Aigaforum: “Blackmailed Nation….” Say What?

Rereading "Ethiopia's new famine: A ticking timebomb", By Rick Hampson, USA Today (August 18, 2008)

What is Aigaforum talking about? Last time, he was depicting the tale of two lines in Addis and Asmara, for Sim card and bread, respectively. I personally thought that could have been some kind of joke, Aiga style satire. I thought unless he lost his mind, he wouldn’t dare to say “there has not been a line for 14 million starving people in Ethiopia”, so what else would it be except “satire”?

Of course, regardless of Shabia cadres’ in the west and other African countries out right lies about Eritrea being prospered, developed and industrialized, in surprising and bold move and contradiction of her shameless cadres, the cabinet member of EPLF told the international community that two-third (about 66.67%) of our Eritrean sisters and brothers are in dire need of food. Currently, each family is receiving 12 kilo grams food aid per month, an amount of food a big family in the west would probably consume in a single dining. Guess what? They are blaming Woyanne (Please listen http://uk.truveo.com/Death-of-the-Dream-Eritrea/id/3136812429).

Ethiopia’s case is not different, but the TPLF gang, including Aigaforum, wants us to think that “things happening to the people in Eritrea are worse than what is happening in Ethiopia.” In line with this meaningless propaganda, Aigaforum has accused USA Today, TIME, and NPR for “Blackmailing the nation [Ethiopia]”. It is shameful. Telling the truth is in no way blackmailing. USA Today has told us what is exactly happening in Ethiopia. In case if aigaforum was in haste for his blurry and unbalanced conclusion as usual or had a plane to catch to China for the Olympic and/or visit family (his communist comrades), I beg aigaforum to reread USA Today ball points as stated herein below.

1. Ethiopia , perennially one of the world's hungriest nations, once again has faced severe famine as result of the drought which killed the entire spring crop, global inflation that has doubled the price of food, armed rebellion in the Somali region that has disrupted food delivery, and assorted plagues, from insects to hailstones.


2. At least 14 million Ethiopians, about 18% of the nation, need food aid or cash assistance, according to government figures and aid agency estimates.


3. The hunger has spread across two-thirds of Ethiopia, from the slums of Addis Ababa to the parched countryside around Konso to the "green hunger" region where the rains came only after the spring growing season.


4. Urban Ethiopians traditionally were untouched by the hunger that droughts brought to the nation's subsistence farmers. Now all Ethiopians face annual food-price inflation of more than 75%; only Zimbabwe’s problem is worse, according to World Bank economist William Wiseman.


5. Even some middle-class residents of Addis Ababa are being forced to put off weddings, carry lunches to work and eat two meals daily instead of three.


6. The nation's emergency grain reserve is tapped out, and last month the food ration was reduced by one-third. The government says 75,000 children are severely malnourished. Some people are eating cactus, roots and other famine foods.


7. Ethiopia is addicted to an ever-growing dependence on food aid from countries who now must deal with increasing food problems of their own.


8. Awkwardly, Ethiopian leaders including but not limited to Zenawi and the country's health minister, who told reporters that “[Ethiopia] does not need to beat the drum of hunger … every year”, are in denial of the famine, so is the Woyanne foot-soldier aigaforum.


9. Ethiopia can ill afford to play down its food needs; other nations' own economic worries have left them less willing or able to feed the likes of Ethiopia.
   

USA today also said:

Unlike 1985, when images of a famine that killed 1 million Ethiopians shocked
the West, this year, there probably will be no mass starvation. An expensive,
elaborate social welfare apparatus, erected largely by the world's rich nations
to avert another 1985, will not permit it. However, since 1985 the population
has doubled to almost 80 million, and per-capita farm production has declined.
Meanwhile, the global cost of raising and moving food keeps rising.
Unfortunately, this year there's been push back from food donor nations, a
fatigue expressing: “'Here's Ethiopia again, looking for food again."

Who is to blame?

1. Beneath the system designed to stave off famine, Ethiopian agriculture is weaker than ever. Per-capita farm production has fallen by more than one-third since the famine of 1984-85, largely because the population has doubled — up to an average of 5.4 children per family — and the average farm plot has gotten smaller and drier.


2. The "green revolution" that transformed agriculture in Asia and Latin America after World War II largely bypassed [Ethiopia].


3. Most Ethiopians farm as their ancestors did — with oxen, wooden plows and rainfall. Farmers agree the latter has become increasingly unreliable.


4. Ethiopia also suffers from a centralized agricultural policy [of Zenawi] that does not encourage small private enterprise or even allow small farmers to own their land.
   

Result?

• Hunger remains a touchy issue in Ethiopia. The famine of 1973-74 brought down Emperor Haile Selassie, and the one of 1984-85 marked the beginning of the end for the regime that ousted him. Now, this famine of 14 million people along with the sprit of election 2005 marks the beginning of the end of the Zenawi regime. Amen! Hallelujah!


• The nation's reliance on others for food undercuts its sense of itself as the only African nation not colonized in the 19th century, and the only one to conclusively defeat a European power: the Italians at the Battle of Adwa in 1896.


• Being synonymous with famine "hurts the image of the country."
  

Solution?

• Ethiopia needs agricultural development: hybrid seeds, irrigation systems, market roads, storage facilities.


• Zenawi should return to his conscience and do the right thing by opening the democratic space, having respect to the rule of law and human rights, ending the ethnic politics and scrapping article 39, and being amenable to sound economic policies. Otherwise, he would go in disgrace as his two predecessors did.

So why aigaforum is crying out loud?

“Nation blackmailed?” Give me a break. Please ask him if any of these are untrue? Does he know what he is talking about? “ Balckmailed?” Who is forcing the regime of Meles Zenawi and for what sake or what to gain? Who is threatening the regime of Meles Zenawi to reveal what is not out there already? Telling the true face of the famine happening in Ethiopia is not unfair threatening or incriminating of Zenawi’s regime. If aigaforum thinks that the international aid agencies are telling the truth of the famine to avenge the new NGO legislation, he is fooling himself. We all know that law is being enacted to dismantle the Opposition groups and it has nothing to do with the famine, healthcare etc.

Actually, I have my own question for him.

• Isn’t Zenawi’s shameful ethnic politics and favoritism out there?
• Hasn’t he helped the massacre of thousands of Ethiopian soldiers in the hands of EPLF after the down fall of Dergue?
• Hasn’t he compromised Ethiopia’s unity and sovereignty?
• Hasn’t he caused the killing of Ayder School Kids and General Hayelom’s?
• Hasn’t he caused the 100,000 people death for senseless war?
• Hasn’t he caused the death of 20,000 young Ethiopians from the province of Tigray at the hands of EPLF?
• Hasn’t he massacred or caused the massacred of our brothers and sisters in Gambela, Awassa, Regions 3 and 4 at large and indiscriminately, Arba Gugu, Asebot Gedam, Bedno, Ogaden, Afar, Tigray and Addis Ababa etc?
• Hasn’t he caused, as a result of his idiotic economic policy, millions of people to be affected by drought and famine year after year?
  

What blackmail is aigaforum talking about? What a shame!