The month of May, which roughly corresponds to the month of Ginbot, has been eventful in the history of Ethiopia particularly beginning in the second half of the past century up to the present. Traditionally, Ginbot is considered a harbinger of sickness, disease, pestilence, hunger and famine. On the first day of the month, Ginbot Ldeta, one’s house and homestead is thoroughly cleaned and the trash collected and burnt. Offerings is made to the Virgin Mary. The coffee ceremony is held *out side* the home and grains like chick peas, sunflower seeds and barley or wheat are roasted together and before being consumed some of it is thrown in all four directions to ward off evil spirits and to ask mother earth to give her produce in abundance in the coming year.
The Italians entered Addis Ababa on May 5 and the boastful Mussolini declared at Palaso Venezia in Rome that Ethiopia is now and forever to be a colony of Italy. Exactly five years later, on May 5, with supreme historical sense, Emperor Haile Selassie chose to reenter Addis Ababa to permanently erase the hateful memory of the Fascists. Today is Ginbot 7 when the Ethiopian peoples hopes and aspirations to democracy, which they had expressed in a manner never seen not only in Ethiopia butt even the rest of the world, firmly rejected the Weyane. Sadly the world looked on when the Weyane snatched the elections from the jaws of victory and asserted its dictatorship. With a sense of history worthy of its forefathers the Ginbot 7 party was established on this date to erase the painful memories of the Weyane and to rededicate the Ethiopian people to democracy and good governance. By doing so it has systematically exposed the crimes of the Weyane as no other political party has done before.
Traditionally , Ginbot was considered as an evil month in Ethiopia and no marriage ceremony is performed in that month because it was believed that one or the other party in the marriage would die. Emperor Haile Selassie wanted to defy this backward tradition and chose to marry his daughter Princess Zenebe Work in the month of Ginbot . Sadly the Princess accompanied her (later traitor) husband Dejazmatch Haile Selassie Gugsa to Mekele and died in pregnancy. People said “you see the accursed month of Ginbot”
One of the most horrendous crimes of the second half of the 20th century was the massacre of thousands of the Ethiopian youth in Addis Ababa and the rest of Ethiopia on May Day. The crimes of the Weyane, though horrendous, does not even approximate a fraction of the crimes committed by the Derg and its Kebele cadres whose periodic and sustained pogroms continued thought its 17 years reign of terror. Last week the Weyane buried the remains of 11 Red Terror victims whose remains were identified by Argentine forensic experts and 19 others who have not been identified. They were laid to rest accompanied by a military band and appropriate pomp and circumstance. They were among the hundreds of persons killed in the outskirts of Kotebe (strangled by piano wire and rope, hanged on trees and tied to trees alive so that they can be devoured by roaming hyenas at night, and the few lucky ones shot)
This is a very first small step to address the Derg crimes. A make shift Red Terror memorial where photos of the victims were displayed has been set up. However, its purpose was compromised when among the photos was that of Wallelign Mekonnen, who was not even alive during the Red Terror and that of the Emperor feeding his dogs from a silver platter.
Next week, May 20, will be the 20th anniversary of the escape of the notorious criminal Mengistu Haile Mariam. He is living safely in exile a privilege he has denied for millions of his victims. His alter ego and his namesake Sargent (later Captain) Mengistu Gemechu, the Janus faced prefect criminal, who has remained in the shadows while murdering hundreds and has escaped justice by dying in prison. Two of the Derg murderers are in exile – one here in the US and the other in Australia. A notorious murderer, a Colonel and friend of Mengistu, had come to the US on account of his daughters and died peacefully in Tennessee a few months ago. If the trend continues even Mengistu might come here on a visit and lecture us about the virtues of the Derg. We have sunk so low.
As Marx says “history repeats itself first as a tragedy, then as a farce.” We have been, like an ostrich, burying our head in the sand pretending to forget the past. But a people who forgets its past is condemned to repeat it in the future. Witness the hundreds of Derg murderers who are mixing in our mildest and trying their best that we forget the past and urge us to focus exclusively on the present. *We have, and should have, the capacity to do both.
