By Maru Gubena
I have often wished, especially given that things have started very recently in Tunisia and Egypt, to prove me wrong. I have even begged my Lord God, kneeling down and bowing my head to the ground, to prove me wrong, at least at this time, at this very moment — to allow us to share and enjoy the newly ripening fruits of political and power changes that have taken place in Tunisia and are currently under way in Egypt. Yes, I did implore my Lord to help speed the winds of radical change that have been blowing from Tunis, which have quickly reached Cairo and other major cities of Africa, and to let them blow above the skies of my country as well! Yes, I begged my God to help us bring unexpected, abrupt changes in the attitudes and behaviors of all Ethiopians, both at home and scattered throughout the globe, to fight against our longstanding hostilities and resentments, including their foundations in deep-seated jealousies and animosities, and instead to be kind and caring to and for each other. Yes, I certainly and unambiguously want to be proved wrong at this time, at this very moment, marked by a sudden uprising of the people of Africa against their cruel, repressive and brutal rulers. I want those massive winds of change of the peoples’ revolution, now blowing across the skies of other countries and peoples, to quickly reach the skies, mountains and hills of my country, Ethiopia, as well, shaking the houses, the living rooms and the sleeping rooms of the corrupt and cold-blooded rulers of Ethiopia.
Oh yes! As can be read and heard in my various articles and interviews of the past five or more years, I always have argued relentlessly that the long-standing Ethiopian political culture that has shaped and reshaped the attitudes and socio-political behaviours of Ethiopians would not and will not allow Ethiopians to rise up, not just against their heartless, brutal and tyrannical rulers, but also against the cardinal foundations and the elements that divide them, including the factors of family and group orientation and regionalism. Yes, I have said and written as recently as the first week of December 2010 that unless we take the required decisive measures as urgently as possible to end the prolonged infighting and persistent wrangling among us, the lifespan of Meles Zenawi and those around him will be extended by an additional two or more decades, “unless some kind of coup d’état within his own circle, possibly by the armed forces, were to occur”.
(Readers who wish to contact the author can reach me at [email protected])
19 thoughts on “From Tunis to Cairo, and Cairo to Addis”
Good author,
If you knew the problems for such a long time why can’t you then provide the fair working solutions that suits to the specific Ethiopian context as opposed to the Tunisian context and move the sleeping and divided nations and nationalities along the right path?
If this is the case you guys need very dedicated people, those people of tunisia and cairo suferes for the new jenerations to come and they know the outcome work hard for it. They don’t just talk day and night, so you guys need to come together first don’t just wait for the wind to blow.
I just want to make bold my feeling about the “reporter” newspaper in Ethiopia. You see, Amare Aregawi is more dangerous than Meles Zenawi. He is a venom. At this time all what he writes in his rubbish gazetta has no mention of what is happening in Egypt, Tunisia, yemen, etc…. Therefore, let’s do not forget that he is our most wanted enemy!
Be vigilant!
You know, such type of revolution will never ever happen in Ethiopia. Fact Melses and the TPLF and their stooges have divided the country by ethnicity, hence creating such animosity among each other, which serve the purpose of them people staying in power. The only way Melse and his groups will ever leave is if one of them Tigrians kill him.
Anything is possible and can happen in Ethiopia.Dictators don’t have a life;time is running out for the dictators.
Ethiopians soon will rise up against the very few lawless and bring out the change needed for our country.Mubarak’s son and his families are already left Egyupt by exclusive advice of his dictator father,the Mubarak;well,the Mubarak will soon follow his son and join him in exile.Where will Zinawians run to for a life long exile? will Zinawians escape or be captured to face the justice?
The wind is blowing from yemen to Ethiopia my brother and sisters this is our time to get rid butcher meles.
Thieves don’t argue when they robe people they kill each other trying to share the meat. We have to wait for Meles the mouse and Azeb the Cat scratching each others face.
What are you going to do after a violent uprising? It is not that such things never happened before.
hmm….. let me guess: Another DERG or some coalition (united front) will be formed? And Maru kneels down to god again for a wonderful out come.
Why would any one expect a different outcome by doing it 3 times the same way? Chances are a worst outcome is probable.
One can pray for Manna from heaven. With good knowledge of agriculture and an irigation system the odds gets better.
Cheers!
It is quite possible in Ethiopia and situation has been ripe since long ago. A year a go, I posted my comment on this site saying only a three day operation is enough to bring a radical change in Ethiopia. The only pre condition is the coalition of G7 and OLF.
Thanks Maru;
We were 2 millions peoples on the street in Meskel Adababay in 2005 and why not 4 millions now.We did and we can do now on the name”Aduwa Reviol”
” Tenesina Teramed
Kindenh Aberta
La gerhn na Hitzbh
Le wegen Meketa”
Ethiopia Etopia Kidemi……
First this revolution have to start in Diaspora. We have to have open, fare, and democratic dissection with our so called leader in diaspora our leaders in diaspora are after our money, money money…..Where is the Beef? What have they done beside fighting each other. Change the diaspora leaders with young generation let them pass there life time leadership to the new and young Ethiopians the young can do better with a new ideology the youn can work with every one.
GOD BLESS ETHIOPIA
the tplf gangs must be wetting their pants in fear as things are unfolding in Tunisia and Egypt at this very moment. I just heard a few miniutes ago according to some political analysts, the power of the people gathering momentum in Egypt is so powerful, the police won’t be able to stop it. I have no doubt in my mind Ethiopia will be next. They have done it before and they can do it again. I remeber very well, the massive demonistrations across the country that brought down the Emperor. At the begining it seemed the police was capable of handling it. As the uprising got bigger and more powerful, there was little the police can do to stop it, and the military and the Air force shifted sides and stood with the people. The police how ever, stubbornly stood by the government’s side until it was impossible to to do so. Unfortunately, there was no a matured political organization that could bring the massive uprising into a fruitful conclusion, but instead it was highjacked by a handful military officers. If the tplf and it’s murdurous agazi forces are contemplating to do what they did in 2005; they better think twice, because this time around it is going to be bigger and powerful enough to consume them alive. The best they can do at this time will be, run for their dear life before the dust starts.
There is a slight nagging difference between Ethiopia and Tunisia though. Tunisians have got balls!
Thank you Dr.Maru Gobena for your synopsis.You set a standard for a proper gobbing.We should avoid the old style of journalistic writing.You were one of those writers.
Having said the above,I would like to say that now is the time for action,not to expect the wind of change that is blowing from Tunis to Cairo.I am not saying that the people of Ethiopia should take Meles Zenawis’ Law into their hands now.Not at all.We shouldn’t engulf the people to a fire.
The regime still has its ethnic army-Agaziintact.The brutal dictator has also gave arms and ammunition to its ethnic group in the province.We should recall the the tragedy of the 2005.We should take the maximum care to make a regime change and a change of political system.
People know what they should do and the right time.I am calling for an orderly fashion of change.
Therefore,I urge all Ethiopian political organizations,groups and to close ranks as soon as possible and form a broad based organization that can effectively lead our poor home country to democracy and fast economic progress.AMEN.
How Egypt Switched Off The Internet
By Bobbie Johnson
Amid spreading protests, the Egyptian government has taken the incredible step of shutting down all communications late Thursday. Only a handful of web connections, including those to the nation’s stock exchange, remain up and running.
It’s an astonishing move, and one that seems almost unimaginable for a nation that not only has a relatively strong internet economy but also relies on its connections to the rest of the world.
But how did the government actually do it? Is there a big kill switch inside Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak’s office? Do physical cables have to be destroyed? Can a lockdown like this work?
Plenty of nations place limitations on communications, sometimes very severe ones. But there are only a few examples of regimes shutting down communications entirely — Burma’s military leaders notably cut connectivity during the protests of 2007, and Nepal did a similar thing after the king took control of the government in 2005 as part of his battle against insurgents. Local Chinese authorities have also conducted similar, short-lived blockades.
The OpenNet Initiative has outlined two methods by which most nations could enact such shutdowns. Essentially officials can either simply close down the routers which direct traffic over the border — hermetically sealing the country from outsiders — or go further down the chain andswitch off routers at individual ISPs to prevent access for most users inside.
In its report on the Burmese crackdown, ONI suggests that the junta used the second option, something made easier because it owns the only two internet service providers in the country.
A high-level traffic analysis of the logs of NTP (Network Time Protocol) servers indicates that the border routers corresponding to the two ISPs were not turned off suddenly. Rather, our analysis indicates that this was a gradual process.
While things aren’t clear yet, this doesn’t look like the pattern seen in Egypt, where the first indications of internet censorship came earlier this week with the blockades against Twitter and Facebook — but when access disappeared, it disappeared fast, with 90 percent of connections dropping in an instant.
Analysis by Renesys, an internet monitoring body, indicates that the shutdown across the nation’s major Internet service providers was at precisely the same time, 12:34am local time:
Instead, the signs are that the Egyptian authorities have taken a very careful and well-planned method to screen off internet addresses at every level, from users inside the country trying to get out and from the rest of the world trying to get in.
“It looks like they’re taking action at two levels,” Rik Ferguson of Trend Micro told me. “First at the DNS level, so any attempt to resolve any address in .eg will fail — but also, in case you’re trying to get directly to an address, they are also using the Border Gateway Protocol, the system through which ISPs advertise their internet protocol addresses to thenetwork. Many ISPs have basically stopped advertising any internet addresses at all.”
Essentially we’re talking about a system that no longer knows where anything is. Outsiders can’t find Egyptian websites, and insiders can’t find anything at all. It’s as if the postal system suddenly erased every address inside America — and forgot that it was even called America in the first place.
A complete border shutdown might have been easier, but Egypt has made sure that there should be no downstream impact, no loss of traffic in countries further down thecables . That will ease the diplomatic and economic pressure from other nations, and make it harder for protesters inside the country to get information in and out.
Ferguson suggests that, if nothing else, the methods used by the Egyptian government proves how fragile digital communication really is.
“What struck me most is that we’ve been extolling the virtues of the internet for democracy and free speech, but an incident like this demonstrates how easy it is — particularly in a country where there’s a high level of governmentalcontrol — to just switch this access off.”
This wind has already surged a huge Jolt to the spine of the tyrant. It has a sunamic effect for the states ruled by dictators particularly Ethiopia. I see some indication western lessen their support to the dictators perhaps will stop their financial support in near future.This undoubtly enhances a speedy fall of the regimes. Those of us in the Diaspora should start intensifying our struggle by going out and demonestrate and by assisting those organaizations who work tirelessly. My fellow brothers and sisters of Ethiopia, It is inevitable that Melese goes down.
Make no mistake. I repeat, make no mistake. Addis Ababa is not Cairo or Tunis or Jordan. You can quote me on this one.
Alula
The situation in Ethiopia is diffirent from the situations in Tunisia and Egypt. Tunisians and Egyptians are united and they are one people, the Arabs. Contrary to this, Ethiopians are not united to confront the government in Ethiopia. They are divided a long side their ethnical lines. Even if such demostrations will happen in Ethiopia it will happen along side ethnical groups and they will confront each others and Ethiopia will become the human beings slaughter-house.
let it be and let we all unite and committ ourselves to our freedem