Following a widespread alms boycott by Ethiopian Orthodox Christians, the illegitimate synod presided by Tagay Gebremedhin (formerly Abune Paulos) has decided to destroy the statue he recently built for himself in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa.
Although Tagay Gebremedhin and his cadres are trying to give a different spin to the decision to thorn down the statue, sources in Addis Ababa who are close to the Church told Ethiopian Review that the real reason is economics — churchgoers across the country simply refused to give donations. In some areas, church administrators were forced to make people pay for holy water.
We are gathering more information on this developing issue. Also watch the video below:
Prof. Seid Hassan has informed us a couple of years ago that without the hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign currency that Ethiopians in the Diaspora send to Ethiopia (remittance), the Meles dictatorship would have faced a grave financial crisis. In a recent book, Dr Aklog Birarra has pointed out that Ethiopians in the Diaspora remit over $1.2 billion through official channels alone such as Western Union. An equal amount of money is sent to Ethiopia through non-official channels such as hawala.
In considering anti-remittance campaign and other actions against Meles, it helps to revisit Dr Seid’s insightful article about investment in Ethiopia. [Click here to read]
Ethiopia’s mother of corruption Azeb Mesfin has found her match in Grace Mugabe, the wife of Zimbabwe’s dictator. The similarities between these two witches is amazing. Like Grace, Azeb is forming business partnerships left and right. Like Grace, Azeb is a whore. Read the article below about Grace Mugabe and judge for yourself.
When President Robert Mugabe’s younger sister, Sabina, died in Harare after a short illness, pictures showed the 86-year-old president looking devastated at her funeral.
According to one of Mugabe’s most trusted bodyguards who was present at the time, Sabina Mugabe, 75, warned her brother before she died that he was being betrayed by two of the most important people in his personal and political life: his wife and his personal banker, a pivotal member of his regime.
Sabina told the president that Grace and Gideon Gono, the powerful head of the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe and Mugabe’s confidant, were secret lovers.
Grace, 41 years Mugabe’s junior, has taken lovers before. One lover, Peter Pamire, died in a mysterious car accident. James Makamba, one of Zimbabwe’s richest businessmen and a top-ranking Zanu-PF official, enjoyed her favours but their affair ended in tears, too, when a furious and sexually jealous Mugabe ran him out of town in fear of his life.
But never before has Grace been romantically involved with a politician in Mugabe’s inner circle. And never before has a man so close to the president risked allowing it to happen.
The dangers from discovery are high. Zimbabwe state intelligence officials made it known that Mugabe’s detection of the affair had already led to the murder of the bodyguard present at Sabina’s bedside and more trouble would almost certainly follow.
“Once he hears something like that, I think someone will go and meet God,” said one intelligence official.
A pillar of the regime who Mugabe personally appointed in 2003 to head the central bank, Gono was a person he absolutely trusted ; furthermore, he was a family friend. The two have known each other since 1995 when Mugabe appointed Gono, then chief executive of a major Harare commercial bank, to be his personal banker.
“Mugabe trusted Gono. He even thought our boss was taking care of the first lady keeping a protective eye on her so that she could not again be adulterous,” said one senior official in Gono’s office who became aware of their secret affair, and who spoke out about it for the first time last month, on condition of anonymity.
Another in Gono’s entourage said Gono and Grace, who are business partners in several enterprises in Zimbabwe and South Africa, had been planning a life together after Mugabe’s death.
Mugabe’s marriage to Grace is itself founded on an adulterous relationship which shocked many Zimbabweans at the time. Grace was working as a junior secretary in the typing pool in Mugabe’s office and married to an air force officer when the two began having an affair. They had two children while Mugabe’s first wife, Sally – who was universally popular – battled a terminal kidney disease. After her death in 1996, Mugabe wed Grace, who is widely loathed and notorious for her lavish shopping sprees.
The Gono source said Grace and Gono first became romantically involved in 2005 and had seen each other regularly since. When they could not find an excuse to meet in South Africa or further abroad, they met at Gushungu Dairy Estate, Grace’s 1000ha farm about an hour from Harare.
They met twice, sometimes three times, a month.
They also met at the Harare home of a woman friend and business associate of Grace who is a Zanu-PF stalwart. They exchanged e-mails, which one official privy to them described as “explicit”.
He said Mugabe had always naively accepted as true Grace’s story that she and Gono are related. They are not, although both come from the town of Chivhu, 200km south of Harare.
The enormity of Gono’s betrayal would have come as a devastating emotional shock to Mugabe when Sabina revealed it to him.
Mugabe went to visit his sister between 6pm and 7pm on July 26 in the intensive care ward at the Avenues Clinic in Harare. As he sat on her bed with senior police commissioner Cain Chademana, his most trusted bodyguard, at his side, she told him the truth.
Central Intelligence Organisation (CIO) officials said Chademana told them of the discussion afterwards and said that the president left the meeting devastated.
“At first, Mugabe did not want to believe it was true, but Sabina told him to ask his men about the affair and make up his own mind,” said the officials, quoting what Chademana had told them.
“It was maddening because Mugabe had encouraged their friendship and sometimes asked Grace to see Gono to discuss mutual business matters.”
In early August, a few days after Sabina’s funeral, Mugabe and Grace left together for China on an official visit.
Mugabe took his sister’s advice when he returned to Harare later in August, the state intelligence officials said .
He summoned his bodyguard, Chademana, to tell him exactly what had been going on. Like others in the state security services close to the Mugabes, Chademana had had good reason to believe Grace and Gono were having an affair even before Sabina revealed it in his presence, but had thought it wisest to keep quiet about it.
When Mugabe summoned him in August, “Chademana admitted that he knew something was going on which he had not said before”, said the state security officials.
“Mugabe is said to have gone very silent.”
It was a fatal admission. A matter of days later, at the end of August, Chademana mysteriously died. State security officials handed over his body to his son, Welcome, for burial. No autopsy was performed. The dead police officer was a decorated veteran of Zimbabwe’s liberation war in the 1970s. He had served as Mugabe’s aide de camp for many years and officials in the president’s office let it be known that Mugabe was deeply shocked.
“It will be difficult for us to come to terms with this sad reality,” said Albert Ngulube, the department’s assistant director in a speech at Chademana’s funeral.
“We are not a murderous organisation but peace-loving Zimbabweans who are determined to protect our country.”
His remarks stopped further speculation of foul play arising from the bodyguard’s sudden demise.
But CIO sources last week revealed that Chademana was poisoned under Mugabe’s instructions by Mugabe’s intelligence men, allegedly employing an undetectable poison. The instructions were carried out after Mugabe had briefed Happyton Bonyongwe, the director general of the CIO.
It was a desperate measure to keep Grace’s affair with Gono from leaking out and making a mockery of the ageing president.
“Mugabe wanted it hushed up at all costs,” said a security official. “Gono is his personal banker, knows Mugabe’s financial secrets and is trusted. And there he is betraying the old man by having an affair with his wife.
“It would be too humiliating and could not be allowed to stand. In addition, Mugabe concluded that Chademana was the source of humiliating leaks about the president’s deteriorating health.”
Mugabe hopes the embarrassing secret of his wife’s infidelity with one of his right-hand men is safely buried with the body of the hapless Chademana in the Warren Hills cemetery outside Harare.
The reserve bank governor’s betrayal presents Mugabe with a dilemma. Throughout most of the last decade of political turmoil and economic meltdown Gono was central to Mugabe’s survival in power.
As the controller of the state coffers, he wielded enormous influence and patronage essentially saving Mugabe’s presidency by finding ways to keep the money flowing when the value of the Zimbabwe dollar had collapsed through hyperinflation.
By dipping into the coffers to fund all Zanu-PF projects, seeing the army generals and the security services were paid and bankrolling the party’s 2008 terror campaign to get Mugabe re-elected, Gono made himself indispensable.
After the reaching of a power-sharing agreement last year when Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai joined a coalition with Mugabe, Gono lost some of his power. But he still remains vitally important to Mugabe and the key figures in his regime and cannot be easily got rid of.
As Mugabe’s personal banker Gono, 50, manages the president’s vast family fortune looted from the country which Mugabe and Grace have stashed away in an opaque network of overseas bank accounts, business ventures and properties, many in the Far East. He also looks after the financial interests of General Constantine Chiwenga, the armed forces chief and others who surround Mugabe at the top and have enriched themselves through their positions.
A measure of Gono’s importance is that Mugabe unilaterally reappointed him to his post last year against considerable opposition from Tsvangirai and, clearly feeling his departure would be highly damaging, he has ever since resisted all demands to dismiss him.
Meanwhile, it looks as if Chademana’s killing could backfire. There are rumblings of discontent within the state intelligence agency where officers, already demoralised by low pay and the killing of Chademana, are talking. Last week several came forward with more revelations which showed the depth of Gono’s betrayal.
One who worked in Gono’s office said he first became aware of his boss’s affair with Grace several years ago when he accompanied him to Malaysia on official business.
During the visit Gono, who had been booked into the Sheraton hotel in Kuala Lumpur, the capital, quickly disappeared to the Berjaya Langkawi beach and spa resort on the island of Langkawi to see her.
The source said that he and his colleagues thought nothing of it until they came to settle Gono and Grace’s hotel bill for the stay and found they were paying for a double room.
Asked how he reacted he said: “In our job we never trust anyone. Even those we are working with we don’t trust. We saw and kept quiet. It is very sensitive.”
At the end of last year, he said, the couple had shared a room at the Cape Grace hotel in Cape Town. Another of Mugabe’s right-hand men, the former Air Vice-Marshal Robert Mhlanga – a key figure in the controversial exploitation of Zimbabwe’s Marange diamond field which is so rich it could make Zimbabwe the world’s top diamond producer – was also said to be aware of Grace’s affair with Gono but kept silent.
Mhlanga has hosted the couple at his Johannesburg house on several occasions during their so-called business trips to South Africa.
“Ask me for another trip like that!” Grace said to Gono afterwards in one e-mail message seen by the official.
More incriminating claims came from the workers at Gushungu, Grace’s dairy farm, an hour’s drive from Harare.
The couple pass off their frequent visits to the farm as business and make a point of arriving and leaving separately.
“At first I did not think anything was going on between them outside business because each time Gono came he bought money with him for the farmworkers,” said one.
“But later on I started suspecting that something was going on each time we visited the house after they had gone.
“No one was allowed inside while they were there. After they left we went back inside. At once it was clear the bedroom had been used for their meeting even though the first lady’s bodyguards had tidied up. They had remade the bed but we could see the sheets had been used. And we noticed the perfume in the bedroom.”
Asked if it surprised him that Gono and Grace were using the farm for an affair, one worker said: “I am not surprised by it. Some others might be. But those who worked at the farm and particularly those who worked in the house will not be astonished.
“It was only going to be a matter of time before someone said it for us. We could not say it ourselves because of fear.”
What exactly is a doctrine is a good question. It is a formal way leaders lay down their beliefs, principles, and/or vision so that their citizens will have some clue of where they are taking the country. Apparently Sarah Palin was not aware of the concept, when she sat down with a reporter before the 2008 elections. When asked regarding her understanding of the ‘Bush Doctrine’, the barracuda from Wasilla, drew blank. Her simple innocent answer was ‘in what respect Charlie?’
I do not want you responding ‘in what respect Charlie? when asked about the Meles Doctrine. There is of course a big difference between ‘Ideology’ and ‘Doctrine’. One can say ‘ideology’ and ‘doctrine’ are cousins that can easily be confused by the layman. Marxism is an ideology. Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism are upgrades. Then you have the poor man cheap Apps. that do not rise to the level of ideology, but are thrown in to give petty tyrants a certain air of intellectualism. Juiche in North Korea, Ujama in Tanzania, Green Revolution in Libya etc. are good examples. If you remember Ato Meles came up with ‘revolutionary democracy’ to explain his style, but unfortunately, it did not get traction. It was not definable because it was just empty rhetoric thrown in to explain single ethnic supremacy.
Let us look at some famous ‘Doctrines’ to get a better understanding of the term. I will start with the ‘Monroe Doctrine’. The Monroe Doctrine is a United States policy that was introduced on December 2, 1823, which stated that “further efforts by European countries to colonize land or interfere with states in the Americas would be viewed, by the United States of America, as acts of aggression requiring US intervention.” The US President was warning the European powers to stay out of this hemisphere.
The Truman Doctrine was a policy set forth by U.S. President Harry Truman on March 12, 1947 stating that the U.S. would support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent them from falling into the Soviet sphere. It was a warning to Stalin to stay put.
Last but not least, we have the ‘Bush Doctrine’. Compared to the other doctrines, the Bush Doctrine was as confused as the person himself. It was left open for others to define it and/or to attribute different meanings to the concept. It went something like ‘the US should depose regimes that represented potential or perceived threat to the security of the US even if that threat was not immediate.’ It was an open-ended policy to justify the use of military power. Those without a few nukes were worried.
The ‘Meles Doctrine’ was officially unveiled during his speech at the ‘World Leaders Forum’ last month. It was supposed to be a moment of great significance that will usher a new path of ‘salvation’ for the developing countries. It was a crowning moment organized by his friends and fans for our ‘Dear leader for life’ to shine in the international scene. Professor Stiglitz referred to it as ‘academic dialogue.’ A lot of work went into it. The speech was written, rewritten, proofread, and deemed Columbia worthy by all top TPLF cadres, at least all those that can read. Thanks to the ‘vocal Diaspora’ it fell on deaf ears. How could one formulate such an earth shaking theory with such incessant jabbering by misguided Diaspora and unworthy audience that filled the auditorium. Pox on all of them.
I will attempt to right that went wrong. I took my time and listened to the speech thanks to you tube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWoEPK9njWY.
Professor Joseph Stiglitz’s introduction was both revealing and sad. The Professor is a Nobel laureate and a highly respected economist. Why the good professor is ignoring the findings of highly respected international organizations regarding his guests alleged ‘criminal’ acts is not clear. I didn’t know being a Noble laureate entitles one to forgive and befriend dictators that believe in ethnic purity. I was a little surprised when he said ‘I hope he will, I am sure he will say a few words about Ethiopia’s economic progress.’ What else dear professor, when the title of the discussion was ‘The current global environment and its impact on Africa.’ Am I mistaken in thinking that the prime Minster will talk in general and support his argument with first hand experience as it affected good old Ethiopia?
He did not even mention Ethiopia. Not even once. Not even as an example of ‘neo-liberalism’s failure, the subject he is trying to prove passé. I felt insulted. We don’t even fare a footnote in such a forum. Anyway, without further ado, here is Ato Meles in his own words explaining the Meles Doctrine.
“The last three decades which could be described as the decades of the emergence and triumph of neo liberalism in key centers of global power and hence throughout much of the world have been very bad decades for Africa. They have for all intensive purposes been lost decades. At the beginning period Africa faced a huge burdens and associated micro economic imbalances and low rates of economic growth due to weak management of the economy and unfortunate external circumstances, therefore it was forced to seek support from the international financial institutions which had by then become key enforcers of the emerging neo liberal paradigm. Africa was asked to undergo fundamental neo liberal economic reforms and in return for the support it sought from the international financial institutions. These reforms were sold as the ultimate salvation for its problems and were supposed to lead to sustained economic growth and transformation. The reforms could not and did not lead to salvation. On the contrary the limited industrialization of the continent that has taken place since independence was reversed with no economic revival in sight…..Africans were made to see that neo liberalism was the only game in town ….. this insanity of implementing the same failed neo liberal policies and expecting different resulted in another lost decade during the 90’s. While Africa was mired in perpetual economic crisis and associated political malaise punctuated by horrific and senseless violence neo liberal globalization was making tremendous progress…(here he makes a linear analysis of the international economic situation regarding the emergence of China, India and others) …it was towards the end of the roaring 90’s that the pretense of neo liberal reforms finally leading to sustained growth then transformation in Africa was finally and more or less explicitly abandoned. Africa was now more or less explicitly being managed as a lost case, as a continental ghetto on the margins of a fast globalizing world….. Poverty in Africa was seen to be endemic. The new name of the game thus because not the transformation of Africa’s poverty thru neo liberal reform, thru neo liberal or other reform but the management of its chronic poverty. The objective became to alleviate poverty in Africa and limit the damage of its poverty to itself and to the rest of the world. A new generation of externally driven poverty alleviation strategies thus mushroomed over night thru out the continent…..the emergence of new players in the global economy in general and the emergence of China in particular was beginning to significantly impact on Africa’s economic prospect….as the emerging powers were either opposed to the neo liberalism or reluctant to evangelize on its behalf a new and different game came to town ….Africans have for the first time in three decades real alternatives to the orthodoxy, they now have a choice that they have not had for a long time. The fact the Africans now have a choice is in of itself fundamentally liberating above and beyond that Africans now have a real chance to chart a new course of development, one that incorporates best practice elsewhere and is capable to generating fast growth and transformation. “
That is his story and he is sticking to it. It is very important that you watch the youtube video or re-read the excerpt above. I just want to make sure you know that I am not making it up.
What exactly is the neo liberalism that Ato Meles is ranting about? Here is a definition of the term from wikipedia.org
Neoliberalism is a market-driven[1] approach to economic and social policy based on neoclassical theories of economics that stresses the efficiency of private enterprise, liberalized trade and relatively open markets, and therefore seeks to maximize the role of the private business sector in determining the political and economic priorities of the state.
Thus, what he is theorizing is that the West led by the US and Britain, forced poor Africans to follow this prescription that caused the current distressful situation. Unfortunate for the West, their bankrupt theory has come home to haunt them as seen by the ongoing economic melt down. On the other hand, it had a positive effect on countries like India and China, which brings us to his fantastic conclusion that Africans can now abandon neo liberal voodoo economics and follow the Chinese path that comes without evangelizing about certain bad and nasty African habits such as dictatorship, human right abuse, Kleptocracy, and general evil deeds.
The problem is Ato Meles is not some University professor going on a limb and coming up with fantastic scenarios to prove. No, Ato Meles is a leader of a country. He is, though a Prime Minster by title, the de facto King of Ethiopia. His wish is the law. His theory is the practice of his party. His belief is the national policy. All this is due to the simple fact that he controls the military and public security, both perfect tools of coercion.
Now it would have been better if he has volunteered some factual data to support his argument. After all this is not some Starbucks discussion where anything goes. If we are going to have an ‘academic dialogue’ as promised by the Professor, let us at least make it real and not some ‘Alice in wonderland’ tale.
When he claims that the International financial institutions ‘forced fundamental economic reforms’ on Africans, he should tell us what exactly they forced Ato Meles to do to get financial relief? Let us take the policy of deprivatization as practiced in Ethiopia. I don’t think the IMF prescription was to create a private business (EFFORT) in the name of an ethnic group or sell the illegally expropriated property back to the original owners at inflated price. We are not even going to talk about land. Ethiopia is the only country in Africa where all land belongs to the government and is leased by its people. Americans say ‘there is a sucker born every minute’, they must have been thinking of us.
When he says ‘Africa faced a huge burdens and associated micro economic imbalances and low rates of economic growth due to weak management of the economy and unfortunate external circumstances’, does it sound like shifting responsibility? Let us see Africa was mismanaged by the like of:
· Mengistu Hailemariam of Ethiopia 1974-1991. King of ‘Red Terror’ specialized in using ‘neighborhood committees (kebeles)’ to terrorize and murder over a million citizens. (Body count 1.5 Million lives) He destroyed a generation of future leaders that the country has not yet recovered from.
· Idi Amin of Uganda 1971-1979. Specialized in removal of organs (bodies were found with genitals, eyes, livers, noses missing) and prisoners were forced to bludgeon each other to death with sledgehammers. (Body count about 300,000 lives)
· Jean Bedel Bokassa of Central African Republic 1966-1979. Specialized in cannibalism and known for murder of Scholl age children for refusing to wear uniform manufactured in his factory. (Money count $125 Million)
· Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire 1965-1997. Specialized in what is known as ‘Kleptocracy’ where the distinction between state assets and his own was blurred. (Money count $4 Billion)
· Charles Taylor of Liberia 1997-2003. Rain of death on Liberia and its neighbors. Specialized in ‘child solders’ and his personal fortune was greater than Liberia’s GNP. (Body count over 300,000 lives)
Which of these gentlemen is expected to invest time and energy on good governance and nation building? Micro economic imbalance doesn’t sound credible to me. It is more like ‘lack of accountability and megalomania and a dash of grandiosity’ on the part of these mad men in charge.
As for the theory that commodities are bringing more wealth to Africa, it is a tried and tired notion. Africa’s problem is not the lack of money, but it is purely lack of democracy, the rule of law, and accountability. Look at Nigeria where the leaders have stolen over $400 billion from the oil income Yes, that is billion. Guess what they did with it? Deposit it in Swiss, London, or New York banks.
He concludes by saying ‘Africans have for the first time in three decades real alternatives to the orthodoxy, they now have a choice that they have not had for a long time.’ I fail to see what is new here. Didn’t we have a bi-polar world with just two super powers? So what is the big deal about replacing the Russians with the Chinese? Is the expectation that the Chinese for some pure altruism will be better masters than the ferenjis? Shifting between the West and the East did not bring us any gains last time around. They played volleyball with us. Should we give it another try? Didn’t Ato Meles make a choice when he followed the Albanian model? Of course, he grew up and replaced it with the Western model that he is outgrowing today. What is this madness about adapting a new model at this late in the game?
On the other hand, we are told and retold that the Ethiopian economy is growing double digits and is the talk of the continent. Why would anybody quarrel with such an impressive record? Shouldn’t Ethiopia be presented as poster country for the ‘triumph’ of neo liberalism? It is not good to bite the hand that feeds, is it? Or was the growth statistics a hoax? What is curious is that the Chinese we are trying to emulate are moving towards the Western model at the speed of light. Chairman Mao’s body was not even cold when Deng Xiaoping remarked “black cat, white cat, I don’t care what color it is as long as it catches mice”? Today’s China is boasting plenty of billionaires and the Communist Party is working overtime to balance economic growth and political freedom. A very elusive goal if you ask me. What part of that system are we ogling? Don’t tell me we are looking at the Chairman!
The Meles Doctrine should be declared dead on arrival. It needs work. It is not ready for prime time. The PM should go back to the drawing board and give his argument some meat. Declaration might work when one is dealing with underlings but scholarly work requires a little bit more diligence. In my humble opinion the ‘Doctrine’ suffers from tunnel vision. It looks at the world in one dimension. It is afraid to look out side of the box. I agree with his often repeated statement about ‘the insanity of implementing the same failed policy and expecting different result.’ Isn’t presenting the choice between the Western and Chinese model following a failed road.
The ‘creative potential’ of the Ethiopian people is not taken into consideration. Surely a people scattered all over that left their country bare feet to settle in strange lands and manage to send over a billion US dollars in remittances is a formidable force. They are the same people that work hard and invest in Ethiopia that Ato Meles is taking credit for. If it was not for the Diaspora remittance (a cool billion a year) TPLF’s Ethiopia will be one destitute place. We daily think of those that stayed behind and are suffering the brunt of the fire of poverty, ethnic degradation, famine and general apathy. They should be commended for being so calm and peaceful under trying circumstances. Our people are our precious asset. Our only choice is having faith in ourselves and meeting the challenge head on. There is no free lunch in this life. Both the East and the West require a pound of flesh for their handout. The idea of playing one against the other is a zero sum game. It is so yesterday, it is pathetic.
In preparation for a united front, Ethiopian opposition groups need to answer what their common goal is. According to Ethiopian Review editorial adviser Ato Sioum Gebeyehou, the common goal that binds every one in the country is Ethiopiawinet, i.e., to belong to one nation called Ethiopia. The following presentation by Ato Sioum explains that Ethiopia is a model nation of minorities that is a composite fabric of more than 77 ethnic groups. Click on the image below to view the 3-page presentation:
The recent lawless action of Ethiopian Sports Federation North America’s (ESFNA) executive committee in reversing a decision by the board to invite Birtukan Mideksa as a guest of honor has drawn the attention of a number of Ethiopian groups and concerned Ethiopians who have started to take a closer look at the 25-year-old organization. Ethiopian Review, on its part, has launched an investigation into ESFNA’s activities. Our investigation so far has uncovered the following. (We have also contacted the FBI with a request for investigation. Click here to read.)
1. The ESFNA 9-member executive committee is simply in the service of billionaire businessman Ato Al Amoudi, not the Ethiopian community in North America. ESFNA’s top decision-making body, the 27-member board that represents the soccer teams in the U.S. and Canada, has been stripped of its authority by Al Amoudi’s top aid Abnet Gebremeskel through bribes to some of its members and intimidation by a gang of thugs led by Ayaya Arega, Sebsebe Assefa and Demis Lema (aka Arawit).
Al Amoudi (center) wearing a t-shirt with Woyanne logo; top aid Abnet Gebremeskel (left)
2. Those executive committee (EC) members who are {www:subservient} to Abnet are given wads of cash, free plane ticket to fly to Ethiopia and stay at Sheraton Hotel for free up to 2 months per year. Those who try to carry out their responsibilities as board members are physically threatened by Ayaya and his thugs. The chairman, Mekonnen Demisiew, is the Girma Woldegirogis of ESFNA. For example, when he chairs meetings, Ayaya or one of the thugs simply snatch away the microphone from him and order him what to say or not to say.
3. Attendance has been declining drastically at the ESFNA annual events during the past 5 years. July 2010 was the worst yet. That seems to be fine with Al Amoudi and his Woyanne junta as long as Ethiopians who oppose the ruling party do not control this potentially powerful organization that can bring together tens of thousands of people from all backgrounds.
Ayaya Arega
4. ESFNA is currently facing a lawsuit that was filed at the Los Angeles Superior Court by its former auditor Assfaw Teferi.
5. ESFNA has not been audited by an independent auditor for over 20 years. A few years ago, when some ESFNA members led by the late Dr WM Akalou tried to clean up house, they had discovered that at least $40,000 was missing in one incident alone. The treasurer, who is part of the Ayaya gang, admitted that he took the money and was forced to resign. But soon after that, the stealing continued. It is not unusual for sacks of money to disappear following soccer matches and music concerts.
Arawit
6. Al Amoudi gave over $700,000 to the ESFNA so far, but it is not clear how the money was used.
7. Ayaya and Arawit have escaped from Ethiopia after allegedly orchestrating the savage beating and attempted murder of The Reporter editor-in-chief Amare Aregawi. They attempted to kill Amare after The Reporter begun publishing investigative reports about how Al Amoudi is manipulating the Ethiopian banking system. One of the suspects in the attempted murder is Arawit, who is employed by Abnet through Ayaya. Currently, Arawit is living inside a $3,000-per-month luxury apartment on Massachusetts Ave., Washington DC. All his living expenses are being paid for by Abnet, on top of hefty allowance.
8. While objecting to naming Birtukan Mideksa as a guest of honor, the Ayaya gang has forced ESFNA to name Al Amoudi as permanent honorary president of the ESFNA. As we all know, Al Amoudi is an active member and “election” campaigner of Woyanne.
9. For Al Amoudi’s Ayaya gang, ESFNA is a cash cow that they are milking at will. At one point, the Federation was generating up to $3 million in revenue at the one-week annual event. However, much of the one disappears without a trace. The players are forced to buy their own soccer gear (uniform, shoes, etc.) and some times they raise funds from their local community.
Al Amoudi aid and the real boss of ESFNA Abinet Gebremeskel who lives and acts like a mafia boss
10. It must be noted that most of the ESFNA members are innocent Ethiopians who are being victimized by a well-financed, mafia-like group under the supervision Al Amoudi’s aid Abnet Gebremeskel. Visible and active members of the gang are Ayaya Arega, Sebsebe Asefa, Endale Tufer, Arawit, and Fassil Abebe. Another member of the group, Solomon Tekle, is facing long prison term after being convicted of heroin trafficking. Their mission is to keep the ESFNA under the control of the ruling Woyanne junta, while stealing its funds with impunity.
Ethiopian Review’s investigation of ESFNA continues. We urge any one who has any credible information to contact us at [email protected] or call 202 656 5117. What we have uncovered so far is so outrageous that we are compelled to report our finding to the FBI. Click here to read.
Addis Dimts Radio has a discussion about ESFNA on its Sunday program. Listen here (forward to 1:04:01):
