By Kiflu Hussain
Any report of famine from below the Sub-Saharan Africa has long ceased to be shocking news to the world. Consequently, those to whom it’s incumbent upon to ensure food security to their people have even lost any sense of shame and guilt in the face of massive starvation and plague that wipes an entire society. To one who is familiar with Ethiopian history, for instance, this is the pattern he sees clearly. During the “Great Ethiopian famine” in 1888-1892 known as “KIFU KEN” in local parlance, meaning evil days, Emperor Menilek took measures to avert or alleviate the disaster, albeit inadequate. Starting from ordering national prayer for divine intercession to doling out food to those who made it to the palace, he tried everything at his disposal. By contrast, Emperor Haileselassie hid the 1973 famine that consumed the lives of 200,000 Ethiopians from Wollo and Tigray.In fact, when one of his officials was informed of the influx of people from Wollo to the capital; he reportedly replied “It’s in the nature of Wollo to migrate.” One can see elsewhere in Africa that shirking of ones official duty cruelly like this is still endemic by recalling a news conference addressed by two cabinet ministers of the Ugandan government, Mr. Musa Ecweru and Mr. Aston Kajara (see Daily Monitor, 21 May 2008). After having defended recent deaths in Karamoja as caused largely by poor hygiene and not famine, they added that the Karimojong eat rats and herbs not because they are famished but because the rodents “may be a delicacy.”
The worst cruelty, though, is the holding of starving people as hostages for political ends. During the military regime, Derg used to divert aid meant for victims of drought to its own militias whereas the present regime of Zenawi blocks aid heading for the same victims/see “Ethiopia thwarting food aid to rebel regions in East” by Jeffrey Gettleman, July 22, 2007 The New York Times/.Ironically, the so-called international community, namely the west which blew the cruelty of Mengistu Hailemariam out of proportion became timid to face the callousness of Meles Zenawi even when he suppressed news of impending disaster by expelling journalists and staffs from humanitarian organizations such as Red Cross, Save the children, Norwegian NGO’s etc. Also, tycoons from the Netherlands whose nation achieved a landmark success by becoming the first to eliminate famine in Europe in the early 17th century, are hindering Ethiopia’s chance to do the same by colluding with the present rulers of Ethiopia in a water-thirsty and land hungry flower production business which causes the shrinkage of arable land.
To summarize, as has been said ad nauseam by various scholars, no functioning democracy has suffered famine. Ethiopians too proving themselves as capable of voting in a civilized manner elected those candidates in 2005 that exuded confidence by promising “to do away with famine, if not to step down assuming full responsibility and by apologizing to the Ethiopian people.”Unfortunately, that election was rigged brutally; hence we’re still stuck with tyranny that spread famine inter alia unabashedly with a host of misguided policies.
– – – – – – – –
The writer, an Ethiopian Refugee in Uganda, can be reached at [email protected]
3 thoughts on “No functioning democracy has ever suffered famine”
No functioning Woyane have ever suffered famine. They are all doing well at the expense of the suffering Ethiopians
Ke woyane Talian yeshalal yetawkew
As if it is integrated in their blood, these primitive and unethical groups are still repeating miserable history which happened in the 9th, 11th, 19th and 20th centuries.
So, if we like or not, and as we have been consistently told, we have to sacrifice for our problem. It is not intellectual to blame others to come out from this historical chronic!
It is your Problem, and you are the only solution with god’s fairness!
Hunger in USA rises by 43 percent over last five years
Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 29 Oct 2005 – 19:00 PDT
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More than 38 million Americans go hungry, including nearly 14 million children –
Hunger in American households has risen by 43 percent over the last five years, according to an analysis of US Department of Agriculture (USDA) data released today. The analysis, completed by the Center on Hunger and Poverty at Brandeis University, shows that more than 7 million people have joined the ranks of the hungry since 1999.
The USDA report, Household Food Security in the United States, 2004, says that 38.2 million Americans live in households that suffer directly from hunger and food insecurity, including nearly 14 million children. That figure is up from 31 million Americans in 1999.
“This is an unexpected and even stunning outcome,” noted center director Dr. J. Larry Brown, a leading scholarly authority on domestic hunger. “This chronic level of hunger so long after the recession ended means that it is a man-made problem. Congress and the White House urgently need to address growing income inequality and the weakening of the safety net in order to get this epidemic under control.” According to the Center on Hunger and Poverty, food insecurity increased by nearly a million households from 2003 to 2004. Rates of hunger increased in almost every single category of household during the same time, with single mothers and those living in or near poverty continuing to suffer from severely high rates of both food insecurity and hunger.
California, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, North Carolina, New Mexico, Oklahoma and South Carolina all have food insecurity and hunger rates that are significantly higher than the national average. The lone bright spot in the nation is Oregon. Once considered to have the worst hunger in the country, Oregon has shown significant decreases in food insecurity and hunger since 1999-2001.
“With this astonishing level of food deprivation in America,” Brown concluded, “we need President Bush to step up to the plate. If he now asks Congress to cut federal food programs, hunger will increase even further. We need the moral leadership to stem this crisis.”
— A full copy of Household Food Security in the United States, 2004 is available at ers.usda.gov/publications/err11
— To obtain a bulletin of the analysis by the Center on Poverty and Hunger, visit http://www.centeronhunger.org, or email [email protected]. The author of this bulletin can be contacted at [email protected] or by phone at 781-736-8680.
Laura Gardner
[email protected]
Brandeis University