Yonas Biru, PhD
June 16, 2023
There are two governments in Ethiopia. First, there is Ethiopia run by a narcissist and paranoid Prime Minister. His indifference to the wellbeing of the people he rules and his lack of empathy for their suffering have allowed him to siphon off resources from critical government programs including poverty-targeted ones to finance a handful of his vanity projects. Because the personality architecture of a narcissist is built on a self-inflated scaffold, he lives in an alternative reality, flicking hard facts as inconvenient nuisances. This has denied him the ability to seize the moment when the opportunity for a corrective action arises.
The second government is Oromummaa, an anti-Ethiopia, anti-Christian and Anti-Islam Oromo terrorist cult, that bills itself as “the Master Ideology of the Oromo National Movement.” The movement’s doctrine mimics the Nazification process in its propaganda, mobilization, and inhuman cruelty and is increasingly undercutting the Prime Minister’s government. Its leaders are Professor Asafa Jalata and Shimelis Abdissa. Since 2007, the University of Tennessee Knoxville website has served the movement as a depository venue for hate speeches and genocide inciting documents.
Though the two governments are working in parallel, they have areas of common interests as well as inherent conflicts. Their interests intersect within the Oromo political landscape in their pursuit to establish a tribal political powerbase. Their differences arise from their ultimate objectives. The Prime Minister’s grandiose yearning is to be the king of Ethiopia and the icon of Africa. In contrast, Oromummaa is an inward-looking and backward-sliding part cult and part political dogma, longing to take the nation back to the 16th century.
Despite the Prime Minister’s bravado and chest-beating, his powerbase and legitimacy are being increasingly eroded. He has been emitting signals to work with the Oromummaa leaders. He has gone as far as doing Oromummaa’s bidding in demolishing Churches and Mosques to win their support. Understandably, they do not see him as a trustworthy partner. He has betrayed Lemma Megersa who sacrificed his carrier to help him get the prime ministership. He has betrayed President Isayas who saved him from TPLF. Further, he has turned the gun on the people of Amhara and Fanno who stopped TPLF from advancing to Addis, vowing to kill or capture him.
Ethiopia is collapsing under the weight of the Prime Minister’s manic narcissism and Oromummaa’s genocidal mindset and inhuman cruelty. A frightening Genocide is brewing in slow motion. The Oromummaa hate that drives it is as evil as the energy behind the Rwanda genocide. The international community that promised “Never Again” after the Rwanda genocide has moral obligations to avert an existential threat to 120 million Ethiopians. The international community also has a geopolitical interest in maintaining Ethiopia’s stability as an anchor nation for the Horn of Africa – one of the world’s critical oil transit chokepoints that is vital to global energy security.
Mentally and Morally Unfit Prime Minister
Narcissism – The Prime Minister’s narcissism is manifested in his belief that he is Godlike – omnipotent (all-powerful); omniscient (all-knowing); and omnipresent (present everywhere). He has no reservation to announce that his mother has told him when he was at the young age of seven that he would be the King of Ethiopia who would lead the poor nation to greatness. He did not mince words to declare on a national TV that under his stewardship Ethiopia will be set to become “one of the two superpowers in the world by 2050.” He believes his mother’s fantasy for her child as though it is biblical prophecy.
As a narcissist, he has an unquenchable craving for admiration and recognition. He uses compartmentalization as a coping mechanism to reconcile his imagined fantasies of grandiose success with the reality of his failure. Let me provide one example.
In December 2022, he raised hell when the international media reported that Ukraine was sending a shipload of wheat to feed starving Ethiopians. He went on TV to claim his government never asked for it and expressed anger, suggesting the international community was sending food and announcing it to the international media to undermine his success in achieving food security. He said, far from needing international food aid, Ethiopia was ready to export food.
In 2023, the US and UN stopped humanitarian aid to Ethiopia after discovering “massive government theft” of donated food that was meant to feed starving Ethiopians. Donated wheat was turned into flour and exported to Kenya and Somalia. The Prime Minister’s spokesperson publicly warned the US and UN, stressing their decision to withhold humanitarian food aid will subject millions of Ethiopians to starvation. This is coming from the very Prime Minister’s office that not even six months ago claimed that Ethiopia was producing surplus and exporting wheat.
The Paranoia – The Prime Minister’s paranoia has led him to see peaceful opposition parties as a threat to his omnipotence, omniscience, and omnipresence. In 2021, on national TV, he
accused his peaceful oppositions of conspiring to remove him by force and threatened them stating that they would see “the slaughter of hundreds of thousands of people over night.”
In 2023, he upped his threat, stating “Extremists who want to instigate conflict to remove him from office should know that the consequence more deadlier than the red terror in the 1970s.” According to the African Union, “more than 700,000 people were killed” during the red terror.
The Prime Minister’s disinterest about the welfare of the people and his lack of empathy have made it difficult for him to sympathize or empathize with the people’s suffering. Since he came to power, over a million people have died of war, starvation, mass murder, and over 5 million people have been forcefully displaced. Yet, his priority and focus are on building vanity parks and a pharaonic palace along with an opulent surrounding including three artificial lakes, a zoo, a waterfall and a real estate project of Dubai-grade luxury villas. His vanity is Ethiopia’s costly endeavor to the tune of $15.3 billion.
Responding to widespread criticism of his vanity projects, the Prime Minister dug his heels and pushed back, stating Ethiopia’s poverty will not deter him from pursuing his vanity projects. He claimed the number of Americans on food aid and those who are homeless is equal to 50 percent of the population of Ethiopia (over 60 million). The message was that this did not stop the US from pursuing vanity projects such as going to Mars.
Obviously, this is a willful distortion. First, the number of homeless people in the US is 582,000. The number of Americans on food aid is 42 million that is less than the 60 million figure the Prime Minister used. More importantly, Americans on food aid are not destitute people.
Though they benefit from different government subsidies, a majority of them have cars, their own home, 70-inch TV, the latest iPhones, etc. For example, a family of four (husband, wife, and two children) with annual income of $36,084 to $55,512 qualify for food aid. A family of 8 (husband, wife and six children) with annual income from $60,624 to $93,264 will qualify for food aid because by American standards they are considered poor.
A Slow-Motion Economic Implosion
The cumulative impact of the civil war, misplaced priorities, and bad economic policies is a 25.9% drop in the nation’s GDP. As the Prime Minister go on a Dubai-inspired binge for flashy vanity projects with dancing fountains and parks imitating Peter the Great’s gardens, 22 million Ethiopians are in need of international food aid. Furthermore, more than 2.3 million children are out of school, as they wait for the reconstruction of schools destroyed by the war. To top it off, three million people have slipped below the absolute poverty line.
The Prime Minister’s obsession with vanity projects (including the $15.3 billion palace) that are financed by printing money is destroying the nation’s economy. In 2018, Ethiopia’s inflation rate was 13.8 percent. At the time, the average inflation for Sub Saharan African countries was 4.1 percent. In January 2022, Ethiopia’s inflation was amongst the worst 10 inflationary countries in the world. For 2023, IMF’s projection for Ethiopia is 31.4 percent. By 2024, the projection is 23.5 percent. The median inflation for Africa is projected to be 5 percent by the end of 2024.
Of primary concern is the 2023/2024 government budget deficit of 281.05 billion birr ($5.2 billion). The problem is attributable to several factors. One factor is a decline in tax-to-GDP ratio. Five years ago, the tax-to-GDP ratio was 0.11. In 2022/2023 fiscal year the figure was 0.07. The average for sub-Saharan African was 0.17.
Another factor is unprecedented corruption. Money that should go into the government’s coffer ends up in political officials’ private bank accounts. The 59% drop in gold export earnings is an example. A third factor is a precipitous drop in international aid after the international community lost confidence in the Prime Minister’s ability to govern.
Another area of concern is a steady decline in government capital expenditure (money spent on long term development projects such as roads and bridges). A Cepheus Capital report quoted by Ethiopia in Data shows, in the 2018/2019 fiscal year, government capital expenditure was 6.5% of GDP. In 2022/2023 it was down to 2.9%. Data from the Ethiopian Statistical Service show the same trend. There is no data for 2023/2024. However, given the significant decline in government budget in real terms (accounting for inflation), the figure is likely to be sharply lower than the 2022/2023 figure.
“Dropping sharply lower” seems to be the theme for every sector of the nation’s economy. Tourism is another case in point. The country lost $2 billion due to the war and Covid 19. The war has ended over six months ago, the Pandemic is in our rearview mirror, and the global tourism industry has recovered, Ethiopia has not been able to bounce back. This is primarily because of the breakdown of law and order in the country.
There is no better example of the obliviousness to reality of the Prime Minister than the tourism sector. He keeps building parks for tourists not paying heed to the fact that tourists do go to a country where law and order is in a Hobbesian state. In contrast, Kenya has been able to rebound its tourism sector in 2022. By February 2022, its tourism revenue surged 83% to $2.13 billion. Earnings are expected to increase further to $3.37 billion by the end of 2023.
Manufacturing is another sector in the “dropping sharply lower” column. According to Melaku Alebel, the Minister of Industry of Ethiopia, in 2022, 446 manufacturing industries stopped production. The problem is attributed to the shortage of finance, infrastructure, the absence of coordinated support from the government, and lack of skilled manpower.
Another problem area is foreign exchange (forex). The Prime Minister’s pet projects are given priority. Consequently, the nation’s manufacturing sector and other critical public projects are neglected and pushed into the black market, paying as much as 100 percent premium above and over the official exchange rate.
A Harvard study found the chronic forex shortage was harming manufacturing firms who need imported inputs. Recently, the Addis Ababa municipality had to accept bids that used black market exchange rate to buy 200 city buses from China, costing the city 100 percent more than the market value of each city bus.
Perhaps the most saddening item in the “dropping sharply lower” column is the poverty-targeted government expenditure line. According to the UNDP Quarterly Economic Profile, poverty targeted expenditure for 2022 was 2.9% of GDP, the lowest since 2017. Data from the Ethiopian Statistical services covering 2017/2018 to 2020/2021 show similar trend.
The only bright spot is the Ethiopian airlines, whose revenue of $5 billion was much higher than the revenue the country collects from exports of goods that amounts to $3.9 billion. Sadly, at the writing of this article the big news coming out of Ethiopia is the forced resignation of the chair of the Ethiopian Airlines Board, Girma Wake.
Times Aerospace reported the “shock departure” of a man “recognized as the father of the African aviation industry”, stating: “Wake has been credited with being the driver that put Ethiopian on the path to become the continents largest carrier and a group that competes with major airlines around the world.” The report noted “while supportive of governments’ support for the airline business, he opposed government interference in the running of the airlines.”
The Prime Minister replaced such an aviation icon with a young air force General, who is an unknown quantity in Ethiopian, regional and international aviation circles. Though there are speculations, there is no definitive explanation for his forced resignation.
I believe the decision is driven by a desire to divert the Airlines’ US dollar and Euro based revenues to the Prime Minister’s palace project. I also find it hard to rule out the possibility that the reported export of stolen international food aid is partly linked to the government’s desperate need to supply forex to the Prime Minister’s vanity projects.
Ethiopia’s economy is sinking as the Prime Minister shifts resources from productive and poverty alleviation programs to his vanity projects. Even worse, his vanity projects are built outside of the Legislative Branche’s constitutionally sanctioned oversight authority.
The questions demanding answers are: Can the IMF and World Bank turn a blind eye? Would this not be a dereliction of their respective institution’s duty to undertake a regular health check of the economic and financial policies of member countries?
What we hear is about their obsession with floating exchange rate. The fundamental economic problems are elsewhere. Why are they quiet when the Prime Minister planed and implemented vanity projects outside of the constitutionally sanctioned oversight authority of the nation’s legislative body? Why should they provide heavily subsidized loans to such a despot as he wreaks havoc on the economy? Is this not a violation of their fiduciary obligations to international taxpayers who are financing international aid?
The Oromummaa Government
Literally, Oromummaa means being Oromo or Oromoness. Conventionally, it is a concept to embrace and cherish the Oromo culture. Sadly, the term has been adopted, abducted, and adulterated by morally malnourished and ethically devoid Oromo tribal intellectuals as “as the Master Ideology of the Oromo National Movement.”
Professor Asafa Jalata, the Godfather of Oromummaa, acknowledges the movement has two dimensions: “(1) conventional Oromummaa developed from history, culture, and tradition, and
- national and global Oromummaa – as political and ideological projects.” OPride, one of the prominent Oromo newspaper, defines the term as “an Oromo political identity.”
Supporters of the movement get outraged when the inhuman cruelty of Oromummaa as a political ideology is exposed. Their desire is to hide their political aspirations behind the draperies of Oromo cultures and traditions. The fact is that the most common description of the term in the Oromummaa literature is “a national and global political project.”
What makes it dangerous is that it adds social and religious dimensions to the political core. As a result, “establishing political and religious leadership” is advocated as vital to the Oromummaa movement. This has led them to question the right of Christians and Muslims to practice their religion in the Oromo tribal land. For example, a study at the University of South Africa notes Professor Jalata, “is hesitant to affirm Islam as having any rightful place within Oromo identity” and condemns “the processes of the Christianization” of Oromos as a racist endeavor.
As a political and religious movement, Oromummaa embraces violence and works closely with the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA). The OLA is involved in mass murder and kidnapping of Ethiopian and foreigners for ransom. Oromummaa intellectuals “mobilize financial resources to support the OLA” and they were a part of the OLA delegation when the OLA and the Ethiopian government met in Tanzania for negotiation.
The Oromummaa movement’s primary targets are “the Ethiopian colonial state” and Churches and Mosques who are seen as “Colonial institutions” and “Empire Builders. Though Oromummaa claims to be an economic, political, and cultural movement, its focus is on religion. Specific accusations include:
- “Introducing the Habasha ruling ideas and religion”
- “Introducing an inferiority complex and self-hatred to Oromos”
- “Changing an original Oromo religion and taking Habasha and Arab names, religions, values, and norms”
- “Oromos stared to use borrowed religious identities and sub-identities.”
Pressuring the Oromo People to Abandon Isla Christianity and Islam
When one peels off the Oromummaa movement’s cultural façade and delve into its true intentions, it becomes clear the goal is to resurrect Waaqeffanna (an indigenous Oromo religion) as an official religion. According to the 2007 population census, Waaqeffanna is followed by only 3.3 percent of the Oromo population. In comparison, together Christians and Muslims account for 96 percent of the Oromo population.
Oromos who embrace and revere their Christian and/or Islam religion are under attack. This is how two Oromummaa publications both on the University of Tennessee website describes Christians and Muslim Oromos.
“Oromos, who like their Habasha masters have been the defenders of the Habasha culture, religion, and the Amharic language and haters of the Oromo history, culture, and institutions” and “They are totally estranged from the Oromo way of life and fascinated by the ideas and knowledge of their tormentors that convinced them of their inferiority”
Habesha is a term used to describe Ethiopians from the northern part of the nation. The President of the Oromo region is on the record referring to Amharas as “enemies.”
The Oromummaa campaign is not an intellectual exercise. It is a blueprint for religion cleansing actions. It is a seed for a genocidal campaign. In January 2023, the Voice of America reported the number of Amhara expelled from the Oromo tribal land was close to a million. The people are Christians and Muslims. Documenting the atrocity Christians were subjected to, Pope Francis asked his followers to pray “for persecuted Christians in Ethiopia.”
The Guardian reported “more than 200 Amhara people killed” by Oromo extremists. Most of them were Muslims. The Human Rights Watch also documented another round of mass killing, noting “heavily armed assailants shot and killed about 400 Amhara civilians, including many women and children.” The report quoted a grieving Muslim father:
“My 8-month-old child started crying. I heard an attacker say, ‘Look there, look there …’ before they shot in our direction. They shot my baby dead. I wrapped the dead body with some clothes I was wearing. My other child was shot in her back; the bullet came out around her neck … I then pressed my injured child against my chest, and I prayed to Allah to save her life.”
Over the last three months alone, the Oromo government has demolished over 200 Churches and Mosques. Two explanations were given by President Shimelis at a televised meeting with Christian and Muslim leaders. The first explanation is that the demolished houses of worship were built illegally. The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission has rejected this claim.
The second explanation claims the land where the demolished houses of worship stood will be used to build a new Oromo megacity with high-rises. When President Shimelis got a pushback on his explanations, he followed it up with a disturbing statement: “our enemies know our intentions“. The intention was to use a fictional new megacity as a pretext to get rid of Churches and Mosques. See “Sheger City and Gadaa are Oromummaa’s a Mirage of Castle in the Sky.”
As if to mock the religious leaders in attendance, the President told them, the new structures that they will be allowed to build in the future need to meet high standard that will attract foreign visitors. “Small churches and mosques will not be permitted”, he asserted. If they cannot build Churches and Mosques that attract foreign visitors like St. Peter’s Basilica or the Iconic Mosque at Dubai Creek Harbor, they will have no house of worship.
The truth is not about architectural standard. It is a strategy to deny poor Christians and Muslims from building houses of worship in the Oromo tribal land. There is a saying in the Wello part of Ethiopia: “The Smaller the Church or the Mosque, the Closer to God.” This is to say what matters is the spirit in the room not the glittering marble and glass façade.
The President Shimelis’ televised meeting with religious leaders was a public relations theatre. The reality on the ground is that Christians and Muslims living in the Oromo tribal land are subjected to horror that can only be described as inhuman. The world has read the human rights violation reports of extrajudicial killings of Orthodox Christians religious leaders and the beating of Christian Priests and Muslim Imams in public. It has listened to elder Muslim women crying for mercy stating “At this rate, we won’t find means to even be buried.”
The international media has sat through the national Parliament regular sessions where non-
Oromo members of the Parliament pleaded with the Prime Minister for justice stating:
“The people of Amaro are surrounded by Oromo on three directions. We are denied access to other regions. Our hospitals and churches are burned. It is hard to explain our suffering in words. We are invaded and butchered, and our existence as an ethnic group is in peril.”
Even worse, the world has seen with horror in Addis Ababa as government agents throwing teargas inside an Orthodox church while the congregation was praying and singing hymns of praise to God. These are all small steps in the strategy to elevating Oromummaa and Waaqeffanna as the official governing principle and religion of Ethiopia.
The President Shimelis did not mince words when he announced that Oromo-PP’s plan for “the Future of Ethiopia” is Gadaa – the philosophical foundation and governing principle of Oromummaa that prescribes both religious (Waaqeffanna) and secular duties. The problem is that Gadaa conflicts with Sharia – the Islamic canonical law based on the teachings of the Quran and the conducts of Prophet Mohammed. Professor Jalata’s position is that Christianity and Islam “need to adapt to national Oromummaa.”
This is echoed by President Shimelis who said followers of Christianity and Islam living inside the Oromo tribal land need to realize Oromummaa takes precedence over their religion. Upping the ante, President Shimelis announced on public TV that his government is “spending billions erecting Oromummaa markers in Addis Ababa,” a city where only 19% of the population is Oromo.”
According to the 2007 population census, together Christians and Muslims account for over 99% of the Addis Ababa population. In contrast, Waaqeffanna is followed by 0.05%. In terms of religion Waaqeffanna is a microscopic minority in Addis Ababa. In terms of population, it is a small minority. Yet, Christians and Muslims are told they must defer to Oromummaa and its official religion Waaqeffanna. This is declared from the pages of a leading American University.
In pursuit of adopting the Bible to the Oromo identity, Oromummaa scholars have already published a new version of the Bible, changing the word ‘Ethiopia’ to ‘Cush.’ The Oromoized Bible’s, Psalms 68:31 read’s “Cush is extending her hands to God.”
Oromummaa’s Inhumanity in Pictures
The crime that the Oromo government and the Oromummaa mobsters are committing is intentional and malicious. The pictures below show (1) the dead bodies of a mass murder victim and her child, (2) a screenshot of Amnesty international’s report, (3) a picture that an Iranian newspaper (Tasnim) used with a headline “Anger in Ethiopia as Officials Demolish Hundreds of Houses,” (4) a picture showing the scale of forced displacement of Muslims and Christians, (5) Muslims praying in front of their demolished Mosque, (6) students salvaging school furniture after they were forcefully evicted, (7) a child girl and her baby brother sitting on a street corner after their house was demolished and their furniture was thrown out.
The Source of the Inhumanity and the Genocidal Seed in Oromummaa Atrocities
The atrocities and inhuman acts of Oromummaa are committed by young Oromo cadres, militias, and police officers. These are youngsters whose minds have been poisoned with years of Oromummaa propaganda that was designed to incite rage and fuel revenge. When hate-indoctrinated young Oromos see Churches or Mosques, they see an “Ethiopian Empire Builders” and “Externally imposed cultural and religious identities.”
When they see churches and Mosques, they think of the Oromummaa’s description of a three-step process that enemies of Oromo used to introduce Islam and Christianity. First was taking the land of the Oromo – “occupying the physical space.” Second was “domesticating the native’s mind” using Islam or Christianity as a tool of subjugation by persuasion or force (“በካልቾና በጥፊ”). The allegation is that religion was used to purify, and cleanse the Oromo because the people of Oromo were treated as an unholy (“እርኩስ”). The third and final stage was creating a new history for the subjugated people.
When young Oromos who are poisoned with hate see people from the Northern part of Ethiopia, they see them as agents of “Turks, Arabs, Habashas and the Europeans [who] imposed both Islam and Christianity on Oromos while at the same time suppressing indigenous Oromo religion in order to psychologically control and dominate them.”
The youngsters hate their “enemies” with passion. They draw their anger and urge for revenge believing the false narrative that “The Ethiopian colonial terrorism and genocide that started during the last decades of the 19th century still continue in the 21st century.”
One of the Prime Minister’s Cabinet Rank Senior Advisor had it right when he warned the world on April 3, 2023 stating: “Today’s Ethiopia is at a juncture similar to that of Rwanda when it found itself at the dawn of genocide.” Soon After the Minister’s public notice, the Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention issued a red flag alert for genocide, stressing the Amhara (Oromummaa’s designated enemy number one) are “in a perilous discursive position that could easily devolve into genocide.”
It is not only Christians and Muslims that Oromummaa has victimized. The Oromo youth that it poisoned and turned into a zombified killer that Oromummaa has victimized.
International Intervention is the Only Option
After the Rwanda genocide the international community promised “Never Again!” The Rwanda genocide happened fast. The Oromummaa genocide is brewing in slow motion. The international community has moral obligation to intervene. It also has a geopolitical interest in maintaining stability in the Horn of Africa for reasons noted above.
Before we go to viable options to end the spiraling economic disaster and Oromummaa’s genocidal religious crusade, we need to understand two critical points. The first important point is that the Prime Minister and the Oromummaa cult leaders are using all their firepower to pursue their agenda. A dual tipping points for economic collapse and the impending
Oromummaa genocide is rapidly approaching. The time is now to do everything possible to avert irreversible calamities on both fronts. Ethiopians cannot be halfhearted in their pushback. The Prime Minister and the Oromummaa cannot be reasoned with or appeased.
The second point is that Ethiopians need a two-prong campaign: economic and religious. The religious campaign must be led by religious institutions without any intervention by political activists. The economic campaign must be advanced independently of the religious campaign. Remember international economic and religious campaigns get traction.
The Economy
The economy has been imploding from inside out in slow motion. Every sector of the economy has been bleeding to death drip by slow drip. In recent months we have seen the crisis gain momentum and scale rapidly. The government is suppressing economic protests with bullets and mass imprisonment.
According to the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, the government shot and killed protesters who were holding rallies because of water shortage after the water supply was cut for over a month. The Commission’s report noted: three people died from bullet wounds to their heads and chests and over 30 people sustained injuries of varying severity.
Similarly, a story in Addis Standard reported Police beat up public servants who staged demonstration in the Hadiya zone of the Southern People tribal land after the government failed to pay them salary for three months. The report shared an eyewitness account: “In an effort to disperse the protesters, the police beat three people, who were then taken to the hospital with serious injuries.” Over 40 people were arrested in the aftermath.
Furthermore, protests against stagnant wages in the face of inflation are crashed with regularity and threat. The economic crisis is one spark away to cross the tipping point and plunge the nation and the Horn of Africa into an economic catastrophe. The international community it the only power center with financial leverage to force the Prime Minister correct path.
The most important tool in the international community’s arsenal is sanction. It must be fully used, barring humanitarian aid. Some people think international sanction will “do serious damage to the economy [that is] already on the precipice.” What they fail to understand is that without intervention the economy will collapse. I believe the cost of action in the form of conditional sanction to bring about change is lower than the cost of inaction that allows the Prime Minister to stay the course and cross the tipping point of economic meltdown.
Sanction is the only viable tool to disrupt the Prime Minister’s narcissistic fantasy by starving his vanity projects of badly needed foreign currencies. It allows us to change the tipping point from economic meltdown to economic recovery by making resources available to productive sectors of the economy.
We have the Prime Minister sign a deal with TPLF, sit on the negotiation table with Oromummaa-Shene. The idea that sanction will not work and it should be taken off the table is ludicrous. Correction, it is a STUPID idea from the IDIOTIC #NoMore shelve. Sitting and waiting for a miracle leads to only one outcome: IRREVERSIBLE ECONOMIC BREAKDOWN.
Stopping Remittance, Barring Basic-Necessity Family Support
In terms of generating foreign currency, remittance and diaspora travel to the motherland generate more foreign currencies per annum than international aid and export of goods combined. If well organized, the diaspora community has sufficient leverage to force the Prime Minister change course. For more on sanction and remittance campaign see my Manifesto titled “Averting Civil War in Ethiopia: An Emergency Manifesto.”
Action Points Against the Anti-Christian and Anti-Muslim Oromummaa
No other people on earth would have tolerated the Oromummaa movement as much as Ethiopians have. One word explains our failure: በድነናል. It is dumbfounding that Christians and Muslims are being slaughtered, their houses of worship demolished, and their children left without school or home when there are over 60 Ethiopian Churches and many mosques in the Washington DC area alone. Why have we failed to launch an international campaign? በድነናል
The US is home to the Abyssinian Baptist Church that was established in 1808, after Ethiopian seamen left the First Baptist Church in protest when they were required to sit in racially segregated seats. When the Ethiopians left, African Americans followed them and started their own Church and named it the Abyssinian Baptist Church. The Church is one of the most powerful churches in the US. US Presidents often go there during campaign seasons to seek the Church’s support. Why have we failed to seek their support? በድነናል
The demolition of Churches and Mosques was scaled- and sped-up to finish the job before international uproar ensued. After the fact, President Shimelis met with Muslim and Christian leaders and promised them they will be allowed to build new churches and mosques in an undetermined future. Until then they will remain without houses of worship.
We must not allow the Oromo government to demolish churches and mosques and promise for a better future. Accountability and justice demand redress. NOTHING LESS. Moving forward I propose the following courses of actions.
- Organize a joint Christian and Muslim Committee to launch an international campaign to stop the atrocities against Muslims and Christians and secure full compensation for demolished churches and mosques as well as live lost. Political activists must resist the temptation to intervene. The joint committee must consist only of members of established religious organizations.
- Organize Sunday gatherings in front of the White House at least once a month. This must be led by religious leaders, not political activists. All Muslim and Christian leaders and followers in the DC area must attend. The purpose is to have a joint prayer sessions and pressure President Biden with specific demands to: (1) put conditions on the US aid to Ethiopia, including: international investigation of Church and Mosque demolitions, mass killings of Christians and Muslims and forced displacement of Christians, Muslims and non-Oromo Ethiopians out of the Oromo tribal land, (2) stop the carnage against Churches and Mosques, (3) ensure all Churches and Mosques demolished are redressed with full compensation, (4) ensure all perpetrators are held accountable, and (5) designate the Oromummaa anti-Christian and anti-Muslim movement as a terrorist movement.
- Organize a joint petition by Muslim and Christian religious leaders addressed to key Gulf and European embassies who are providing funds to the Abiy administration with similar five demands listed above.
- Write a joint lcease-and-desist letter to the University of Tennessee Knoxville whose website is serving as a venue and depository for Oromummaa’s hate documents that have led to mass killings, and Church and Mosque demolitions. If they fail to remove all Oromummaa articles from their website, file a class action lawsuit. A group of lawyers should volunteer to do this work.
Ethiopia shall Prevail! Islam and Christianity will survive the Oromummaa assault and continue to thrive! But the time to pushback is today before the looming genocidal danger gets out of hand.
