Mengistu Haile Mariam
The Profile of a Dictator
By Paulos Milkias
Ethiopian Review, February 1994
Origin
The Ethiopian dictator, Mengistu Haile Mariam, who shaped the destiny of this ancient kingdom from 1974 to 1991, has a humble origin that has an intricate web of bizarre twists resembling a story from a fairy tale. On his mother’s side, he is said to be a direct descendant of Queen Zewditu’s maid and Dejazmatch Kebede Tesemma, one of the most prominent aristocrats and a person known for a long time for his involvement in a series of court intrigues. Dejazmatch Kebede was Empress Zewditu’s butler in the 1920s, at a time when she was in an intractable power struggle to keep her throne.
While serving the Queen, the Dejazmatch also doubled as a confidante of the Regent, Ras Teferi Makonnen, later Emperor Haile Selassie who was in line to ascend to the throne. When the Queen was mysteriously found dead in her palace, the same day her Gondere husband, Ras Gugsa Wole, was killed in battle. A Swiss doctor named Aner who was ushered in by Dejazamatch Kebede was suspected of carrying out a coup degrace. Whether or not the Dejazmatch knew of the doctor’s personal mission is, however, not certain.
It was while he was in the commission of the Queen that Dejazmatch Kebedde met Mengistu’s grandmother nicknamed Totit (female ape). Totit had to remain chaste as Ethiopian court tradition states since she was an umbrella bearer to the Queen on all occasions and left the latter’s bedroom only at night. She slept on the floor in an adjacent room in case her services were needed.
An illicit and secret matrimonial relation, entailing a severe breach of court protocol took place between the two and Mengistu’s mother was born. Queen Zewditu, who was angered by this insolence, ordered a special investigation to track down the father of the baby so that he would be prosecuted according to Ethiopian court traditions. But no one came foreword to shed light on the affair.
Dejazmatch Kebede’s uncle Azazh Tilaye, who was in charge of Palace affairs, intervened in order to cover up for Dejazmatch Kebedde who was brought to the court by him from his birth place in the Amhara countryside of Menz (Northern Shoa). The Azazh, prostrating before the queen, maintained that he had sinned before the queen and God and that after realizing his gross error, he tried to take his own life and survived only upon the intervention of close friends. The Queen accepted the explanation, but reprimanded and ordered Totit to leave the palace. The child, who would later be Mengistu’s mother was brought up at Dejazmatch Kebede’s home.
Mengistu’s grandmother was still alive when he seized power. As an old lady, she had taken a vow and was a nun of the Ethiopian Orthodox faith. In fact, on the special orders of her grandson, the nationalization of land did not apply to her. She continued to own the land near the Holotta Military Academy just 30 miles from Addis Abeba which the queen granted her for services prior to her expulsion from the palace in 1928.
On his father’s side, Mengistu is the son of a former slave who was bought by an aristocratic Sub-provincial governor, the Shoan landowner Afenegus Eshete Geda, who encountered Mengistu’s father, Haile Mariam, while he was on a hunting expedition at the administrative district of Gimira and Maji, (in Southern Ethiopia) then under the governorship of Dejazmatch Taye Gulilat.
As a child, Mengistu used to hear derogatory comments against his Negroid features and dark color — rooted in the Konso background on his father’s side. As a result, he had always hated all light-colored Ethiopians with Semitic and Hamitic features. It was not surprising, therefore, that when he took over power, and was attending the meeting of Derg members at the 4th Division headquarters in Addis Abeba, Mengistu exclaimed with emotion:
In this country, some aristocratic families automatically categorize persons with dark skin, thick lips, and kinky hair as “Barias”… (Amharic for slave); let it be clear to everybody that I shall soon make these ignoramuses stoop and grind corn!
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