Sir Bob Geldof told Meles Zenawi to “Grow up!” when he found out that security forces directly under the control and command of Zenawi had massacred hundreds of unarmed protesters following the 2005 elections. It looks like Sir Bob may have to take his own advice and do a little growing up. In the days after the BBC reported its findings some ten days ago on a scam that diverted $95 million from famine relief to weapons purchases by Zenawi’s rebel group in Ethiopia in 1984, Sir Bob has been throwing temper tantrums on the talk show circuits.
Before Bob became “Sir” Bob in 1986, and “Saint Bob” before that for his work in famine relief in Ethiopia in 1984/5, he was well known (vocalist in the Irish group Boomtown Rats) for his brash and abrasive personality in the British and Irish rock music scene. When he toured the talk show circuit last week in the brewing Live Aid-gate scandal in Ethiopia, he showed his true colors once again. He tongue-lashed, chewed out and raked over the coals the BBC, its investigative reporters and editors and the two former high level rebel group leaders-turned-whistleblowers who brought international attention to the scandal. Sir Bob was literally frothing at the mouth. He was furious, combative, huffy and testy. He was affronted, exasperated and totally rattled by the BBC report. Sir Bob was pissed off big time, not at the fingered criminals but at the journalists who dug up the evidence and the whistleblowers who spilled the secret beans. In his interviews, Sir Bob confused the issues and mischaracterized the report[1].
Sir Bob was categorical in his claim that no Live/Band Aid money went to purchase weapons for the rebels at any time:
Not a single penny went on armaments. Not one. Not a pound; not a penny. Let me be clear on that. And I’ve also spoken to some of the others, including the Red Cross, who say it is absolute rubbish that any of their money could have possibly gone on arms.
He said the two individuals who were interviewed for the report by the BBC have an axe to grind, and should be disbelieved because their intention was to embarrass Zenawi as the so-called May election draws near:
The Ethiopians say that he [Aregawi] wasn’t even in the country at the time. This is a dissident political exile whose specific enemy, of which he has a track record of spinning against, is Meles Zenawi, the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, who has a General Election coming up. He is not a credible voice whatsoever.
Sir Bob challenged the BBC or anyone else to come up with a “shred” of evidence of misuse of any of the money he raised, and offered to personally investigate and initiate a lawsuit to recoup any stolen money:
Produce, produce one shred of evidence, one iota of evidence – not some dissident exile malcontent in Holland. Produce me one shred of evidence and I promise you I will professionally investigate it, I will professionally report it; and if there is any money missing I will sue the Ethiopian government who are the rebels who were fighting the war in Tigray for that money back now and I will spend it again on aid. There is not… a single shred of evidence that Band Aid or Live Aid money was diverted in any sense. It could not have been.
However, beneath the veneer of public outrage, Sir Bob was downright aghast and forlorn about what the scandal could do to his image and legacy in Ethiopia and the rest of Africa:
[Live Aid] did influence the entire debate about Africa and development and poverty. It really did have a huge political impact that resonates to today… Twenty-five … I was in Tigray just before Christmas and I saw what we began twenty-five years ago. Valleys, which were moonscapes, now verdant and lush and giving life and jobs and eighteen thousand Birr a year to the farmers of that neighbourhood. That’s what we started. We built dams. There’s our names on them. Not in armaments. We started that. Today, according to the Economist, Ethiopia is the fifth fastest growing economy in the planet in the year of the African World Cup. Isn’t that the story, or part of the story?
In short, Saint Bob saved Ethiopia! The Live/Band Aid-gate 2010 could seriously endanger his divine mission to save the rest of Africa! Right now, it is time for Sir Bob to save Sir Bob.
But why so much sound and fury from Sir Bob?
One wonders. Could it be that he finally got a definitive answer to the question he posed in his trademark song (one of the best selling singles of all time) in 1984: “Do they know it is Christmas?”
Sir Bob seems to be having great difficulty handling the truth now that he knows it. Whatever failings the two former high ranking members of Zenawi’s rebel group may have, they are telling it like it was:
Yep! We knew it was Christmas! It was the best Christmas ever. Thank you, Sir Bob (or should we say Saint Bob [Santa Claus?]) for stuffing the stockings with goodies and for the millions of dollars under the Christmas tree. Tell ya what Bobby? Since them good old days back in ’84, for some of the big boys in the gang, every day been Christmas day!
The fact of the matter is that despite Sir Bob’s histrionics and temper tantrums, famine relief and aid is stolen and diverted for weapons purchases and other corrupt purposes in Africa everyday.
On March 10, 2010, the New York Times citing a U.N. report stated that $240 million in famine relief aid was stolen in 2009 by Somali rebel groups, local contractors and U.N. staff:
As much as half the food aid sent to Somalia is diverted from needy people to a web of corrupt contractors, radical Islamist militants and local United Nations staff members, according to a new Security Council report. The [U.N. report] outlines a host of problems so grave that it recommends that Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon open an independent investigation into the World Food Program’s Somalia operations. It suggests that the program rebuild the food distribution system — which serves at least 2.5 million people and whose aid was worth about $485 million in 2009 — from scratch to break what it describes as a corrupt cartel of Somali distributors… American officials believe that some American aid may have fallen into the hands of Al Shababa, the most militant of Somalia’s insurgent groups.[2]
For Sir Bob to categorically claim that “not a penny” of the relief money was taken by Zenawi’s rebel group flies in the face of the inescapable African reality of corruption, fraud, waste, abuse and outright theft of not just humanitarian aid, but all kinds of international economic aid and loans. If Somali “contractors, radical Islamist militants and local United Nations staff members” could steal $240 million in food aid in 2009 with all the sophisticated and “best practices” monitoring and auditing mechanisms of the U.N. in place, why does Sir Bob tenaciously hold the childish belief that Zenawi’s rebel group could not have taken a “penny” from the aid money he raised in 1984? Sir Bob does not want to face the truth so he has chosen to bury his head, like the proverbial ostrich, in the sands of denial.
Dr. Aregawi Berhe, one of the eyewitnesses to the scam, was a commander in the rebel army. Gebremedhin was a senior finance officer of the rebel group. Just because they have been critical of the Zenawi regime does not mean they are fabricating lies. As the Independent newspaper which interviewed Sir Bob noted: “That does not mean they are wrong, but it sets up reasonable doubts.” That is indeed a fair place to begin establishing the truth. Let Gebremedhin, Dr. Aregawi and many others with first hand knowledge of the facts (including all the principals implicated in the wrongdoing and the NGO bagmen who carried cash to pay the rebels) be called to testify publicly before an independent international inquiry commission. Regardless, as percipient witnesses any evidence given by Gebremedhin and Dr. Aregawi to date is admissible in any court of law in the world, except kangaroo court.
Zenawi, speaking for the first time on the issue last week said he met with Sir Bob in Nairobi who expressed deep disappointment over the BBC report. Amazingly, Zenawi neither confirmed nor denied the central allegation in the report that he and/ or other members of his rebel group diverted relief money in 1984 for military purchases or any other purposes [3]. It was a brilliant anticipatory legal maneuver stonewalling on the central issue as Zenawi leaves no potentially incriminatory statement which could later be used to impeach (show prior inconsistent statement) him. Naturally, one would have expected an impassioned denial and condemnation of the purportedly vile and scurrilous accusations. But not a word. Instead, Zenawi savagely attacked the integrity and professionalism of Martin Plaut, the BBC reporter who broke the story, as a former Eritrean stooge experienced in distortions and lies (elsewhere known as “yellow journalism”). He accused others who had commented on the matter as being driven by “blind hatred.”
Sir Bob should know better. In fact, he does. After he learned of the shooting of innocent protesters following the May 2005 elections, Sir Bob told Channel 4 News on June 9, 2005[4] what kind of a man Zenawi really is:
Spare me, what are they doing? It is pathetic. I despair, I really despair. No doubt, I’ll get a briefing from the Ethiopian embassy: ‘it wasn’t like this, it was like that’. Grow up, they make me puke. I know those people, Meles Zanawi is a seriously clever man, what is he doing? What is he doing closing down radio stations, and journalists and that, it’s a disgrace. Behave.
Whatever disagreements we may have with Sir Bob on the BBC report, we share his despair fully. We really despair with him. We agree with him wholeheartedly that it is a shame and a disgrace to shoot down innocent unarmed protesters in the streets, shut down the independent press, jail opposition political leaders and engage in gross violations of human rights. We share his belief that it is disgrace and a crime to misuse a single penny earmarked for bread and butter for the hungry to buy guns and bullets for a rebel army. Unfortunately, the fact is that the world is menaced by “seriously clever men” who will stop at nothing, even stealing food from the mouths of babes. That makes all of us puke with disgust, not just Sir Bob. Because one believes in a noble cause, it does not follow that those with whom one comes in contact are also noble.
It is a great thing Sir Bob did in Live Aid back in 1984 and thereafter. But there is new thinking and evidence on the horizon. As Dambissa Moyo’s new book “Dead Aid” shows, the influx of aid, including humanitarian aid, is at great risk of both being corruptly diverted and of exacerbating existing endemic corruption in Africa. It may be hard for Sir Bob and the rest of us naïve Ethiopian utopians to open our eyes in Africa’s New Age of Kleptocracy and see “seriously clever men” and con artists lining up to cannibalize their people for their last bowls of rice and handful of pennies.
The fact remains that there is still famine of the worst kind in Ethiopia and Africa that no Live Aid, Band Aid or Dead Aid can cure. It is a famine of democracy, justice, accountability, transparency, rule of law and human rights.
In the final analysis, the BBC report is not about Sir Bob’s reputation or legacy in Ethiopia or his future humanitarian work in Africa. It is about the truth; and if Sir Bob is truly committed to finding out the truth, let’s come together, relentlessly pursue it and let the chips fall where they may. We believe the truth shall make us all free!
Alemayehu G. Mariam, is a professor of political science at California State University, San Bernardino, and an attorney based in Los Angeles. He writes a regular blog on The Huffington Post, and his commentaries appear regularly on pambazuka.org, allafrica.com, newamericamedia.org and other sites.
No one can forget the vivid images of the 1985 Live Aid Concert. The huge event organized by Bob Geldof raised more than 100 million euros ($136 million) for Ethiopia’s starving population. Governments around the world and countless aid organizations initiated an enormous amount of humanitarian response to help the hungry in the Horn of Africa.
But now the statement of a former high-ranking rebel commander alleges that some of the aid money was used to purchase arms by a former rebel group, which was fighting against the communist military junta leader at the time, Mengistu Haile Mariam.
Given the upcoming elections in May, the allegations which implicate current Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, come at an extremely volatile time.
In the mid-1980s, the CIA reported that western aid money for Ethiopia’s starving population was more than likely being diverted for other purposes by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). At the time, the communist military regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam was fighting several rebel groups, including the TPLF which was led by Meles Zenawi, the current prime minister.
The statement of a Netherlands-based high-ranking TPLF commander living in exile confirms old rumors. Dr. Aregawi Berhe told Deutsche Welle that “the rebel movement, TPFL, had received the money under false pretences – through its development arm, the so-called ‘Aid Association of Tigray’ (MARET). But MARET belonged to the party. So after the aid from donors and aid charities was collected, it was made available through the budget of the party’s central committee – for logistics and financing of the resistance.”
Reactions to the allegations
Those implicated in the TPLF aid scandal include key members of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) – a coalition that has ruled Ethiopia since 1991. Their spokesman, Sekuture Getachew, categorically denies the allegations.
“We should not forget that at the time the TPLF had asked for help from donor countries and aid organizations and therefore saved hundreds of thousands of people in the Tigray Region from starvation.”
“The ruling EPRDF, to which TPLF belongs, has a lengthy and internationally recognized reputation for dealing with aid money and the appropriate implementation. That is generally known. Incidentally, we know that the people smearing us are those who were excluded from the party as a result of their scheming,” he said.
However, the statement of the former TPFL commander, Aregawi, is supported by a fellow rebel, Gebremedhin Araya, who described to the BBC how the rebels deceived western aid workers disguised as Muslim merchants and sold sacks of grain which were in part filled with sand: “I was given clothes to make me look like a Muslim merchant. This was a trick for the NGOs,” he said.
Sarah Wilson, spokeswoman for Christian Aid, one of the leading charities in the 1984/85 famine, distances the organization from the allegations: “We definitely assume that donations, which Christian Aid and others obtained, were spent on food and used for the benefit of the poor,” she told Deutsche Welle.
Ethiopia’s stability at stake
Former TPFL officers Aregawi and Gebremedhin, the two chief witnesses, have fallen out with Meles for some time and gone into exile. Their statements, true or not, three months prior to the elections also appear like a PR-coup against the administration.
Shimeles Kemal, a spokesman for the Ethiopian government, says that these revelations are not a coincidence. In May, Ethiopians will be going to the polls, and the ruling coalition and opposition are positioning themselves for the elections. The last ones, in 2005, ended in bloodshed, so the situation is very tense.
“It does not surprise me that allegations made of thin air should come up in the approach to the primaries. The attempt to take down the name of the party and all the Ethiopian people who gave their lives for peace and benefit of the Ethiopian people is a disgrace,” he said.
Africa is becoming increasingly popular as a tourist destination. Figures by the UN World Tourism Organization show the continent will show an average growth rate of over five percent per year by 2020.
But Burghard Rauschelbach, head of the tourism and development program at the German Association for Technical Cooperation GTZ, said that such figures do not accurately reflect the realities of tourism in every African country.
“Tourism activity for sub-Saharan Africa increased, but it’s a matter of the destination and country,” Rauschelbach told Deutsche Welle.
Gambia, Senegal, the Seychelles and Swaziland saw a decrease in visitors, for example. Tourism increased in South Africa, which captures about one-third of the 30 million visitors to sub-Saharan Africa.
Rauschelbach said South Africa’s popularity was due its “variety for different target groups.” The country offered safaris, adventure, cultural and beach holidays, as well as ecotourism.
Countries do not always benefit
It is not a coincidence that sub-Saharan Africa’s most developed country also happens to be the leading tourist destination. The industry adds billions of dollars to the South African economy and contributes a large part of the GDP for most countries. Tourism generates 25 percent of the export value for Kenya, 13 percent for the whole of sub-Saharan Africa, and as much as 60 percent in a country like Gambia.
But even though tourism may boost economies, it has not always been beneficial to overall development. In large numbers, tourists can overwhelm local culture and traditions. Locals may not benefit much when the working conditions are bad, Rauschelbach said. More diversity in the products and services that are offered was needed in order for tourism to contribute to development.
TourismWatch, an NGO affiliated to the Protestant Church’s Development Service EED, studies the effects of tourism on development. Its head Heinz Fuchs said that tour operators should incorporate in their concepts corporate social responsibility (CSR), in which companies integrate social and environmental concerns in their business operations. This would allow tourism to contribute to progress in poor countries, Fuchs told Deutsche Welle.
This trend is one focus at the tourism fair ITB Berlin, taking place in the German capital this week. A CSR day is being held on Thursday.
Socially responsible tour operators
“More and more tour operators are engaged in CSR in their businesses,” the German Travel Association said. A good example was Studiosus, which offers “study trip” holiday packages in cooperation with partners in local destinations. It is more up-market because the vacations tend to be expensive. A two-week vacation to Ethiopia would cost well over 2,500 euros ($3,400 dollars).
Another organization that offers “alternative” volunteer holiday packages is TravelWorks. It cooperates with local partners in different parts of the world. The company offers travelers a stay with a host family combined with social or environmental work in a local institution.
Nico Siegmund, a young German student teacher who participated in a TravelWork program in Ghana in 2009, was happy with his experience there. But he said he felt that it was too costly. Siegmund’s two-month volunteer holiday cost 960 euros without air fare, vaccinations, visa or other travel costs.
“It’s pretty expensive because you have to pay for everything yourself, so the flights, the vaccines, travel insurance and the stay,” Siegmund said.
A standard for corporate social responsibility in tourism
As the number of tour operators such as Studiosus and TravelWorks grow, which incorporate CSR and make it more significant for tourism, experts feel that there needs to be a standard for evaluating operators.
In Germany, the EED, KATE Center for Ecology and Development, the University of Applied Sciences in Eberswalde and Friends of Nature have been working on a standards-based measure for a tour operator’s inclusion of CSR in their business concept.
After this year’s ITB Berlin, the CSR label will be awarded to all tour operators that are ecologically and socially responsible. It’s hoped that CSR will promote socially responsible tourism in a sustainable manner.
“Tourism needs business concepts that work economically and socially, so that people in the destination can benefit from it,” Fuchs said.
The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria reports nearly 5 million lives have been saved since 2002 through programs it has supported for the treatment of these three killer diseases. A new report shows the fund’s multi-billion dollar investment is paying big dividends in improving the health of millions of people in developing countries.
Since its creation in 2002, the Global Fund has contributed more than $19 billion to combat AIDS, Malaria and Tuberculosis. The money has supported more than 600 programs in 144 countries. Countries in sub-Saharan Africa have been the major recipients.
The results are impressive. The fund reports 2.5 million people infected with HIV currently are being treated with antiretroviral therapy and this has resulted in a significant decline in AIDS deaths in many countries, including Ethiopia and Malawi.
It says around 6 million people with active tuberculosis are being treated for the disease. And, this too, is resulting in fewer deaths globally.
Through its malaria prevention program, the fund has distributed more than 100 million insecticide-treated nets. The report says 10 of the countries in Africa with the highest incidents of the illness have reported declines in new malaria cases and a decline in child mortality of 50 to 80 percent.
The fund’s Director of Strategy, Performance and Evaluation, Rifat Atun, says these programs saved at least 3,600 lives every day in 2009, and even more can be saved through continued funding of these programs.
“We can, for example, given the rate of investment and the scale at the moment we have, eliminate malaria as a public health problem, decline the mortality of under five in children, mothers and beyond,” noted Atun. “We can prevent millions of more HIV infections and also in tuberculosis. But, most importantly, we can look to a world that is free of HIV infection in children. We can virtually eliminate transmission of HIV from mother to child.”
But Atun, cautions continued progress will require the partnership to continue to work in the effective way in which it has done. He says support must be maintained for the countries that have been able to achieve these results.
The Global Fund is a combination public-private partnership among governments, civil society, the private sector and affected communities. Most of its money comes from the G7 industrialized countries. But, private organizations, such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also contribute significant amounts.
The Global Fund says it will be able to reach several health-related Millennium Development Goals by 2015, if it receives the money it needs to continue scaling up its activities in the coming years.
The fund is setting its sights on reducing both child and maternal mortality rates by three quarters, to halt the spread of HIV and to reverse the incidence of malaria and other major diseases.
If democracy is a government of the people, kleptocracy is a government of thieves.
Last week the secret world of Meles Zenawi’s kleptocracy, famine aid-sharking and money laundering in Ethiopia was exposed by two of his former comrades-in-arms in the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). Gebremedhin Araya, a former treasurer and TPLF co-founder Dr. Aregawi Berhe, detailed the scam used to swindle, hustle and con millions of dollars from international famine relief organizations in the mid-1980s. The two former top leaders accused the TPLF leadership, including Zenawi, for taking tens of millions of dollars earmarked for famine relief in the Tigrai region to buy weapons and enrich themselves. Gebremedhin said he personally handed cash payments and checks in the hundreds of thousands of dollars to Zenawi and Sebhat Nega, the top two TPLF leaders who controlled the cash flow of the organization. Although Gebremedhin was the treasurer, he said he was not privileged to know what happened to the money after he delivered it to Zenawi or Nega. The incriminatory evidence, (including a candid photograph of TPLF cadres counting and recording wads of cash handed over to them by a foreign aid worker from a large satchel on the floor), is shocking as it is damning and irrefutable.
In 1984/5, at the height of the catastrophic famine, nearly a quarter of a billion dollars were raised internationally for famine relief in Ethiopia. Michael Buerek of the BBC who visited the Tigrai region at the height of the famine in 1984 described the situation as “a biblical famine in the 20th Century” and “the closest thing to hell on Earth” (See video[1]).
According to the available evidence, normal delivery of emergency humanitarian aid to the Tigrai region in 1984 was virtually impossible because of rebel activity in the outlying areas and bombardment by the military junta. The road normally used to deliver aid supplies to the Tigrai region from the capital had become unusable because of rebel military activity. The various international famine relief non-governmental organizations (NGOs) had to find alternate routes to quickly deliver relief aid to victims in rebel-controlled areas. Many of these NGOs eventually set up shop in eastern Sudan close to the Tigrai border in an attempt to deliver aid quickly. The large concentration of NGOs and the publicity surrounding the enormous fundraising efforts by various international celebrities for Ethiopian famine victims caught the attention of the TPLF leaders who saw a lucrative business opportunity for themselves delivering relief aid to victims in areas their controlled.
According to the former TPLF leaders, Zenawi and his top cadres hatched out and successfully executed a scam to use a front “humanitarian relief” organization called “Relief Society of Tigrai” (REST) for aid delivery. The TPLF leaders managed to “convince” the various NGOs operating out of the Sudan that REST is a genuine charity organization completely separate from the TPLF, the declared military wing. In fact, REST was the other face of the TPLF coin.
The evidence further indicates that to magnify the severity and extremity of the famine situation for the NGOs, the TPLF leaders ordered the exodus of large numbers of victims into the Sudan creating a mushroom of refugee settlements in the Sudanese border areas overnight. Using different techniques and methods, the TPLF leaders stage managed an elaborate marketing “drama” for the NGOs to buy and deliver aid to the large famine-stricken population inside Tigrai. This was done principally by organizing a small group of their most trusted and inner circle members to pose as “grain merchants” and solicit business from the NGOs.
The deception games, or more accurately the famine aid-sharking scheme, played on the Western NGOs were varied. At the onset of the scam, they used a three-staged process. In stage one, one group of TPLF/REST officials masquerading as legitimate grain merchants would approach the myriad NGOs and offer to sell them substantial quantities of grain for quick delivery to the famine victims. At the time, the TPLF had acquired and stashed in secret warehouses grains from various sources, including NGOs, for use by its fighters. These secretly stashed grain stockpiles were in fact being offered for sale to the NGOs. The TPLF/REST “grain dealers” would complete the sale transaction and return back to their hideouts with the payment from the NGOs. Gebremedhin said he delivered to Zenawi and Sebhat Nega the cash and check payments from the NGOs. He described the scam with mind-numbing simplicity:
I was given clothes to make me look like a Muslim merchant. The NGOs don’t know me because my name was Mohammed. It was a trick assigned (created) by the top leaders for the NGOs. I received a great amount of money from the NGOs and the money was automatically taken by (the TPLF) leaders. The money, much of it, the leaders put it in their accounts in Western Europe. Some of it was used to buy weapons. The people did not get half a kilogram of maize.
Once the purchase was made another group of TPLF/REST operatives would take over the responsibility of delivering the relief aid inside Tigrai. In the second stage, TPLF/REST officials would facilitate spot checks of grain stockpiles in their own secret warehouses. But the warehouses were tricked out. Gebremedhin said, “if you go there, half of the warehouse was stacked full of sand.” The NGO representatives would perform visual inspections of the stockpiles, give their approval and cross back into the Sudan to conduct additional grain purchases.
In the third stage, the same or different group of TPLF/REST officials would go back to the NGOs and make a pitch for additional sales of grains for delivery in a different part of Tigrai. These offers did not involve any new or fresh supplies of grain. Instead, stockpiles of grain already in secret storage facilities in various locations throughout Tigrai were trucked around to new locations, giving the appearance to the NGOs that fresh supplies of grain were being bought in and delivered. Since the aid workers have no means of independently verifying the grain that is being shuttled from one location to another from completely fresh shipments, they would perform cursory inspections and make payments. In that manner, TPLF/REST was able to sell and resell multiple times the same previously acquired stockpile of grain (and sand) to the NGOs generating millions of dollars in revenue. TPLF/REST used various ways and techniques in 1985 to maximize its business transactions with the NGOs and in selling grain shipments sent by donor countries.
Dr. Aregawi told the BBC that of the $100 million that went through TPLF hands at the time, $95 million was diverted for weapons purchases and other purposes not related to famine relief. He stated that the TPLF stage-managed “dramas” to “fool the aid workers”. A recent BBC investigation identified a 1985 official CIA document which concluded: “Some funds that insurgent organizations are raising for relief operations, as a result of increased world publicity, are almost certainly being diverted for military purposes.” Robert Houdek, a senior US diplomat in Ethiopia in the late 1980s, was quoted by the BBC saying that TPLF members at the time told him that some aid money was used to buy weapons. An aid worker named Max Peberdy stated that he had personally delivered to TPLF/REST officials $500,000 in Ethiopian currency to purchase grain.
The prima facie evidence of massive relief aid diversion by the TPLF is compelling and damning[2]. Those accused of involvement in the wrongdoing have dismissed the evidence as “rubbish”; they have not called for a full fact-finding inquiry to clear their names of such serious and grave charges. Until such inquiry takes place, the evidence of aid-sharking and theft stands unchallenged and unrefuted. To be sure, very little of the famine aid money in 1984/5 channeled through the TPLF went to help the hungry, poor and dying in Tigrai. Nearly all of it (95%) was diverted for military and other purposes. Bob Geldof who organized Live Aid/Band Aid in 1984 collecting tens of millions of dollars in donations recently threatened, “If there is any money missing I will sue the Ethiopian government.”
The systematic plunder and pillage of Ethiopia over the past two decades can now be put in clear perspective.
We now know:
Why Ethiopia’s only outlet to the sea was signed, sealed and delivered, overriding contrary advice by international diplomats;
What went down in the deal to hand over Badme to the aggressor in binding international arbitration following the aggressor’s decisive military defeat at the cost of over 80,000 Ethiopian lives;
How the May 2005 elections were stolen in broad daylight;
Why the missing millions of dollars worth of gold bars from the national bank in 2007 are still missing; Of the secret sweetheart deals that turned over the country’s gold mines to cronies at bargain-basement prices;
How state enterprises were given out to family, friends and supporters for pittance in the name of privatization;
About the secret deals made to demarcate the border between the Sudan and Ethiopia;
About the fire sale of millions of hectares of farmland to foreign “investors”;
About the no-collateral bank loans in the millions of dollars to friends and supporters and the 1.7 billion birr ($141.6 million) loan to Messebo Cement Factory, one of the many companies owned by the “Endowment Fund for the Rehabilitation of Tigray” (EFFORT a/k/a Zenawi, Inc.,), which sent the Development Bank of Ethiopia careening into insolvency);
About the monopoly of the cement business by Zenawi, Inc./EFFORT;
About the multi-million dollar child-trafficking business in the name of inter-country adoptions;
About the secret deals to sole source the construction of the Gilgel Gibe dams to an Italian company;
About the “genocide and interhamwe” scare talk;
About the corrupt procurement and contracting practices that direct state business to cronies, supporters and friends;
About the rampant nepotism, patronage and clientelism;
Why draconian “laws” we enacted to criminalize NGOs and the independent press; and on and on and on.
We know because we now have the blueprint for the perfect kleptocracy!
One must grudgingly admire these con men for their sheer audacity, genius and creativity in ripping off so much money from the charities in the mid-1980s (and for the last two decades from the Ethiopian people). Even Ali Baba and his 40 thieves could not have pulled off such a brilliant scheme to sell and re-sell the NGOs the same sand as grain over and over again. Even Hermes, the Greek god of thieves, would not have been able to come up with such an exquisitely perfect plan to hoodwink and bamboozle gullible NGOs of millions of dollars. They truly deserve the title, “A New Breed of African Thieves”.
The facts are plain to see. We know now that these thieves did not stand for the people of Tigrai at the critical hour in 1984. They sure as hell do not stand for the people of Ethiopia today. They stand for themselves and no one else. They will try to cling to power by creating enmity and polarization between the people of Tigrai and their brothers and sister in the rest of Ethiopia. That is the ONLY way they can stay in power. As an old Ethiopian saying teaches, disorder and chaos creates ideal conditions for thieves (Gir gir le leba yimechal.) The Ethiopian opposition today is in a state of gir-gir (disarray, discord and mess). When the core of opposition political activity revolves around ethnic bashing, finger pointing and finger wagging, the ideal conditions for thievery are created and maintained. But there is a way to deal with Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves:
Close ranks regardless of ethnicity or regionality; reaffirm our basic humanity in our Ethiopianity; renounce our old enmity; openly declare our steadfast unity and trumpet our Ethiopian nationality at every opportunity.
When we have done these things, we will have freed ourselves from domination and rule by a kleptocracy — a government of thieves, by thieves, for thieves!
We should all thank BBC’s Africa Editor, Martin Plaut, for his extraordinary investigative work in this affair.
FIGHT CRIME. SAY “NO” TO THIEVES!
[1] See 1984 BBC video at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8321043.stm
[2] See details of the scam in excerpts from Gebremedin Araya’s Amharic manuscript: Pt. 1, http://www.ethiomedia.com/course/telat_ena_ethiopia.pdf
Pt. 2, http://www.ethiomedia.com/course/tplf_crimes_against_humanity.pdf
Alemayehu G. Mariam, is a professor of political science at California State University, San Bernardino, and an attorney based in Los Angeles. He writes a regular blog on The Huffington Post, and his commentaries appear regularly on pambazuka.org, allafrica.com, newamericamedia.org and other sites.
Last week, a couple of interesting political statements grabbed the cyber headlines. One was a truly entertaining piece entitled “Letter from Ethiopia,” by the indomitable Ethiopian journalist Eskinder Nega. Eskinder’s “Letter” sought to make sense of the power jockeying that is apparently taking place backstage to replace dictator Meles Zenawi. The other was a bombastic speech given by Zenawi to a captive audience in Mekele in observance of the 35th anniversary of the founding of his liberation movement. In that speech, Zenawi unleashed a torrent of vitriol against his opponents and critics to rival Hugo Chavez’s, and indulged in a little bit of megalomaniacal braggadocio and self-glorification for democratizing Ethiopia and inundating it with prosperity.
Using the so-called election scheduled for May, 2010 as a backdrop, Eskinder crystal-balled the inevitable implosion of the ruling “EPDRF” party, and sketched out the qualifications of the motley crew of droll characters standing in line as heirs-apparent to succeed Zenawi on the “throne”.
Scratch beyond the surface and the EPRDF [Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front] is really not the monolithic dinosaur as it is most commonly stereotyped. [It has become] a coalition of four distinct phenomenon: the increasing confusion of the dominant TPLF [Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front], the acute cynicism of the ANDM [Amhara National Democratic Movement], the desperate nihilism of the OPDO [Oromo People’s Democratic Organization] and the inevitable irrelevance of the incongruent SEPM [South Ethiopian People’s Movement] (a grab bag of some 40 ethnic groups from the southern part of the country). ”
In the battle royal for the “throne” are a number of goofy and cagey characters including “OPDO’s Girma Biru” who is said to be “managerially competent” but a dud and a wimp when it comes to formulating a “grand vision and [lacks] the ruthlessness deemed crucial to keep the EPRDF vibrant and intact.” OPDO chairman Abadula Gemeda, the butt of “the city’s political jokes”, is considered a possible contender and given full credit for his own “comical intellectual pretensions.” ANDM’s Addisu Legesse is said to be held in “particular high esteem” by Zenawi for his servility and slavish loyalty beyond and above the call of duty. Then there is the Svengalian master of intrigue, Bereket Simon whose “influence is expected to wane once Meles eventually leaves the limelight.” The crocodilian Sebhat Nega, “king maker for two decades”, has apparently “chosen to leave TPLF’s politburo” but remains a member of the Central Committee as puppet-master extraordinaire.
In other words, the politics of “succession” to Zenawi’s “throne” has become a veritable theatre of the absurd. The personalities waiting in the wings to take over the “throne” (or to protect and safeguard it) bring to mind the witless characters in Samuel Beckett’s tragicomedy play Waiting for Godot, arguably the most important English play of the 20th Century. In that play, two vagabond characters anxiously wait on a country road by a tree for the arrival of a mysterious person named Godot, who can save them and answer all their questions. They wait for days on end but Godot never shows up, but each day a young messenger comes to tell them Godot will be there tomorrow. As they wait each day, they try to find something to do. They keep busy chatting, arguing, singing, playing games, swapping hats, taking their shoes off, napping and doing all sorts of trivial things just “to hold the terrible silence at bay”. Each day, the characters tell each other that they can not go on waiting. They are so tired of waiting day after day that they contemplate suicide. Godot never shows up but the two characters keep returning to the same place day after day to wait for him; but they can not remember exactly what happened the day before. Godot never came.
Waiting for Zenawi to leave power is like waiting for Godot to arrive. It ain’t happening. He is not only the savior and the man with all the answers, he is also the Great Patron who makes everything work. In his Mekele speech, Zenawi made it clear that he is staying put and the great business of state business will go on as usual; and but for the wicked opposition elements and pesky critics, how things could really be awesome! But he did not hold back in visiting his wrath on his opposition and critics. With rhetorical flourish, he lambasted his former comrade-in-arms, opposition elements and critics with the Amharic equivalent of “muckrakers”, “mud dwellers” and good-for-nothing “chaff” and “husk”. He accused them of being “anti-democratic”, “anti-people” fomenters of “interhamwe”. He called them “sooty”, “sleazy”, “gun-toting marauders”, “pompous egotists” and every other name than could be pumped out of the Insulto-Matic machine. He repeatedly denounced his opposition for rolling in a quagmire of mud and trying to smear mud on the people. After all was said in that speech, it was clear that he was the one doing all the mud-slinging and mud-rolling (chika jiraf and chika mab-kwat). (It must have been a bad hair day for him [no pun intended]!)
Zenawi pulled no punches slamming and vilifying his opponents and critics:
There are those who maintain an eagle eye on the regime with bitter animosity and sully it by painting and drenching it in soot. Regardless, our country has marched into democracy confidently and irreversibly.
Anti-democratic and anti-people forces have so much contempt that they badger our uneducated people telling them chaff is wheat. However, our people are used to winnowing the chaff in the wind and keeping the wheat. Our enemies are peddling chaff to the people and trying to find holes to sabotage our peoples’ democracy, peace and development. But since our organization knows that our operation is airtight, we are not concerned.
The chaff hope to provoke the people into anger and incite them to undemocratically resort to violence. Although they (the “chaff”) can not dirty up the people like themselves, they may try to smear the people with mud in the hope of inciting them into lawlessness.
It was an unstatesmanlike speech, to say the least. But there were a few odd things about the speech itself. Even though the speech was given to a captive audience in Mekele, the clear impression that is created for the listener is that the people of Tigray will be doing the winnowing of the useless “chaff” from the valuable “wheat.” The contextualization of the speech subtly cuts off the people of Tigray from the rest of the country. The incredible amount of venom in the speech could make a snake puke. The allusion-fest to “mud”, “soot,” “chaff”, “wheat”, etc., and the thinly veiled ad hominem attacks, derision and disparagement of opponents and critics points to a deficit of intellectual discipline and rigor to argue and fiercely debate the issues in the court of public opinion. Instead of name-calling, one ought to use hard evidence and logical analysis to disprove the allegations, contentions or analysis of the opponents and critics. In this regard, there is a rather humorous tu quoque (two wrongs make a right) logical fallacy that infuses the whole speech. Zenawi takes the position that since his critics “wallow” in mud and keep slinging it at him, it is right for him to wallow in and sling mud and muck back at them while professing to command the moral high ground. In other words, it is right to “fight mud with mud.” The problem of a mud fight is that everybody gets dirty. It is morally superior and infinitely more pragmatic to fight the “mud slingers” by slinging back at them, not mud pies, but facts, evidence, data and logical analysis.
The speech is also noteworthy for its self-righteousness, messianic fervor and dogmatic certitude in the speaker’s rectitude: Everybody is chaff except the winnowed wheat. Everyone is a member of the Evil Empire except the anointed Jedi Knights of the TPLF who are the guardians of peace and justice in the Republic (to borrow from a popular American motion picture “Star Wars”). Such a Manichean worldview (Weltanschauung) of good and evil and chaff and wheat is symptomatic of narcissistic self-absorption, a behavioral pattern well documented in the psychological literature; and empirically observed in terms of faulty reasoning, acute hostility towards others groups, rigid character attributes and blindness to one’s failings.
The real issue is not about name calling, mudslinging or even determining the true bearers of the democratic cross. The real issue is about the accountability of a personalist dictatorship that is sustained through a self-aggrandizing oligarchy that now craves a veneer of legitimacy by staging a democratic “election” for international donors. The fact remains that no amount of mudslinging, soot smearing or bombastic speech can mask the true nature of an election in a dictatorship. One can put the finest lipstick on a pig, but at the end of the day the pig is still a pig.
As Zenawi’s speech shows, he exercises absolute imperial power for self-gratification and self-glorification; and his declared aim is to mold Ethiopian society in his own image. His ruling regime fundamentally believes that political power grows out of the barrel of the gun (not from the consent of the people), fully aware of their own feebleness without the gun. Their raison d’etre is to amass and centralize political and economic power at all costs and maintain themselves in power by greed, fear and blind ambition.
We fully accept the metaphor of “chaff” and “wheat” as a judicious and appropriate way not just to understand Ethiopian politics today but also as a practical way of resolving the crises of confidence in governance and proper determination of leadership succession. It is the right time now to put the metaphor to a real test: Let the Ethiopian people winnow the “chaff” from the “wheat” in the calm winds of a genuinely free and fair election in May 2010! That seems highly unlikely; and the chaff that stands in the way of the people “shall inherit the wind”.
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Alemayehu G. Mariam, is a professor of political science at California State University, San Bernardino, and an attorney based in Los Angeles. He writes a regular blog on The Huffington Post, and his commentaries appear regularly on pambazuka.org, allafrica.com, newamericamedia.org and other sites.
