Educated or uneducated, some Ethiopians have little understanding of the relevance of titles and honorific. We have, for instance, Meles Zenawi’s former Ambassador to Kenya. His proper title is Ato, as far as I know. He is currently Zenawi’s speaker of the rubber stamp parliament. On TV, in “parliament”, in private, in public and even in kitchens the man uses “ambassador” as his title and the cumbersome honorific, His Excellency.
This man is none other than Teshome Toga. A recent documentary, a kind of lamentable self-promotion shown on ETV, was even entitled “Ambassador Teshome Toga’s routines in parliament” despite the fact that he is currently serving Meles as a “house speaker.”
If at all, “ambassador” is a title that should never kept for life, it should be correctly used as “former ambassador” as he is no longer servicing as head of a diplomatic mission. But to be fair to the man, he is not alone. Former ambassadors of the imperial regime, Derg and the current ethnocratic [tribal] clan are still stuck in such titles as ambassador, minister, commissioner and the like and some demand to be exalted as such.
Long after their jobs were over, either through defection and retirement, they use this cumbersome “titles” and others meekly call them “Ambassador Teshome”, “Minister Hagos”, “Commissioner Bereket” etc, and the title-obsessed former officials get puffed up. But what the mis-users of personal titles don’t know, or pretend not to notice, is the fact that job titles are not for life.
Honorific, though quite traditional that originated in ancient royal courts, is a recognizable legal title such as His Excellency, Your Excellency, Your Honour, His Royal Highness etc. Even honorific is not title for life but is used in reference to a political office.
Why is it then that people who have left their offices long ago, or defected for that matter, think that they are still holding on to their jobs… still ambassadors, generals or ministers in Ethiopia?
Why are we required to use titles to refer to people who no longer hold their “beloved” offices, however wrong and confusing they are, for no apparent reasons than just to boost the ego of these former appointees of succeeding bad, dictatorial and unpopular governments that have never served their people well? If they must use these titles and old honors, they should remind us that they are not currently holding the political offices by adding the adjective former or the prefix ex. That would clear the confusion as well as save the ego of the former diplomats, ministers, generals, commanders, commissioners… who love misusing useless titles and honorific.
There are also others, engineers for life. Normally, engineer is not also an honorific but a job title. However, our older generation still think that it is a title and demand us to call an engineer with his job title. Former or ancient engineers use “engineer” as their life time title.
In Ethiopia, time doesn’t go fast. It is slow and change is hard to come by as there is resistance to change. The world is moving faster while we are stuck in tradition. Whoever starts a wrong tradition or a popular mistake, knowingly and unknowingly, is often immortalized when others repeat the mistake forever. But at some point, we need to realize that correction is needed.
Though unrelated to the main point I have raised, I would like to touch upon two examples of perennial mistakes we never tried to correct. It may be a foreigner who misspelt our capital city as “Addis Ababa”, which is not only wrong but changes the flower into an old man. Children use “ababa” to refer to an older person. The correct spelling should have been abeba, which is the Amharic equivalent for flower. So which one is Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa [sic] or Addis Abeba? A new old man or a new flower? The choice is ours as the foreigners who made the mistake did not know the difference.
Anyway, titles should not be kept for life but need to be used correctly as mistakes should also be corrected at one point. Students who never correct their mistakes learn little and may even repeat their mistakes again and again.
THREE Ethiopian exchange visitors who had been staying in Hartlepool have vanished during a trip to the Houses of Parliament.
The three men were among a group of nine visitors who were staying with families in the town as part of a three-month visit to the UK.
They went to the capital to visit the corridors of power in a tour which Hartlepool MP Iain Wright was asked to help arrange.
But at the end of the day’s tour, the men failed to meet up with the rest of the group and organisers Global Xchange were forced to contact the police to report them missing.
Police and Home Office chiefs are now investigating their disappearance.
Organizers say their main concern is for the safety of the men, who have been named as Zerihun Weldeyohans, 24, Habtamu Debela, 27, and 21-year-old Muluneh Tilahun Abera.
It was at around 6pm when they separated from the rest of the group to buy telephone calling cards.
Programme supervisor Georgina Richards reported the men missing to the Metropolitan Police at 10pm when they failed to show up at their London hotel, where they were due to stay overnight before returning to Hartlepool.
Concerns grew further when the trio didn’t turn up for the 11am journey to Hartlepool the following day.
All three men have valid visas which do not run out until September 9.
Their families in Ethiopia have been informed.
The Global Xchange programme involves 18 volunteers, nine from the UK and nine from Ethiopia, living in Hartlepool while working for community organisations.
Zerihun is based at Cafe 177 and Headline Futures, Habtamu at the West View Project, while Muluneh has been working at Hartlepool United’s study support centre.
A statement released by the organisers said: “The British Council and VSO can confirm that three Ethiopian participants in the current Ethiopia Hartlepool Global Xchange have been reported missing.
“All three are male and aged between 21 and 24. The group had been on a trip to London to visit the Houses of Parliament. After the visit some of the group were socialising at the South Bank Centre but the three young men went their separate ways to purchase some telephone calling cards.
“They later failed to arrive at the homes where they were due to stay on the evening of Wednesday, July 15. They did not meet their colleagues for their return journey to Hartlepool.
“The young men have not made any contact with British Council, VSO or their project supervisors in Hartlepool and the primary concern is for their safety as they were on their first visit to London.
“The police have been informed and are treating this as a missing persons case. The police have undertaken standard inquiries to establish the location and safety of the young men.
“The programme is due to run until August 31, and the young people had not indicated that they intended to resign from the group. All three are in possession of valid visas and return flights.”
Mr Wright, who didn’t meet up with the group due to parliamentary business, said: “The purpose of the visit was to show visitors to this country the Houses of Parliament.
“It was organised by Global Xchange, and I hope that the three missing people are found as quickly as possible.”
A spokesman for the Home Office said they would only become involved if those involved stayed in the country longer than their visa allowed.
Addis Ababa (Reuters) — Ethiopia’s long-serving Prime Minister tribal dictator Meles Zenawi said early this month he was looking forward to relaxing after a retirement from power that he hopes will be agreed soon with his ruling party.
So who might replace him? Following are the three names most widely touted, and a summary of main opposition figures:
SEYOUM MESFIN
Physicist Seyoum has been Ethiopia’s foreign minister since Meles came to power in 1991. Fiercely loyal to the prime minister, he used his weight as a well-regarded former rebel fighter to help Meles purge their Tigryan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) of dissidents in 2001.
Respected for his skill as an international negotiator, he is considered a contender by the Addis Ababa diplomatic community. [Seyoum’s negotiating skill has so far resulted in turning the Horn of Africa region into a war zone.]
GIRMA BIRRU
Trade Minister Girma may prove the perfect compromise candidate. Despite making up only 6 percent of the population, the Tigryan ethnic group, of which Meles is a member, dominate Ethiopia’s political establishment.
The Amhara ethnic group have traditionally ruled the country and are likely to lobby for one of their ruling party members to take over should Meles resign.
Girma is an Oromo — an ethnic group which, though Ethiopia’s largest in number, have never held power. [This is false. Reuters need to get its fact straight. Also Girma is not an Oromo. He is just Hodam.]
TEWODROS ADHANOM
Educated in Britain, Tewodros has been health minister since 2005 and has a string of achievements under his belt — including a significant reduction in Ethiopia’s child mortality rate — that have won him international respect. [Ethiopia currently has no functioning health care system. Hospitals are short of basic drugs such as antibiotics.]
The opposition is unlikely to win elections due for 2010. Its leaders were jailed after Meles blamed them for street violence after a disputed 2005 poll and they have made little impact since their release in a 2007 pardon deal.
They say that is because of government harassment but Meles denies that. Some of their key figures are:
BIRTUKAN MIDEKSA
The charismatic former judge leads the Unity for Democracy and Justice party. She was imprisoned in December after the government said she violated the terms of the 2007 pardon. Meles says there is no chance she will be freed before the 2010 poll.
SEYE ABRAHA
Once nicknamed the “TPLF’s Strongman”, Seye was defence minister from 1991 to 1995. He fell out with Meles in 2000 and was jailed for corruption. He insists his imprisonment was politically motivated. Recently released, he is involved in a coalition of opposition groups going up against the government in 2010.
BERHANU NEGA
Berhanu is an economist who was elected mayor of Addis Ababa in the 2005 election then jailed shortly after. He fled to the United States after his release where he formed “May 15th”, an organisation named after the date of that poll. The government says Berhanu planned a recent plot to overthrow it and has charged 32 men it says were receiving money from him to buy weapons and bombs. He says the accusations are fabricated.
(Reporting by Barry Malone, Editing by Andrew Cawthorne [a 6th grader can write a better, more truthful report than these two.])
Nairobi (BBC NEWS) — The first undersea cable to bring high-speed internet access to East Africa has gone live.
The fibre-optic cable, operated by African-owned firm Seacom, connects South Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda and Mozambique to Europe and Asia.
The firm says the cable will help to boost the prospects of the region’s industry and commerce.
The cable – which is 17,000km long – took two years to lay and cost more than $650m.
Seacom said in a statement the launch of the cable marked the “dawn of a new era for communications” between Africa and the rest of the world.
The services were unveiled in ceremonies in the Kenyan port of Mombasa and the Tanzanian city of Dar es Salaam.
School benefits
The cable was due to be launched in June but was delayed by pirate activity off the coast of Somalia.
The BBC’s Ben Mwangunda in Dar es Salaam says five institutions are already benefiting from the faster speeds — national electricity company Tanesco, communications company, TTCL, Tanzania Railways and the Universities of Dar es Salaam and Dodoma.
The BBC’s Will Ross in Nairobi says the internet revolution trumpeted by Seacom largely depends on how well the service is rolled out across the region.
To the disappointment of many consumers, our correspondent says some ISPs (internet service providers) are not planning to lower the cost of the internet, but instead will offer increased bandwidth.
But businesses, which have been paying around $3,000 a month for 1MB through a satellite link, will now pay considerably less – about $600 a month.
The Kenyan government has been laying a network of cables to all of the country’s major towns and says the fibre-optic links will also enable schools nationwide to link into high quality educational resources.
But our correspondent says it is not clear whether the internet revolution will reach the villages, many of which still struggle to access reliable electricity.
KHARTOUM (ST) — Sudanese Police are reported to have began a series of crackdown on the neighborhood of Ethiopian and Eritrean refugee communities in the capital, Khartoum.
Since July 5, truckloads of Sudanese police along with government security forces have raided homes and refugees-owned business centers of hundreds of Ethiopians and Eritrean refugees confiscating properties of their restaurants and homes.
Some refugees on condition of anonymity said that some women and children were beaten and raped by members of the joint force.
UNHCR protection officer in Khartoum Teresa Ongaro confirmed to VOA that there was a series of raids of “refugees and illegal workers over the weekend.” But the UN officer said that she has not heard any reports of police raping women and children.
There are about 30 thousand refugees in Khartoum and about 100 thousand in Eastern Sudan bordering Eritrea.
Many go to Khartoum to find a better life, but are exposed occasionally to ill treatment. She said UNHCR personnel and lawyers have interviewed 314 victims of the recent raid, and determined that 91 fit the UNHCR qualifications for refugees. She said these refugees were freed the next day.
The refugees say more than 50 have already been deported.
Similarly, southern Sudanese authorities are carrying out crackdown in all the Southern Sudan’s ten states, targeting illegal immigrants whose influx has now been blamed on the worsening insecurity in the region.
Local authorities have blamed a number Kenyan refugees for increased insecurity in the region, most of whom are perceived to be part of several heavily armed gangs that have been terrorizing residents of Juba city and its environs especially at night.
Last month, the Government of Southern Sudan (GoSS) directed security agents to firmly deal with rising cases of insecurity that have also seen a number of foreigners lose their lives in attacks by gangs.
ADDIS ABABA — Ethiopia’s regime has suspended the operations of 42 non-governmental organizations allegedly involved in activities that are “out of their mandate” in the Southern region of the country.
Ethiopia’s Southern regional state justice office chief Mr Yilma Meresa told this writer that those NGOs were out to interrupt the peace and development of the region.
Mr Yilma refused to disclose the name of the suspended organizations. However, he hinted that most of them were local NGOs.
The Nation has learnt that international humanitarian organization Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and two local gender rights organizations are among the suspended NGOs.
The Ethiopian government moved to revoke the license of the NGOs following accusation of their alleged involvement in reporting human right abuses in the rural areas.
Ethiopian government publicly accused some NGOs of supplying “inaccurate” information to the United States’ State Department, which was published in March 2009.
Food aid
Meanwhile, United Nations humanitarian office in Ethiopia has warned that the number of people who need food aid in Ethiopia will increase to 6.2 million unless more food aid can be secured.
The recent number of people requiring food aid has been 4.9 million and now the country needs additional 390,000 metric tonnes of emergency food aid for the coming three months.
Ethiopia leads the region by registering an average 10 per cent annual economic growth, has been avowed to end hunger but has achieved less success.
Landlocked Ethiopia is also facing port congestion at port Djibouti which delays the flow of food aid to the country.
Recently, World Food Program (WFP) urged Ethiopian authorities to prioritize the transport of food aid rather than agricultural fertilizer, which is equally important for the second most populous African nation at 85.2 million (UN, 2008).
According to WFP, Ethiopia government agreed to prioritize transporting food aid and allocate more berths for ships to offload available food aid at port Djibouti.
