(EMF) – Ethiopians residing in Oslo, Norway, held a rally on Dec. 10, 2008, demanding the release of the popular artist Teddy Afro. The demonstration was held in front of a city hall where the 2008 Noble peace prize was awarded.
Demonstrators chanted: “Free Teddy Afro!” “Free all political prisoners in Ethiopia!” “Justice and democracy in Ethiopia!” They denounced the dictatorial regime of Meles Zenawi and the unjustified arrest and of Teddy Afro.
Government officials and diplomats from different countries, journalists, and guests of the Noble prize ceremony observed the demonstration. Leaflets describing the politically motivated court drama against Teddy Afro, and the injustice in Ethiopia were distributed to the public.
The protest rally was organized by Kinijit Support and Development Organization in Norway
Nairobi — The government has blocked Kenyan members of President-elect Barrack Obama’s extended family from talking to the media.
Family members will have to ask permission from government before issuing making any statement concerning Obama.
The government will also vet all those seeking information about the family.
“We are doing this because we want to ensure better flow of information.
The government has decided that you should inform its officers who will be based here if you want to address the media,” Athman Said, an Under-Secretary in the Ministry of Heritage, told the Obama family in Kogelo yesterday.
A proposed Obama Cultural Home comprising of a museum, a gallery, a library and a leadership centre will be put up in Kogelo, Said told the family. A cultural officer, Dorcas Obege, will be assigned to Kogelo to vet visitors and others seeking information about the family.
Said, who was leading a delegation from the Department of Culture, said the government had set aside Sh30 million to upgrade the proposed Obama cultural home.
Athman said his department was liaising with the United States government to have both published and un-published materials by President-elect Obama on display at the proposed library. The government was also planning to produce a video of Mama Sarah Obama, the President elect’s step-grandmother, telling the history of the Obama family.
The government has graded all the roads leading to Kogelo and set up a police station within the home to protect the Obama family after there was an attempted robbery.
Kenya Power and Lighting Company has also connected power to what used to be a sleepy village. The value of land has doubled in the last few months and several investors are understood to be planning to build hotels in the area to provide for the many tourists who are expected to visit Kogelo on what will be known as the Presidential Heritage Tourism Circuit.
Heritage minister William Ole Ntimama confirmed that the government had decided to make Obama’s fathers home in Kogelo , Siaya district into a national heritage site.
“This is a great opportunity to open up the western tourism circuit and we have asked Treasury to find us some money so that we can roll out a number of projects that will make this a truly memorable cultural site,” said Ntimama.
He however expressed surprise at the veto on the family talking to the media. “I am not aware of that ban because my officers have not told me about it. It will be surprising if they have done that because it is not right. The Obama family should be allowed to say whatever they want to without any bureaucracy,” said Ntimama.
The location of the proposed heritage centre has caused a row in the family with some Obama relatives from Kendu Bay insisting it should be built at Kanyadhiang which was Obama Senior’s ancestral home before the family moved to Kogelo.
The family made the claims last week to Gender and Culture Minister Esther Mirugi who unveiled a signpost showing where the museum will be built in Kogelo.
(BBC) – More than 80% of Somalia’s soldiers and police – about 15,000 members – have deserted, some taking weapons, uniforms and vehicles, the UN says.
The head of the UN monitoring group on Somalia, Dumisani Kumalo, said Islamist insurgents got many of their weapons and ammunition from the deserters.
The head of the Somali police rejected the UN’s report.
Meanwhile, the African Union wants peacekeepers from Burundi and Uganda to stay when Ethiopian troops leave soon.
In the UN report, Mr Kumalo, the South African ambassador, also said most of the Somali government’s security budget – supposedly 70% of its total budget – disappeared through corruption.
The Somali police chief, Abdi Awale, said all the money had been properly spent, and only a few soldiers and police officers had deserted.
Peacekeeper pledge
With Somalia’s fragile transitional government facing a growing insurgency, the African Union’s top diplomat said he hoped the 3,400 peacekeepers currently stationed in Mogadishu would stay – despite claims by the Ethiopian prime minister that they would leave.
“We have asked the African countries to increase their participation in Somalia, asked the UNSC (UN Security Council) to join us there, and to the AU partners to help us financing this force,” Jean Ping said.
“A withdrawal from Somalia is something we cannot accept, not only the AU, but also the rest of the world,” he said, according to AFP news agency.
Mr Ping’s comments come in response to a statement in the Ethiopian parliament by Prime Minister Meles Zenawi that African Union peacekeepers wanted to leave Somalia.
The AU force, from Uganda and Burundi, had been expected to stay and even beef up its presence to make up for the planned Ethiopian pull-out at the end of the month.
Ethiopia has said Burundi and Uganda have asked its army to help their peacekeepers pull-out, but Burundi and Uganda have denied this.
The United Nations Security Council is due to consider a US proposal to send a full UN peacekeeping force to Somalia – something the AU has been pressing for.
Ethiopia troops intervened two years ago to oust Islamist forces from the capital, Mogadishu.
But different Islamist factions are again in control of much of southern Somalia.
Ginbot 7 Movement for Justice, Freedom and Democracy has launched a worldwide fund raising campaign today. In a statement released to the media, Ginbot 7 said that the fund will be used to carry out an all inclusive strategy that it has devised to remove the Woyanne tribal dictatorship in Ethiopia. Read the full statement below in Amharic:
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister dictator Meles Zenawi has declared “mission accomplished” in Somalia, and told parliament Ethiopian Woyanne troops will be home from their controversial two-year military mission within weeks. Mr. Meles also pledged Ethiopia Woyanne would guarantee the safety of African Union peacekeepers in Somalia, should they choose to withdraw. [The dumb Woyanne cannot even guarantee the safety of his own troops.]
The Ethiopian Woyanne leader admitted it has been impossible to crush the Islamist extremist al-Shabab forces and establish a stable government in the two years since he dispatched troops to neighboring Somalia. But he said that was not Ethiopia’s Woyanne’s objective.
That, he said, is the job of the United Nations, which gave legitimacy to Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government; the African Union, which initially pledged to send 8,000 peacekeepers that he thought would quickly replace Ethiopian Woyanne soldiers; and the international community.
But in answering questions in parliament, Mr. Meles said he was bringing the troops home confident they had accomplished the twin missions of preventing the establishment of a militant Islamic regime, and giving the international community time to intervene. [Woyanne is getting out of Somalia with its tail between its legs.]
“Our main mission was to defuse the plan orchestrated by Eritrea, accompanied by al-Shabab, and anti-peace elements in Ethiopia, he said. “We have defused it in a way that it cannot come again. That is, if we feel there are signs it is coming back again, we can take action. We did that in the first two weeks. Our second mission was to give the international community and Somali peace forces time to accomplish their mission of bringing lasting peace to Somalia. We consider two years enough time. So we have accomplished both our missions. Unfortunately, it has not been possible to bring lasting peace to Somalia.” [What a clown!]
Urgent efforts are underway to bolster the 3,400-member AU force known as AMISOM, and possibly transform it into a U.N. peacekeeping mission. If that fails, however, and the international community abandons Somalia, Mr. Meles said he has assured Burundi and Uganda, the two AMISOM troop contributors, that Ethiopia Woyanne will guarantee safe departure of the peacekeepers.
“When we intervened in Somalia, there were forces that stood by our side,” he saidi. “So when we think of withdrawing from Somalia, we also think about how those countries will withdraw their troops. When we withdraw, the Burundi and Uganda forces have told us that if we withdraw, they might like to withdraw. They have told us they would need our assistance to withdraw form Somalia. They say it would be better if we escort them first, then we withdraw.”
AU Peace and Security Commissioner Ramtane Lamamra is in New York for talks with U.N. secretary-general and Security Council ambassadors about ways of preventing a collapse of Somalia’s transitional government after Ethiopia Woyanne leaves.
African Union diplomats in Addis Ababa said the international community is showing a heightened awareness of the severity of Somalia’s crisis. The U.N. Security Council is said to be preparing a ministerial-level meeting on Somalia next week. The African Union Peace and Security Council will hold a similar session the following week.
Even so, diplomats said it would take months to replace the several-thousand Ethiopian Woyanne troops who are going home, much less to bring the AMISOM force up to its authorized strength of 8,000, or to transform it to a more robust U.N. peacekeeping mission.
In what are seen as significant political developments, the leader of the opposition Alliance for the Re-Liberation of Somalia returned to Mogadishu this week after a two-year absence, and the transitional government’s parliament is assembling for a meeting Saturday aimed at affirming a power-sharing deal.
Major Tzion Shenker, who currently serves as the operations officer of the northern Gaza brigade, will soon be promoted to lt.-colonel, thereby becoming the army’s first-ever Ethiopian battalion commander.
Commander of IDF Ground Forces Major-General Avi Mizrachi already approved the appointment, and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gabi Ashkenazi is expected to sign off without any objections. Shenker is expected to serve in the army’s Kfir infantry brigade, where he spent most of his career.
Shenker came to Israel with his parents when he was four. He walked with his family from Ethiopia to Sudan, and from there they were air-lifted to Eretz Yisrael. He began his life in Israel in Beersheva and later attended a dati school.
After being promoted he will be the highest ranking Ethiopian officer in the IDF, and he has already signaled he plans to continue, hoping to become the army’s first major-general.
IDF officials report that enlistment among the Ethiopian community is higher than in most other sectors of society, but the numbers entering elite combat units and officers school are relatively low.