By Yilma bekele
There are two special slang words that have been assimilated by the English language. They happen to explain certain circumstances in such a vivid way there is no need for further clarification. I am referring to ‘cojones’ and ‘chutzpah’. One is borrowed from Spanish and the other is Yiddish in origin.
Chutzpah is used to explain unashamed or insolent person. A good example is ‘having the quality of being able to murder both your parents, and then plead the court for mercy on the grounds that you’re an orphan.’ Cojones is a term meaning having balls, not scared. A perfect example is for someone to come home late after a night out with the guys, smelling of perfume and beer, lipstick on your collar, slapping your wife on the ass and having the balls to say, “You’re next.” You can say he has got cojones.
The current regime in Ethiopia is a serial practitioner of both these traits. In this futile attempt to present itself as a functioning ‘Sovereign Nation’ it gets plenty of ‘solicited’ help from the World Bank, IMF and US ambassadors in Addis.
It was only a month ago that the IMF declared ‘“Ethiopia has recorded impressive growth during the past few years—the fastest for a non-oil exporting country in Sub-Saharan Africa. Growth has been supported by structural reforms and infrastructure development, as well as favorable agricultural conditions.’ Well and good. May be we thought wrong. There really is progress and some how we just don’t see it. Sorry we were blinded by the 12 million starving, the high unemployment among the youth and the migration of the youngest and brightest.
Unfortunately we were correct. The World Bank has the ‘Chutzpah’ to backtrack and declare all to be an illusion. Now they say we are almost broke. The new report claims ‘Ethiopia is close to exhausting its foreign-currency reserves and may need a loan of $1 billion to fund food and fuel imports to avoid economic growth from slowing.’
Have you ever heard of such double talk? Aren’t we broke because we did not create a real growing economy? They are loaning us money so we don’t slow down? Our economy is supposedly growing double digits but we need an advance to feed ourselves. Just great! Thus we are going to borrow one billion to stay afloat. Don’t even think of the interest on a billion dollar. Believe me it is murder. You see in the realm of banking nothing is free. The idea is to squeeze every penny from the customer but all done legally. Ethiopia must have a bad rating. Being poor and on welfare does not help. We have no leverage. We are a very high-risk borrower. We are a candidate for a sub-prime loan or the IMF as a lender will dictate the direction of the economy. They call it ‘structural adjustment’.
The IMF will be either the lender or they will guarantee that the loan will be paid. The money will be used to buy oil and food. Oil from the Middle East and food from Europe and America. There will be no forward progress. After paying principal and interest we will have no money left for education, health infrastructure investment and other needs. They loan you money to buy stuff from them at inflated price. I bet you they even charge fees for ‘structuring’ the loan.
Never mind all that. The real ‘Chutzpah’ is that they are giving the loan to the same guys who caused the ‘melt down ‘ in the first place. They must know something we don’t know. What is for sure is the loan will be paid by Ethiopia. It looks like the WB and IMF view of Ethiopia does not extend beyond the balcony of the Sheraton.
Voice of America reported that Zimbabwe and Ethiopia have offered to evacuate nationals wanting to escape the anti-foreigner attacks in South Africa. You can say these two dictators have cojones. It also takes some chutzpah to ask a citizen you have exiled because of your failed policies to return to an empty house. So you travel thousands of miles crossing rivers and streams, hostile tribes, corrupt police and border guards, guides from hell, hunger, cold and unbearable heat to find work and they are offering to take you back!
Walta the government news service wrote ‘the government of Ethiopia launched here on Thursday its first-ever National Nutrition Strategy (NNS), which will ensure that all Ethiopians secure an adequate nutritional status.’ The regime does not lack cojones. In a country where there are 12 million starving citizens, the TPLF folks are swindling the ferengis to fight malnutrition.
On April 5, 2005, Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Meles Zenawi announced a plan to have Universal Internet Access in Ethiopia in 3 years. The Prime Minister was quoted as saying then “information technology lay at the heart of transforming the impoverished country where millions are dependent on foreign aid.” He continued “We plan to ensure universal access and Internet connectivity to all the tens of thousands of rural kebeles (districts) of our country over the next two to three years.” For a leader authorizing investment in highly specialized computer software to block websites it requires chutzpah to promise universal access. It is like buying a book with so many of the pages cutout.
In February 2007 Sudan Tribune on its web site reported ‘Ethiopia has an ambitious multibillion-dollar (-euro) plan to provide all its citizens with electricity within eight years…we already have plans in place to begin supplying power, hopefully, to Sudan and Djibouti by 2009, and Kenya by 2010,” Mihret said. Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation a government monopoly and a cash cow can only supply electricity to a little over 20% of the population. I believe it requires big cojones to promise 80% increase in production in eight years. It definitely calls for double cojones to sell power to neighbors who are producing double amount today. Here is a comparison of four African countries.
| Country |
Ethiopia
|
Kenya
|
Sudan
|
Ghana
|
|
|
|
|
|
| Population |
76 Million
|
36.9 Million
|
39.3
|
22Million
|
| Electricity Production |
2.86 Billion Kwh
|
5.502 Billion Kwh
|
3.94 Billion Kwh
|
6.64 Billion Kwh
|
| Telephone – Land |
725,000
|
293,000
|
636,000
|
356,000
|
| Telephone – Cellular |
866,700
|
6.48Million
|
4.68Million
|
5.20Million
|
| Internet Hosts |
89
|
2120
|
21
|
2899
|
| Internet Users |
164,000
|
2.77Million
|
3.5Million
|
609,800
|
| Radio AM |
8
|
24
|
12
|
0
|
| Radio FM |
1
|
18
|
1
|
86
|
| Radio Short Wave |
1
|
6
|
1
|
3
|
| TV Stations |
1
|
8
|
3
|
7
|
It is highly unlikely that we will be selling electricity to our neighbors. It we have the money it might be cheaper to buy it rather than investing billions on power plants. We can spend the billions on education and train future scientists to come up with new sources of energy.
‘U.S Ambassador to Ethiopia said that the successive economic growth being registered in Ethiopia as well as the stable political system are of paramount importance for the peace and stability in the Horn of Africa. Ambassador Donald Yamamoto told the Ethiopian government news service WIC recently that the presence of stable political, economic and social conditions in Ethiopia help the country play crucial role towards ensuring peace and order in the region as well as in the fight against terrorism.’
Ambassador Donald Yamamoto is correct in one out of five important tasks he mentioned. There is no stable political system in a one party state, it is called dictatorship. The economic condition is in a state of melt down with 12 million starving. Social conditions are abysmal in this environment. The neighborhood is very unstable because of us and the correct description will be war and disorder. When he said we are helping the fight against ‘terrorism’ he is correct. We are nothing but hired hands. But the problem is we don’t have terrorists threatening us. No one who is capable of doing us harm. Today, or in the near future. We have a choice to feed our people or to go to war. Our government has chosen war.
His predecessor Charges d’ Affaires Vicky Huddleston is remembered for telling Dr. Berhanu Nega to ‘abrogate his elected position and tell the public to accept as Mayor the person appointed by the regime. Her predecessor Ambassador Aurelia Brazeal, a black lady is famous for telling us that ‘democracy is a process and it takes time.’
I have no idea if these individuals have the chutzpah or they have the cojones. You be the judge. Mr. Obama, the Democratic Party nominee for the presidency in his victory speech said ‘the President of the United States isn’t afraid to let any petty dictator know where America stands and what we stand for.’ It is music to our ears. It is a notice to those who can hear. The business card Ato Meles printed which says ‘Meles Zenawi, Prime Minister, #1 terrorist fighter will have no currency in the next US administration. We Believe!!
By Dick Morris
Putting Hillary Clinton on the ticket for vice president creates a ménage-à-trois. Bill will be the unexpected roommate. Even if a President Obama can discipline Hillary and get her to play second fiddle, there is not the remotest chance that he can get the former president to accept such rules. Even if Bill Clinton wanted to rein in his newly prolific public expressions of rage and frustration, there is doubt that he is any longer capable of doing so.
Hillary, who likely desperately wants to be tapped for vice president, is going about it in exactly the wrong way. She seems to be demanding a kind of coalition government between herself and Obama, a definition of the vice presidency not likely to appeal to the president. It reminds me of 1980 when there were discussions of a ticket with Reagan as the presidential nominee and former President Gerald Ford as the vice president in a coalition government where the VP would have extraordinary powers.
Intended to reassure voters who were panicked by Reagan’s “extreme” conservatism, the arrangement never came to fruition, a development which gave us the House of Bush.
Instead of conceding defeat and campaigning for Obama, auditioning for the spot of loyal teammate, Hillary insists on keeping her options open and vies for the spotlight with Obama, exactly what you do not want a vice president to do.
Last night, when Obama went over the top in delegates and could claim the nomination as his, Hillary organized a rally of all of her supporters, directly competing for airtime with the newly minted nominee.
Adding Hillary to the ticket would not bring Obama a single vote (except possibly for Bill’s). Her supporters are divided into two distinct categories. The original Clintonistas were strong Democrats, party faithful, pro-choice, middle-aged and up, largely female and all white. But Hillary’s recent backers have been downscale whites of both genders who were turned off by Obama’s pastor, wife and other associates and were afraid he might be a Muslim in disguise. Unhappy about voting for a woman, they never really liked Hillary but turned to her when the alternative was Obama.
If Hillary had won the Democratic nomination, these latent backers of Hillary in the primaries might still have voted for McCain in the general. Their support of Hillary is purely linked to her opposition to Obama. Were she to join the ticket, they would vote for McCain anyway. After all, Obama will still be black and the Rev. Wright will still be nuts.
But adding Hillary to the ticket brings, along with her, Bill.
The public Bill Clinton has morphed over the past few months from a statesman and philanthropist to a petulant, angry, cursing, spoiled narcissist, accusing everyone of being sleazy and biased and in so doing fashioning himself as a foil for Obama. This unattractive image is not the right one for the bottom of a ticket in a presidential race. And make no mistake, Bill comes along with Hillary.
But the more serious problem is the public record that Todd Purdum, an excellent journalist, laid out in his Vanity Fair piece. Bill’s relationships with billionaires, his pursuit of financial gain, his alliance with the emir of Dubai, and his acceptance of speaking fees and income from some of the least savory of types is not what you need to carry around with you in a presidential race. To put Hillary on the ticket is to confront nagging questions about donors to the Clinton Library and Bill’s refusal to release them. It would be to inherit a load of baggage that Obama does not need as he tries to position himself as the candidate of change, antithetical to the corrupt and corrupting ways of Washington.
On her own, Hillary would be no bargain as vice president. She would never accept direction and never sublimate her ambition or agenda to Obama’s. But with Bill in tow, her candidacy becomes even more fraught with peril should Obama be inclined to bow to pressure and put her on the ticket.
– – – – – – –
Dick Morris, a former political adviser to Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.) and President Bill Clinton, is the author of “Outrage.” To get all of Dick Morris’s and Eileen McGann’s columns for free by email, go to dickmorris.com.
By Adam Fresco, Fiona Hamilton and Rajeev Syal
Times Online
Only four days ago Arsema Dawit was surrounded by those she loved most – her friends, her younger brother and sister and her mother – as she blew out 15 candles on her birthday cake. Yesterday those same friends streamed into the family’s neat three-bedroom flat in Waterloo, South London, struggling to explain why this sweet-natured choirgirl has become the latest victim of London’s knife crime.
Some chose to criticise the Metropolitan Police, which they say failed to take seriously a complaint that her alleged murderer had harassed and assaulted her in the weeks leading up to her death. But most were too overcome with grief to speak. Women covered their heads with white shawls out of respect for the family, some wailing as they entered the building. Arsema’s mother, Tsehay, surrounded by women, sat in one room of the flat with her son Robel, 13, and daughter Feruz, 12.
She was too distraught to speak to visitors, able only to acknowledge them with a nod. Berekati Asfeday, a family friend, said that Arsema’s mother was so upset that she “can’t talk, just cry, cry, cry, non-stop cry”.
The men sat in a separate room of the family home, which was was decorated with religious icons. “Everyone is so upset. It is a deep grief,” one male visitor said.
Those who had the strength to talk described a happy and deeply religious teenager who had fought against the odds since arriving in Britain from Eritrea more than four years ago.
The family had moved to at least three homes across South London before settling within sight of the Houses of Parliament. Friends said that the children’s father had not lived with the family for some time.
Arsema had learnt English and was busy preparing for her GCSEs at the nearby Harris Academy, with dreams of university and a career.
Simon Tesfaghiorgish, a family friend, said: “Arsema’s life was maths, history, reading and reading the Bible.”
She was determined not to forget her African heritage and was an enthusiastic member of the Eritrean community church, singing in its 20-strong choir. Most members of the congregation at St Michael’s Community Church in Camberwell were Eritreans fleeing the fighting against Ethiopian Woyanne soldiers in the East African region.
Father Yohannes Sibhatu, the parish priest, said: “She worshipped in this church and used to sing in the choir. She used to be very active, but in the last two years, for some reason, she was quite quiet.
“She was a nice girl, very likeable, and she may have had quite a few friends in the church. I am really shocked and really sorry for the family that this has happened. As a priest and as a member of the community – like everyone else – I am feeling very sad.”
One schoolfriend said: “She loved her church, and she doted over her brother and sister. She was loved, and loved others. We cannot believe it.”
Tragically, it appears that the church was at the centre of the cycle of events that led to Arsema’s death. Friends said that an older male worshipper had begun to take an unhealthy interest in her and as a result she had missed three recent Sunday services.
Mr Tesfaghiorgish said: “He wanted to marry her – he wanted her. But the family were not interested.”
Arsema and her mother complained to the police about the man on April 30. But 12 days later, when police tried to interview Arsema, she apparently failed to substantiate the accusations.
Mr Tesfaghiorgish said that he could not believe that the police had failed to act sooner after complaints had been filed. “The mother and the girl told the police a number of times that he had been harassing her. The police said they couldn’t take any action,” he said. “We are going to complain about this.”
Wayne Fort, a neighbour, said that he had seen a man arguing with one of Arsema’s female relatives two months ago. He said that the woman had been warning him to stay away.
“There was a chap who seemed to be infatuated with her. He seemed to have met her at the church,” he said. “I could see from the efforts of the elders of the family they were trying to get rid of the man.”
On Monday afternoon Arsema, dressed in her school uniform, stepped into the lift of her block of flats. It is believed that her attacker had lain in wait until she returned home from school.
Another neighbour, Cosima Paniza, heard Arsema arguing with a man on the staircase. “I went to put my rubbish in the chute and I heard the man and the girl arguing. I couldn’t get the words of the girl because she was shouting so loud. It sounded like he was threatening her,” she said.
Mr Fort’s partner and daughter found the teenager’s body. He said that his daughter had called him, screaming: “Daddy, Daddy, quick, come! The girl’s in the lift, she’s on the floor, there’s lots of blood.”
A blade was still sticking out of her side. The attack was so violent that part of the handle had snapped off.
An hour later officers arrested a man on suspicion of murder on the pedestrianised Hungerford Bridge in London, about half a mile from the crime scene. He had been spotted previously by passers-by apparently washing blood from his hands in a public lavatory next to the County Hall hotel.
He was later seen on the bridge, clinging to its side and talking into a mobile phone. He was arrested by two plainclothes officers wearing stab vests.
Yesterday, as postmortem examination on the schoolgirl took place, her fellow pupils were told of her death at a series of special assemblies. Many were left in tears at the announcement that their classmate was the 16th teenager to be murdered in London this year.
One schoolfriend said: “She was a very bubbly person. Almost kind of an angel. She was smiling all the time. I’ve heard a lot of things from different people but I don’t think she had a boyfriend. I never saw her with anyone.”
Cathy Loxton, the principal at Arsema’s school, the Harris Academy in Bermondsey, said “Arsema was a popular, friendly and well-behaved girl who had much to contribute to our school community.”
Arsema’s future had been considered so bright that to help to fulfil her potential she was being helped by a school mentor. Tirzah Bright, 22, overcome with emotion, could only say: “She was a very hard worker – she worked very hard. She was a nice girl. She didn’t deserve this to happen to her.”
12 day wait for police after complaint about stalker
Arsema had to wait 12 days for police to make contact after complaining that an alleged stalker had threatened to kill her.
Scotland Yard yesterday ordered an internal investigation into the actions of officers in the weeks leading up to the stabbing of the schoolgirl as she returned home on Monday.
The inquiry will focus on whether officers could have saved Arsema, who was found stabbed to death in a lift at the flats where she lived near Waterloo station, Central London.
The Times has learnt that Arsema and her mother gave police the name of a suspect who had assaulted and threatened to kill her, although it is not known whether she gave them the correct one.
The teenager, who sang in the choir at her local Eritrean church and celebrated her 15th birthday on Saturday, described the suspect as being aged 29 or 30. A man was arrested shortly after the killing in “an agitated state”. Although he is 21, police are confident that he is the suspect from the original inquiry.
The schoolgirl had gone to Kennington police station with her mother on April 30. She told officers that a man had assaulted her and threatened to kill her at a nearby McDonald’s restaurant on April 16.
The matter should have been dealt with quickly because it involved a young person, categorised by the police as being vulnerable.
The case was given to Southwark CID but it was not until May 12 that a Safer Schools officer spoke to the victim at her school, Harris Academy. However, Arsema denied any knowledge of the incident. A week later police contacted her mother and the inquiry was continuing when Arsema was killed.
A spokesman for Scotland Yard said: “The victim was unaware of the incident and had no knowledge of it. Despite this we continued to investigate the circumstances of the incident and Arsema’s mother was subsequently contacted on May 19.
“The investigation was being progressed when Arsema was tragically killed.”
He added: “It has been established that Arsema and the suspect knew each other but the exact nature of their relationship is unclear at this stage.”
Detectives from the Territorial Policing Violent Crime Directorate have started an internal review and part of their investigation will focus on what officers were doing for the 12 days before they visited the schoolgirl.
A source told The Times: “They will want to know what officers did and when. If they were given a name of a suspect, what did they do to try to trace him?”
It may be that officers went to the suspect’s address but he was not there or they did nothing. Investigators will want to know if the fact that the alleged victim was not cooperating influenced their actions.
A police officer said: “If it was an older man involved in the complaint you would hope that it would have raised flags with officers – he could have been a predatory paedophile.
“If officers knew where he was I would have hoped that they had gone round to speak to him. If they have not I would say they have been negligent in their duty of care to the victim.”
Detective Chief Inspector Caroline Goode, of the Homicide and Serious Crime Command, is investigating what happened in the weeks before Arsema was killed.
She said: “I am trying to establish the true nature of the relationship between Arsema and the man in custody. We are speaking to her family and friends to help to build a picture of events leading up to the murder.”
A new study shows that Amara and Tigre merchants founded the ancient civilization of Gebts 5100 years ago and as a result developed the world’s first written language of business and trade.
Gebts represented a prime location to sell their goods and products, which Amara and Tigre merchants appear to have done in the area since 6000 years ago. But the key to establishing the ancient civilization that we all know about was when the Amara and Tigre merchants moved their farms and production into Gebts. Once they did, they needed to develop a way to document workers, wages, productions and sales.
Evidence is found in the word for “writing” in ancient Gebts, “matet”, which of course means, “give a report,” in Amarigna (“mehtat” in Tigrigna).
Using drawn-out objects to represent vowels and consonants, the Amara and Tigre developed a written language that could be used with both Amarigna and Tigrigna. Each vowel or consonant was taken from an object that contained it. Thus a drawing of a leg (“bat”) represented the consonant “b” and a closed lock (“zege”) was drawn for the consonant “z.”
Moving Amara and Tigre farming production into Gebts meant the local Gebts population could be employed as the farming and production labor. This allowed the merchants to generate an economy that never existed before.
But also, moving into the new region stimulated the economy with export sales, since new international markets could more easily and quickly be reached from the north-facing ports of Gebts at the Mediterranean Sea. This was an important opportunity for both Amara and Tigre merchants, as prior to this, Amara had to rely on the Nile River and Tigre had previously done trade primarily through the Red Sea, Indian Ocean, Arabian Sea and Persian Gulf to the south.
As a part of the administration of Gebts by the Amara and Tigre, Amarigna and Tigrigna represented a unique 2-language national written language system.
Surprisingly, the study reveals that Amarigna and Tigrigna were not recently split from each other, as it is commonly believed, and were already distinct languages 5100 years ago. The study also shows that Amara and Tigre culture has remained very much unchanged from 5100 years ago; we use the same words, eat the same food, and share the same beliefs 5100 years ago as we do now.
To view a list of 250 words from the ancient Gebts writings, visit ancientgebts.org
