Human Rights Watch has released a 111-page report that discusses how the $3 billion Ethiopia’s dictatorship receives annual from foreign donors is fueling the Meles regime’s machinery of repression while contributing little or nothing for the country’s development. HRW writes:
Led by the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), the government has used donor-supported programs, salaries, and training opportunities as political weapons to control the population, punish dissent, and undermine political opponents—both real and perceived. Local officials deny these people access to seeds and fertilizer, agricultural land, credit, food aid, and other resources for development.
… But development agencies have turned a blind eye to the Ethiopian government’s repression of civil and political rights, even though they recognize these rights to be central to sustainable socioeconomic development.
Read the full report here.
While the conclusion HRW has reached about the devastating effect of foreign aid on Ethiopia is not new, the facts and figures that are included in the report make the case for holding the donor agencies directly accountable for the atrocities that are being committed by the Meles brutal dictatorship. The Obama Administration, in particular, is a major disappointment since President Obama gave hope that he would not support “those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent.” Despite his promise, he is currently giving the Meles genocidal dictatorship over $1 billion per year.
The solution for Ethiopians is within us. We must not depend on any one to remove the Woyanne cancer. Let’s identify Woyanne’s soft targets and start hitting.