Most of my readers know how much I enjoy “bedtime stories”. Recently, I wrote about my favortie bedtime story of Pinocchio in Africa. Ever heard of the story of Chicken Little? One day Chicken Little was scratching around the yard when something fell on her head. “Oh,” screeched Chicken Little, “The sky is falling. I must go tell the king.” Chicken Little ran and ran until she met Henny Penny. “Why are you running so fast, Chicken Little?” asked Henny Penny. “Ah, Henny Penny,” said Chicken Little, “the sky is falling, and I must go and tell the king.” Chicken Little and Henny Penny told the same story to Ducky Daddles, Goosey Loosey, Turkey Lurkey and Foxy Loxy along the way to the king’s house. “I know a shortcut to the palace,” said Foxy Woxy. “Come and follow me.” But the wicked Foxy Woxy led them right up to the entrance of his foxhole where he planned to dine on the fine feathered friends. Just as they were to enter the hole, they heard the king’s hunting dogs growling and howling. Foxy Woxy ran across the meadows and through the forests with the hounds on his tail. He ran until he was far, far away and never returned.
The story of Chicken Little illustrates the angst, hysteria and paranoia of the ruling regime in Ethiopia. The sky is always falling whenever dictator Meles Zenawi wants to tighten the screws on news and information reaching the people. In 2010, Zenawi justified electronically jamming Voice of America Amharic broadcasts by making the preposterously outrageous claim that the Voice of America was promoting genocide in Ethiopia: “We have been convinced for many years that in many respects, the VOA Amharic Service has copied the worst practices of radio stations such as Radio Mille Collines of Rwanda in its wanton disregard of minimum ethics of journalism and engaging in destabilizing propaganda.” In other words, the Voice of America is the Voice of Genocide, Rwanda. In February 2012, Lebanon’s Telecommunications Minister Nicolas Sehnaoui served a formal complaint on the ruling regime in Ethiopia and demanded an immediate end to the illegal practice of jamming Arabsat transmission of ESAT (Ethiopian Satellite Television) programming.
In the past year, Zenawi has been telling the world that he has caught and jailed some of the most dangerous and wild-eyed terrorists in Ethiopia today, including the incomparable Eskinder Nega, the 2012 winner of the prestigious Pen’s Freedom to Write Award, the indomitable Reeyot Alemu, a young woman journalist who won the 2012 International Women’s Media Foundation Courage in Journalism Award and the intrepid Woubshet Taye, managing editor of the now shuttered Awramba Times. Last week, in his statement in the Congressional Record, U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy noted that the ruling regime in Ethiopia has made it impossible for “journalists like Eskinder Nega to do their work of reporting and peaceful political participation.”
Zenawi has been running in overdrive trying to plug every nook and cranny by which Ethiopians could get news and information from independent sources. According to recent statements of Reporters Without Borders Africa (RWB), “The Ethiopian government is trying to attack every means of information exchange.” Ethiopia’s Chicken Littles are so paranoid that they are now requiring the printing presses over which they have total monopoly to censor newspapers printed in the country. Last month, Berhanena Selam, the largest regime-owned printer and other smaller printers were “trying to impose political censorship on media content before publication.” In a proposed “standard contract for printing”, these printers claimed they have the right to refuse to print any text if they determine they have “adequate reason” it breaks the law. RWB noted, “This [contract] openly contravenes article 29 of the 1994 federal constitution, which guarantees press freedom and bans censorship in any form…. Only an independent and impartial judge should have the power to impose any kind of sanction or prohibition affecting media freedom.” Nice try by RWB, but talking constitutional law to Zenawi and Co., is like preaching Scripture to a gathering of Heathen.
RWB further reported that the regime-owned internet service provider “Ethio-Telecom” had installed a system for blocking access to the Tor network, which allows users to browse and access blocked websites anonymously. According to data published by Tor, the highest number of Tor users in Ethiopia between March and June 2012 peaked at a little over 350 individuals! All of the trouble and expense to block fewer than 400 individuals out of 85 million from anonymously browsing the internet.
The Skype is Falling!
Skype and other internet-based phone call services and social media are popular among a microscopic segment of the younger set who have access to the internet cafes in the urban areas and affluent types who could afford a personal computer and internet service. But the number of users of Skype-type services is infinitesimally small and the available internet service in the country is limited, unreliable and retrograde. A 2010 Manchester University’s School of Education study cited in Freedomhouse’s Freedom on the Internet 2011 report (FFI 2011) found that “accessing an online e-mail account and opening one message took six minutes in a typical Addis Ababa cybercafe with a broadband connection.” Anyone who has made or received Skype calls to or from Ethiopia knows that it is like pulling teeth, an exercise in self-aggravation. Ethiopia is only second to Sierra Leone Internet for having the least internet penetration at 0.5 percent of that country’s 85 million population. Internet service is “almost entirely absent from rural areas” where 85 percent of the population lives, according to FFI 2011. Similarly, Ethiopia is the only country in Sub-Saharan Africa to impose nationwide, politically motivated internet filtering:
Although Ethiopia is one of Africa’s most populous countries, poor infrastructure and a government monopoly on telecommunications have significantly hindered the expansion of digital media. As a result, Ethiopia has one of the lowest rates of internet and mobile telephone penetration on the continent… The government has responded by instituting one of the few nationwide filtering systems in Africa, passing laws to restrict free expression, and attempting to manipulate online media. These efforts have coincided with a broader increase in repression against independent print and broadcast media since the 2005 parliamentary elections, in which opposition parties mustered a relatively strong showing.
Why would Zenawi want to send a citizen to the slammer for 15 years just for making a phone call using a computer phone? Informed commentators suggest that the “telecom fraud law” is motivated by the bottomless greed and consuming paranoia of those who cling to power in Ethiopia like engorged ticks on an African milk cow. Elizabeth Blunt, a former BBC correspondent in Ethiopia, explains that the telecom fraud law is intended to suppress competition by “Internet cafes [which] may be allowing people to make calls for far less than the cost of Ethiopia telecom, the state’s telecommunications provider that has the monopoly and charges very high prices – and doesn’t want to have its service undermined. But there is also the issue that Skype can’t be listened to so easily and can’t be controlled.” RWB is concerned that the latest paranoia which has caused the regime to “block access to Tor might be the first step towards creating a system that would allow the regime to intercept any email, social network post or VoIP call made in the country.”
The 2012 “Proclamation on Telecom Fraud Offences”
The now widely publicized “Proclamation on Telecom Fraud Offences” (PTFO) 2012 appears to be in draft form, despite reports to the contrary. The PFTO purportedly repeals provisions in Art. 25 of the Telecommunications Proclamation No. 49/1996 as amended by Proclamation No. 281/2002. But none of that amounts to a hill of beans because there has never been a draft “law” presented to Ethiopia’s rubber stamp parliament that has ever been rejected. Draft or no draft, for the rubber stamp parliament, Zenawi’s word is law. The rubber stamp parliament will blindly adopt the most nonsensical, illogical, ineffectual and immoral “laws” presented to it by Zenawi. Without a shadow of a doubt, the rubber stamp parliament will unanimously (at least by a margin of 99.6 percent) approve the PTFO . But what the hell is the PTFO?
It appears that the PTFO is another one of those haphazard and slipshod cut-and-paste jobs (similar to the so-called “Anti-Terrorism Proclamation No 652/2009) scarfed from the laws of other countries, arguably the U.S. The patches of vacuous phrases and empty clauses interspersed in the PTFO uncannily mimic certain U.S. anti-wire fraud statutes such as 18 U.S.C §§ 1343 (wire fraud), 1029 (fraud and related activity in connection with access devices) and 1030 (fraud and related activity in connection with computers). The U.S. laws, consistent with the presumption of innocence, require the government to prove knowledge, intent and willful participation of the accused in the fraudulent act or scheme using wires or electronic access devices.
The PTFO is completely oblivious of the most elementary requirements of any criminal law: the concurrence of intent (mens rea) and the commission of the criminal act (actus reus). For instance, under Part Two (2) of the PTFO, “whosoever uses or holds any telecommunications equipment without obtaining prior permit… shall… be punishable with rigorous imprisonment from 1 to 4 years…” Accordingly, “‘telecommunications equipment’ means any apparatus used or intended to be used for telecommunications services, and includes its accessory and software.” Under these tandem provisions, any person who “holds” a mobile phone, a child “holding” a toy Walki-Talkie, or any person who “holds” a laptop bundled by the manufacturer with communications sofware or encoded in the operating system or hardware without license from the Ministry of Communications would be looking at “1-4 years” in the slammer. (Obviously, those who drafted the “law” are clueless about the evidentiary distinction between “holding” and “possession”.) Arguably, anyone who uses a tin can phone (which is within the PTFO’s definition of “telecommunications equipment” since “electromagnetic” waves vibrate through the string connecting the cans) would be exposed to the same penalty. The PTFO is the kind of law Charles Dickens would have called “an ass, an idiot”.
On its face, the PTFO is a “law” made necessary by the alleged fact that “the legal provisions in the country are not sufficient to prevent and control telecom fraud.” Telecom services includes “cellular mobile service, internet data communication” and other “transmissions or receptions through the agency of electricity or electromagnetism (sic)…” Anyone who “manufactures, assembles, imports any communications equipment without permit” will be sitting in the penitentiary between 10-15 years in prison. Anyone who “uses or holds” such equipment is looking at 1-4 years. Anyone who provides “telecom service without license” will be locked up between 7-15 years. Anyone who “uses telecom network or apparatus to disseminate any terrorizing message connected with a crime with the anti-terrorism proclamation….” faces 3 to 8 years (Art. 6). Anyone who “obtains any telecom service without payment of lawful charge or by means of fraudulent payment” will be punished by “rigorous imprisonment from 5-10 years.” (Art. 7). Anyone who “establishes any telecom infrastructure” or “bypasses the telecommunication infrastructure other than the telecommunication infrastructure established by the telecommunication service provider (sic)” is subject to 10-20 years imprisonment (Art. 9). Anyone who “duplicates SIM cards, credit cards, subscriber identification numbers…” faces 10-15 years imprisonment. “Whoever provides telephone call or fax services through the internet commits an offense punishable by 3-8 years.” The person using the service will cool his heels in the clink for up to 2 years. (Art. 10, 10(3)).
Law Making in a Rubber Stamp Parliament
No one should see how sausages, or laws are made in Ethiopia’s rubber stamp parliament. Perhaps that is an overstatement. The fact is that “laws” are not made in Ethiopia’s parliament. They are rubber stamped. That parliament approves “laws” faster than a Chinese factory can crank out a T-shirt. But rubber stamping the will of one man does not a law make. As Shakespeare said, “Lawless are they that make their wills their law.”
The PTFO is a pitiful exercise in lawmaking. In substance and form, it is no different than the dozens of “proclamations” that have been approved by the rubber stamp parliament over the past decade. It is arbitrary, capricious, thoughtless, reckless and, and most of all, pointless. Having studied so many of these “proclamations” over the years, I am amazed and dismayed by what passes as lawmaking in Ethiopia’s parliament. In one of my recent commentaries on the cut-and paste anti-terrorism law proudly pirated from the laws of other countries, I stated: “I cringe in total embarrassment at such a stunningly shallow understanding of jurisprudence, glib talk about the law and inattention to a glaring logical fallacy in one’s argument.”
The deficiencies of the PTFO are not limited to lack of legislative purpose, policy substance or logical structure; they also extend to the cavalier, crude and clumsy approach to legislative draftsmanship. On its face, the PFTO is bereft of any elementary sense of proportionality, the simple idea that the punishment should fit the crime. How can any sensible legislator or executive propose to punish a citizen with 15 years hard labor for talking into a computer phone? This is not just inane, it is insane!
Equally important, the PFTO is unsupported by any discernible legislative need or justification. In its preamble, it states that “the legal provisions in the country are not sufficient to prevent and control telecom fraud.” But that claim is completely speculative and unsupported by any factual findings. There are no studies referenced – independent or regime-sponsored – which show the magnitude of the “internet fraud” problem or the alleged threat to “national security” posed by the improper or illegal use of the internet. There is no research or analysis supporting the proclamation. There is no expert testimony to support it and no opportunity has been made available for public comment or input. It is a “law” based purely on fear and smear.
Catching the Real Con Artists, Scammers, Swindlers and Fraudsters
There is plenty of evidence of massive fraud elsewhere that requires immediate and decisive action. Remember the 2008 cat burglars who heisted “USD$16 million dollars” worth of gold bars and simply walked out of the bank in broad daylight? Although the heist was widely believed to be an inside job and a number of suspects were fingered, no one was ever prosecuted. In 2007 when Ethiopia’s auditor general, Lema Aregaw, reported that Birr 600 million of state funds were missing from the regional coffers, Zenawi fired Lema and publicly defended the regional administrations’ ‘right to burn money.’” The ashes of that “burned money” were never found. In February 2011, Zenawi publicly stated that 10,000 tons of coffee earmarked for exports had simply vanished from the warehouses. He called a meeting of commodities traders and in a videotaped statement told them he will forgive them because “we all have our hands in the disappearance of the coffee”. They drank coffee, sang Kumbaya and went on their merry ways.
Last December, Global Financial Integrity reported, “Ethiopia, which has a per-capita GDP of just US$365, lost US$11.7 billion to illicit financial outflows between 2000 and 2009. In 2009, illicit money leaving the economy totaled US$3.26 billion, which is double the amount in each of the two previous years…” Now, there is a gigantic fraud problem crying out for a law and aggressive prosecution. Last month Zenawi mused philosophically, “What is the poison that leaders face when you go to national palaces, and transforms people with vision sometimes into ordinary thieves? Let’s start with the total amount of loot in Africa, and what our role as leaders in that looting is…” Great question! The man with the “vision of an Ethiopian Renaissance” should have a ready answer. But for the rest of us, a more mundane question is : Why not start the anti-fraud campaign by going after the looters who are looting millions from the national treasury and the army of looters illicitly laundering billions of looted dollars in foreign banks before hounding nickel and dime internet cafés which survive by peddling feckless Skype service for pennies?
The PFTO is wrong-headed and mean-spirited. Its sole aim is to suppress all communication technology the regime believes could be used to provide the people access to indepednent sources of information and news. The infinitesimally small number of Skypers use the service to talk to family members and friends abroad. They pose no threat to anyone. The threat of arrest and harassment against perceived opponents is so pervasive that few would hazard to use Skype or similar technology as a means of political agitation.
The PTFO is vague and overbroad, and cannot pass constitutional muster as RWB has suggested. Many of its provisions are ambiguous, nonsensical, unintelligible and just plain legal gobbledygook. What is a “terrorizing message” under art. 6? Could a ringtone on a mobile phone which rings by announcing, “Meles Zenawi is a dictator!” (as it appears to be a common ringtone among a segment of mobile phone users in Ethiopia), result in a 15 year sentence for the hapless user? (On second thought, I may have to concede that legal point in light of the sheer “terror” Zenawi displayed at the G-8 Summit in Washington, D.C. last month when he faced the young lionhearted Ethiopian journalist Abebe Gellaw.)
For me, the principal purpose of the law is to protect liberty and establish a just society. But on that point, I shall defer to Shakespeare:
We must not make a scarecrow of the law,
Setting it up to fear the birds of prey,
And let it keep one shape, till custom make it
Their perch and not their terror.
….
For pity is the virtue of the law,
And none but tyrants use it cruelly.
As to the criminalization of Skype, my practical suggestion to Ethiopians wishing to communicate with their families and friends abroad is to quickly learn the arts of using smoke signals, drum beating, pictogram drawing, pigeon flying, ram’s horn blowing and to drill down on the science of tin can phones and Morse Code. (Oops! Forget Morse Code, it uses “the agency of electricity or electromagnetism”, whatever that is!)
-… . -.- .- !
Amharic translations of recent commentaries by the author may be found at:
Yachi Neger is a condom called our conscience, if we wear it we can reside in the grace of God or we can disrobe from this same condom and dwell in the abode of Saytan::
by Teddy Fikre dated: Friday, June 22nd, 2012
Tesebsebu lijoch, kuch belu. Sit down and listen to a story that I am about to tell you that might one day either give life to your future children or entomb you a wooden box. This is a story of lust and love intertwined with greed and hubris. This is an article inspired by Jah Lude and written by the blood of millions of Africans as they made love in the midnight sky only to be greeted by death by the morning sun. This is story of disease more pernicious than meqegenet, a lethal virus so deadly that Africa is being whittled into an empty continent because they refuse to use Yachi Neger.
The disease I am talking about is HIV/AIDS. AIDS has decimated Ethiopia and the rest of Africa. It is not fair to be honest, a people who love God like Africans are the ones who always get it the worst. We do as God tells us, yet our children starve and perish in unmarked graves. It breaks my heart and I cry a million tears for million African children who will perish this year because they don’t have anything to eat and they drink from dirty pools of water right outside of Addis Sheraton. There but for the grace of God goes my child in Bole; there goes my child famished and dying from malnutrition as I complain in my posh apartment about eating Ramen noodles. I feel like cursing God at these moments when I see wealthy Ethiopians giving Hebret to our mother country by giving a couple of hundred birrs to a 12 year old innocent girl who was forced to become a prostitute in order to eat.
There, this is the heart of the matter. You see, Yachi Neger is really Yeze Neger. A dear friend let me borrow her Jah Lude CD last night and I have been playing track four on repeat all day as I ponder and wonder how we have become lost as a people. The difference between life and death is information, we Ethiopians in the Diaspora have more knowledge than Google, yet we turn to prostituting Ethiopia for the sake of a couple of birrs. Mata mata you can do your dirty deeds in the darkest nights yene gayta gin nege nege the world will always know what you are up to because you are a rotten injera. So this is my attempt to lift the veil of ignorance from my community and let you see that we are all intertwined under on the mattress called Ethiopia. We were all born in between bed sheets and birthed by our mothers on blankets of hope. Yet we can choose to perish overnight on the same bed sheet and be enveloped in darkness in a blanket of disease if we don’t use protection and protect ourselves from our own demise and our own greed.
All these reflections manifested into my menfes because Jah Lude sang a song about condoms titled “Yachi Neger”. It is for this reason that I am elevating Jah Lude to the status of Teddy Afro and Tilahun Gessesse, one CD and he has joined a pantheon of Ethiopian legends. You see, there is a difference between a singer and a virtuoso. Singers sell products by the way of CDs; virtuosos sell visions by way of redeeming their people. Two-bit crooners sing about “Fiker” while saying nothing but konjo, virtuosos like Tilahun and Jah Lude sing about “Fiker” and in the process apply love to Ethiopia and her people. The difference between Soulja boy and Talib Qweli is the difference between genocide and reclamation. Any denkoro can pick up a mic and sing a song of misogyny and malfeasance, but it takes a true visionary to grab center stage and sing a song of love.
Remember these words when the denkoros at AESA One prostitute our country as they hold their first annual Ethiopian cultural sham while inviting gangster rappers by the names of Jeezy, T-Pain, and Llyod to represent our beautiful country. I wish I could put Yachi Neger on them all and make them go away into the midnight sky. They call themselves AESA One; I call them AESA Dicks because they are useless sperms of Ethiopia who are whoring out our names for the sake of a few dollars. To the AESA crew, you chose to disregard “Yachi Neger”, just remember as you curl your lips between the hips of Al Amoudi that the thousand dollars you make today will not take away from the fact that you just burned yourself with HIV money.
I hope you go buy a double-sided Sealy mattress so that your double-sided tongues can slither at peace while you sleep with the thought of a 13 year old innocent Ethiopia girl being sold into prostitution in Saudi Arabia. The money you are using to plaster DC with AESA One is blood money and for that we will forever remember your dastardly deeds. You justify your greed by saying you are… continued…
After reading the above article by clicking on above link, view MUSIC VIDEO ABOUT YACHI NEGER::
[please click to listen to Yachi Neger -> Ethiopian Killers by name of AESA One]
So Al Amoudi gave you $2,000,000 to put together an ARIF Ethiopian cultural event. You could have gotten performers like Common, Beyonce, John Legend or Lauren Hill to put the most positive light on Ethiopia. Instead you chose to go with T-Pain, Jeezy, BoB, and LloydSo time to focus on the word your feature performers say. This flyer will be translated in Amharic (using GRAPHIC words) and will be plastered all over DMV. I am going to get 10,000 posters and flyers printed myself and plaster EVERY Ethiopian restaurant, church, market, and business in the DMV to show how duplicitious this event is.
Everyone, please share this article to the world and print it out and post it where you can. Let’s be like Adwa Jegnas and defend the honor of our mother Ethiopia and expose those who do wrong by our community….peace and le zelalem Ethiopia and stay away from RFK stadium on July 4th, the event is put together by BLOOD MONEY. Just know that somewhere in Saudi Arabia a 12 year old Ethiopian girl is being raped by an Arab Sultan as you do Eskista at RFK. Any promoter or business person that does business with AESA One is taking part the raping of Ethiopia and they are enemies of the people.
Over my dead body will you advertise this phony event using the clean flag of Ethiopia while the AESA One pimp back in Addis has the dirty Ethiopian flag with the devil’s symbol on it. You are not slick, we see what you are doing, and I will make sure that Washington Post, New York City Times, Congressmen from VA & MD, the DC City Council, Mayor Grey, and Senators all know how you are financing your event. Judgment cometh AESA One. Peace::
Two years ago in America, it was the year of the “metrosexual”, it seems we have arrived at a new day, we have arrived at the age of the “Habeshasexual”::
by Yohannes Aramaji dated: Thursday, June 21st, 2012
[picture provided by AESAOne Habesha men]
(Washington P0st DC Bureau) It is the hottest fashion trend of the summer. All around America and Ethiopia, from DC to Addis, Habesha men can be seen strutting and flaunting their hips as they sway down city streets wearing Habesha Kemis. The scene is omnipresent, Habesha man after man can be seen sipping buna at Starbucks as they gossip about sports and politics wearing Habesha Kemis to keep them cool from the heat of summer dog days. As their wives and girlfriends are at home taking care of the kids and the household, Habesha men everywhere are setting the fashion world upside down as they wear some of the most exquisite Habesha dresses and skirts.
We are not sure where the trend started, most likely it was a trend that started sometime after World War II and has taken on a life of it’s own since the turn of the 21st century. Take a moment today and drive over to Starbucks off Leesburg Pike in Alexandria Virginia or a random Ethiopian restaurant in Addis and there you will see Habsha men sipping Italian cappacino or smoking sheesha wearing the most lovely Habesha kemis. You will see these men sitting on their duffs all day with their legs crossed gossiping all day and night about soccer or debating who is a Woyane or a Shabia as children in Ethiopia die on a minute by minute basis from a lack of hope and nourishment.
The favorite color of these Habesha men in Habesha kemis is the hot pink, they have forsaken the warrior clothing of the past and have now embraced the Habesha kemis as the outward representation of their true manhood. Some Habesha men have taken it even further and have augmented their Habesha kemis with panties and thongs from Victoria Secret as they talk endlessly about overthrowing Meles Zenawi and advocating a war on the TPLF even though it is not them or their children that will be dying in this war they desire so. This is the next iteration of Habesha fashion, Habesha men have embraced their oneness with their femininity as they have lost all semblance of Ethiopian jegnas and are now content on wearing bras instead of adorning shields to protect their country from outside invaders.
By far the biggest consumers of this new trend are Habesha promoters and so called doctors. You can see the Habesha men promoters walking up and down DC passing out flyers as they wear their Habesha kemis and disseminating flyers that have pictures of Ethiopian queens looking like sluts and whores on their flyers as these Habesha men promoters switch their hips while wearing their Prada sunglasses to match their Habesha kemis. You can also see Habesha men who call themselves “doctors” who have no PhD to speak of and are doctors by name only wearing Habesha kemis instead of surgeon’s gear as they bop and flop down 9th Street in DC or while they stay at Addis Sheraton in Addis. These Habesha men doctors are a hit in Addis wearing their Habesha kemis, they arrive in Addis as conquering warriors in the mold of Italian soldiers, they do more damage than Mustard Italian mustard gas, they spend their precious money not to help out starving children back home, instead they help out the local economy by giving a few birrs to young prostitutes in the streets of Addis.
While they are wearing their Habesha kemis, these so-called “doctors” have become the biggest consumers of prostitutes in Ethiopia—they destroy the lives of young and precious Ethiopian girls as they steal their future all while these Habesha men are wearing the hottest hop pink Habesha kemis while they sip the finest wine as these set-a-set “mena” sit next to Al Amoudi. Al Amoudi in fact has bought the most expensive Habesha kemis, the Chinese had to use 400 bales of cotton and 4,000 pounds of silk to make a custom made Habesha kemis for Al Amoudi and you can see him driving in the back of limousines with his legs crossed and sipping Moet with his $4,00,000 Habesha Kemis. In a couple of weeks, you will see DMV invaded by Habesha kemis wearing men as they decend by the thousands to celebrate at RFK stadium for the first ever AESAOne “Ethiopian” soccer tournament sponsored by none other than the $4,000,000 Habesha kemis wearer himself Al Amoudi.
Sweat shops in China cannot keep up with the pace of demand for Habesha kemis, over 100,000 Habesha Kemis are manufactured and shipped from Beijing on a day to day basis to Addis and DC—95% of which are being shipped to Habesha men. This trend of Habesha men wearing Habesha kemis will not go away anytime soon, it seems that both the younger generation and the older generation of Habesha men are loudly and proudly yelling “I am set a set and I’m proud of it!” as they snap their fingers and do… (continued )
Sewoch, this is only 1/3 of the article, please read FULL article before forming your opinion! Click HERE To read full article
PS now watch what will happen, the very same Habesha kemis men will attack the messenger while disregarding the message. This is what Habesha kemis wearing men do, they are best at leflafanet and never follow logic. Watch them reveal their Habesha Kemis with the comments below…
[click to read full article and listen to Brow Condor Radio]
Internet intrusion and increased repression in Ethiopia
By Graham Peebles | Redress.cc
19 June 2012
Graham Peebles views the Meles Zenawi regime’s chronic suppression of the internet and media freedoms in Ethiopia and asks how long will Addis Ababa’s allies in the US, Britain and the European Union tolerate the regime’s flagrant violations of rights enshrined in domestic and international law.
Freedom of speech, freedom of expression and freedom of assembly are basic human rights and are enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It is not for a government – whose function is to serve the people – to decide who or indeed if these freedoms should be allowed. Although etched into the Ethiopian constitution, freedom in its various democratic manifestations remains a fantasy for the people, who are increasingly controlled, inhibited and impoverished. The Ethiopian government under the leadership of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is imposing ever more stringent and repressive measures of subjugation. If it could it would control and restrict the very air the people breath.
Internet control and privacy
In its latest assault on the human rights of the people, the governing Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) decreed certain activities on the internet to be illegal. Access to the internet inside Ethiopia is very poor. According to Open Net Initiative (ONI) Ethiopia “has the second lowest internet penetration rate in sub-Saharan Africa (only Sierra Leone’s is lower)… Only 360,000 people had internet access in June 2009, a penetration rate of 0.4 per cent.”
The Ethiopian Telecommunication Corporation (ETC), a government owned and run body, and the Ethiopian Telecommunication Agency (ETA) have exclusive control over internet access in the country. According to the media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RWB) on 7 June, “Ethiopia’s only ISP [Internet Service Provider], state-owned Ethio-Telecom, has just installed a system for blocking access to the Tor network, which lets users browse anonymously and access blocked websites”. In order to achieve such selective blocking, according to RWB, “Ethio-Telecom must be using Deep Packet Inspection (DPI), an advanced network filtering method” that is used by repressive states, such as China and Iran. This sophisticated system, RWB says, “allows governments to easily target politically sensitive websites and quickly censor any expression of opposition views”.
Internet filtering in Ethiopia has been in place for some years, according to Freedom House. Its report, “Freedom on the Net 2011”, states: “Tests conducted by Freedom House found that in mid-2010 the websites of Freedom House, Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International were inaccessible. In March 2010, Voice of America reported that its website was blocked in Ethiopia.” The BBC reported that in June 2010 emails sent from Ethiopia to the Committee to Protect Journalists were also blocked.
This latest invasion of privacy and restriction of freedoms comes on the back of a new law passed on 24 May which, among other things, bans the use of Voice over the Internet Protocol (VoIP) hardware and software, such as Skype, which enables people to use the internet as the transmission medium for telephone calls, and imposes a penalty of up to 15 years imprisonment for the heinous crime of making a telephone call to a family member or friend.
Internet access, and national and international calls, which have to be made through the state telecommunications provider, the ETC, are extremely expensive. A 2010 study by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) found that Ethiopia’s broadband internet connections were among the most expensive in the world when compared with monthly income, and come second only to those in the Central African Republic.
The new legislation also allows the government to inspect any imports of voice communication equipment and accessories, and to ban such imported shipments without prior notification. One suspects this may well simply be the first step in establishing total government control over access and use of the internet, leading to monitoring of emails, social network sites, chat platforms and so on, all of which could now be targeted and monitored. Indeed, RWB has already voiced its fears that the DPI “will be misused for surveillance purposes by a government that already subjects the political opposition and privately-owned media to a great deal of harassment”.
Up until now government acts of repression have been mainly targeted at independent journalists, political activists and opposition supporters living and working outside the country. Journalists working abroad and publishing online find themselves attacked in print by comments from government stooges, as Freedom House states in its report. It said: “In addition to censorship, the authorities use regime apologists, paid commentators and pro-government websites to proactively manipulate the online news and information landscape.” This new move, however, throws a noose around all internet users. As ONI states, “Ethiopia is increasingly jailing journalists, and the government has shown a growing propensity toward repressive behaviour both off- and online. It seems likely that censorship will become more extensive as internet access expands across the country.” Such is democracy under Meles Zenawi.
Unlawful laws of control
The reasons offered for the new legislation by the regime are the well-trodden justifications of the unjust, made by the unlawful. RWB quotes the authorities, as saying that “the ban was needed on national security grounds and because VoIP posed a threat to the state’s monopoly of telephone communications”. Duplicitous at best, such actions of extreme repression are born out of paranoia. And let us point out there should be no such state telecommunications monopoly anyway.
These measures fit into a broader pattern of restrictions of freedom, all of which violate human rights laws. The Anti Terrorist Proclamation that came into effect in 2009, to a chorus of international criticism and fury, set the tone of repression and is being followed with ever-greater ferocity. The Ethiopian constitution, a legally binding document, of course proclaims universally recognized freedoms – all of which the government contravenes. As ONI states, “The Ethiopian government maintains strict control over access to the internet and online media, despite constitutional guarantees of freedom of the press and free access to information.”
What the constitution says
Relevant constitutional statements of intent specifically relating to the media; include Article 29on the “Right of Freedom of Thought, Opinion and Expression”. This states:
Everyone has the right to freedom of expression without any interference. This right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any media of his choice.
It also says: “Freedom of the press and other mass media, and freedom of artistic creativity, is guaranteed.”
Regarding the right to privacy, Article 26 makes plain that “Everyone has the right to the inviolability of his notes and correspondence, including postal letters, and communications made by means of telephone, telecommunications and electronic devices. It adds that “Public officials shall respect and protect these rights.”
Censorship by the printing presses
In tandem with the current illegal attacks on internet freedom, the state-owned printing presses are tightening the screws of suppression and are, according to RWB, “demanding the right to censor the newspapers they print”.
Not only is there a state monopoly on telecommunications, but the press are also state owned. There is only one Amharic-language daily national paper, with around 32,000 readers, in a country of 85 million people.
Both television and radio are firmly under the control of the Meles regime.
Berhanena Selam is the main state printer, and has a virtual monopoly on newspaper and magazine printing. Along with other state-owned printers, it is trying to impose political censorship on media content before publication. According to RWB, “In a proposed ‘standard contract for printing’ recently circulated by state printers, they [the printers] assume the right to vet and reject articles prior to printing.” Article 10 of the proposed contract, entitled “Declining to print content violating the law”, states “the printer has the right to refuse to print any text if he has ‘adequate reason’ to think it breaks the law”. This in itself breaks the law as it contravenes Article 29 of the constitution, which prohibits any form of press censorship.
Not only do the actions of the Meles regime – a centralist government in the extreme – contravene the Ethiopian constitution, but the the grave breaches of human rights contravene numerous legally binding international treaties signed by the government. Internet access is a human right and is covered by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. This has been clearly emphasized by the United Nations special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Frank La Rue, who has reminded “all states of their positive obligation to promote or to facilitate the enjoyment of the right to freedom of expression and the means necessary to exercise this right, including the internet”. He also stresses that “there should be as little restriction as possible to the flow of information via the internet”.
Complete control of the media pertains inside Ethiopia, and these controls are becoming ever more intense with greater disinformation and manipulation of the press and the primary source of news, television.
The Meles regime exercises a brutal and deeply repressive dictatorship. How long will the West, whose dollars, pounds and euros support the needy throughout Ethiopia, continue to turn a blind eye to the myriad human rights violations and a deaf ear to the cries of the people for justice and freedom? Sit not in silence America and Britain as your strategic, undemocratic “ally” in the Horn of Africa suppresses and controls the people of Ethiopia while claiming to act in their interest. Demand that international law is observed, federal law honoured and human rights upheld.
Saudi agent Al Amoudi, in collaboration with Woyanne junta leaders Meles Zenawi and Azeb Mesfin, is pillaging and looting Ethiopia by creating over 40 mega corporations during the past 20 years, while forcing into exile so many hard working Ethiopian businessmen. Al Amoudi has been able to dominate every thing in Ethiopia because he is being back up by TPLF guns. He should not be allowed to do the same thing to Ethiopian communities in the Diaspora. He hijacked the Ethiopian Sports Federation in North Amercia (ESFNA) for over 7 years, but he and his servants were kicked out by patriotic young Ethiopians this year. Now he is pouring millions of dollars of blood money — the money he stole from the people of Ethiopia — to organize a big festival in Washington DC starting July 1st. Netsanet Le Ethiopia Radio had a discussion last Sunday about this festival. Listen below:
The Sky is Falling!
Tesebsebu lijoch, kuch belu. Sit down and listen to a story that I am about to tell you that might one day either give life to your future children or entomb you a 
