Ethiopian (Woyane) Airlines hijacked

February 18, 2014

by Yilma Bekele

The Name is Ethiopian but that particular property belongs to our Woyane masters. It is there for the TPLF to do what it wants. It started with such promise and grew up to be such a proud achievement by both people and country. That is until Woyane showed up.

That promise of building an organization that belongs to us all was nipped in the bud by Meles Ashebari Zenawi and friends. Like all other institutions, Ethiopian Airlines was absorbed by the TPLF mafia and molded in its own image. Like most other institutions created by earlier generations that the TPLF inherited, the first order of business was to clean house in the name of re organization and install cadres from one tribe.

Democracy and its Trade-off: Ethiopia’s Path to National Reconciliation By Prof. Messay Kebede

In many of my previous articles, even as Meles Zenawi was in absolute control of the country, I have defined the creation of a government of national reconciliation as the best roadmap both for the easing of some of Ethiopia’s socio-economic problems and initiating the construction of a democratic future. My assumption was then that Ethiopia could benefit from Meles’s dream of grandeur: had he taken the initiative of creating a genuine government of reconciliation, he would have marked history in a way similar to Nelson Mandela. The purpose of this article is to confirm that the proposal is still relevant.

Before I go further, there is one basic hurdle that needs to be removed. Every time I propose a government of national reconciliation, I face two different objections. Some pity my naivety and demolish my proposal with a heavy blow of realism by asking, why would the ruling elite invite the opposition parties when it feels strong in the face of a weak and divided opposition? Others tell me that my position does no more than side with the ruling party by throwing cold water on the struggle to remove the EPRDF which, they say, is beyond redemption.

ECADF: Open Letter to Mr. Umar Hassen Ahmad al-Bashir

February 8, 2014

Mr. Umar Hassen Ahmad al-Bashir, President

The Republic of the Sudan

Khartoum, Sudan

Dear: Mr. al-Bashir

The Ethiopian Current Affairs Discussion Forum (ECADF) is a non-for–profit organization where concerned Ethiopians from all over the world discuss matters that affect Ethiopia and Ethiopians.

It is a recorded history that Ethiopia is the only country in African that has never been colonized and pioneered an anti-colonization movement.

Saving Ethiopia From the Chopping Block

February 3, 2014

by Alemayehu G. Mariam*

WE live in a time that gives new meaning to Shakespeare’s line in Julius Caesar: “The evil that men do lives after them…” Today we come face to face with the evil Meles Zenawi has done when he lived. A piece of Ethiopia is retailed once again to the Sudan. They call it “border demarcation.” I call it call it border slicing, dicing and pricing — all for thirty pieces of silver!

In July 2008, I gave an impassioned speech in defense of the territorial integrity of the Ethiopian motherland at a conference called by a North American civic society group known as “Gasha for Ethiopia”:

We are here today to help stop Meles Zenawi

US House Bill Requires Accountability From Ethiopia (Press Release)

January 28, 2014

US House Appropriation Bill Requires Increased Accountability from Ethiopia as Prerequisite for Funding

PRESS RELEASE

Solidarity Movement for New Ethiopia

Washington, DC – Is United States policy towards Ethiopia shifting? For years Ethiopians, social justice groups, human rights organizations and civic groups have been calling on donor countries to demand greater accountability from the Government of Ethiopia for funds received, citing the lack of political space, endemic injustice, the repression of basic freedoms and widespread human rights crimes; however, now, the people of Ethiopia have reason to expect that the climate of impunity is changing.

The United States House Appropriations Committee has included stringent new requirements of accountability from the Government of Ethiopia in a section of the new 2014 bill that directly addresses Ethiopia. (Please refer to the sub-section of the bill below.)

Kenyatta at the ICC: Is Justice Deferred, Justice Denied?

January 27, 2014

by Alemayehu G. Mariam*

I am getting a little jittery over the repeated delays, postponements and all the backpedalling talk about “false evidence” and “lying witnesses”  in the Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta International Criminal court trial. I don’t want to say I smell a rat but I feel like I am getting a whiff. Is the stage being set to let Kenyatta off the ICC hook?

There has been feverish efforts to defer, delay and dismiss Kenyatta’s prosecution as a sitting head of state since  January 2012 when the International Criminal Court’s  (ICC) Pre-Trial Chamber confirmed charges against him.  In May 2013, Kenya’s Ambassador to the U.N. Macharia Kamau filed a 13-page “Confidential” letter with the President of the UN Security Council seeking to take the Kenyatta case out of ICC hands and directing it to relinquish  jurisdiction to Kenyan courts. In the same month, Hailemariam