When Mr. Hastert bottled H.R. 5680 in the International Relations Committee just before the midterm recess, most supporters of the bill were deeply disappointed, and angry. We had labored long and hard to get the bill to the floor, and done a marvelous job of generating unanimous bipartisan support for it in committee. In the eleventh hour, we found out that we had been double-crossed by Speaker Hastert.
Hastert’s action in blocking the legislation from floor action was not entirely unanticipated, but we considered his intervention so remote that we failed to develop effective counter-strategies. After all, Hastert showed no signs of opposition to the bill at any prior time, nor did he manifest the slightest interest in it until late September. Hastert gave us a September surprise.
We felt Hastert had bushwacked us, mugged us in broad daylight. But we could not figure out why he would block the bill. H.R. 5680 was ready for floor action. He could have worked with the International Relations Committee and addressed any concerns he may have had about the bill. Supporters felt betrayed. For the first time in Diaspora history, Ethiopian Americans were poised to use the American legislative process to advance the cause of human rights and democracy in their homeland; and as we hurtled to the end zone for a touchdown, we ran into a stonewall.
But we did not take it lying down. We went directly to Hastert’s constituents and made our case. They listened to us, and in less than a week we were able to enlist the support of local evangelical, civic and media leaders. The heat was on! Hundreds of telephone calls poured into Hastert’s Hill office from the 14th Congressional district. His staffers were amazed, but not amused, by the ferocity of our grassroots efforts.
As Congress recessed for the midterm elections, we had made extensive plans to undertake grassroots work in Hastert’s backyard with support from key individuals in the local media, academic institutions, churches and synagogues and civic institutions. We were ready to take on the Speaker; but we did not have to: Divine intervention was to deliver Hastert an October surprise. Within days of sabotaging H.R. 5680, “Stonewall†Hastert, principal linebacker for Zenawi’s regime, was himself backed into a corner with the Mark Foley scandal. He had apparently been coddling a pedophile who preyed on Congressional pages (high school students who serve as messengers for members).
Early in the Hastert controversy, I had a chance encounter with an elderly lady who tried to cheer me up after listening to my tales of woe over the recent turn of events in Hastert’s office. Her words proved prophetic: “ayozoh lije, gid yelem, yeEtiopia amlak yikeflewal.†(It’s alright my son, the God of Ethiopia will hold him accountable.â€Â) What a difference a few weeks can make! And how the God of Ethiopia has worked in mysterious ways!
In a speech I gave at the University of California, Los Angeles on September 16, 2006, the premier of Obang Metho’s documentary “Betrayal of Democracy,†I urged supporters of H.R. 5680 to shout a great shout around the U.S. Congress, like Joshua’s army fighting the Battle of Jericho, and bring down the walls of DLA Piper lobbyists. And we made a great shout on the Hill, and thank God, our mighty adversaries — those on the Hill and their lackeys peddling influence on the Hill– have fallen down like the walls of Jericho.
Mr. Hastert is now history, repudiated by the American people. Mr. Armey and the whole lot of parasitical lobbyists of his ilk that thrive on the misery and suffering of poor countries like Ethiopia will now be forced to seek a more humane line of work.
But we are the survivors. We are still here, strong and determined than ever, to make history.
Lessons to be learned…
There are many lessons to be learned from the 2006 midterm elections. What the American people did on November 7 is not unlike what the Ethiopian people did on May 15, 2005. They did major house cleaning (no pun intended). After 12 years in power, the Republicans had grown arrogant, disdainful and imperious. Corruption was rampant among some of their members, and a number of their senior lawmakers were selling influence, taking bribes, engaged in sexual debauchery and all sorts of other unethical and immoral conduct. In the end, the Republican House was sending a steady supply of its convicted members to the jail house, or the Big House.
Lesson #1: When the Republicans launched their revolution in 1994, the Democrats had held control of Congress for nearly four decades, and in the end they had fallen from grace. In their “Contract With America,†Republicans promised greater fiscal responsibility, middle class tax relief, legal reform, enhanced national security and many other things. But after only 12 years of controlling the legislative branch of government, the Republicans had abused their power and the trust of the American people. The American people said: “It is time to throw out the rascals!†And a boatload of Republicans was thrown out, and President Bush magnanimously admitted: “We got thumped, it’s time, let’s go.â€Â
In May 2005, Ethiopians voted for fundamental change in their system of governance. They wanted to sweep out 14 years of EPDRF mismanagement. 14 years of misrule. 14 years of misgovernment. 14 years of malfeasance. And 14 years of corruption. And when they voted with a 90 per cent turn out, they thought they had thrown out the EPDRF rascals, given them a good “thumping.†But the rascals would not accept the verdict of the people. Instead, they jailed the opposition leaders for having won the election fair and square. The lesson for Zenawi and company is that when you are repudiated by the people, you graciously accept your fate and work to create an atmosphere of bipartisanship for the good of the country. Even die-hard communist and socialists have figured this one out. Just this week Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua, leader of the Sandanista socialist revolution in the 1980s, won the presidential election after 16 years of conservative rule. Zenawi and his party have a great opportunity to do the right thing. Acknowledge the people’s verdict of May 2005. Be magnanimous. Step aside, become part of the loyal opposition, and give the opposition a run for their money in the next election.
Lesson #2: Abe Lincoln was right: You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time. After 12 years of Republican control of national government, the American people were tired of being fooled. They had enough of the lies and deceptions, and the diversionary tactics and campaign tricks of Karl Rove. In the end, the Republicans could not fool anybody, except themselves. The jig was up! The outcome is no different for Mr. Zenawi: The jig was up for him in May, 2005.
As country folks like to say: “You can’t fool nobody, no more, no how.†Sure, you can arrest your opponents, jail them, torture them, exile them, whatever. You can terrorize and make the lives of ordinary Ethiopians hell. But despite your army, your money and you influence, there is one thing you can’t and will never be able to do: Fool the Ethiopian people anymore. They know who you are!
Lesson #3: The imperative of democracy is that you must accept the judgment of the people. When the American people voted for the Republicans in 1994 and elected President Bush in a tightly contested race in 2000, they made a decision. Americans who did not support President Bush accepted the verdict of the razor thin majority that elected President Bush along with the electoral college system that made it possible for the candidate with the fewer number of popular votes to win over the candidate who had the most popular votes.
Strange things happen in the polling booths. Things like people getting disgusted with the way their leaders exercise political power and authority. Americans struck back and withdrew their consent on November 7. But Republicans did not see it coming, or were blinded by their own arrogance. They got zapped by the people, and they will have many years to pay the price of their arrogance.
Well, strange things also happened to Zenawi and company in May, 2005. Ethiopian voters went to the polls and said: “We don’t want you. We want the opposition.†Very simple and clear message.
The lesson for Zenawi and company is that when you play by democratic rules, you always take a chance. If you have not been doing a good enough job while in power, you get “thumped.†Zenawi and his EPDRF party should understand that a thumped party is a dumped party. Their best option is to accept the fact that they have been rejected by the people, and organize to win the next election. That is what the Republicans will do, and that’s the price you pay in a democratic system when you lose an election.
Lesson #4: Democracy is a funny thing: When you thumb your nose at the people, exploit and oppress them, mistreat and terrorize them and violate the very rights guaranteed them in the Ethiopian Constitution, they grow weary and impatient. Americans learned the lesson of tyrannical abuse of power in their struggle for independence. Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence:
* But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security… The history of the present King of Great Britain [George III] is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world….â€Â
Ethiopians can do better, and bring about a just and fair society through democratic and peaceful means. They are ready, willing and able to do so. In May 2005, they demonstrated their ability and readiness to engage in democratic selfgovernance beyond a shadow of a doubt. Ninety percent of the eligible voters turned out and said: “Meles, EPDRF and the whole lot of you, you gotta go!†Let the people’s decision stand, and Zenawi and his party stand down.
Lesson #5: There comes a time in all human events when enough is enough. That time came for the Republicans on November 7, 2006. They lost their way after 12 years of controlling Congress, and now they must find their way back to the political wilderness.
For Zenawi and the EPDRF, enough was enough on May 15, 2005. Zenawi and the EPDRF have lost their vision, if they ever had one. Ethiopia remains at the bottom of the list on indicators of human rights, democracy and economic development. Famine, HIV and other plagues menace the country year after year. Our youth wander aimlessly and hopelessly. The rich get richer and the poor are reduced to subhuman levels of existence. Government officials and their cronies line their pockets and accumulate wealth while young people are executed in the streets like wild animals. Dissidents and ethnic minorities are massacred and
persecuted. Mr. Zenawi: ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
On November 7, 2006, the American people spoke. And Mr. Hastert got the message: “It’s time to pack it up and go.†So, “Farewell, Mr. Hastert, Good Bye, Mr. Armey!†And Mr. Zenawi: If you are listening to the voice of your people which still echoes from May 15, 2005: The jig is up! “You got thumped, it’s time, let’s go.†So long!
In the November 2006 issue of the British Journal of Health Psychology, entitled “Mind the gap in intelligence: Re-examining the relationship between inequality and health, author Satoshi Kanazawa from the London School of Economics and Political Science argued under the guise of an allegedly “objective” and statistically supported study that “individuals in wealthier and more egalitarian societies live longer and stay healthier, not because they are wealthier or more egalitarian but because they are more intelligent” (pg. 623). By this logic, diseases are allegedly associated with low national IQs in developing countries with Ethiopia heading the list with the lowest national IQ of 63 out of 185 nations followed by Sierra Leone.
The author, building upon his own previous theories that have not gained any recognition, and through showing an insignificant correlation between income, on the one hand, and life expectancy at birth, infant mortality and age-specific mortality rate, on the other, attempts to prove that there is a strong correlation between intelligence and life expectancy at birth, infant mortality and age-specific mortality rate. He further tries to expound this argument on a microlevel through surprisingly applying verbal intelligence test measured by GSS rather than IQ test to measure intelligence. The conclusion being as noted above.
The author heavily overelies in the majority of his work on highly controversial figures
like A. Jensen, and works like and “the Wealth of Nations” (by Lynn and Vanhanen) from which he uncritically copies the national IQ measurements!
In the highly controversial, and the Wealth of Nations, the IQ measurements and methodology are strongly criticized, which makes the work as a whole unreliable.
Even though so-called “national IQs†(if such a category/measurement can be viable at
all) for most of the 185 nations they study do not exist at all, they find ‘creative’ ways to undertake the measurement. So for example the national IQ for El Salvador is calculated out of the average of the national IQ for Guatemala and Colombia since they are both neigbours of the country in question? But in the case of Kyrgyzstan, they calculated the national IQ through an average of Iran and Tukey in which both are not negibours of the country in question. While in the case of Vietnam they calculated the national IQ out of the average of that of China and Thailand, even though historically the vietnamese are not related to the Thai while there is strong ethnic, cultural and historical affiliation to China.
From here, the authors ignore the ethnic diversity and heterogeneity of third world
countries, the shifting and imposition of national boundaries and movement of populations via immigration, for example, factors which all deem the calculation of a
national IQ impossible, not to mention Kanazawa’s conclusions. If empirically tested, one
can assume to find that Ethiopians in the Diaspora enjoy a healthier life than those at
home even though their IQ, according to Kanazawa, is necessarily the same since it’s
genetically inherited!
In addition, one wonders if a calculation of IQ is possible at all, and if so considering the
culturally biased current IQ measurement tests if their results are of any applicibality to
third world people, not to mention that the correlation between IQ tests and intelligence
which Kanazawa heavily relies on is one that awaits proof.
Furthermore, the Copenhagen Consensus Project have showed that deficiency in iodine
results in lower IQ scores and thus the relationship between inequality and IQ scores,
since particuarly in inland territories where iodine is scarce, only people with capacity
can obtain it. Also, the “Flynn Effect” that indicates that IQ scores improve with time is
totally neglected for the benefit of genetic explanations of IQ?! Moreover, Kanazawa
explains poorly why IQ itself cannot be a consequence of income inequality.
A quick look at the table by Lynn and Vanhanen of national IQs and a comparison
between Denmark and the US shows that even though Denmark ranks higher in
egalitarianism and wealth, the US still leads in life expectancy at birth, infant mortality
and age-specific mortatlity. Findings from the table Kanazawa himself so relies upon conflict strongly with his conclusions.
After carefully reading Kanazawa’s article, I came to see clearly that it is a miserable
attempt to stir debate through imposing his bankrupt theories of the Savanna Principle
and the evolution of general intelligence on the academic community and thus gain some
recognition! Having said that, I believe it is still a mistake to leave these views
unchallenged. The ideological conviction behind these views invokes only Western race
theorists of the 19th century that brought to the emergence of the Eugenics movement.
From here, I call upon Ethiopian and African health and medical professionals to
challenge these views publicly. I further call for the formation of a body of scholars that can follow and challenge such disgraceful views.
In the November 2006 issue of the British Journal of Health Psychology, entitled “Mind the gap in intelligence: Re-examining the relationship between inequality and health, author Satoshi Kanazawa from the London School of Economics and Political Science argued under the guise of an allegedly “objective” and statistically supported study that “individuals in wealthier and more egalitarian societies live longer and stay healthier, not because they are wealthier or more egalitarian but because they are more intelligent” (pg. 623). By this logic, diseases are allegedly associated with low national IQs in developing countries with Ethiopia heading the list with the lowest national IQ of 63 out of 185 nations followed by Sierra Leone.
The author, building upon his own previous theories that have not gained any recognition, and through showing an insignificant correlation between income, on the one hand, and life expectancy at birth, infant mortality and age-specific mortality rate, on the other, attempts to prove that there is a strong correlation between intelligence and life expectancy at birth, infant mortality and age-specific mortality rate. He further tries to expound this argument on a microlevel through surprisingly applying verbal intelligence test measured by GSS rather than IQ test to measure intelligence. The conclusion being as noted above.
The author heavily overelies in the majority of his work on highly controversial figures
like A. Jensen, and works like and “the Wealth of Nations” (by Lynn and Vanhanen) from which he uncritically copies the national IQ measurements!
In the highly controversial, and the Wealth of Nations, the IQ measurements and methodology are strongly criticized, which makes the work as a whole unreliable.
Even though so-called “national IQs†(if such a category/measurement can be viable at
all) for most of the 185 nations they study do not exist at all, they find ‘creative’ ways to undertake the measurement. So for example the national IQ for El Salvador is calculated out of the average of the national IQ for Guatemala and Colombia since they are both neigbours of the country in question? But in the case of Kyrgyzstan, they calculated the national IQ through an average of Iran and Tukey in which both are not negibours of the country in question. While in the case of Vietnam they calculated the national IQ out of the average of that of China and Thailand, even though historically the vietnamese are not related to the Thai while there is strong ethnic, cultural and historical affiliation to China.
From here, the authors ignore the ethnic diversity and heterogeneity of third world
countries, the shifting and imposition of national boundaries and movement of populations via immigration, for example, factors which all deem the calculation of a
national IQ impossible, not to mention Kanazawa’s conclusions. If empirically tested, one
can assume to find that Ethiopians in the Diaspora enjoy a healthier life than those at
home even though their IQ, according to Kanazawa, is necessarily the same since it’s
genetically inherited!
In addition, one wonders if a calculation of IQ is possible at all, and if so considering the
culturally biased current IQ measurement tests if their results are of any applicibality to
third world people, not to mention that the correlation between IQ tests and intelligence
which Kanazawa heavily relies on is one that awaits proof.
Furthermore, the Copenhagen Consensus Project have showed that deficiency in iodine
results in lower IQ scores and thus the relationship between inequality and IQ scores,
since particuarly in inland territories where iodine is scarce, only people with capacity
can obtain it. Also, the “Flynn Effect” that indicates that IQ scores improve with time is
totally neglected for the benefit of genetic explanations of IQ?! Moreover, Kanazawa
explains poorly why IQ itself cannot be a consequence of income inequality.
A quick look at the table by Lynn and Vanhanen of national IQs and a comparison
between Denmark and the US shows that even though Denmark ranks higher in
egalitarianism and wealth, the US still leads in life expectancy at birth, infant mortality
and age-specific mortatlity. Findings from the table Kanazawa himself so relies upon conflict strongly with his conclusions.
After carefully reading Kanazawa’s article, I came to see clearly that it is a miserable
attempt to stir debate through imposing his bankrupt theories of the Savanna Principle
and the evolution of general intelligence on the academic community and thus gain some
recognition! Having said that, I believe it is still a mistake to leave these views
unchallenged. The ideological conviction behind these views invokes only Western race
theorists of the 19th century that brought to the emergence of the Eugenics movement.
From here, I call upon Ethiopian and African health and medical professionals to
challenge these views publicly. I further call for the formation of a body of scholars that can follow and challenge such disgraceful views.
On Sunday, Nov. 5, at 10:30 pm, a sophomore student from Admas College was killed by a federal police officer on Bole Road.
According to sources, Bereket Hadgu, 24, was shot through the back while walking with friends, who were talking and laughing loudly. No words were ever exchanged between the policeman and his victim.
The officer, who has reportedly been taken into custody, has claimed that the gun “misfired” while he was hitting another student with the butt of the weapon. However, witnesses confirm that the shot was fired intentionally and without provocation.
The body of the student was returned Monday to his parents in Mekele, Northern Ethiopia.
afrol News, 2 November – A recent survey reveals that a large majority of Ethiopian women believe that the harmful practice of female genital mutilation (FGM) should be discontinued. Data also shows they are getting it their way. While 80 percent of Ethiopia’s women were circumcised in 2000, by now only 38 percent cut their daughters.
A country-wide study conducted in Ethiopia last year by the Central Statistical Agency of Ethiopia and the US survey companies ORC Macro and Measure DHS has now been released. The 433-page report – an updated national Demographic and Health Survey (DHS) – gives special weight to women’s reproductive health, therefore also including data on harmful practices such as FGM.
The survey reveals a rapid turnaround in Ethiopia regarding society attitudes towards harmful practices, and a strong victory for the many gender organisations fighting FGM in the country.
Interviews conducted with over 14,000 women and over 6,000 men showed that both FGM prevalence and acceptance was quickly dwindling. While in 2000, some 80 percent of all Ethiopian women older than 15 years were circumcised, this had gone down to 74 percent in 2005. This seemingly small reduction however only reveals how the practice of FGM started decreasing a decade ago, as most girls are cut at young age.
While their mothers were almost certain to fall victim to the knife, young Ethiopian girls by now are likely to avoid FGM. Indeed, only 37.7 percent of those women that were circumcised themselves said they had passed the harmful practice on to one of their own daughters – down from 52 percent in 2000. During the last few years, therefore, more than 60 percent of Ethiopian girls have avoided FGM.
This is also reflected by the question to Ethiopian women whether the practice of FGM “should be continued”. Only 31.4 percent favoured continuation – down from 60 percent in 2000 – while an overwhelming majority of almost 70 percent was against. Among the youngest age group (15 to 19 years), only 22.9 percent favoured continuing the practice of FGM and among Addis Ababa women, only 5.6 percent were in favour.
In all but one region, the trends towards rejecting FGM were clear, although the urban and the educated parts of the population has gone farthest in changing their attitudes. Thus, around 65 percent living in the capital or having at least secondary education are circumcised, contrasting 76 percent of rural women, 77 percent on non-educated women or more than 90 percent of women in the Somali and Afar regions.
The rural impact of anti-FGM campaigns nevertheless was strongly documented in the survey. In the Somali region, where 97.3 percent of all women over 15 years are FGM victims, only 28.1 percent of mothers say they have passed the practice on to their recent daughters. The Somali region is culturally close to Somalia, where FGM is almost generalised. In the culturally related Afar region, on the other hand, 85.1 percent of mothers had cut their daughters.
According to Dr Stanley Yoder, an anthropologist with ORC Macro and author of FGM chapter in the Demographic and Health Surveys, FGM practices in Ethiopia “range from a symbolic tiny cut on the clitoris to the partial or complete removal of the external female genitalia and partial closure of the vaginal area (infibulation).” This most harmful form of FGM has been inflicted on 6.1 percent of women nationwide, while it remains the usual form in the Somali and Afar regions.
In some countries, like Egypt and Ethiopia, FGM is an ancient practice, predating Islam. In some parts of West Africa, on the other hand, the practice of FGM began only in the 19th and 20th centuries, and is wrongly understood as being part of Islamic practices. By now, it forms part of traditions in 28 African countries.
LONDON – The London School of Economics is embroiled in a row over academic freedom after one of its lecturers published a paper alleging that African states were poor and suffered chronic ill-health because their populations were less intelligent than people in richer countries.
Satoshi Kanazawa, an evolutionary psychologist, is now accused of reviving the politics of eugenics by publishing the research which concludes that low IQ levels, rather than poverty and disease, are the reason why
life expectancy is low and infant mortality high. His paper, published in the British Journal of Health Psychology, compares IQ scores with indicators of ill health in 126 countries and claims that nations at the top of the ill health league also have the lowest intelligence ratings.
Paul Collins, a spokesman for War On Want, the international development charity, said the research ‘runs the risk of resurrecting the racist stereotype that Africans are responsible for their own plight, and may reinforce prejudices that Africans are less intelligent’.
Collins added: ‘The notion that people in poor countries have inferior intelligence has been disproved by much research in the past. This is another example, which other academics will shoot down.’
Philippa Atkinson, who chairs the LSE student union’s 85-strong Africa Forum and teaches in the school’s Department of Government, said the paper ‘reflects the now discredited theories of eugenics, which should have been left behind’.
‘Eugenics was a very influential discourse for centuries,’ she said. ‘It’s the discourse that colonialism and racism in America until the Sixties were based on, and was part of the basis of apartheid too. Nobody could prove that there are racial or national differences in IQ. It’s very, very controversial to say
that national IQ levels are low in Africa, and completely unproven. It’s a surprise that the odd person would try to bring it back,’ she said.
However, she said the research contained some interesting ideas and merited serious consideration, and stressed that academics such as Kanazawa should not be deterred from exploring controversial subjects.
The reaction to Kanazawa’s paper will reopen the simmering debate about whether academics are entitled to express opinions that many people may find offensive.
The Observer revealed last March that Frank Ellis, a lecturer in Russian and Slavonic studies at Leeds University, supported the Bell Curve theory, which holds that black people are less intelligent than whites. He also believed that women did not have the same intellectual capacity as men and backed the ‘humane’ repatriation of ethnic minorities. Initially, the university backed Ellis, despite protests by students and teaching staff, but he took early retirement in July.
Kanazawa declined to comment on either War on Want or Atkinson’s allegations about reviving eugenics because, he said, other academics had come up with the national IQ scores that underpinned his analysis of 126 countries. In the paper he cites Ethiopia’s national IQ of 63, the world’s lowest, and the fact that men and women are only expected to live until their mid-40s as an example of his finding that intelligence is the main determinant of someone’s health.
Having examined the effects of economic development and income inequality on health, he was ‘surprised’ to find that IQ had a much more important impact, he said. ‘Poverty, lack of sanitation, clean water, education and healthcare do not increase health and longevity, and nor does economic development.’
The LSE declined to offer any opinion on Kanazawa’s conclusions but defended his right to publish controversial research. A spokeswoman said: ‘This is academic research by Dr Kanazawa based on empirical data and published in a peer-reviewed journal. People may agree or disagree with his findings and are at liberty to voice their opinions to him. The school does not take any institutional view on the work of individual academics.’
Kate Raworth, a senior researcher with Oxfam, said it was ‘ridiculous’ for Kanazawa to blame ill health on low IQ and ‘very irresponsible’ to reach such conclusions using questionable and ‘fragile’ international data on national IQ levels.
Rumit Shah, chairman of the LSE student union’s 52-member Kenyan Society, said lack of education was probably one reason why many Kenyans die young. Aids, tuberculosis and malaria were key factors too.
Kanazawa’s article was a ‘misrepresentation’ of the true causes of ill health in Kenya, added Shah. ‘It portrays a bad picture of Kenya, because not everyone in Kenya has an IQ of 72. If there was more education, Kenyans would be wiser about their health.’
