When the Ethiopian government asked Thwol Othoy if he
wanted to be resettled, he agreed, attracted by promises of a better
life - a clinic, school for his children and land to farm.
But he
now struggles to feed his family. After moving from western Ethiopia to
the tiny town of Abobo in the Gambella region, he was allocated less
than half his previous two acres on which he used to grow maize.
"The
food is not enough," said Thwol, 35, sitting by his thatched hut,
barefoot and in tattered shorts with an open shirt exposing his bony
chest.
Thwol and his family were moved off government-owned land
under the east African nation's two-year-old commune programme, which
pools scattered rural residents into new communities, ostensibly to
provide them better access to services.
But some rights groups and
observers fear the programme has another goal: to shove farmers aside
for eager -- and often foreign -- investors who cultivate land for crops
that will be exported to fuel rocketing food demand in China and other
developing nations.
"Livelihoods and food security in Gambella are
precarious, and the policy is disrupting a delicate balance of survival
for many," Human Rights Watch said in a January report.
The
government aims to resettle 1.5 million of its approximately 82 million
people by next year. Officials say there is nothing sinister about the
plan.
"Any society that's scattered, there's no way you can hear
their voice or ensure social and economic services," Federal Affairs
Minister Shiferaw Teklemariam said. "It is better to (create) organised
set-ups."
Ethiopian land is wholly owned by the socialist-leaning
government, which leases it out to companies and individuals for farming
or livestock grazing.
In the Gambella region -- dense with
vegetation and blessed with regular rain and a large river -- 200,000
people, or just over half the region's entire population, are due to be
resettled over the next three years. Close to 90,000 people -- or 20,000
households -- have already been moved.
The fields along the river
in Gambella are vibrant green and brim with rice husks, but in Kir, a
nearby resettlement village, resident Obuk Ojulu said the land was not
as fertile and that he had to rely partly on state grain handouts.
"Where we were before, there was good land," said Obuk, 25. "Here it is not good."
Kir
has a small clinic, though its supplies are usually low and a nearby
school has no teachers, just rows of kids flipping idly through tattered
and outdated textbooks.
Regional agricultural department head Ahmoud Oto denied food shortages and insisted villagers are better off.
"Previously,
where they were living, they were not benefiting from services," he
said. "Now they are beneficiaries of clean water, health and education."
Human
Rights Watch has accused the government of pushing communities off the
land to make way for investors, who already occupy 500,000 hectares
(2,000 square miles) of land in the region.
As incentives, the government offers tax breaks, pools of cheap labour and long-term leases of fertile land at affordable rates.
An
additional 1.2 million hectares (4,600 square miles) is earmarked for
agricultural investors in Gambella over the next three years.
Authorities
insist investment boosts development by creating jobs and spurring
economic growth, but Human Rights Watch senior researcher Ben Rawlence
said residents' needs are being overlooked.
"Everybody wants better access to services, the problem is how it happens," he told AFP by phone from London.
"The
right of development is not just the right of the state to bulldoze
land. It's also the right of the people to choose how they want to
develop."
Human Rights Watch warns the resettlement programme is
reminiscent of the "collectivisation" drive by the authoritarian
military regime in the 1970s that forcibly relocated 13 million people
-- often violently -- but ultimately failed because no services were
provided. Thousands died as a result.
Milkesa Wakjira, processing
coordinator for the Ethiopian-owned Saudi Star company, which rents a
10,000-hectare (40-square-mile) plot near Abobo, defended the leasing of
land.
"This is not a question of land grabbing," he said,
standing before a sprawling green rice paddy as tractors trundled by.
"If the land belongs to the government, no one is in a position to grab
it because if the government wants the land, they can take it back."
Wakjira
said the community welcomes the new jobs and the company's efforts to
pave the area's jumbled dirt tracks. Saudi Star has also given two cars
to the local district and donated 200 beehives to local farmers.
But more than 50 percent of the rice Saudi Star grows here is exported, mainly to Saudi Arabia, Wakjira said.
Opening
its doors to foreign investors is part of the government's ambitious
Growth and Transformation Plan, which aims to boost Ethiopia's economic
growth and reach middle-income status by 2015.
The International
Monetary Fund says Ethiopia's economy is growing at a rate of 7.5
percent, though the government pegs growth at 11 percent. The country's
main exports are livestock, coffee and agriculture.
Despite the scarcity of food and land, Thwol says he will tough it out in Abobo for now.
"School is here, clinic is here and small water is here," he said.
Even though his plot of land has shrunk, he prefers to be near these services, no matter how under-resourced they are.
ይህው
እንግዲህ ፆም ሊፈታ ነው። ተስፋዬ ካሳ በአንድ ቀልዱ ላይ ሁለት ችግር ያላቸው…! (“ር”ን ረዘም ያድርጉልኝ)
እናም ሁለት ችግርርርር … ያላቸው ባልና ሚስቶች ብላችሁ አንብቡልኝ፤ ስለ ፆም ፍቺ ያወሩትን እንዲህ ነግሮን
ነበር፤
