 15.35 BST
A man holds an Oromo Liberation Front flag as people in Addis Ababa
celebrate the triumphant return of Oromo activist Jawar Mohammed.
Photograph: Tiksa Negeri/Reuters
Jawar
Mohammed never travels alone. When the US-based Ethiopian activist
returned to his home country on 5 August, he was treated like royalty. A
posse of sharply suited young men hovered by him at all times. Jeeps
carrying security guards patrolled his hotel in central Addis Ababa, the
Ethiopian capital. Supporters from the provinces arrived in droves to
pay their respects. Over the course of a two-week visit he held about 25
to 30 meetings a day, according to an exhausted aide.
After meeting with the Guardian in his hotel suite he rushed off to
give a lecture at the capital’s main university, entourage in tow.
Nothing demonstrated the breathtaking transformation in Ethiopian
politics over the past four months quite like the red-carpeted return of
a figure who was once the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary
Democratic Front’s (EPRDF) most wanted man.
From a studio in Minneapolis, where he founded the controversial Oromia Media Network,
Jawar has spent the past decade agitating over social media for
political change back home in Ethiopia, which he left as a scholarship
student in 2003. This was his first time in Ethiopia since 2008.
Facebook
Twitter
Pinterest
Jawar Mohammed addresses a news conference upon arriving in Addis Ababa in August. Photograph: Tiksa Negeri/Reuters
So effective was he as an activist that by late 2016, as
anti-government protests billowed across the country compelling the
EPRDF to impose a state of emergency, the Oromia Media Network was labelled a terrorist organisation and Jawar accused of crimes against the constitution.
By early 2018 the revolutionary fervour had grown so loud that Hailemariam Desalegn was forced to resign as prime minister, paving the way for his enormously popular successor Abiy Ahmed, a young reformist from Oromia, Jawar’s home and the country’s largest and most populous region.
The Oromia Media Network, along with some smaller outlets and
activists, has used social media to devastating effect over the past few
years, coordinating boycotts and demonstrations and bringing Ethiopia’s
large and often brutal security apparatus close to its knees.
“We used social media and formal media so effectively that the state
was completely overwhelmed,” Jawar says. “The only option they had was
to face reform or accept full revolution.”
During the course of a triumphant homecoming, the former terrorist (charges were dropped
in May) toured the country, mostly around Oromia, where he was welcomed
by vast and jubilant crowds. On his first day he led a tub-thumping rally in the capital’s main concert hall.
Later he travelled to Ambo, the epicentre of the Oromo protest movement
– a struggle for political freedom and for greater ethnic
representation in federal structures, which Jawar played a main role in
orchestrating. Tens of thousands arrived to greet him, more than when
Abiy visited the town shortly after his inauguration in April.
As Jawar had promised his supporters – mostly young, politically active Oromo men known as the Qeerroo
– he took off his shoes and walked prophet-like through the streets of
the city. He then planted a tree at the site where a young man was
killed by security forces nearly 15 years ago, long before the rise of
the movement that threw him into the national spotlight.
“They used to make me so happy and proud with what they did,” he said
of Ambo’s Qeerroo. “So I told them: ‘One day I will come to your city
and show my respect by walking barefoot.’ That day came and I had to
deliver.”
Few doubt the importance of Jawar in recent Ethiopian history.
Perhaps more than any other single individual, he took the once-marginal
politics of Oromo nationalism and made it mainstream. Today, Oromos –
the country’s largest ethnic group – dominate the highest offices of
state, and Jawar enjoys significant personal influence over the
country’s new leaders, including Abiy himself.
We used social media and formal media so effectively that the state was completely overwhelmed
In a recent interview with local media he claimed
– to the dismay of many Ethiopians – that the country now effectively
has two governments: one led by Abiy, the other by the Qeerroo. This
puts him in a position of extraordinary responsibility, since he is “one
of the Qeerroo” and “a significant portion of the country listens to
me”, he admits.
Many are uncomfortable with the whiff of demagoguery that accompanies
Jawar. One Ethiopian journalist (who asked to remain anonymous) notes
his “Trumpian sense of truth when inconvenient facts surface”.
He has been accused of inflating the numbers of protesters killed by
security forces and, infamously, telling his followers (73,000 on Twitter
and more than 1.4m on Facebook) that army helicopters fired live
bullets at civilians during the tragic stampede that occurred during an
Oromo cultural festival in October 2016. Independent journalists present
confirmed this did not happen. He has a history of smearing journalists he disagrees with as government “agents”.
He has also been accused of inciting ethnic and religious violence. In a 2013 video,
for example, he is heard saying: “My village is 99% Muslim. If someone
speaks against us, we cut his throat with a machete.” Jawar says the
clip was doctored, adding that he would not say such a thing because his
father was a Muslim and his mother a Christian.
In recent years, he has whipped up his supporters against the
Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front, the once dominant ethnic Tigrayan
wing of the ruling coalition, which critics argue led to attacks against
Tigrayan civilians as well as those of other ethnic groups. Jawar says
that he has long sought to steer his supporters towards “non-violent
resistance”, and adds that “even when TPLF was in power and actively
killing our civilians we ensured Tigrayan civilians were not subject to
attacks”.
These days, Jawar comes across as a more moderate and conciliatory
figure. He says he plans for the Oromia Media Network to set up offices
across Ethiopia
and become a professionalised outfit. He points to the BBC and NPR as
models. He insists he has no intention to enter formal politics,
preferring to remain an activist.
“I want to help us in the next couple of years transition to
democracy. And for that I want to use my influence over the population
so that they can calm down, contain themselves, and ensure peace while
the political leadership works out arrangements for transition,” Jawar
says.
The last point is especially significant. In recent weeks instability
across Ethiopia has escalated sharply, especially in his own region.
The day after his interview with the Guardian a rally in the town of
Shashamene turned violent, as a crowd of Jawar followers publicly hanged
a man they suspected of carrying a bomb. Two more died in the carnage
that followed. Many Ethiopians blame him for the unrest, and he was
compelled to cancel the rest of his tour.
Jawar nonetheless remains optimistic about the country’s future, and
about the prospect of a peaceful politics free from violent expressions
of ethnic identity. “I do believe if we democratise the Ethiopian state –
allowing people of all ethnicities to participate in the political
process and to get a fair share of power and wealth – there is a
possibility the next generation will be proud Oromo and proud Ethiopian
at the same time. I think that is possible.”
This story was amended on 21 August to include a response from Jawar Mohammed and to clarify claims against his organisation.
Since you’re here…
… we have a small favour to ask. More people are
reading and supporting The Guardian’s independent, investigative
journalism than ever before. And unlike many news organisations, we have
chosen an approach that allows us to keep our journalism accessible to
all, regardless of where they live or what they can afford. But we need
your ongoing support to keep working as we do.
The Guardian will
engage with the most critical issues of our time – from the escalating
climate catastrophe to widespread inequality to the influence of big
tech on our lives. At a time when factual information is a necessity, we
believe that each of us, around the world, deserves access to accurate
reporting with integrity at its heart.
Our editorial independence
means we set our own agenda and voice our own opinions. Guardian
journalism is free from commercial and political bias and not influenced
by billionaire owners or shareholders. This means we can give a voice
to those less heard, explore where others turn away, and rigorously
challenge those in power.
