Wednesday, 25 February 2015

The sorry state of Woyane tyranny,,,Fake Medias, courts, parliament, Election Board, investments, diplomas…

Fundamentally tyranny is rotten to its bones and the principle reason why society under its rule is ill-governed; poor, without freedom and rights. Similarly, what TPLF led tyranny brought on the people of Ethiopia is a tragedy beyond comprehension that will have far MORE implication in the future over and above what we experienced in the past. Surprisingly, it managed to fake its stay by committing appalling atrocities and corruption and elaborately covered it up for far too long.
Enough is said about Woyane  tyranny over two decades. Enough time elapsed for the dimwitted regime and its operatives to learn something better beyond faking, committing corruption and atrocities and covering it up with elaborate propaganda. And, more tragically; enough lives were lost, livelihood ruined and resources squandered to fulfill the twisted ideology of the  tyranny to teach the regime’s apologists and everyone else to wake up and smell the COFFEE.
But, the naughty TPLF operatives are not listening. In fact, they are getting bolder and nastier than ever in the LAST hour– intensifying their atrocities and corruption and faking everything to preserve their beloved tyranny. Their violation of the unspoken rule; ‘you shall not fall in love with tyranny’ is making them irrational enough to bit everyone around them and beyond.
QUITE honestly, they are confused of their own empty propaganda and in dilemma to tell the difference between the real from the fake things they do. In one hand, they feel faking to preserve ethnic tyranny is worthwhile undertaking in exchange for what it provides. In another hand, they know the real thing is going to expose and end its rule and the goodies that COME with it. Therefore, they are in a hard place and a rock — ‘dumb if you do dumb if you don’t’ that consumed their humanity to turn them into a walking zombies against the people.
Sadly, they don’t even have the decency to respect the professions and the institutions they represent — be it Media, business, education, politics, the law… or whatever else REQUIRES professional integrity and ethics and independence. In the process, they not only threw their honor in the garbage bin but surrender their respective professions as instrument of tyranny at the expenses of our unfortunate people under them. Such self-infected wound often stays a lifetime and rarely heals – infecting the generation to come.
Equally tragic is most of our contemporary elites’ indifference not to institutionally challenge their compromised peers serving the ethnic tyranny — failing to SUBJECTthem for the punishments they deserve.
Therefore, beside lots of blame to go around, Ethiopia today is not only a failed state under the mercy of a fake revolutionary democratic ethnic regime’ elites and the indifference of the rest held together by the faith of her regular folks. Her future is not promising due to the fragmentation of her people brought by the elites’ unchecked ego not to come together to challenge tyranny for the people cause.
The recent fiascos of the TPLF’s operatives illustrates the regime is held together by fake institutions run by fake professionals doomed to implode. Equally worrisome is the lack of institutions to break the cycle of the blame game to institute the rule of law to deprive a hiding place and punish the offenders of the regime and anyone that violates the rights and freedom of the people.
Take for instance the Ethiopian Election Board unprecedented breach of public trust AGAIN as it reached the bottom of the pits as reported recently. It is the tip of the iceberg of what TPLF run regime doing by infesting public and private institutions with cadres and pseudo professionals with bogus credential and lack of professional integrity.
Menga Bekana and Addisu Gebreigzabhier
Menga Bekana and Addisu Gebreigzabhier
The two principals that were handpicked since the formation of the Election Board were and still are the dishonorable Dr. Menga Bekana and Dr Addisu Gebreigzabhier (TPLF’s illusive operative with not much PROFILE and image in the cyber space) along the rest of irrelevant members filling seats.
Their recent embarrassing behavior of sidestepping their professional duty, integrity and ethics as members of the supposedly independent Election Board by interfering in the internal AFFAIRS of opposition parties in collaboration with TPLF owned Radio Fana was the best example of pseudo professionals faking the role of Election Board unheard of even by the African standard.
That is not all, both officials of the Board were trained by Professor Ephraim Isaac, the controversial Founder of the Horn of Africa Peace & Development Center (PDC), the Coalition of Ethiopian Elders (CEE) and a Board of Advisor and expert in the National Committee on American Foreign Policy (NCAFP) along with the African Project Director, Ambassador Herman J. Cohen, the former Assistant Secretary of State for Africa in the administration of President George H.W. Bush (1989-1993), and senior advisor for African Governance at the World BANK, according to NCAFP’s website.
Currently, Ambassador Cohen is President of Cohen & Woods International and Project Director of the NCAFP’s Africa Project where Professor Ephraim is a Project and Country Director of the Peace Dialogues for a Sustainably Stable Ethiopia. https://www.ncafp.org/about-us/founders-and-principals.
‘In that capacity, on NOVEMBER 15, 2012 he (Prof. Ephraim Isaac) held by invitation only roundtable discussion at the Harvard Club in New York City titled “Laying the Groundwork for Democracy” as part of the NCAFP’s Ethiopia Project “Peace Dialogues for a Sustainably Stable Ethiopia”. Among the invited was “Dr. Addisu Gebreigzabhier, who serves as Deputy Chairman of the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia since 2007, and Professor Merga Bekana, Chairperson of the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia’, according to NCAFP website. It goes on “As Chairperson of the Board, Professor Bekana hasSUCCESSFULLY managed both local and general elections in 2008 and 2010 respectively, in addition to having organized referenda and by-elections”.
No one knows what the ‘groundwork for democracy’ and ‘successfully managed election’ means in TPLF instigated votes robbery that net over 99% of all the previous elections and the treats and arrests of the oppositions go through to run for elections. No one also knows what responsibility the Professor would take as Project and Country Director of “Peace Dialogues for a Sustainably Stable Ethiopia” and how and with whom peace dialogue is TARGETED behind the backs of Ethiopians.
With the Professor public credential and caliber one would expect the highest degree of transparency and professional integrity. But, it appears he took the meaning of mediation, peace dialogues and election at a whole different level to preserve the regime than to bring about democratic governance and accountability. Simply looking at the past record and the Election Board website’s lack of transparency, including the absence of the identity and PROFILE of the members alone would disqualify it to be considered an institution let alone as Election Board to publicly endorse it and the members as an impartial.
The QUESTION is why would Professor Ephraim put his reputation on line for the tyrannical and corrupt regime that doesn’t have any interest in peace dialogue or the Election Board members that don’t have the integrity to run anything let alone an important institution where the rights and freedom of Ethiopians depends on?
Sadly to say, no independent Media or any other institutions investigated and made the Professor and his associates ACCOUNTABLE legally or otherwise on what exactly they do in the various organizations they are involved and what kind of training they provided to the Election Board members to behave the way they do in the name “Peace Dialogues for a Sustainably Stable Ethiopia”.
Constantinos  Berhe, the Co-Founder of Lem Ethiopia,
Constantinos Berhe, the Co-Founder of Lem Ethiopia
Another recent investigative report by the celebrated exiled journalist Abebe Gelaw of Addis Voice was the fake diplomas of ‘Dr.’ Constantinos Berhe, the Co-Founder of Lem Ethiopia, the Environment and Development Society of Ethiopia based in Addis Ababa that supposedly qualified him to teach Public Policy at Addis Ababa University.
Constantinos’ ‘bogus’ diploma from a fake university identified as American Century University in New Mexico run by an Iranian American national with one office and a secretory is the tip of the iceberg that would implicate all Universities in the COUNTRY and the Ministry of Education itself.
According to Lem Ethiopia website, Constantinos claim a colorful PROFILE as “author of numerous papers published in professional journals, presented to workshops and symposia. With a Ph.D. in Resource Management, his specific skills are in strategic planning and programming, resource management, sustainable human development, civil society development and sustainable livelihoods including participatory policy analysis, formulation, and management and governance and conflict management”
Some of his experience POSTED includes ‘a senior adviser for institution such as the EU, UNDP, UNECA, UNICEF, WFP, FAO, African NGOs and Governments of Kenya, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Ethiopia, South Africa, Malawi, Rwanda, Somalia, Uganda, Tanzania, Nepal, India and South Africa on the Development agenda. He has been extensively involved in policy research work in governance, poverty, and sustainable livelihoods’.
Whether all his work experiences are based on the bogus credential he provided to the various organizations listed is not clear and REQUIRES more investigations. But, it worth to ask, what does it take for 100s of Medias populating the cyberspace to investigate 100s of bogus businesses, Medias and organizations and 1000s of government officials and the ruling regime’s operatives with fake credentials?
Ironically, Lem Ethiopia Constantinos run have “ A Code of Ethics defining organizational relationships, popular ACCOUNTABILITY, and conduct of work and sense of direction is as much an essential point of departure for any agency or peoples’ organizations like Lem Ethiopia. In this regard, our organizational principles & values adhere to promoting sustainable development, participation, and empowerment, flexibility, transparency, gender equity, accountability, and dedication & commitment”, according its website.
The revelation says more about how the ruling regime undermines public institution– issuing and legitimizing bogus credential for its officials and operatives. After all, what does it take to VERIFY a bogus diploma from the real at the Ministry and University level?
Abadula Gemeda and Shiferaw Shigute Wolassa
Abadula Gemeda and Shiferaw Shigute Wolassa
Unfortunately, the diploma mill is not an isolated incidence but said to be so rampant even the Speaker of the House and the former Oromia REGIONPresident Abadula Gemeda, bought Bachelor of Art and Master Degrees in Public Administration from the same American Century University and Military Science from a nonexistent Chinese college, according to report.
The Minster of EDUCATION Shiferaw Shigute Wolassa that oversees the nation’s education also acquired A Master Degree in Organizational Leadership from the Azusa Pacific University that is allegedly issued 1000s of bogus diplomas for the regime officials and operatives with two weeks long seminars.

Tuesday, 24 February 2015

OROMO AND THEIR POLITICAL STRUGGLE

The main aim of this event was to show the overall view of 
Oromo and our political Struggle against TPLF /Weyanee and we demand;
-To stop the arbitrary arrest,kidnappings,Tortures,killings of innocentOromo people
-to stop evicting oromo farmers from their Ancestral land.
-to release all Oromo political prisoners Without any prerequisite.
-to reverse the implimentation of the Oromo Evicting Finfinne master plan.
-to respect the rule of law
-to stop the banning of indipendent oromo civic associations.
source,http://finfinnetribune.com/Gadaa/2015/02/video-the-oromo-and-their-political-struggle/

TPLF’s Leaders Arrogance and Contempt – Inviting Further Bloodshed and Loss of Lives – HRLHA Statement

The following is a statement from the Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA).
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HRLHALogo2011
February 23, 2015
Since the downfall of the military government of Ethiopia in 1991, the political and socioeconomic lives of the country have totally been controlled by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front/TPLF leaders and business institutions. As soon as the TPLF controlled Addis Ababa, the capital city, in 1991, the first step it took was to create People’s Democratic Organizations (PDOs) in the name of different nations and nationalities in the country. With the help of these PDOs, the TPLF managed to control the whole country in a short period of time from corner to corner. The next step that the TPLF took was to weaken and/or eliminate all independent opposition political organizations existing in the country, including those with whom it formed the Ethiopian Transitional Government in 1991. Just to pretend that it was democratizing the country, the TPLF signed seven international human rights documents from 1991 to 2014. These include the“Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment”. Despite this, it is known that the TPLF has tortured many of its own citizens ever since it assumed power, and has continued to the present day.
The TPLF Government adopted a new constitution in 1995; and, based on this Constitution, it formed new federal states. The new Ethiopian Constitution is full of spurious democratic sentiments and human rights terms meant to inspire the people of Ethiopia and the world community. The TPLF’s pretentious promise to march towards democracy enabled it to receive praises from people inside and outside, including donor countries and organizations. The TPLF government managed somehow to maintain a façade of credibility with western governments, including those of U.S.A. and the UK. In reality, the TPLF security forces were engaged in intensive killings, abductions, disappearances of a large number of Oromo, Ogaden, Sidama peoples and others whom the TPLF suspected of being members, supporters or sympathizers of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), Ogadenian National Liberation Front (ONLF), and Sidama People’s Liberation Front (SPLF). TPLF – from high officials down to ordinary level cadres in the various regional states – engaged in enriching themselves and their family members by looting and embezzling public wealth and properties; raping young women in the occupied areas of the nations and nationalities in Ethiopia; and committing many other forms of corruptions.
After securing enough wealth for themselves, the TPLF government officials, cadres and members declared, in 2004, an investment policy that resulted in the eviction of indigenous peoples from their lands and all types of livelihoods. Since 2006, thousands of Oromo, Gambela, and Benishangul nationals and others have been forcefully evicted from their lands without consultation or compensation. Those who attempted to oppose or resist were murdered and/or jailed by the TPLF1. The TPLF government then cheaply leased their lands, for terms as long as 50 years, to international investors and wealthy Middle East and Asian countries, including Saudi Arabia2. The TPLF government has done all this against its own Constitution, particularly article 40 (3)3, which states that “The right to ownership of rural and urban land, as well as of all natural resources, is exclusively vested in the State and in the peoples of Ethiopia. Land is a common property of the Nations, Nationalities and Peoples of Ethiopia and shall not be subject to sale or to other means of exchange”. These acts were also against the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 17 (1 & 2)4, which says, “1. Everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others. 2. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.”
In order to facilitate further corruption and embezzlement, the money paid for the leases as long as 50 years were received in cash. For example, the Indian agro investor Karaturi explained to a Guardian newspaper’s reporter that the TPLF government officials asked him to pay in cash in order to get the land, which he called “green gold”5. These gross human rights violations by the TPLF leaders against the Oromos, Gambelas, and Benishanguls have been condemned by many civic organizations, including Amnesty International, the Human Rights Watch, the Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa, the Oakland Institute and others.
The giving away of Oromo land in the name of investment also includes Addis Ababa, the capital city situated at the center of Oromia Regional State. 30,000 Oromos were evicted by the TPLF/EPRDF Government from their lands and livelihoods in the areas around the Capital City and suburbs, and their lands were given to the TPLF officials, members and loyal cadres over the past 24 years. In order to grab more lands around Addis Abba, the TPLF government prepared a plan called “the Addis Ababa Integrated Master Plan,” a plan that aimed at annexing about 36 towns and surrounding villages into Addis Ababa. This Master Plan was first challenged by the Oromo People’s Democracy Organization/OPDO in March 2014.
The challenge was first supported by Oromo students in different universities, colleges and high schools in Oromia, and then spread to Oromo farmers, Oromo intellectuals in all corners of Oromia Regional State and to Oromo nationals living in different parts of the world. The Oromo nationals staged peaceful protests all over Oromia Regional State. In connection with this Addis Ababa Integrated Master Plan, which had the risk of evicting more than two million farmers from around the capital city, about seventy Oromo students from among the peaceful protestors were brutalized by the special TPLF Agizi snipers and more than five thousand Oromos from all walks of life were taken to prisons in different parts of Oromia Regional State. The inhuman military actions and crackdowns by the TPLF government against peaceful protestors were condemned by different international media, such as the BBC6, human rights organizations, such as Amnesty International and the HRLHA7. The government admitted that it killed nine of them8. The unrest that started in central Oromia suddenly escalated to such a high level that the TPLF leaders suspended the expansion plan for a while.
Mr. Abay Tsehaye
Mr. Abay Tsehaye
However, recently, without the slightest regret and sense of remorse over the massacres committed against peaceful protestors of Oromo Nationals by his government in May and April 2014, the TPLF’s co-founder, top official and the current Prime Minister’s (Hailemariam Dessalegn’s) special advisor, Mr. Abay Tsehaye, vowed in public that anyone who attempts to oppose the implementation of the so-called Addis Ababa Master Plan would be dealt with harshly. In his speech, he confirmed that the TPLF government is determined to continue with the master plan, no matter what happened in the past or what may come in the future. In a manner that Abay Tsehaye was reiterating that the annexations of towns and cities in central Oromia into the capital Addis Ababa will go ahead as planned regardless of the absence of consultations and consent of the local people and/or the officials of the targeted towns and cities. Besides displaying his extreme arrogance and contempt for the Oromo Nation, Mr. Abay Tsehaye’s speech was in direct breach of constitutional provisions of both federal and regional states.
2AbayTsehayeHRLHA2015
The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa (HRLHA) would like to express its deep concern that this TPLFs leader’s speech not only encourages violence against the country’s own citizens, but also invites further bloodshed and losses of lives; it leaves no room at all for dialogue, consultation and consent – norms which are at the core of a genuine democracy. This is still happening despite the killing of more than seventy Oromo youth and the arrest and incarceration of thousands of others as a result of violent and deadly responses by armed forces of the TPLF and the government to peaceful demonstrators in May and April 2014.
Conclusion:
The HRLHA believes that the gross human rights violations committed by the TPLF government in the past 24 years against Oromo, Ogaden, Gambela, Sidama and others were pre-planned and intentional all the times that they have happened. The TPLF killed, tortured, and kidnapped and disappeared thousands of Oromo nationals, Ogaden and other nationals simply because of their resources and ethnic backgrounds. The recent research conducted by Amnesty International under the title “Because I am Oromo”: SWEEPING REPRESSION IN THE OROMIA REGION OF ETHIOPIA’9 confirms that peoples in Ethiopia who belong to other ethnic groups have been the victims of the TPLF. The TPLF inhuman actions against the citizens are clearly a genocide, a crime against humanity10 and an ethnic cleansing, which breach domestic and international laws, and all international treaties the government of Ethiopia signed and ratified. The Human Rights League of the Horn of Africa wants to hold the TPLF government accountable, as a group and as individuals, for the crimes they have committed and are committing against Oromos and others.