(ENA) – On Monday, March 17, 2008, the Federal President of Ethiopia, H.E. Mr. Woyanne puppet Girma Woldegiorgis will be received in Berlin, Germany by the Federal President of Germany, H.E. Mr. Horst Köhler.
The Ethiopian President is off to Germany after an official invitation from the President inviting him to Berlin to converse on issues of mutual concern for both nations.
It is to be recalled that President Köhler visited Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on December 12, 2004 and also visited the African Union. Furthermore, German Chancellor Dr. Angela Merkel also visited Addis Ababa on October 4, 2007.
Diplomatic relations between Germany and Ethiopia are 104-years-old, from the first diplomatic communications to the establishments of embassies in Addis Ababa and Bonn (later to Berlin).
The current Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Ethiopia in Berlin is H.E. Mr. Kassahun Ayele; likewise H.E. Dr. Claas Dieter Knoop is the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Germany in Addis Ababa.
(The Times) – Randlord-to-be? Sheikh Mohammed Al-Amoudi, who has apparently already made an offer for the Elchim Estate
Kidnap drama: The Sunday Times of April 17 1966 tells the story of the Glazer family’s ordeal. The stolen baby, Sam, is now selling the property in which Al-Amoudi is said to be interested
The Glazers, owners of the site, made headlines in 1966 when they were involved in a kidnapping drama.
Sheikh Al-Amoudi could join a growing list of wealthy foreigners who own expensive SA land.
One of the richest men in the world has placed a bid for arguably South Africa’s priciest piece of vacant land in Sandton, north of Joburg.
Ethiopian-born Sheikh Mohammed Al-Amoudi, who is ranked the 97th richest person in the world with a fortune of R72-billion, secretly flew into Joburg to view the 110000m² site, which is on the market for R200-million.
Owned by the Glazers, one of the city’s wealthiest families, Elchim Estate has been described as a developer’s dream.
Pam Golding Properties development manager Andre Dippenaar this week declined to comment on interested parties who had viewed the site.
He also said that, due to an agreement with the owners, he could not disclose the offers that had been made.
But Metro has established that Al-Amoudi is among a group of interested buyers who had offered in the region of R150-million for the land.
The site is earmarked for residential and hospitality rights. Council documents show that developments could range from a 35-unit townhouse complex to a 125- room hotel or a shopping complex.
The Glazer family, who earned their fortune in property development, made headlines in 1966 when they were involved in a kidnapping drama.
Etty Glazer, who lives in a 218m² apartment in the Michelangelo Towers in Sandton, was kidnapped with her then 22-month-old son, Sammy, now in his 40s.
The four kidnappers were paid a ransom totalling R140000. They were later arrested.
Sam now lives in the US, but he is heading negotiations for the sale of Elchim Estate.
Before his death in 1984, Etty’s husband, Bernard, had built hotels, bought land and acquired mineral interests across vast areas of Zambia, Zimbabwe and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The rest of the family have remained low-key, avoiding public attention.
Although it is not known how much land the family still owns in Joburg, their site in Morningside is one of the most expensive properties in the northern suburb.
Deed records show that the highest price fetched for a piece of land for development was R138-million last year.
No details of that particular sale are available.
Although Pam Golding Properties has remained silent about people interested in acquiring Elchim Estate, the asking price is only a fraction of Al-Amoudi’s wealth, which he accumulated from a business empire that ranges from mining to hotels.
Al-Amoudi made his fortune in construction and property before branching out to buy oil refineries in Sweden and Morocco.
He is the largest private investor in Ethiopia, putting money into diverse assets, including property and a food-processing plant.
He has maintained a relatively low profile, but has expensive tastes and owns a 34m yacht worth more than R130-million. It boasts three double cabins, a guest cabin, a saloon with bar and a Jacuzzi on the upper deck.
The sheikh also bankrolls the Ethiopian national soccer team.
If Al-Amoudi snaps up the Sandton land, he could join a growing list of foreign billionaires who own property in South Africa.
I have the distinct pleasure of announcing that my photographic book on Ethiopia is now in print. The book is entitled:
An Ethiopian Album: A Photographic Journey Through Nature and Culture
In 248 pages and nearly 400 photographs, An Ethiopian Album covers all Ethiopia, from ancient to modern, from desert to mountaintop, from the Ogaden to Metema, and from the Omo Valley to Aksum. Uniquely among available photographic books on Ethiopia, An Ethiopian Album gives special attention not only to the rich history and culture of Ethiopia, but also to the country’s special biodiversity and natural history. The book was long in the making. I believe that it will please you very much. The book is only available from my publisher’s web site:
I lived in Ethiopia from 2000 to 2002 while my wife worked there for the United Nations’ Children’s Fund (UNICEF). An Ethiopian Album is the product of our deep respect for Ethiopia’s history and culture, and our fascination with the visual beauty of the country and its people. I am honored to offer my book to you now.
On Wednesday, the BBC reported that millions of dollars in gold at the central bank of Ethiopia has turned out to be fake: What were supposed to be bars of solid gold turned out to be nothing more than gold-plated steel. They tried to sell the stuff to South Africa and it was sent back when the South Africans noticed this little problem.
This is an amazing story for two reasons. First, that an institution like a central bank could get ripped off this way, and second that the people responsible used such a lousy excuse for fake gold.
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I consider myself something of an expert on fake gold (I’m not really, I just think I am) ever since I was asked to give advice on the subject to the author Damien Lewis for his recent thriller, Cobra Gold. I worked out in detail for him how you could make really convincing fake gold, and ended up as a minor character in the novel, where I am known as “Goldfinger Gus”.
The problem with making good-quality fake gold is that gold is remarkably dense. It’s almost twice the density of lead, and two-and-a-half times more dense than steel. You don’t usually notice this because small gold rings and the like don’t weigh enough to make it obvious, but if you’ve ever held a larger bar of gold, it’s absolutely unmistakable: The stuff is very, very heavy.
The standard gold bar for bank-to-bank trade, known as a “London good delivery bar” weighs 400 troy ounces (over thirty-three pounds), yet is no bigger than a paperback novel. A bar of steel the same size would weigh only thirteen and a half pounds.
According to the news, the authorities have arrested pretty much everyone involved, from the people who sold the bank the gold, to bank officials, to the chemists responsible for testing and approving it on receipt.
The problem is, anyone who so much as picked up one of these bars should have known immediately that they were fake, no fancy test required. The weight alone is an instant dead giveaway. Even a forklift operator lifting a palette full of them should have noticed that his machine wasn’t working hard enough. I think they must have been swapped out while in storage: Someone walked in each day with a new fake gold bar and walked out with a real one. If they were fake on arrival then everyone who handled them in any way must have either had no experience with gold or been in on the scam.
Now, for me the more interesting question is, how do you make a fake gold bar that at least passes the pick-it-up test? The problem is that there are very few metals that are as dense as gold, and with only two exceptions they all cost as much or more than gold.
The first exception is depleted uranium, which is cheap if you’re a government, but hard for individuals to get. It’s also radioactive, which could be a bit of an issue.
The second exception is a real winner: tungsten. Tungsten is vastly cheaper than gold (maybe $30 dollars a pound compared to $12,000 a pound for gold right now). And remarkably, it has exactly the same density as gold, to three decimal places. The main differences are that it’s the wrong color, and that it’s much, much harder than gold. (Very pure gold is quite soft, you can dent it with a fingernail.)
A top-of-the-line fake gold bar should match the color, surface hardness, density, chemical, and nuclear properties of gold perfectly. To do this, you could could start with a tungsten slug about 1/8-inch smaller in each dimension than the gold bar you want, then cast a 1/16-inch layer of real pure gold all around it. This bar would feel right in the hand, it would have a dead ring when knocked as gold should, it would test right chemically, it would weigh *exactly* the right amount, and though I don’t know this for sure, I think it would also pass an x-ray fluorescence scan, the 1/16″ layer of pure gold being enough to stop the x-rays from reaching any tungsten. You’d pretty much have to drill it to find out it’s fake. (Unless, of course, central bank gold inspectors are wise to this trick and have developed a test for it: Something involving speed of sound say, or more powerful x-rays, or perhaps neutron activation analysis. If bars like this are actually a common problem, you certainly could devise a quick, non-destructive test for them, and for all I know, they have. Except, apparently, in Ethiopia.)
Such a top-quality fake London good delivery bar would cost about $50,000 to produce because it’s got a lot of real gold in it, but you’d still make a nice profit considering that a real one is worth closer to $400,000. A lower budget version could be made by using the same under-sized tungsten slug but casting lead-antimony alloy around it (to match the hardness, sound, and feel of gold), then electroplating on a heavy coating of gold. Such a bar would still feel and sound right and be only very slightly underweight, while costing less than $500 to produce in quantity. It would not pass x-ray fluorescence, and whether it passes a chemical test would depend on how thick the electroplating is.
This is the solution I recommended for Cobra Gold, because they only needed their fake gold to pass a field inspection, which is to say, someone picking it up and knowing what gold should feel like when you lift it. You may quibble for other aspects of the plot if you like, but I think the fake gold would have worked.
And let me tell you, it’s a sad day for criminal masterminds when my fictional fake gold, designed only to trick a terrorist cell, is so much better than the real fake gold used to rip off a real government bank for millions of real dollars.
The Woyanne-controlled EAF is trying to force Haile Gebreselassie to run the Beijing Olympics marathon risking his health just to make the Chinese communists happy.
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Haile Gebrselassie told to obey rules
(Reuters) – WORLD record-holder Haile Gebrselassie cannot opt out of the Beijing Olympics marathon and must follow Ethiopian sports rules, the country’s athletics federation have said.
Gebrselassie, who suffers from exercise-related asthma, told Reuters this week he would not run the 42.195km event because he feared Beijing’s air pollution was a threat to his health.
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) said his withdrawal was fully justified and that no one could force him to compete but the Ethiopian Athletics Federation (EAF) said the decision was not his to make.
“It is not up to Haile Gebrselassie to decide on participation in the marathon event in Beijing,” EAF technical director Dube Jillo said.
“It is the Ethiopian Athletics Federation, representing the nation, that determines whether Haile is fit to compete in the marathon event in Beijing’s Olympics or not.”
The twice Olympic 10,000 metres champion, who will attempt to qualify for the 10,000 in Beijing, is one of a long list of athletes and officials to have voiced concern over pollution in the city.
Dube’s remarks on Friday seemed to contradict a statement he made on Monday saying that it would be Gebrselassie’s own choice whether to run in the marathon or 10,000m.
IOC President Jacques Rogge has said the long-distance events could be rescheduled if conditions were too bad. A BBC report quoted Gebrselassie as saying he would consider running the marathon if the venue were changed.
Gebrselassie was not immediately available for comment.
Dube said a team of doctors and officials would decide whether Gebrselassie was fit to compete in the event.
“The federation will start selection of the country’s athletic team at the end of April based on criteria to qualify, which takes athletes’ current performances and conditions into consideration,” he said.
Related story >>
————————- Beijing cools down Gebrselassie offer
(TDN) – Chinese officials poured cold water yesterday on Ethiopian world record holder Haile Gebrselassie’s offer to run in the Beijing Olympic marathon if the venue was switched.
Sun Weide, spokesman for the Beijing Olympic organizing committee said, “The course for the marathon has been fixed and there are no plans to change it,” the Agence France-Presse reported.
Earlier this week Gebrselassie, an asthma sufferer, told reporters he would skip the marathon in Beijing for fear the city’s notorious pollution could damage his health and even bring his glorious career to a premature end. But he has since appeared to relent, and was quoted saying earlier yesterday that he would consider taking part if the venue for the marathon was switched to a less polluted location.
“Beijing is a beautiful city, the marathon route is well planned, and the spectators are hospitable,” said Sun. “As for the pollution, we are confident that we can deliver good air quality for the Games.”
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was Gebrselassie’s withdrawal was fully justified but will otherwise have no effect on the Games.
“This was a personal choice and no one can force him to run at the event,” IOC Vice President Lambis Nikolaou told Reuters. “Considering his condition (asthma) it is totally justified but it will not have any effect on the Games themselves.”
Meanwhile, sales of game tickets have started. In Turkey, ticket purchases can be made through the Tourism and Travel Agencies Foundation (TURSAV) Web site, www.tursav.org.
The opening ceremony is the highest priced event at $245-725, while final games for basketball, football, athletics, volleyball, swimming and table tennis range between $64-128.
I originally intended to send this paper to a professional journal. I changed my mind because its message deserves to be read by a wider public. And since the best way to reach a wider public is through the Web, I sent the paper to popular Ethiopian websites without altering its academic form and diluting its contents, except for some theoretical ramifications.
In many ways, the ideas that Aleqa Aseres Yenesew develops in the book that I am analyzing directly deal with the problems that Ethiopia and Ethiopian society face today. The book is highly interesting because it suggests that the mess we are in now has its seed in the adoption of a wrong educational policy since the end of the Italian war. Asres proposes solutions in which he discloses the elementary fact that the heritage of a legacy and the assumption of a common destiny define a nation rather than its ethnic or linguistic oneness. He shows this in his defense of Ge’ez language: for him, this Tigrean legacy is the essence of Ethiopian identity. Consequently, what makes you Ethiopian is less your identity as Amhara (he himself is an Amhara of Gojjam) than the heritage of Ge’ez legacy. Unity lies in the acceptance of a common heritage and destiny.
But what about the southern peoples of Ethiopia who do not trace their identity back to Ge’ez? Here Asres advances a bold assertion by questioning the Western qualification of Ge’ez as a Semitic language that invaders from South Arabia brought with them. He emphatically argues that Ethiopians are black and that Ge’ez is an African language. For him, the Semitic thesis is a Western machination intended to create a divide between northern and southern Ethiopia. The direction of history is clear: the torch of Ge’ez––which is then an idea, a divine mission, and not an ethnic identity––must pass to southern peoples. And it cannot do so unless Ethiopians present themselves as the descendants of Ham.
The objection that Asres’s reasoning lacks scientific credibility because it is filled with biblical references and argumentations would miss the important point that what matters in this case is not that facts justify the discourse, but whether the discourse is empowering, whether it organizes the world in such a way that it gives us strength, unity, and historical destiny. Besides, one can take away the biblical content and only retain the logic of national unity and empowerment. When I wrote my book, Survival and Modernization, I was not even remotely aware of Asres’s works. Yet what a delightful surprise when I discovered that many of my findings reproduce Asres’s thought! I take this opportunity to thank Aleme Tadesse for introducing me to Asres’s writings.
Introduction
The opposition of traditional scholars to the proliferation of modern schools is a fact known to all those who are familiar with the difficult beginning of Ethiopia’s modernization. Besides the opposition of the nobility and the church hierarchy, traditional scholars known as debtera had used all their influence to convince the country of the perilous nature of Western education. Emperor Haile Selassie and those who supported him often had to battle energetically to neutralize their opposition. To the youngsters sent to Western schools before and soon after the Italian invasion of 1935, the opposition of the debtera appeared as a pathetic attempt to stop what was unstoppable, namely, the march of the long-awaited modernization of Ethiopia. They easily figured out that the debtera’s ignorance of the modern world and the anger against the loss of their traditional influence aroused the resistance. To them, the defense of the traditional schooling betrayed the most stubborn form of traditionalism, which was nothing else but a wrong-headed endeavor to shield Ethiopia from the benefits of modernization in the name of tradition and the status quo.
The Ethiopian President is off to Germany after an official invitation from the President inviting him to Berlin to converse on issues of mutual concern for both nations.