Ode on Solitude

"Happy the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound,
Content to breathe his native air,
In his own ground.

Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire,
Whose trees in summer yield him shade,
In winter fire.

Blest! who can unconcern'dly find
Hours, days, and years slide soft away,
In health of body, peace of mind,
Quiet by day,

Sound sleep by night; study and ease
Together mix'd; sweet recreation,
And innocence, which most does please,
With meditation.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown;
Thus unlamented let me dye;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lye."

By Alexander Pope 1700

I been thinkin 'bot you

By Ankob Zuta, Blogger of De Birhan Blogspot
17-7-2011

And this one. My uncle used to love this song. God bless his soul. He used to dedicate it to his girlfriend on Getahun Kebede's Listener's Choice Program of the Ethiopian Radio English Desk every weekend back in the days. Though , I knew the meaning not , I loved listening to it. It was one of the best love songs he loved listening to on Sunday nights in addition to Don Williams' -We got love- that is one of my favourites to.

Here we go again, I'm thinking abt ye

Ethiopians Disconnected!!!

By Anko Zuta, Blogger of De Birhan Blogspot

16-7-2011

Phoned back home to my parents home. I was informed that a robber has been in the house and stole clothes and parts of their parked convertible. Very bad. I am here thousands of kilometres away , so can't be of any help than consoling them. Crime rate in Addis Abeba has sky-rocketed than any-other time . Nairobi,Kenya and Jo Berg,South Africa have been famous for criminality. Addis is now joining the list with the inclusion of armed robbers marching in the city. Well, it is easy to know that crime rate goes up when there is extreme inequality within society, sociologists have a terminology for it.The thieves who stole my parents home belongings are not any aliens but youngsters who couldn't make ends meet for various reasons and found themselves poor; the country can't feed or help them. There are thieves here in the European country that I am in too but the ones here steal due to ''greed'' and ours steal because of poverty. I feel bad for them,God love them.But when it comes to you and the one

who is stolen is you then you say they have to be curtailed...stopped...locked up ...and punished,this is called retributive justice in legal terms. I did feel the same when it came to us,,,, i said you should report them and get them locked up!! But I then said well you can't blame them they live in an extremely desprate situation where there regime can't rescue them either from emigration or dying from poverty.

According to a close fiend of mine , a veteran journalist , whom i asked about the alarming crime in Addis Abeba, he said.... "There is huge crime in Addis Abeba, the government and police are controlling revolution not the criminals ". That is a great view from an Addis Abeban who was a victim of daylight robbery himself. The government is hunting revolutionaries not criminals who are giving the innocent public a hard time.He needs them as they rather keep the public busy from thinking and working towards change. I say it again, the regime in Ethiopia cares less about the budding robbers, thieves and vagabonds- it rather cares and locks the revolutionary youth.

Disconnection

My main theme here is not the above subject.It is the hunger and poverty again as always. About disconnected Ethiopians. Who are they ? They are the likes of you and me. They are the successful Ethiopian educators, thinkers, professors, business people and the elites.They are the disconnected Ethiopians. We are.

There are many Ethiopians than many other African countries who are in higher positions in international organisations and prestigious universities.We even have very key guys in the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.We have very amazingly beautiful world-class super models.Africa's richest tycoon is an Ethiopian too. We have all these and that that could be described as ''successful'' in the Western sense of it. But they are still disconnected. These thousands of successful Ethiopians, who are spread all around the world are disconnected.

Disconnected from what ?

Disconnected from our senses, the reality and the truth. The reality and the truth is that Ethiopians and Ethiopia is an extremely poor country- the 'hungriest' nation on earth with millions of clever,wise and successful people. Wherever you, to which ever ''big'' organisation or organisation you go to wherever in the world, you will surely find professional Ethiopians who play key part in the organisations and make a good living for themselves.The problem comes, when it relates to a collective and cooperative success. I know most of them tried their best and finally lost hope on Ethiopia. However, they never , i hope been part of any campaign or movement that has attempted to raise the awareness of Ethiopians worldwide and make them connect with our poorness and hunger and backwardness and root it out once and for all. We need to be connected.

It is my stand and belief that a change of politics is one of the fundamental methods of rooting it out. The problem needs a multidimensional,holistic and regional solution meaning from politics, cultural,religious,social to management, administration, governmental , peace and what have you.Nevertheless,each and everyone of us individually, need to stop the disconnection... the cars we drive, the houses we live in, the luxuries life we live, the expensive stuffs we have at our homes show our disconnection. When we live , we live like there is nothing going on behind us...that our brothers and sisters are starvingggggg . We avoid that...we individually live like other individuals in the richest nations live...there is nothing with that...but still i see a full disconnection in us. So,we need connection.

So ?

• stop the disconnection
• comeback to your senses
• come , meet,organise and work towards rooting out poverty,hunger and famine
• Works towards a political change
• Whenever you buy the expensive cars,make important decisions in the international organisations you work in and universities you teach, luxuriously indulge ourselves - please remember your poorest brothers and sisters at home and in the Horn of Africa (Kenya, Djibouti,Somalia,Uganda ).
• Lets work for a sustainable solution not a fire-fighting work

The Crown Council of Ethiopia

His Imperial Highness Prince Ermias Sahle-Selassie, grandson of Emperor Haile Selassie

By Ankob Zuta, Blogger of De Birhan Blogspot

14-7-2011

We Ethiopians boast. Yes we do. We are the '''poorest and hungriest''

people in the world as the Economist did describe us on its last year's issue.But we infact have reason to boast.Valid ones. I can't stopping naming them cause they have been overstated and boasted upon.One of my histories, and Kings that I am so proud of and would love to boast with is His Imperial Majesty Emperor Haile-Selassie. I won't say much about him cause he is one of the things that the world knows us through in addition to our athletes,beautiful girls and famine. I will rather be discussing about the Crown Council of Ethiopia(http://www.ethiopiancrown.org/) and his grandson, HIH Prince Ermias Sahle-Selassie Haile-Selassie, Chairman - Crown Council of Ethiopia.The Crown Council of Ethiopia is located in Carleston , USA.According to the Offical Website of the Council "The Crown Council of Ethiopia is the Constitutional Body which advises the reigning Emperors of Ethiopia and, during an interregnum (such as now), actually acts on behalf of the Crown. The Council’s members are initially appointed by an Emperor, and subsequently (during an interregnum) sustained in their posts or replaced under the direction of the President of the Council."

The Council doesn't plan and work to reinstate the Monarchy however endeavours to work for the welfare and contribute to the best of Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.

"It is significant to note that the Monarchy has not relinquished its rôle and duties in Ethiopia. At the time of this writing in January 2004, the Crown Council is in the midst of redefining the role that a Constitutional Monarchy can play in Ethiopia that is much more in line with the role that constitutional Monarchs play in other countries."

This means it would more of have an advisory role. The current President of the Crown Council of Ethiopia,Prince Ermias has been the most ''active'' representative and actor of the Council so far. I have read and watched a lot about him than any of his Imperial brothers. He has so far been the one who kept up his Granddad's legacy and continued teaching the World about us and our 'miraculous' nation. God Bless Him.

Flipping through the Website , I read one cool paper that was a latest presentation of himself at the The Institute of World Politics , USA. It was entitled "Africa’s multicultural tradition and the possible interaction with the current Arab trends ".In this paper the Prince says "... Africa’s quest for the universal yearning for freedom must transcend the continent’s pre-modern loyalties to sects, tribes and ethnicities. The evolving challenge is to build inclusive and enabling democratic institutions where people’s voices count. Leaders and Foreign Powers can no longer be allowed to promote and exploit divisions along sectarian, tribal or regional lines that can lead to anarchy and civil war. The cynical time-proven colonial game of divide-and-conquer can no longer be tolerated – it is no longer acceptable." This highly extrovert and democratic thought of the Prince is today in the heart and minds of many Ethiopian elites and the rank and files like me. In the video , that i posted below, Prince Ermias speaks of the aspect and value that the Ethiopian Monarchy vis a vis Rastafrianism has and was built upon in the Caribbean; the quest for ending oppression and subjugation and love for freedom. He says in most Caribbean countries that he visited , he did witness that.

One more thing that he did mention about his Granddad , HIM HaileSellasie , I hope wasn't heard before now by most Ethiopians as Ermias recounts, "My grandfather, the Emperor Haile-Selassie, understood and these precepts of morality and character, and in the end, paid the supreme price for them. While well-known to historians, it is not so generally know to the public that prior to voluntarily acceding to the coup leaders’ demand for his abdication, the Emperor’s elite personal bodyguards implored Him to allow them to destroy those civilian and military elements agitating against Him – a request that was widely conceded as being handily within the military capabilities of the Emperor’s guard. Yet my Grandfather, a moral and principled visionary, refused to slaughter his own people and condemn himself forever to the “wrong side of history”, choosing instead to step-down peacefully, voluntarily and gracefully into history from His venerable and unique station as The Last Christian Emperor. "

Yes I believe the Emperor was a kind hearted, God fearing, lover of his people. Unfortunately, he ended up at the wrong time in the wrong hands of the merciless communist dictator, Mengestu Hailemaraim.

Before I finish, I would like to call your attention to the following video presentation of His Imperial Highness Prince Ermias Sahle-Selassie Haile-Selassie's speech on The Lion of Judah at the The United States Library of Congress – Hebraic Section in December,2010.It is an interesting one crowded with wisdom .

Also before i finish, I would love to call the attention of Prince Ermias and the members of the Crown council :

1. To reach the Ethiopian mass both in the Diaspora and Ethiopia. Reach the opposition, civil societies and private groups. Deliberate on what to do and how we can save Ethiopia from its misery.
2. Although what you have done so far is appreciable and means a lot to us , your Ethiopian brothers and sisters; I believe if you utilise the mass media and other platforms other than conferences and your Website, we will hear you better and be with you in your grand endeavours.
3. You are one of the living positive images of Ethiopia;we want you to shine further and cleanse our negative images.

When will Ethiopia have a regime that doesn't shame its citizens going hungry??

*Civil Servants in the West fasting and donating to the drought victims in the Horn of Africa

* Somalia's Situation the ''Worst Hunger'' in History

By Ankob Zuta , Blogger of De Birhan Blogspot

13-7-2011

Let me just start by quoting a fellow Ethiopian's analytical blog on The Creation of New Aid Customers- A Critical Look at the Current Development Practice in Ethiopia; in his assessment the Blogger concludes saying " In my opinion the current practice of development in Ethiopia has close similarity with international and multi-national business practices. The international financial institutions and bilateral donors are acting like wholesalers and NGOs and the government of developing countries (Ethiopia) are behaving like retailers. The people at the grassroots level are customers of aid services. If the service providers were away from the business, life would be very difficult."

I like to agree with him in most part. No work of enabling or saving people from social/food welfare has been done.Those who are on safety net (like the social welfare of Europe ) are 13 million in Ethiopia. These people are ok as long as the West/WB/IMF /WFP and bilateral donors continue to bail them out food. The government doesn't have a long term solution of taking these people out of Welfare and making them free of aid dependence.

I have come across this report

Joint Government and Humanitarian Partners' Revised Humanitarian which states that 4

,567,096 people who need assistance that the government says are “on the critical condition before they reach brink of starvation” are actually taking the slack as they have been ignored by the regime of Meles Zenawi with the aim of protecting the reputation of his disillusioned ''developmental state'.

The above table (click on it to enlarge) shows the gravity of the humanitarian crisis though the government fully ignores it.Forget Somalia which has no government or aid agencies that can evaluate the situation.

It is true that Food has become as precious as gold for the people of the world.In the coming 50 years , those who could afford to buy food will be the well-to-do ONLY. For instance, North Korea , is a country on the brink of 21st century mass starvation next to the Horn of African countries. Three months ago, United Nations (UN) in its report stated that more than six million people - a quarter of North Koreans - urgently needed more than 430,000 tonnes of food however,the scale and scope of drought in the Horn of Africa is actually unkindest of all (10million people at risk of starvation ).

The year 2011 has witnessed various major natural disasters; the flooding in Queensland, Australia in January 2011, deadly quake in New Zealand in February 2011, the massive quake and tsunami in Northern Japan in March 2011 are some of them. Now, we are faced with another disaster in the Horn of Africa, a drought that is said to be ‘‘the worst in 60 years’’.

I have been able to gather information from my different contacts in various European countries that civil servants are making pledges to skip their meals for a few days and donate the starving in East Africa.Their media know how to blow such news, so do the NGOs.

Hunger, starvation,famine, poverty, conflict and war are very shameful things ; but they seemingly have become the culture and custom of the people of East Africa especially , i am finding many people from this region who don't feel ashamed or anything of these things.They say "what can you do.It has become our synonym, which we can't control.And disasters like this are climate induced ...so ignore it".Well, I feel it is better to think so sometimes than burn alone.

Now a 5th nation is added into the list of drought hit countries : UGANDA , a country that has been so cool economically so far has now got the slack.And Somalia is said to be in the most ''unimaginable'' exacerbated by the extremist militants.The militants have agreed to hang their guns for the sake of relief work; wish they should forever. As I always said in my old writings and conferences I spoke on, conflict, lack of good governance and freedom are the major causes of hunger/famine , and Somalia and Eastern Ethiopia are good cases at this moment.

Northern Ethiopia which was hit by the worst type of famine when I was 3 or four years old; is now hunger free why ? because there is a relative peace, stability and huge conservation and food security work going on. Southern Ethiopia,Oromia,and Eastern Ethiopia (Ogaden) which have never been hungry have now taken the brunt why ? maladministration, neglect by the regime, bad governance, war and lack of peace.

I am saying to myslef crunched in this unfurnished room '' When will Ethiopia have a regime that doesn't shame its citizens going hungry?? ''

Excellent Report

Excellent reporting by an excellent journalist; brief ,balanced and to the point.It at least shows the other side of Ethiopia and cools down the infuriatingly overwhelming news of hunger and drought of the Horn of Africa/Ethiopia.

UN Human Rights Committee Review of Civil and Political Rights in Ethiopia

Recorded live on July 11, 2011 4:30 PM GM

and

World Disasters Map Legend

Click on the above picture to enlarge; it maps the totality of disasters that have happened in 2011 in various parts of the world Australia,New Zeland, Japan and the current huge drought in the Horn

What was the impact of post colonialism theory on Ethiopian politics ?

By Anko Zuta, Blogger of De Birhan Blogspot

10-7-2011

Last week, at one of the two places I work, I was asked if I would be interested to give a lecture on cultures and education. I hope it did work out well. I was asked for an autograph/signature by girls as soon as i finished lecturing lol am bragging here. But on a serious note, it was kinda cool.

I was off-tracked in the middle of my speech by one student who asked me what I think has the role of Western ways of thinking, has been on human progress and development. In my answer, i have quoted an Ethiopian Orthodox Priest who shared me his opinion on modern education vis a vis Western ways of thinking once. He described it in this phrase " it is a blinding devil". That was what i answered them- though not hundred percent, I opt to agree with the Priest. Education has made me/us sceptical, coward,confused and constrained.

One of the less nicer effects of education is seen in the case of postcolonial theory. I ain't a post colonialist in stand and academia. I rather find this theory a new form of intellectual despotism and ''divide and rule''. Our newly born neighbour, South Sudan is a result of postcolonialism theories in one way or the other.

What is postcolonial theory ?

According to the encyclopedia.com definition, Postcolonial theory, often said to begin with the work of Edward W. Said, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and Homi K. Bhabha, looks at literature and society from two broad angles: how the writer, artist, cultural worker, and his or her context reflects a colonial past, and how they survive and carve out a new way of creating and understanding the world and/or as to Wikipedia is a specifically post-modern intellectual discourse that consists of reactions to, and analysis of, the cultural legacy ofcolonialism. Postcolonialism comprises a set of theories found amongst anthropology, architecture, philosophy, film, political science, human geography, sociology, feminism, religious and theological studies, and literature.

Postcolonial Theory - as epistemology, ethics, and politics - addresses matters of identity, gender, race, racism and ethnicity with the challenges of developing a post-colonial national identity, of how a colonised people's knowledge was used against them in service of the coloniser's interests, and of how knowledge about the world is generated under specific relations between the powerful and the powerless, circulated repetitively and finally legitimated in service to certain imperial interests.

In general, it is a thinking, movement and an academic endeavour that is anti,post colonial in nature and aims to achieve real independence and freedom from colonisation of both the mind, culture,identity,gender,race and nation.

Ethiopian postcolonial theorists ?

Broadly speaking Ethiopia doesn't expectedly have post colonial theorists. Why? because it has never been colonised.I don't know of any Ethiopian scholar or writer who has written with an anti-West or coloniser dynamism or genre.

But.... But there are post-colonial theorists who have never publicised themselves as postcolonial theorists so far but factually are.They were brainwashed,educated and manipulativly exploited by the postcolonial theory. They as the by products of postcolonial theories have established political parties led them so far and even attempted to realise their wish in practice. Oromo Liberation Front(OLF), Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF) , Tigrean People's Liberation Front (TPLF) and Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) are the very good cases.

These parties were all founded by Western or third level educated postcolonail theorists. Although they shoved the ideologies of different Western philosophers such as Marx and Lenin- they are all the by products of postcolonial theories.

Aregawi Berhe,Tecola Hagos,Jordan Gebre-Medhin,Hussien Sora,Elemo Quilixxu, Abdirahman Mahdi, Sheikh Ibrahim Abdalla Mohamed and many others I haven't named here were and are still postcolonial theorists who founded or advocated a political movement with modules of anti colonialism - the coloniser being the Abysianain or the undefinable ''Shewan Dynasty''.

Their core ideology is that the ethnic Oromo,Tigreans,Eriterains or Ogadenians were colonized by the "Amhara Highlanders'' , Shewa and they need to be liberated from that colonization. This is a typical example of post-colonial theory.

Edward W. Said, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and Homi K. Bhabha haven't researched or came up with anything different from the above.

I would love to agree with the Moroccan scholar Bin 'Abd al-'Ali who argues that what is seen in contemporary Middle Eastern studies of postcolonial theories is 'a pathological obsession with ... identity'. Ethiopia suffers from identity politics and that is why change has been so slow. Our ''current leaders'' are well informed of postcolonial theories and are applying them well in their divisive rule. Our opinion leaders as well who make their life in the interperetaion and analysis of post colonial theories have affected the minds of the new generation.Postcolonial theories might work in the case of Orientalist Vs the West or the colonising West Vs the colonised rest in broad senses. But the deeper and particularistic postcolonail theories of Africa that have been questioning the centuries old peaceful coexistence of indigenous people as in the case of Ethiopia, Rwanda and Sudan,Bosnia and many other similar nations , have only brought us what you see,,,

Silent Opposition

By Anko Zuta, Blogger of De Birhan's Blogspot

10-7-2011

Title: We Cannot Remain Silent: Opposition to the Brazilian Military Dictatorship in the United States (Zim Anelem)

Author: Green, James,

Year : 2010

Description:

In 1964, Brazil’s democratically elected, left-wing government was ousted in a coup and replaced by a military junta. The Johnson administration quickly recognized the new government. The U.S. press and members of Congress were nearly unanimous in their support of the “revolution” and the coup leaders’ anticommunist agenda. Few Americans were aware of the human rights abuses perpetrated by Brazil’s new regime. By 1969, a small group of academics, clergy, Brazilian exiles, and political activists had begun to educate the American public about the violent repression in Brazil and mobilize opposition to the dictatorship. By 1974, most informed political activists in the United States associated the Brazilian government with its torture chambers. In We Cannot Remain Silent, James N. Green analyzes the U.S. grassroots activities against torture in Brazil, and the ways those efforts helped to create a new discourse about human-rights violations in Latin America. He explains how the campaign against Brazil’s dictatorship laid the groundwork for subsequent U.S. movements against human rights abuses in Chile, Uruguay, Argentina, and Central America.

Green interviewed many of the activists who educated journalists, government officials, and the public about the abuses taking place under the Brazilian dictatorship. Drawing on those interviews and archival research from Brazil and the United States, he describes the creation of a network of activists with international connections, the documentation of systematic torture and repression, and the cultivation of Congressional allies and the press. Those efforts helped to expose the terror of the dictatorship and undermine U.S. support for the regime. Against the background of the political and social changes of the 1960s and 1970s, Green tells the story of a decentralized, international grassroots movement that effectively challenged U.S. foreign policy.

....

Ethiopia and countries of the Horn of Africa(Djibouti, Eritrea,Somalia,Sudan) are in a silent opposition.Conditions are grave.The regions is the only place that is in extreme hunger,conflict,war and dictatorship. It needs an immediate solution. The best solution being uprooting the old school dictators and brining a new generation of democratic,freedom and just thinkers. The region needs a durable solution and stability not just a ''controlling'' and ''façade'' stability and peace .

I took the above book's review deliberately. Those of you who know the politics of these countries finds exact similarity in what is going on these Region and the Brazil of then.

- All the Dictators in the Horn of Africa, Meles,Issayas, Guelleh, and Bashir have come overthrowing their communist predecessors and still sell themselves as anti communist s while in a double standard doing their affair in bed with China.

- It didn't take these dictators long enough to win the approval and support of the West especially the West.Ethiopia's Meles is a particular case , as he was smart enough to aggrandise himself as the promoter of Western ideals and protector of the peace and security of the region. At the expense of the suffering of the people in this region, the West supports and arms dictators like him.It may take time but these dictators will fall by the truthful and honest predisposition of the poor mass.

-''Few Americans were aware of the human rights abuses perpetrated by Brazil’s new regime. '' Same is the case regarding the awareness of some Westerners about the human rights abuses in this Region of Africa. Although the few ''concerned'' are aware of the abuses, they have always given a deaf ear to it won by their own ''unmeetable and endless interests''.

-Most informed Ethiopian political activists, most in the Diaspora and the rest in Ethiopia are now working hard to let the world/West know about the abuses taking place in Ethiopia and beyond.Ethiopian Satellite Television (ESAT TV), Solidarity Movement for New Ethiopia (SMNE),Ethiopian Youth National Movement and Ginbot 7 Movement in Ethiopia;

Democratic Youth Movement in Sudan,Abdourahman Boreh's movements in Djibouti, and the Eritrean Democratic Alliance (EDA) in Eritrea are some of them.All are frighting against well armed military dictators.The only support they have is of their own people's. But that is more than enough if used well. The support of the West to these dictators elongates the misery and victory of freedom fighters and campaigners.

They all are educating journalists, government officials and the public about the abuses taking place in dictatorial Ethiopia and the Horn.

- Although foreign policy changes have been uttered since the coming of Obama, nothing new has been updated.The current administration's in the West who have all the ''power'' of supporting and not supporting these regimes shouldn't wait until they turn against them.

-I am gonna start reading the book. Those of you who are pro freedom,democracy and human rights should also read it and see what needs to be added learning from the Brazilian experience or has to be deducted. The struggle in Ethiopia as was in Brazil should lay a groundwork for subsequent movements in Eritrea, Somalia,Sudan, Djibouti and Kenya as was in Chile, Uruguay, Argentina and Central America.