A friend remembers Taye Woldesemayat
By Marilyn M. Boyd
Ethiopian Review, Nov 1996
I will never forget November, 1996, and that telephone call from the Illinois State University Department of Political Science. They had just received word from the University of Missouri that one of their graduates and a graduate of ISU, Dr. Taye Woldesemayat, had been arrested in May, 1996 and was languishing in chains in an Addis Abeba prison. Horror, panic, a feeling of helpless pain swept over me as I sat weeping at my desk.
After that initial blow there was no other response but action. Many calls later and with help from knowledgeable friends, the basics of the story emerged. There was a web site, there were news groups on the Internet, and addresses of Ethiopian governmental officials to whom one could send petitions. Emotion turned to energy.
When I finally connected to the web site and the picture of Taye popped up, a flood of memories came washing over me. How proud we were of him and his accomplishmentsPresident of the Ethiopian Teachers Association.
More than anything, I remembered how much I had learned from this man, how passionately engaged he was in bringing education and justice to his country, and how many happy times we had shared as he went about his work here at International House.
His great gift was to befriend all who lived in I-House, from sheltered Americans leaving small-town rural life for the first time, to shy Japanese girls who had never met anyone from Africa, to a frightened Somali who recognized a soul mate, although their countries were, or had been at war. He welcomed them all and helped them get to know that, no matter where they were from, there was much to be shared in this unique living-learning environment.
What fun we had! Dances, reggae music, home-cooked ethnic food, arguments about politics, and the creation of some marvelous friendships.
Taye was always challenging us to see that life was rich, but there was also much work to be done in the world; there were serious issues that needed our attention. And did he ever love discussing the events of the developing world.
By the time I assumed the position of Program Coordinator at International House, he and his thesis advisors from the Political Science Department had founded a weekly current events forum which they called Global Review. Taye then started a student organization so that they could apply for and receive fee monies in order to give guest speakers an honorarium. He encouraged us to hold international banquets and send the proceeds to hunger relief. He taught us to participate in campaigns to oppose Apartheid in South Africa, and help to free Nelson Mandela.
All that came back to me now. Free Mandela, indeed. Now it was my friend Taye needing the organizational response. I immediately drafted a letter to the ISU community explaining what had happened to Taye, and asked for faculty and student signatures. The response, in a very short time, was significant, from many different departments and colleges. We got coverage on local television, radio, and in the newspapers.
That was November-December, 1996. In early January 1997, I wrote the I-House alumni and informed them of the terrible things which had befallen Taye. There were responses from around the world. Americans who were teachers celebrated Taye’s life and his contributions during our U.S. celebration of Black History Month. A friend and researcher at U.S. News and World Report tried to interest reporters in Taye’s situation. Another friend at UNESCO in Paris has kept us informed of all the actions and publications Education International has sponsored on Taye’s behalf. Taye was awarded their Trade Union Human Rights award, as was his murdered colleague, Assefa Maru, in May 1997.
I also wrote to my representatives here in Illinois and received almost identical letters informing me Taye was an anti-American “terrorist.” Much to my horror, the U.S. State Department printed this abomination in its 1997 Human Rights Report. I wrote them back to call this a lie and called a Senator several times on the telephone. I wrote the Africa Desk at State and finally, Madeleine Albright herself. I have never received official word from any of the State Department officials, but I now have begun a correspondence with someone in the U.S. Embassy in Addis Abeba who keeps me better informed.
Students who organize Global Review, which has been running continuously since 1979, made a booth at our annual International Fair and featured Taye and his plight in 1998. Many people stopped by their booth and signed petitions saying how much they valued his work at ISU and wished him well. We have never heard if our petitions and signatures were received by him, but we all started writing directly to Taye. In 1997, I had two post cards from him in response to letters. Now, in 1998, nothing.
After being out of the country for five weeks this summer, I returned to find that Taye had received that award from Education International, a world-wide trades union group for educators. Every three years, on the occasion of their World Congress, Education International honors two educators by conferring awards for their contributions to the preservation and promotion of human rights and to quality in education.
They are chosen by their “peers,” who represent 23 million education employees throughout the world.
Whether or not this event and what later happened are connected, we cannot know, but simultaneously we learned that Taye’s jailers were once again tormenting him. And if that were not enough, the judge to whom he complained charged him with contempt and ordered him back into the chains we had so loudly protested in 1996. No wonder he has not written lately.
So, once again, I have been heard telling his story on the local radio.
Fellow church-goers regularly include him in their prayers and responded to the one request we received directly from Taye, that we send non-political magazines for him to read. In one of those two post cards, he did write to say he had received at least one packet of materials, several issues of Smithsonian magazine.
The consoling fact about these years in prison is that he is still alive. If his health and spirits hold, there is hope. We will not let his jailers forget that his friends are working, praying, and waiting for his release. Surely, even if our letters to him do not get placed in his own hands, his captors will feel the rebuke of our attempts to contact him. Perhaps they will even feel guilt over the abuse of human rights.
As those in Amnesty International have often reminded us, shining that light on prisoners of conscience and their captors through letters is an effective tool.
The terrible thing about this long imprisonment is its tremendous waste.
Taye has so much to contribute to the well-being of his country. He is a fine teacher, an admirable human being, a man who works for peace and justice. Why would you lock up the most talented? Well, as I learned from Taye when we worked to free Nelson Mandela, it is the honest voice, the born leader who is to be feared by the dictator; the leader who works not for justice, but for mean and narrow ends always wants to silence dissent.
And just as that unimaginable day arrived, the day Mandela walked from his cell a free man, we can look forward to the same for our friend, Taye. It took patient, steadfast work, hope, and prayer on the part of the world community. Patience and hope. That I can do. That I WILL do until we welcome Taye Woldesemayat back to life outside those prison walls which now confine him.
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Marilyn M. Boyd is Program Coordinator of International House and Lecturer in Peace History, Illinois State University, Normal Illinois.