SEATTLE – Some errors are frequently appearing in media reports coming out of Addis Ababa in recent times. A few of them could be unintentional and a few others inserted to please or ease government reprisal against the reporter. Unless checked in time, the errors may end up playing a publicity stunt for a regime that has clearly posed a threat to the survival of Ethiopia.
The statement that the ‘Zenawi regime is a close ally of Washington’ was true during the era of the Bush Administration. Not any more. Today to apply that previlege to the Zenawi regime may be more of a hype than a fact. The current Obama Administration is trying to distance itself from Mr Zenawi’s ruling group which is on record as perpertrator of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity. Hence the planned March on September 13.
Though Bereket Simon or Meles Zenawi would leave no stone unturned to diminish the rising image of the jailed UDJ leader, it should be noted that no amount of media disregard would overshadow the life and commitment of Birtukan Mideksa to the reign of democracy and justice in Ethiopia. It is a matter of time before the champion of human rights and justice emerges from the dungeons of Zenawi as the savior of the nation now fraught with deliberate ethnic fragmentation. It is a matter of time before Birtukan emerges as the female Mandela of Ethiopia.
We have faith that our colleagues working with the Voice of America (VOA), the Associated Press (AP), Reuters, BBC and other media organizations wouldn’t bow to the dictates of tyrannical regimes like Zenawi’s, and desist from carrying out their professional duties.
Another incident worth paying attention to is how recent media reports only mention that about 100 opposition leaders and journalists were jailed and nearly 200 killed following the elections in 2005. This is true. But a larger picture is missing: The brutal 2005 government crackdown that terrorized a nation of 80 million people. Thousands of lives have been unaccounted for, families torn to pieces, and businesses destroyed.
Parallels can rightly be drawn between the bloody 2005 crackdown in Ethiopia and the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, or the 1976 Soweto Massacre in South Africa. After Mr Zenawi took all powers into his hands and decalred a state of emergency in May 2005, at least five major concentration camps were opened in the country, each housing several thousand detainees. There are political prisoners jailed during the crackdown but still languishing behind bars. The legacy of terror lingers on.
Now with Ethiopian opposition members being hunted down again ahead of the so-called 2010 election, the cycle of state-sponsored terror is back in action, and running at full throttle.
Hence our conviction: “TPLF cannot be reformed; like apartheid, it should be dismantled.”
