By Samuel Habtu Belay
The last few weeks have shed more light on the shady dealings that are going on between the TPLF government and the US Administration (primarily through the State Department and the nominally independent USAID) and the unprincipled stand of a few people in these two institutions. Here are examples.
One of the interesting developments is a Request for Applications (RFA 663-A-08-002) that USAID advertised last Friday (9 November) to fund a programme called “Human Rights Technical Assistance in Ethiopia”. Under this programme, USAID intends to provide approx. $1,028,000 USAID funding to be allocated over a two-year period.
According to the RFA, the purpose of the programme is “improved independent monitoring, investigation, and reporting of human rights abuses and violations with the objective of deterring human rights violations. This will be achieved through a package of interventions primarily targeted at the EHRC [Ethiopian Human Rights Commission] and EHRCO [Ethiopian Human Rights Council]. In addition, other NGOs will have access to capacity building activities, primarily through training, as the occasion arises”.
By USAID’s own admission, the EHRC has done little since its establishment by Parliament in 2000. EHRCO is an organisation that the TPLF would love to see disappear from the face of the earth!
One may ask, so what is the problem if USAID decides to make funds available to support human rights in Ethiopia? Is it not good news? Would not most Ethiopians like to see human rights violations independently monitored, investigated and reported? Well, at face value, we should rejoice that the US Administration has finally come to its senses and it is going to support human rights in Ethiopia. But, hang on, is it not the case that HR 2003 (Ethiopia Democracy and Accountability Act of 2007) was prepared by Congressmen Payne and Smith to support human rights in Ethiopia? Is it not true that the HR 2003 Bill actually offers a lot more money to support human rights protection in Ethiopia, not just US$1 million? Did not the State Department publicly oppose that Bill? It does not take a genius to understand the plot behind this “gesture” – the US Administration is doing everything including provision of a Human Rights Technical Assistance fund to support human rights in Ethiopia in order to avoid a Bill which highlights the lack of progress Ethiopia is making in this area.
The RFA blames the opposition for the post-election violence and tries to appease the TPLF government by arguing that it inherited weak institutions from the Derg and it is “some governmental institutions [that] have been accused of compromising the spirit and letter of the constitution when faced with threats, either in the form of active insurgencies or the unwillingness of some opposition parties to accept election results”. Are they trying to tell us that the top leaders are angels and bear no responsibilities for the execution of hundreds of people on the streets of Addis Ababa and up and down the country? This is completely unacceptable.
Furthermore, according to the RFA, “The Ethiopian Government has made strong constitutional, legal and rhetorical commitments to improve the human rights situation”. Indeed, the TPLF government is full of hollow rhetoric and very clever in pulling the wool over the eyes of the international community in this way. The RFA does not stop there. It tells us that “In the post-May 2005 election environment, some opposition parties and leaders allegedly used inflammatory rhetoric and even called for the overthrow of the Government, willingly or unwillingly contributing to the street violence and human rights abuses that followed the national elections of May 2005”. Conspicuous by its omission from the RFA is whether the said violence and human rights abuses were independently investigated and what the conclusions of the inquiry commission were! Who was responsible for the violence and abuses? Who carried out the violent acts and abuses? May be Mr Michael Rossman (the Agreement Officer) and Ato Belay Teame (the Agreement Specialist) could enlighten us more.
Having said the above, the architects of the RFA could not have timed the announcement better. When the HR 2003 Bill goes to the Senate floor in the coming few weeks, we should not be surprised if the Oklahoma Senator (R) James Inhofe (despite latest denials from his office that he has not put a hold on the Bill) argues that the US Administration is already doing what the Bill sets out to achieve and there is no need for the Bill. The ideas of Senator Inhofe and Jendayi Frazer are nauseating not only to Ethiopians who would like to see human rights respected in Ethiopia but also to their own citizens. I was having a conversation with two American colleagues from Washington DC (originally from New Hampshire) and San Diego areas a few days ago. Our conversation led us to politics and the foreign policy of the current US Administration. Their conclusion that the current US Administration is the worst that they have seen in their lives (they are in their late 40s) says it all. They commented the Administration completely ignores the world reality and lives in its own “invented reality”. I hope this will help them to understand the Ethiopian reality, and that what they are doing is not based on the facts.
What next? May be another USAID programme to build the capacity of the media in Ethiopia announced a day or two before the HR 2003 goes to the Senate floor? It will not come as a surprise if the major beneficiaries of such a programme are going to be the state controlled Ethiopian TV and Ethiopian Radio and the “free press” Walta Information Centre!
Jendayi Frazer, when she retires from public service, may tell why she blindly supported a dictator. Is it not that what Ambassador John Bolton (formerly US Ambassador to the UN) did in his new memoir, “Surrender is Not an Option: Defending America at the United Nations and Abroad”? He exposed Ms Frazer for informing him that she wanted him to “reopen” the 2002 Eritrea Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC) decision, “which she had concluded was wrong, and award a major piece of disputed territory to Ethiopia”. Ms Frazer may also tell in her memoir pretty soon after the current Administration’s departure who instructed her to ask the Ambassador to consider “reopening” the EEBC decision.
As long as such blind diplomatic, political and financial support is maintained, Meles, Bereket and their comrades will continue abusing the human rights of Ethiopians: the right to life and personal security, to a fair trial, right to participate in the democratic process, and freedom of expression. As Bereket was quoted saying in a recent interview, the death of Ethiopian soldiers in Somalia is a sacrifice but “not that serious in our opinion”. Of course, the death of Ethiopian soldiers is not a matter for Bereket to lose sleep over!
___________________________
Samuel Habtu Belay can be reached at [email protected]