(AFP) – AN Ethiopian Woyanne kangaroo court has sentenced to death five top military officers of former Marxist ruler Mengistu Haile Mariam, for air raids that killed hundreds in an open market in 1980.
The state-run Ethiopian News Agency said the five officers were sentenced for the raid at Hawzen, along with five others given life sentences and four given terms of 19 years. All were tried and sentenced in absentia.
Ethiopian Air Force officers were [falsely] accused of bombing Hawzen in the northern Tigray region, killing hundreds of civilians on a market day on June 23, 1980, prosecutors said.
Ethiopia Woyanne has been trying former officials of Mengistu’s regime for the past 14 years for horrific killings carried out under his rule.
Most are in exile after rebels including the current prime minister, Meles Zenawi, overthrew him in 1991. Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe, where he lives in luxury under the protection of President Robert Mugabe.
The same court in January 2007 sentenced Mengistu to life in prison for killings thousands of people during his 17-year rule which included famine, war and purges including the “Red Terror” slaughter of suspected opponents.
Prosecutors have said his sentence was not commensurate with his crime and appealed for a death sentence in May. The court is expected to hear the appeal this year, but Mengistu is not likely to face justice.
(The Times) — If and when — and only when — a representative, internationally legitimate government has been installed in Zimbabwe, it will receive the support from donors and investors necessary for economic recovery to begin.
Zimbabwe today has one of the worst performing economies in the world. By the time of the elections on March 29, the inflation rate was estimated at 100000% a month, or nearly 275 % a day, a figure which makes the local currency essentially worthless.
But it is the human cost of the current crisis which defies comprehension. Life expectancy in Zimbabwe is the lowest in the world: 37 years for men and 34 for women. In 2004, the last year for which figures are available, it is estimated that around two-thirds of the rural population and over half of their urban counterparts (totalling some 7.5 million people) could not meet basic food and non-food requirements. Unemployment is more than 75% and HIV/Aids afflicts one in five Zimbabweans.
A number of international and regional economic initiatives have been proposed to end the crisis in Zimbabwe. For example, the International Monetary Fund’s 2007 “fishmonger’s” plan centred on the rapid delivery of foreign aid, amounting to US3-billion over five years, targeting key areas such as food support, infrastructure and emergency aid.
But while donor aid can play a stabilising role, long-term, sustainable recovery depends on getting the private sector working once more and on making fundamental reforms in some critical areas.
Firstly, it will be important to rebuild the foundations of its once highly profitable commercial agriculture sector, which previously generated most of Zimbabwe’s foreign earnings, employed the largest number of people, produced the largest proportion of the commodities needed by other industrial and commercial businesses, was the largest customer for the transport, construction, insurance, financial, commercial and legal service providers, and gave rise to the bulk of the government’s tax revenues.
Secondly, the “land issue” is central to conditions and perceptions of governance and the rule of law in Zimbabwe. Clear policy on land is required as a key step in rebuilding domestic and foreign investor confidence in public institutions and practices. The inequitable, pre-1999 land dispensation can neither be reinstated, nor can the currently unsustainable situation, which has brought untold misery to millions of Zimbabweans, be tolerated. A balanced strategy involving reform, restitution and recapitalisation has to be devised for the land to realise its true commercial (and collateral) value.
A pragmatic and more equitable arrangement also calls for a systematic targeting of a small number of farmers previously engaged with large-scale farming and willing to return. Their knowledge and experience should be harnessed as part of a new contract between them and a select number of incumbents who have — by whatever means — taken up title to farmland. This new agreement should seek firstly to provide food security in Zimbabwe and, over time, to become a driving force of the country’s economic recovery, exploiting both its available skills and economies of scale.
The police force has ceased to be a national force and has become a party police force of Zanu-PF. In the judiciary, judges who found against Zanu-PF in the initial land cases have been marginalised and were eventually forced to resign if they did not heed government’s wishes. The military, too, has become an extension of the ruling party. Its powers and responsibilities have been directed towards protecting the party and suppressing any form of opposition.
A health warning: if Zimbabwe’s rate of economic decline has averaged more than 8% a year since 2000, it will take the same rate of growth for the same period to get back to the moment of decline.
Nonetheless, as has been learned from post-conflict situations including Ethiopia and Mozambique, a rapid bounce-back to respectable levels of income is possible if there is political normalisation and the reinstatement of market principles to the economy.
Dr Herbst is Provost at Miami University of Ohio and author of State Politics in Zimbabwe; Dr Mills heads the Johannesburg-based Brenthurst Foundation; Dr McNamee is with the Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies based in Whitehall, London
The Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) is prompted to issue this statement in response to the statement by the UN’s News release, dated March 28, 2008. The News Release reports, among others, that, “The deteriorating situation with regard to human health, food security, livelihoods, and livestock health, initially reported in Borne zone has spread to Bale, East Hararge, Guji and Liben zones of Oromia Region. Poorly performing rains for upcoming rainy season forecast by National Meteorological Agency are likely to exacerbate the exiting situation in lowland agropastoral areas of Oromia Region.” The report predicts that, “An estimated 88, 000 people in affected woredas [districts] in Borana zone require emergency assistance from government, humanitarian partners and UN agencies.” The News Release also warns of similar “emergence of hotspots in the SNNPR.”
The OLF applauds the UN’s news release for bringing to the attention of the World Community the grim situation that Oromo people are facing at this difficult time and for calling for emergency assistance for those affected in Oromia and other parts of Ethiopia. The OLF leadership believes that no responsibility is greater and no calling nobler than saving the lives of our pastoralists and farmers who are victimized by forces beyond their control.
At the same time, the OLF would like to point out that the cause that the UN Report gives to the calamitous situation of the Oromo people as “poorly performing rain” is only a part of the truth. The other part of the truth is bad governance of the Ethiopian regime, which has made the lives of the Oromo truly miserable. What is more, the current Ethiopian regime, which is dominated by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), follows discriminatory and lopsided economic development policy in Oromia and other regional states in southern Ethiopia.
It is imperative to remember that since the Meles regime came to power in 1991″the effects of the dry season”, the usual cause for famine in Ethiopia has shifted from Northern Ethiopia, in general, and Tigrai, in particular, to the Southern Ethiopia, in general, and Oromia, in particular. The Tigrai region, the home base of the Meles and the regime’s ruling elites, that used to be known for drought and famine for several decades, is now boasting for unheard of all round economic progress. These days there are no warnings of famine concerning Tigrai. It is good news that Tigrai economy is progressing and the people of Tigrai are no longer subjected to starvation like the Oromo.
At this point it is pertinent to ask why Oromia is starving while Tigrai is prospering? Since the creation of the modern Ethiopian empire in the 1880s Oromia has been known as the breadbasket of Ethiopia. More than sixty percent of Ethiopian government revenue comes from Oromia. Most of Ethiopian cash crops come from Oromia. Oromia, the Oromo regional state, is the most fertile part of Ethiopia, which enjoys abundant rainfall and has numerous rivers and lakes. With its hardworking farmers and abundant animal population Oromia always prided itself not only on its self-sufficiency in food production, but also produced surplus for the rest of Ethiopia and for international market.
Why is the same land now starving and needs humanitarian assistance of food? The answer is very clear. The root cause of the famine in Oromia is the TPLF regime’s policy towards Oromo people. Because the Oromo constitute almost forty-five percent of the population of Ethiopia, the TPLF, which represents less than seven percent of the population of Ethiopia, fears Oromo numerical strength. As a result the TPLF dominated Ethiopian regime follows the policies of destroying all independent Oromo organizations and impoverishing the Oromo people.
How does the TPLF regime impoverish the Oromo people? The regime follows well documented discriminatory economic policies. It provides disproportionate and unfair budget allocation to Oromia. It is this regime that has classified the educated and the entrepreneurial classes of the Oromo as enemies of its ‘revolutionary democracy’ ideology. What is more, the regime has imposed gross human rights violations in Oromia, which forced tens of thousands of Oromo farmers to seek refuge in the neighboring countries in the Horn of Africa and beyond. Since it came to power in 1991, the current Ethiopian regime has dispossessed, displaced, and disenfranchised tens of thousands of the Oromo people, which is the real root cause for the underdevelopment and starvation in Oromia
today.
As if its gross human rights violations in Oromia are not enough, the irresponsible and myopic TPLF regime has been engaged in an intentional deforestation of Oromia since it came to power. On the pretext of flushing out the OLF guerrilla fighters, the current Ethiopian authorities, intentionally set fire to Oromia’s natural forest that is a cause for the fast degradation of Oromia’s ecological system. It is worthy of note that the most recent intentionally set fire to Oromia’s natural forest is that of the Shakiso forest of Bale zone destroying huge forests.
The OLF would like the UN and the world community to know that the TPLF regime is punishing the Oromo people for demanding their fundamental human rights. The regime deprived the supply of fertilizer to Oromo farmers for their alleged support of the OLF. It was with the intention of depriving the Oromo people a relief and development assistance that the TPLF regime banned the Oromo Relief Association (ORA) from legally functioning in the country.
The regime also illegally confiscated ORA’s assets and properties, including a ready for distribution relief and humanitarian aid. The TPLF regime has either withheld the humanitarian and development assistance provided by the Western World from the Oromo people or diverted it to the Tigrai region or used it for a provision of its armed and security forces.
Therefore, the OLF calls on the UN and other humanitarian agencies to directly help the needy Oromo and other people in Ethiopia. We also request that the UN and other humanitarian agencies make sure that the humanitarian aid that they provide reaches the needy people. The TPLF regime is totally discredited to be entrusted with the task of distributing humanitarian aid.
The OLF would like the UN and the world community to know that so long as the tyrannical regime of Meles Zenawi is in power, the World Community would continue to hear more alarming reports about the famine in Oromia and other parts of Ethiopia. What will end famine and gross human rights violations in Ethiopia will be the replacement of the current regime by a government that does not discriminate among its citizens, a government that does not pursue discriminatory economic development policies, a government that is accountable to the people, a government that honors the rule of law and human rights.
Finally, the Oromo people are struggling for their freedom and basic democratic rights- to life, liberty and pursuit of happiness. We call upon the Western World and all concerned governments and organizations to impress upon the Ethiopian government to immediately stop its gross human rights violations in Oromia and other parts of Ethiopia and to end without delay its discriminatory economic development policies, which are the main cause of famine in Oromia.
Victory to the Oromo People!
Daawud Ibsaa
Chairman, National Council of the OLF
The Woyanne-controlled kangaroo court in Ethiopia has handed down long-prison and death sentences against officials and military officers of the Derg regime today. Some of those who sentenced to death are air force pilots who had been accused of bombing civilian targets in Tigray region. There are, however, reports that some of the civilian bombings in Tigray were orchestrated by Woyanne. For the Woyanne tribalists, it’s appropriate to gun down students in Addis Ababa, wipe out villages in Ogaden, bomb markets in Mogadishus and kill thousands of civilians, but those who are accused of harming the ‘golden’ tribe face firing squads. The following is a report by Woyanne’s Ethiopian News Agency.
High Court passes down sentences on 19 genocide convicts
A/A, April 4, 2008 (Addis Ababa) – The Federal High Court on Friday passed down sentences ranging from death penalties to 19 years in jail on 19 genocide convicts while having deferred the sentence of one convict who is standing trial at an appeal court.
Five of the convicts have been sentenced to death, five of them to life, another five to 25 years and the other four to 19 years in jail.
Accordingly, Colonel Mengesha Hunde, Captain Tedesse Agonafir, Colonel Alemayehu Esatu, Major Markos Solomon and Major Getahun Kassa, all tried in absentia, have been sentenced to death.
The relevant Bench of the court also sentenced Captain Aboneh Negash, Captain Mesfin Mengistu, Captain Getachew Mengesha, Captain Zenebe Asfaw and Lieutenant Colonel Tilahun Bogale each to life in prison. These of convicts were also tried in absentia.
Lieutenant Jelcha Derra, Captain Dereje Abdissa, Captain Assefa Tegegn, Major Wondwosen Bekele and Lieutenant Colonel Yeshitla Mersha have been sentenced to 25 years in jail.
In a related development, of the five convicts who were tried in their presence, Colonel Berhanemeskel Haile received a sentence of 25 years reduced from a previous death sentence, Colonel Girma to 20 years from life, Colonel Solomon Kebede and Captain Kifle Wube to 19 years from 25 years.
The case of Captain Legesse Asfaw was deferred because he is standing trial after the special prosecutor and defense lawyers took the case to the Federal Supreme Court on appeal of a verdict passed by the Federal High Court.
Captain Legesse and most of the present convicts were found guilty of ordering the horrendous air raid at an open market day on Sene 15 (June 23) in 1980 E.C. in Hawzen in which thousands of civilians were massacred.
