Mr. Prime Minister, contingent on the final human tragedy your ethinc based politics/policies may bring on Ethiopia, your regime may very well take the historical place of “the Hutu leaders of Rwanda” who orchestrated much of the mass killing during the 1994 genocide. I just hope that your government will not take Ethiopia down in a similar bloody path given that your policies and repressive actions have created a fertile ground for an ethnic war and political and social disorders of immense magnitude. I believe the concerns of Honorable Members of US Congress emanate from this alarming threat posed by your regime’s venomous policies and repressive actions.

Mr. Prime Minister, the world has registered many genocidal killings by your government. The massacre of over 400 members of the Anuak ethnic group, the past genocides in Arbagugu and Bedeno compels us to draw a logical parallel between the Interahamwe of Rwanda and your government. As many have witnessed, your army, has been an instrument of the state sponsored terror and a tool of perpetuating tribalism and mass killings in Ethiopia. It is evident that you trained such a trigger-happy and loyal force outside of the national army solely to defend your ruling oligarchy. In contrast, it is a tragedy that the national armed forces continue to fight a senseless war at the border with Eritrea, while your government made a conscious decision to make a populous state of over 70 million a landlocked country inhibiting yet another medium of economic growth.

Mr. Prime Minister, today, the world is a global neighborhood tied together by the web of common human interests, economic growth, trade and respect for the rule of law and quest for freedom. There is no place for tyranny, ethnic obsession and narrow nationalism. The world is looking at the ongoing state sponsored terror in Ethiopia in the contest of the ethnic policies of your regime and numerous massacres and genocidal crimes perpetrated by your government. For the international community not to do so would be to ignore your ongoing transgression of the sanctity of life for what it is … a precursor for all out genocidal crimes. You are unable to foresee and do not want to provide a solution to deal with what is creeping under your watch.

Reverting back to your letter dated June 28, 2005, one would expect a prime minister of “a civilized nation like Ethiopia” to clearly address and act on the concerns set forth by the honorable members of the U.S. Congress. On the contrary, you have chosen to hide behind your hollow “constitution” and “the rule of law” to defend terror and murder of innocent Ethiopians. Prime Minister Meles, there is no rule of law in Ethiopia, there is no democracy in Ethiopian, and if there is democracy in Ethiopia it is only a PR ploy or a façade. There is no peace in Ethiopia; the guns are silent only for the moment, if they are.

Mr. Prime Minister, your government is wrong on the political policies, wrong on the economy, wrong on the social and educational programs, and it is proven to be ineffective in the overall management and delivery of basic services to our people, needless to mention your daily terror and repression. There is state failure in Ethiopia due to your government’s ongoing engagement in unnecessary and avoidable wars, implementation of bad policies, ineptness to setup and implement the right development programs, mismanagement of resources, repression and corruption and the like. Your government is unable to knit even basic recourses to deal with recurring food shortage in Ethiopia.

Mr. Prime Minister, the democratic movement is born out of popular will and the quest for freedom and democracy and the burning need for a change in Ethiopia. Unfortunately, this noble movement is being decimated with brutal force as opposed to being protected and cherished. Mr. Prime Minister, your track records and your bloody past do not reflect your conviction for democracy. Your government, in view of your horrific repressive actions, has so far displayed a great deal of rhetoric to create a semblance of democracy but very little democratic actions on the ground. The democratic reforms you are trumpeting and believe to have embarked are empty given your repressive nature and lack of basic respect for human life. It is used to deceive the world but not to genuinely democratize our country. The ideals of democracy is used to achieve non-democratic objectives, is used to assert your personal supremacy and to give an international legitimacy to the ruling oligarchy.

Mr. Prime Minister, the elections day turnout of our people to register their vote should not be misconstrued or used to validate the fairness of the “election process”, as you attempted to do in your letter to the “Honorables”. The primary litmus tests for validating a democratic process and free and fair election are genuine electoral framework, genuine participation, and respect for the rule of law and respect for the electoral results. The validity of a democratic election should not be by mere observation of groups who may have given remarks based on what they are temporarily led to believe or due to wrong impressions; some observers unfortunately gave remarks as they landed in Addis without examining the election realties on the ground. This is used to create a perception of free and fair election for your expediency. EU observers and many other neutral bodies, nevertheless, have stated that they are troubled by the election process/counting despite election-day massive turnouts.

Mr. Meles the true feeling of the ruling coalition is clearly demonstrated by giving a death warrant to its core army for the massacre of innocent demonstrators and by jailing opposition’s leaders, activists and supporters throughout the country. These are true manifestations of the ruling coalition’s “bitter disappointment” as the Honorable Members of US Congress simply put it. The atrocities demonstrate your government’s real nature and a futile attempt to gain individual supremacy over popular will.

Mr. Prime Minister, tyrants depend on violence and extra-constitutional or extra judicial means to grab or secure state power. The opposition is a movement for freedom, democracy and an expression of popular will; it is not extra-constitutional or violent by any measure. The opposition does not have the “extra-constitutional” makeup or means to fight a tyrannical government that is backed by heavily armed soldiers with death warrants to massacre their own people. The opposition has lunched a peaceful but resolute struggle that is more powerful than your dictatorship, and it is for this reasons the opposition is scoring sweeping victories against the ruling party. Mr. Prime Minister, the power of the opposition emanates from non-violence, the will of the people, the quest for freedom, and it draws strength from your government’s ineptness and oppressive nature.

Mr. Prime Minister, the opposition’s quest is not to “use the electoral process to remove the constitutional order through extra-constitutional means” as you indicated in your letters, but to fight peacefully so the will of the people is fully and unequivocally respected. The “Rose” and “Orange” revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine, you mentioned in detest, and other popular movements of Salvadorians and Serbians, to mention a few more, are examples of popular challenges and movements which forced tyrannical leaders such as Slobodan Milosevic to accept electoral defeat but not launch a “revolution” via extra-constitutional means as you put it.

I submit to you Mr. Prime Minister, the “Rose” and “Orange” movements in Georgia and Ukraine will be followed by many in the years ahead to challenge regimes who continue to squash and walkover their people’s rights and disregard electoral defeat. The popular movements in Ukraine, Georgia and Serbia are exemplary movements and fair journeys in view of repression and lack of respect for the rule of law and electoral results. Such popular movements are frightening and a blow to tyrants but a gospel for the subjugated and repressed.

May God bless the Honorable Members of US Congress!