Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Oromiyaa Biyya Koo Madda Sirna Gadaa


Dachii burqaa aadaa fi madda sirna Gadaa,
Kennaa uumamaa ti waajjirri kee odaa,
Irreechaa fi ateetee aadaas hedduu qabdaa,
Elellee fi shaggooyyee dhiichisaa fi ragada.
Biyya koo lalistuu qabeenyaan badhaatuu
Madda lageen hedduu gaarreniin marfamatu
Qabeenya addaa addaan kan baayyee hawamtu
Midhaan gosa hedduu fi albudaan faarfamtu.
Bosonaa fi qilleensa rooba ganna guutuu
Nyaata gosa hedduu baayyinaan kan qabdu
Biyyoo biyya abbaa koo hundaan badhaafamtuu
Oromiyaan keenya biyya jaallatamtuu.
Biyya dhadhaa fi dammaa dachii bunaa fi warqee
Badhaatuu hangaatuu qabeenyi ishee marge
Halagaa si saama mirga ilmaan kee sarbee
Yoom aara galfattaa kun hndumtuu darbee
Waa’ee biyya kootii an waan baayyeen faarsaa
Si irra fagaachuu kootu gar malee na aarsaa
Halkan hundaa ciiseen abjuudhaan si argaa
Galma hann’uura kootii dachii haadha margaa
Kan addunyyaaf fakkii biyya sirna Gadaa
Badhaatuu uumamaa kan hin qabne mudaa
Akkasitti hin haftuu gaaf tokko gmmaddaa
Ol ka’ii dubbadhu nus siif seennee waadaa.
Dachee koo dubbadhu meeqa beela baaftee? (2)
Lageen koo iyyadhu meeqa dheebuu baaftee?
Warteessuus halagaa hagam jiraachiftee?
Jabana hijiraas keessumota halalaa meeqa keessumsiiftee?
Iyyadhu Oromiyaa tasa hin callisinii (2)
Lmuu ilmaan nafxanyaa hin keesumsiisinii
Iyyii iyya labsi ilmaan kee dammaqsi
Gadaa kee deebisii addunyaadhaaf labsi.
Biyyuma kee irratti nagaa si dhorkattee
Bosona kee gubdee warqee kee buqqaaftee
Ilman awaannisaa dhakaa keessaa yaatee
Siin si agabsitee ofiif quuftee bultee???
Dachii koo dubbadhu meeqa jiraachiftee?
Hagam beela baafte meeqa dheebuu baaftee?
Ilmaan nafxanyootaa warteessuu guddiftee
Tolaan kee maaf bade maaf galata dhabdee?
Hrma kee xuxxuuxee harka kee irraa nyaatee
Si irratti guddatee dhala kee fakkatee
Nyaaphaaf si afeera sobaan si hawwatee
Kee lubbuu siif dhaba dhugaan si jaallatee.
Harras boo’aa jirta kan Tasfahun Camadaa
Ilmaan kee hundatu Lapheen Cabee gadda
Gumaa ilmaan kee baasuuf haaromsinee Waadaa
Gadda kees jijjiirree gaaf tokko gammaddaa.
Dubbadhu dachii koo tasa hin callisinii
Osoo wareegamtuu du’a kee hin dhoksinii
Dachii magariisa dhiigaan booressanii.
Ilmaan kee qaqqaalii hedduu ajjeesanii
Masaraa kee diiguun mana hidhaa ijaartee
Garii biyyaa yaasuun kaanis iyyoomsitee
Osoo nuti jirruu maaliif tuffatamtee,
Ati hortee qabdaa nutu si dagatee
Qaamnni hundaa cirmee gar malee madooftee
Walii galteen kahee nama hidhuuf dhabdee
Maaf irratti ilaaltu hundattoo dhaammattee
Yaa ilmaan koo maaloo na dhaqqabaa jettee.
Dhaamsa ishee dhagahaa waan jabaa dubbattee
Isin alaa wal nyaattuu diinni natti ammattee
Osoo isin jirtanii mirga koo sarbitee
Lafa irraa daguugdee daa’imman koo fixee
Jaarraa tokkoon dura jaarsa kabajamaa addunyaan hawwitu,
Abbaa keessan kunoo Bokkuu harkaa darbattee diinni kan salphistu’
Qaanii hagas gahu gurraan dhaageessanii ijaanis argitu
Waan haaraa maal qabdu me deebii naaf kennaa isin maalitti jirtuu?
Shamarran koos kunoo hedduun biyyaa yaatee
Hormi itti taphatee gar malee dhaanamtee
Gariis gurguramtee kaan allattiin nyaattee
Baayyees galena irraa qurxummiin hirmaattee
Nyaaphaan cunqurfamee yartuun tuffatamee
Mirga koo uumamaa borxaadhaan sarbamee
Hagamin jiraadha gadootti ilaalamee
Jetteetu dubbattee Aayyoon dararmtee
Kolonii balleessuuf warraaqsi dawwaa dhaa
Cunqursaa sabummaa maalumaafan baadhaa
Kanaafan wawwaadha eenyummaan himadhaa
Diinaa fi firri haa beekuu biyyi koo Oromiyaa dha
Harras boris taanaan anis oromoo dhaa……….
Abdii Borii

In Ethiopia, state controls hold back a waking giant

By Richard Lough and Aaron Maasho
  • Ethiopia’s revival a tale of Africa Rising
  • Nation still overshadowed by charismatic former leader
  • Hailemariam cautious on opening state-dominated economy
  • Ruling coalition keeps ethnic rifts in check
ADDIS ABABA, Sept 17 (Reuters) – When global drinks giant Diageo bought a brewery in Ethiopia, it paid a premium for a stake in a barely tapped African market that in the 1980s had spectacularly failed to feed its own population.
Diageo paid $225 million for state-owned Meta Abo, joining a list of firms seeking a foothold in Africa’s second most populous nation that was once run by communists and now has an emerging middle class after a decade of double-digit growth.
“We paid a premium of course and that was a deliberate decision … We knew the value of what we were buying,” Francis Agbonlahor, Diageo’s managing director at Meta Abo, told Reuters in a capital that boasts smart highways and new office blocks.
Ethiopia is now sub-Saharan Africa’s fifth biggest economy, leap-frogging next door Kenya and wooing investors from Sweden, Britain and China, as other emerging markets lose some of their shine.
Few nations can better tell the story of “Africa Rising”, the narrative of a hopelessly mismanaged and violent continent now prized for strong growth and, in many cases, the kind of political stability scarcely imaginable a decade or two ago.
Yet like other African nations, Ethiopia must now work out how to maintain economic momentum as the U.S. Federal Reserve starts to turn off the taps of easy money that drove investors to more adventurous markets, and when China’s economy and those of other emerging powers start to shift down a gear.
That means another tricky transition for Ethiopia, which has until now relied on the state to run its economy, but which has seen growth rates slip to 7-8 percent, short of the level needed for its goal of middle income status by 2025.
“When you are starting from a very low base with a lot of donor support, it is easy enough to grow in a strong, robust way,” said Razia Khan, head of Africa research for Standard Chartered bank. “As the economy matures … it is going to become a lot more difficult.”
DILEMMA
Opening up the economy, as many businesses at home and abroad want, could draw in new investment but may also loosen the controls that can be exerted by a government made up of ethnic and regional parties that has carefully managed development and kept a lid on rivalries.
That is the dilemma for Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn and his cabinet, who still work in the shadow of Meles Zenawi, the rebel-turned-statesman who ruled with an iron grip for two decades until he died last year. Caution remains the watchword.
“We are not ready now,” Foreign Affairs Minister Tedros Adhanom told Reuters when asked if Ethiopia could open up its mobile network or banks, prime targets for foreign investors.
Concerns about a deepening rich-poor divide and worries about changing the tried and tested policies of a charismatic leader, all weigh in to deter officials from a big shift.
But moving too slowly risks squandering investor enthusiasm and damaging the prospects of a nation once best known for “Red Terror” purges under communist rule in the 1970s and its 1980s famine. For now, at least, it has not deterred investors.
“I was in India recently and the thing that caught me by surprise (when talking) to foreign investors (was) the country that kept being mentioned was Ethiopia,” said Khan.
Diageo is not alone in seeing the potential. Heineken of Holland and France‘s BGI Castel have snapped up breweries, which were among first state firms to be sold off.
The Ethiopian Investment Agency says Unilever and Nestle are sniffing around, and South Korea’s Samsung told Reuters it was exploring Ethiopia as a place to assemble its electronic goods. The two European companies did not comment.
Hennes & Mauritz (H&M), the world’s second biggest fashion retailer, has put in test orders as the nation seeks to boost textile exports to $1 billion a year by 2016 from $100 million last year.
H&M spokeswoman Marie Rosenlind said that, if the tests were successful, production could start this autumn.
LENDING SUPPORT
With manufacturing accounting for just 4 percent of gross domestic product, Ethiopia needs such investors to help reduce its reliance on exports of coffee, horticultural products and livestock that have driven growth until now. It also remains one of the world’s biggest recipients of aid.
“No other country that I’m aware of, aside from these resource-rich countries, … can go to middle-income status with still 50 percent of GDP on agriculture,” Guang Z. Chen, the World Bank’s country director, told Reuters in a June interview.
China could lend support, though this time not in the usual form of donations that have helped African growth till now.
Chinese shoe exporter Huajian has announced plans to co-invest $2 billion in an industrial zone outside Addis Ababa to bolster its Ethiopian exports and create up to 100,000 jobs.
The African Development Bank says a switch by Beijing towards domestic consumption may boost manufacturing in African economies like Ethiopia, where labour is cheap and power is a third of the price in China.
Ethiopia is building a huge dam on the upper reaches of the Blue Nile, part of plans to export electricity in a few years.
Until now, the most visible signs of growth are in the capital, where building sites clad in wooden scaffolding have mushroomed. In the upmarket Bole Medhane Alem suburb, an emerging middle class is enjoying new luxuries.
A fast-food outlet sells burgers and fries for a just over $4, more than many Ethiopians earn for several days’ work. “We’re not coping with demand,” said one employee.
At a nearby coffee house, whose logo mimics Starbucks, hip youths in low-cut jeans sip frappuccinos and caramel macchiatos.
“The middle class is growing and is really increasing its purchasing power,” said 18-year-old Yohannes, sitting near a billboard advertising two new residential tower blocks carrying the slogan: “From shabby to chic. Witness the transformation.”
“I WON’T BE ONE OF THEM”
Yet for some, change is not being felt, including those in the capital’s tin-roofed slums.
“You can see it all around you, there are rich people. But I am not going to be one of them,” said Elias Zelalem, a teenager who earns $1.60 a day shining shoes — if business is brisk.
Ethiopia’s ambition is to achieve middle income status in 12 years time, defined by the World Bank as a per capita income of $1,430. In 2012, Ethiopia’s per capita income was $410.
Yet to do this, Ethiopia’s $43 billion economy needs to repeat the 10.7 percent average annual growth achieved in 2004 to 2011. Some question whether the state’s determination to meet this target is coming at the cost of private business.
“We have to overcome poverty. How fast we should do this, therein lies the difference (of opinion),” said Zafu Eyessus Zafu, whose United Insurance Company is a shareholder in a commercial bank. He wants financial services open to foreigners.
Two thirds of Ethiopia’s 8.5 percent growth in 2011/12 was due to public spending, the World Bank said. Half of spending needs are raised domestically, leaving little for private firms.
“If we need 50 million birr ($2.7 million) from the bank we may get 20-25 million,” said a truck importer who identified himself as Taye, wary of using his full name in a nation where the state has long kept a tight lid on dissent and criticism.
“For foreign currency it is impossible. We can apply to the bank and wait a month or more,” he added.
PROVEN POLICY
The credit crunch is deepened by a state-imposed requirement that each time a bank lends cash it must loan an additional 27 percent of the loan’s value to the government in the form of a low-interest Treasury bond to help fund development projects.
But the government shows no change of tack. Reining in the state would challenge the vision of Meles, whose portrait still hangs in government offices.
“There is no need to look for policy changes at this time,” deputy premier Muktar Kedir told Reuters earlier this year.
“We are of the mind that we have to fully implement the policy that has already proven itself successful,” he said.
A policy shift could open rifts along ethnic lines in the coalition made up of four main regional parties. There is little room for anyone who might challenge the status quo.
Without the force of personality or reputation of his predecessor, Hailemariam has shown no sign he has the political will or clout to veer from Meles’ path.
That may mean Ethiopia has to be content with slower growth and investors will need patience.
“Ethiopia is missing out in several respects,” said Standard Chartered’s Khan. “But there is this very cautious policy.”
Reuters

Monday, September 16, 2013

TPLF’S Long Term Political Objective and Its dreadful Impact For Oromos

Oromo elders have been practicing Gadaa system for well over 500 years.  Social scientists of diverse backgrounds at different times have studied the Gadaa system. Many of them have testified that it is uniquely democratic. The above three sentences partially clears that our ancestors were ruling our land democratically since long time back. Starting from 70’s we have been struggling to get back that right of we had lost under Menelik’s Empire, it was self-determination of Oromoiyyaa. Indeed, we shall get back our right for two main reasons, firstly we are capable of ruling our land, secondly it’s our natural right to posses and govern our land. The young generation has to show its super effort to secure those rights by what ever it takes. ‘’We should say enough for once again!’’ TPLF should not rule our land for the coming years in the presence of us.
The latest event of ethnic cleansing that is being  perpetrated against the Oromos in Eastern Hararge zone is a continuation of a grand design of the TPLF-led regime of Ethiopia to undercut the demographic weight of the Oromo and the territorial expanse of Oromiyyaa.  This design, one which its leaders in many occasions in such obvious boldness have spoken about, is framed to fulfill its long-term political and economic objectives.
The obvious political objective of the TPLF-led regime of Ethiopia is primarily the restraint of the Oromo political life. The regime with a minority constituent base is always scared of the Oromo population size with its potential political weight. To overcome this fear and sense of insecurity, it has been determined to maintain its political hegemony and keep Oromiya under its occupation by all what it takes. To achieve their devilish political interest they had to go through different mechanisms .One of among their methods is preying young Oromo generation who are vibrant and insuperable in political stage.  Frankly TPLF have chosen to squeeze our political knowledge superiority by using their aggressive power. As we still see they are exercising their power by carrying out worst actions like Imprisoning, torturing, killing, chasing of Oromo patriots.
With the intent of ethnic cleansing, the TPLF has directly launched a silent war on the Oromo people over the years. However, such a war meant to extinct a community of people has often been masked under the heading of “human rights violation”. In effect, what the TPLF has been and is still carrying out on the Oromo nation should be taken as a designed action of ethnic cleansing. Its actions that clearly attest to this fact are many.  Other actions of the TPLF have violated the very existence of Oromo communities during its rule. Man-made famines it help created resulted in starvation that took heavy tolls in life in many parts of Oromiya and most notably in Borena, Hararge, and  Arsi that the international media once referred to it as ‘green famines’. Its barbaric act of environmental terrorism has equally brought about destruction of ecosystems and exacted an inordinate number of human lives and loss of habitats for rare flora and fauna. Suffice to mention here two notorious cases that illustrate the TPLF’s acts of brutality on the environmental resources of Oromiya: The blazing and decimation of the forests in Bale and most recently in Iluu Abbaa Boora. The immediate impact of this act on the present generation of the affected communities is enormous. Furthermore, looking at this heinous crime of the TPLF from a larger scope, it is conceivable that such a destruction of ecosystems would have far-reaching implications on generations to come. It would undoubtedly check the population growth of the communities, a desired result that the TPLF leaders are hoping to secure.
Despite relentlessly working at its silent ethnic cleansing grand plan over the last two decades, the demographic weight of the Oromo people has still remained upsetting for the TPLF led-regime.
For the TPLF regime, pitting one ethnic group against another has served as a political survival means for so long. It would continue using this wild political card for as long as it is in power. Should all ethnic groups who have lived in harmony side by side for millenniums and shared a common political history fail to see its divide and conquer policy and rise up in unison and challenge it, the policy will continue serving its purpose. This would mean all oppressed ethnic groups will remain prey of this parasitic regime.
For at least two decades, genocidal massacres against Oromo have been framed that way in order to cover-up the deliberate effort by TPLF elites to either reduce Oromo by attrition to a minority population or to destroy them fully so that Tigireans can take over Oromia and its resources. That is their long-term plan.
With absolute military, economic and diplomatic powers, Tigirean elites have ever been emboldened to destroy the Oromo nationality and its material, cultural and intellectual properties. They are accountable to no one–not to their laws, not to international law and not to moral principles. TPLF elites’ arrogance is becoming limitless, soaring. While they engage in genocidal activities in Oromia, the international community has afforded them the complete silence they so want. However, the human and material destruction caused by Tigire elites in Oromia is equivalent crisis to Syria and Darfur. Although, we should have to get limited interference of international community to calm current genocidal deeds of TPLF. We shouldn’t wait their help, we have to strengthen our struggle as much as we can . I will conclude this short article with Martin Luther king saying   ‘’freedom is never voluntarily given by oppressor, it must be demanded by oppressed ‘’.
Oromiyyaa for Oromos !!

In Ethiopia, more land grabs, more indigenous people pushed out

0916-world-oomo_full_380A journalist’s visit to South Omo, where rights groups say police have raped women and otherwise pressured locals to leave an area tagged to become a huge sugar plantation, was quickly curtailed by authorities.
By Will Davison | September 16, 2013
HAILEWUHA VILLAGE, SOUTH OMO, ETHIOPIA
(Christian Science Monitor) — As night wore on in a remote valley in southern Ethiopia, one policeman dozed and another watched a DVD comedy on a battery-powered laptop.
Close by, in a clutch of thorn trees and grass huts, an ethnic Mursi man tried to explain to outsiders why he is so concerned for his people, who have lived here as semi-nomads for generations but may soon be evicted to make way for a giant sugar plantation.
“We Mursi [people] do not accept this ambitious government ideology,” the man said of an official state plan to house them in new villages in exchange for their compliant departure. He is speaking in the village of Hailewuha, his face lit by flashlight. Cattle shuffle and grunt nearby.
“What we want is to use our own traditional way of cultivation,” he says.
Ethiopian officials say the Mursi, like a growing number of ethnic or tribal groups in Ethiopia, are voluntarily moving out of their ancient lands; human rights groups say this is untrue.
The ongoing controversy is not new in Ethiopia, and “land grabs” by governments for lucrative leasing deals have become a story across the continent.
For example, in Ethiopia’s lush Gambella region, in the western area bordering Sudan, locals have been forcibly relocated to make way for the leasing of farms to foreign firms. This year, the World Bank and British aid agencies were swept into controversy over charges they helped fund the relocation including salary payments to local officials involved in the clearing of land.
The Mursi have lived in Omo for centuries. Partly for this reason they get frequent visits by tourists and anthropologists alike. Tall and elaborately decorated, their scarified bodies are daubed with paint and ornamented by hooped earrings and bicep bangles.
But now the Mursi may be those most affected by government operations to overhaul South Omo, an area that officials in Addis Ababa are calling economically and socially backward.
The plan would turn this scrub and savanna into about 700 square miles of state-owned sugar plantations that would in turn require building Ethiopia’s largest irrigation project.
The water to feed the sugar cane year-round is to come from the Omo river, and is made possible by Gibe III, a partly Chinese-funded hydropower dam that may be completed as early as next year. The cane will be processed at some five local factories.
The people of this valley, the Mursi, Bodi, and Karo, some of whom number only a few thousand, would need to reduce their cattle — their most prized possessions. Then many if not all will move into enlarged permanent villages.
Controlling the flow of the river will mean the end of an annual flood that makes fertile a strip of land for crops once the seasonal waters recede. An ongoing attempt to control Mursi traditions now means that at public meetings, state authorities implore the group to end “very bad” cultural practices like stick fighting and their characteristic lip-plates.
To be sure, Ethiopian authorities promise new jobs, public services, and plenty of irrigation for every Omo household that agrees to move out.
But this is not the view of international human rights groups who claim that Ethiopia is broadly and constantly harming locals as part of an authoritarian model of development.
In the most recent salvo, the Oakland Institute accused the state of using killings, beatings, and rapes as methods of forcing South Omo residents to accept the sugar cane projects. The California-based advocacy group also accused Western aid agencies and some US and British officials of covering up evidence of the abuses they heard about on research missions.
Instead of investigating claims made by Survival International, Human Rights Watch, and the Oakland Institute, Ethiopian authorities smear them as anti-development.
These groups help “drag Ethiopia back to the Stone Age,” is how the prime minister’s spokesperson, Getachew Reda, recently described Oakland’s agenda.
“We have a scar from them [critics],” says the chief administrator of South Omo, Molloka Wubneh Toricha, about the activists and journalists who make the 400 mile journey from Addis Ababa to the Kenya-border area, hoping to monitor developments. “They try and blacken our image.”
Yet in the single nighttime interview the Monitor was able to conduct with the Mursi, the criticism of the rights groups were echoed: “The government uses our ignorance and backwardness to control us,” said the Mursi man. “They force us to do farming…. Those who have been in the bush shall settle together in common village and be brothers. But our leaders do not accept this.”
It is impossible to verify whether these comments reflect the community’s opinion since officials and police prevented further inquiries by reporters in a trip there in August.
While regional officials at first permitted access to the Mursi, a few hours later, the administration backtracked.
Reporters on an independent visit were forced to camp next to the Hailewuha police station. A security commander regularly called in on a shortwave radio to check that the journalists were still corralled. Senior regional police arrived the next morning to escort them back to the regional capital, Jinka.
Later, apologetic officials in Jinka all had the same explanation: there had been a “misunderstanding.”
Yet rather than a genuine mix-up, the obstruction seemed to stem from a basic mistrust of outside eyes and voices. Mr. Molloka said journalists frequently “divert” the views of residents: “This is what burns our hearts,” he says, “at public meetings we told all the people not to give information to journalists.”
With media muzzled and most civil society initiatives stifled by restrictive laws, there is little independent information about what is happening in South Omo.
Along with the plight of the Mursi, for example, little is known about the impact of as many as 700,000 migrant workers that may move here to work on the sugar cane plantations.
Tewolde Woldemariam, a scholar and senior figure in the ruling party, who left in 2001, and an academician, Fana Gebresenbet, argue that the people, cultures, language and rights of South Omo people, which are theoretically protected by the constitution, are threatened by the new influx of migrant workers.
“Unless the problem is realized and mechanisms to tackle it are put in place, this demographic change puts the cultural and linguistic rights of the indigenous ethnic groups…at great risk,” they wrote for a conference in April at the Institute for Peace and Security Studies at Addis Ababa University. ”If we will be mixed with external people, perhaps we will be exposed to some contagious diseases like HIV/AIDS which we have never experienced in life.”
The sugar and resettlement projects are well-intended but note little authentic official response about possible adverse effects, they wrote.
“The attitude of lumping everyone who raises the possibility of negative consequence of the development project on the local culture as one who wants to permanently perpetuate the pastoral lifestyle for tourist purposes is rampant at all levels of the region,” they said.
An important failing of trying to engineer and control the future of Omo is that local residents are kept from the design and involvement in policies concerning themselves, is the consensus view of a number of analysts sympathetic to the nomads.
As the Mursi man who we spoke to asked reporters late at night: “The government forces us to accept this project. Do you think this is a good way?”
Christian Science Monitor

Sunday, September 15, 2013

Statement of peaceful demonstration of the Oromo Community in the United Kingdom

Demonstration 13 Sept 2013 002Today, 13 September 2013, members of the Oromo Community in the UK, protested against human rights violations and brutal killing exercised by the criminal Ethiopian Government.
The aim of the protest was to stand against Human rights abuses and the brutal killings of thousand s of Oromos including Engineer Tesfahun Chemeda and the Massacred Muslim Oromos in Arsi.  The arbitrary arrest, torture, extra-judicial killings, mass murder & disappearances are not only the day- to- day practices in Ethiopia, but also reached the highest peak.  For example,  the Oromia Support Group in United Kingdom, a non-political organization that raise awareness of human rights violations in Ethiopia, has reported four thousand two hundred seventy nine (4,279) extra-judicial killings and 987 disappearances of civilians in Ethiopia from 1994 – 2010. These figures do not include the unreported killings and secret arrests that are exercised at several corners in the country particularly in Oromia region. The recent shocking incidents were the killings of twenty- seven innocent civilians including five children in Kofale, Arsi region of Oromia on August 3, 2013. http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/ethiopian-repression-muslim-protests-must-stop-2013-08-08 and the murder of Engineer Tesfahun Chemeda who has been tortured and killed in Kaliti prison custody on August 24, 2013.
The surprising news was that, despite all the repressions and killings, the Ethiopia Government was privileged to be the top aid recipient in Africa. Currently, the Ethiopian government is receiving $500,000,000 every year ($2 billion in the next 4 years) from the UK government alone. http://www.voanews.com/content/ethiopia-is-top-uk-aid-recipient-117204413/157544.html..  According to the current trend, the size of this aid is increasing and there is also a plan for huge investment at the cost of poor Oromo farmers’ displacement due to the land grab. The donors say ‘’we are trying to help the millions of very poor, very vulnerable Ethiopians improve their lives’’. But the reality on the ground is that they are financing the government who is terrorizing and suppressing its people and increasing poverty, while enriching the government officials and few of their cliques.
A number of independent bodies accused the Ethiopian government for using the aid money for repression and sidelining the opposition into submission.  Also the Ethiopian Government officials openly use their power to enrich their families and close friends with the aid money. The corruption, poverty and injustice increased alarmingly at a higher rate in Ethiopia as the aid money goes up. So where is the help for the poor?
We believe that the UK and US Governments are fully aware of all sorts of human rights abuses exercised by the Ethiopia Government.
http://allafrica.com/stories/201304231206.html?viewall=1. However, they give deaf ears to these repressive and brutal government actions and provide the huge tax payers’ money and give moral and technical supports.  Therefore, we appeal to the UK government, the US government and the international community:
  • To stop indirect or direct involvements in activities suppressing the struggle of the Oromo and other victims of the brutal Ethiopian Government by revising their aid plan.
  • To seek justice for Engineer Tesfahun Chemeda who has been murdered while he was under the custody of the Ethiopian regime.
  • To seek justice for the twenty seven innocent Muslims, including 5 children, who have been massacred in Kofale, Arsi region of Oromia by the Ethiopian Government?
  • To support the Oromo and other victimized communities in Ethiopia to overcome injustice and help them to live in freedom, peace, and democracy and achieve stability in the region.
The Oromo community in the UK
London, September 13, 2013.
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Friday, September 13, 2013

Ethiopia: Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review to Nineteenth session of the UPR Working Group of The Human Rights Council

HRLHA_new


Ethiopia


Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review
Nineteenth session of the UPR Working Group of
The Human Rights Council
May-April 2014 Geneva, Switzerland
Submitted: September 2013

The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) is a non-political organization which attempts to challenge human rights abuses suffered by the peoples of various nations and nationalities in the Horn of Africa. The HRLHA aims at defending fundamental human rights including freedoms of thought and expression, and raising the awareness of individuals about their own basic human rights and that of others. It focuses on the observances as well as the due processes of law and promotes the growth and development of free and vigorous civil societies. The HRLHA holds the Special Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council.
Executive Summary
This report mainly focuses on human rights issues in Ethiopia particularly that have occurred in the past four years (2009-2013), which is since the human rights situation in the country was reviewed by the Sixth Session of the Working Group on the UPR in 2009 by the United Nations Human Rights Council. The assessments done by the Sixth Session of the Working Group on the UPR in November/December 2009 based on the human rights reports from the Ethiopian Government, the UN independent investigators, and the civil society organizations indicated that the human rights situation in Ethiopia was bleak, and that the government should take necessary measures to bring about some improvements in this regard in the country. The working group on the UPR of 2009 concluded its assessment by providing 142 recommendations to be considered by the government of Ethiopia. Ethiopia’s responses to the recommendations as of 01/04/2010 showed that the Ethiopian government rejected 43 of them. The government accepted 99 recommendations in principle and presumably will work towards their implementation. However, the reality on the ground shows that the human rights situation in Ethiopia rather deteriorated from year to year after the UPR 2009.
Methodology
The information in this report mainly comes from the HRLHA’s human rights researches, press releases, and urgent actions on human rights violations in Ethiopia that reflect on the Agency’s work of monitoring, investigating and reporting on human rights violations done from 2007 to the present.
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Thursday, September 12, 2013

Waamicha: Hawaasa Oromoo Tingvoll Norway

Waamicha: Hawaasa Oromoo Tingvoll Norway

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Kabajjamoota ummata Oromoo hundaaf!
Duraan dursinee, maqaa KHG OCTMR-tiin, baga nagaan nuuf jiraatan isiniin jenna!! Asumatti aansinee wonti osoo dhiifama isin hingaafatin birra hin darbne tokko guyyaan duraan beeksisa itti maxasine  irraa guyyaa kanati sababa iddoo qophii itti qopheeffachuu barbaane nu jalaa qabame galmma biraa dhabuu irraan akka ta’e akka nuuf habatanii guyyaa amma itti jijjiirame kanati dhuftanii akka nu woliin dabarsitan jedhaa dogongora uumameef dhiifama isiniin jenna.
Akkuma beekamu Hawaasa Oromoo Tingvoll fi Romsdal Norway (OCTMR) hawaasa yeroo dhiyoo keessa hundeefame ta’uun isaa ni beekama. Haata’uu malee, hanga hundeefamee asitti hujiilee hawaasa Oromoo boonssan hedduu dalaguti jira. Isaan dalagaman keesaa Aaadaa Saba Oromoo ummata biyya keesa jirutti argisiisuu, seenaa saba Oromoo barsiisuu fi Afaan Oromoo ijoollee biyya ormaati dhalatan barsiisuu dabalatee Gaafii mirga dhala namummaa kan sabin Oromoo sarbamee/dhabee jiru debisiisuuf gaafilee barbaachisaa ta’an qaama dhimmi ilaaluuf dhiyaasaa jira of-fuulduras haala cimaa ta’een kan itti fufunu tu’uu isaa ni beeksisfina. Kanaaf, Eebi Hawaasa Oromoo Tingvoll fi Romsdal Norway Onkololeessa/Oktober 12.2013 waaree-dura sa’aa 3:00 AM-11:00 Hlkan-qixee akka lak. EU-tti ta’uu isaa ni beeksina. Kanaaf, kootaa woliin haa kabajinuu! “Wolitti heddummatee jirbiin Arba hiiti” jedhuumiiree! Akkasumas waan dandeettan hundaan hawaasa kana jabeessuu irratti akka qooda keessan baatan abdii fi kabajjaan waamicha isinii dabarsina.
Galatoomaa!
Koree Hawaasa Oromoo Tingvoll Norway