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Berhanu Nega talks about Birtukan’s arrest on BBC

(BBC) – One of Ethiopia’s main opposition leaders has been sent back to prison to serve a life sentence, after a pardon granted to her last year was revoked.

Birtukan Medeksa was among more than 100 people jailed for offences after controversial polls in 2005.

A dispute over the terms of her release caused her re-arrest.

Her colleague Berhanu Nega, who was also pardoned and now lives in exile, told the BBC it showed the government “was hell-bent on staying in power”.

The BBC’s Elizabeth Blunt in the capital, Addis Ababa, says Ms Birtukan was a former judge and one of the younger and more charismatic leaders of the coalition which did so astonishingly well against the ruling party in the 2005 elections.

Our reporter says that while in jail facing charges of treason, she became even more of a heroine, attracting widespread sympathy as a single mother separated from her baby daughter.

After the opposition leaders were pardoned and released last year, she emerged as the leader of a new coalition, the Union for Democracy and Justice (UDJ), painstakingly stitched together from various opposition groupings to contest elections in 2010.

The government news agency, quoting the ministry of justice, said her pardon had been revoked, since she had denied requesting her pardon.

Ms Birtukan’s problems started when she spoke to journalists abroad about the way the opposition leaders were released, our correspondent says.

She talked about negotiations which had taken place between the opposition and government, with the help of a panel of elders, before their pardon was granted.

The government prefers to lay emphasis on a document signed by the prisoners, regretting any mistakes they had committed and asking for pardon.

This implies that their release was part of a normal judicial process, rather than in any way part of a negotiated political deal.

Mr Berhanu, who was elected mayor of Addis Ababa in 2005 and now lives in the United States, says the aim of the government is to “humiliate” any opposition to its rule.

“What this is doing is to change the nature of the struggle,” he told the BBC’s Network Africa programme.

“There is no other way to freedom and liberty in that country without getting rid of this government.”

8 thoughts on “Berhanu Nega talks about Birtukan’s arrest on BBC

  1. Even in May 2005, no one expected Meles and the blood-drenched Woyane will give up power peacefully. The idea then was to expose the hypocrisy of Meles who at the time was boasting as the most democratic African leader, wining and dining as he then did with the likes of Tony Blair and the G8 leaders. We in Ethiopia all knew that this Meles was a hypocrite par excellence and that he will not hestiate from reneging on his word and engaging in subterfuge to cling to power. As we predicted, that indeed happened, and as we expected the courageous CUD (Kinijit) showed that they were much preferred to the unpopular Woyane and that “king Meles” was indeed naked and a hypocrite .

    But recently and yesterday we were caught by surprise. We never imgainged that Meles and Woyane will go this low. Now this is KILET par excellence! The accusation and jailing of Teddy Afro was one Woyane kilet. Now the foolish and incredible excuses the regime concocted to arrest and imprison our heroin, Birtukan, leaves any one even with the least common sense breathless and dumbfounded.

    Would a regime go this low to cling to power? Would a regime lose any sense of balance and common sense blinded by vindictiveness? We are not suprprised by his motive. His motive has always been never to surrender power to democratically elected leaders loved by Ethiopians. Meles knows that Birtukan didn’t have to even campaign to win the 2010 election. Even the mention of her name in the ballot will bring havoc to Woyane. But the excuse he gives through his mouthpiece Bereket was most brazen. Thus, the best excuse that kiletam Woyane can come up with is to claim she denied that she asked for pardon!! What a hutzpah!!

    Who cares? Everyone knows the arduous negotiations that the Shimgagiles undertook to free the political prisoners. Stories abounded at the time that Meles under pressure was going to release the political prisoners any way and he only needed a face saving mechanism to do so, and the helpless prisoners as well as Woyane were willing to admit some mutual responsibility for the political predicament the country found itself at the time. Hence the Shimagiles’ involvement, and the final release of the political prisoners.

    But now, Woyane insisting that Birtukan should not “disclose” or discuss a fact that every one knows to be the case is not only outrageous but beyond anything imaginable. I am in total disbelief that a regime will go this low in its reasonaing and cavalier attitude towards its public image!

    If any one has any doubt from now on that anything good could come out of this treacherous and vindictive regime, then it is clear that such person has an agenda of his or her own to sustain Woyane rule come what may! Any civilized debate then becomes a waste of time!

  2. Yes, Doctor! This is just like you said it before “I said So and I told you So!”. No change without putting down this regime(Woyane).Period!!!! Ethiopia will Rise soon!

  3. Let all Ethiopian know that Meles’s regime will colapse from Inside out. This is the time we need a true leader. All true Ethiopians need to pray a bout our mother land. God already pass the leadership from Meles beacuse of his evil leadership.

  4. By Teodros Kiros (PhD)

    Enough is enough, the people must say. We cannot take it anymore.

    God, please speak.

    God please speak sense to our leaders, who are taking away our existential rights, to choose our leaders, to organize our people, to fight for their rights. Our rights are being chipped away. Our ears are muffled with unbearable pain. Our eyes are shattered by misery. Our mouths are being denied their rights to speak, through our leaders.

    Dear God, speak, please speak, and save our historical nation, from entering into a civil war that we cannot afford.

    We have patiently waited for change. We continue to silently bare the pangs of hunger. Our mothers cannot nurse their babies. Our fathers, permanently unemployed, squander their days at Bars, wishing that the pain will go away by the power of Tej and Tela. Our young bodies bored and hopeless take it on reckless sex, to only discover that our bodies are now ravished by AIDS, and let it be we say, let the body part company from the soul, so that when we are gone, we shall meet God to purify us from pain, hunger and hopelessness.

    I leave the legality of Ms. Birtukan’s right to recant or not recant, to our able lawyers, as important as the question might be. That is not what concerns me here.

    My concern goes deeper, to the marrow of the bones. If our leaders, who are peacefully organizing the people to demand change cannot exercise that right, what rights are then allowed them by the constitution? Should not the rights of the people who are coming in record numbers to listen to their leaders, count for something, or is the democracy that the regime never fails to mention, a democracy that listen only to those who sing its praises?

    I say to the people, this time we must resist the intimidation of our leaders by marching on every street, every road, and every corner within Ethiopia and its Diaspora.

    Resisting regimes which do not respect our leaders are simultaneously violating our existential and legal rights.

    We will be remiss if we do not resist Ms. Birtukan’s right by the right constitutional measure of protest at the right time, for the right reason, at the right place, and for the absolutely right reason.

    I must add, we must do this in millions, and Solidarity Movement for a New Ethiopia must take the lead, and put the Ethiopian people toward rendezvous with victory.

    Teodros Kiros (PhD) December 29, 2008

  5. The next step is to organize rally in addis ababa againist Meles zenawi. This is an opportunity to invade the palace where the prime minester is living.We are ready to give our life ,there is no life until we restore our pride.

    ” Even Birtukan,the women take risk to free Ethiopia we need to rise up,unite and do everything we can to stop this surpent dictator”

  6. To expect Meles’s goverment to be democrat is like to change or train a hayna to behave like a dog.The woyane is created and come to power with gun ,fight and propoganda ,so they think that every thing can be resolved with gun ,fight and propoganda. But our leaders were inspired by peaceful struggle of history teach them from other contries that they could bring change that way. Infact this contrise had changed through this process ,but there had been little right to organize;there had been a little right to assemble. so we need to review our way of struggle and we should think of new strategise that is carefully planned and calculated……please send me your opinion at [email protected]

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