Meles Zenawi and our money

By Yilma Bekele

The richest.org
(http://www.therichest.org/)

an
internet site that publishes the net worth of rich and famous people in the
world in its recent publication included none other than our own Meles Zenawi
in the company of other billionaires in its ranking. I am certain we all looked
twice to make sure someone is not playing tricks on us. I am afraid it is true.
There is no reason to doubt why the folks at richest.org would pick on our guy
unless they have verifiable facts in order to splash his name and picture on
the front page.  Of course they are aware
his wife and family will sue the hell out of them if there was no truth to
their assertion and pay dearly for it too. Up until now no one has come forward
to set the record straight if mistake was made.   

What they
publically splashed across their front page was Meles Zenawi is worth $3
Billion US dollars. His profession is given as a politician and included
details about his length in office and marital status. As an Ethiopian this for
me is a very troubling question that I must answer to myself to satisfy the
many questions twirling in my head. To be frank with you I have no concept of a
billion dollar and I am afraid even a million is
beyond my pay scale. How did Meles Zenawi do it?

We know
for sure Meles Zenawi never worked for wages until he became the President of
Ethiopia in 1991. He came to the job with the clothes on his back; I am sure
some books and most probably not even a wallet in his pocket. He had no needs
for all that while engaged in fighting the Derg. Ever since that day he has
stayed in Arat Kilo and has never engaged in a profitable business, been
officially involved in any partnership that we know of or known for his keen
sense of entrepreneurship. He has been a political leader. The nagging question
again is how does one amass 3 billion dollars while not engaged in a business
enterprise? What exactly is this special ability he possessed that turned according
to his wife a four thousand bir a month salary into a 3 billion bonanza in less
than a decade?

Since he
is dead I am afraid we are unable to ask the individual. Whatever form his
wealth is in it is safe bet to assume it is not invested or sitting in one of
our banks. But one fact we know for sure is that the folks at the richest.org
were able to find out and verify their data in order to publish such
information. Of course we can summarize how one makes a lot of money being a
political leader and we wouldn’t be off the mark. The only way open to such an
individual is corruption and using the power of his office for personal gain. I
am afraid it does not require a degree in nuclear physics to figure that out.

In hind
sight it is possible to pinpoint the period when the Prime Minster decided to
engage in such outright petty theft of our National wealth and help himself and
his family in this criminal behavior by looking at the political and economic
situation in our country. I will bet anything that 2005 was the point in time
that the dictator turned rouge and decided to pay us back for the perceived
betrayal and ungratefulness for his sacrifice on behalf of our Nation. You see
the problem with disturbed and mal adjusted people is that they always believe
their selfish deeds is in the interest of others and they do not take rejection
kindly. The 2005 election was what drove our tyrant to the abyss and that trend
continued to the end. Three billion dollars is not a small matter and it
requires some unfulfilled deprivation to satisfy. We are of course finding out
today the little tyrant was up to the job. 
 

What we do with this information is
what interests me the most.
After all we know he did not earn it. The natural assumption is he stole it
from us. That I am afraid is not off the mark since he did not take it with our
permission. The question to our people and nation is what do you exactly do
when someone illegally takes what belongs to you? Really except for an
Ethiopian this is such a pedestrian question it is enough to roll one’s eyes
and say whatever dude! Naturally if someone robs you and you know who, it is
safe to assume you would call the police on the individual or take him/her to court
to get redress.

That is
what I am hoping we do. Get off our righteous anger, get over our surprise, put
that cynical behavior behind us and earnestly look for ways to recover what is
legally, morally and justifiably ours. I have a few proposals to make that I
think is not beyond our ability to try to do. The people of richest.org have
already done the best part of the job for us. They I am sure without much
personal motivation have been able to find out the dead guy certainly stashed
all that money away. Thus I am assuming we have such an incentive to move
heaven and earth to follow the trail and uncover every penny of what is taken
from us. This is what I think we should start with:

• Demand the Ethiopian Government open an investigation regarding the alleged wealth of the PM to clear his good name and the reputation of our country.
• Demand the Ethiopian Parliament start investigation to see if the information has any validity.
• Demand the Ethiopian government put a travel ban on his widow and family until the issue is resolved.
• Encourage, help and advice patriotic Ethiopian banking professionals to secure information regarding money transfer connected with the ruling group.
• We in the Diaspora organize a team consisting of forensic accountants, banking and finance professionals, finance lawyers, computer scientists and criminal investigators to follow the paper trail where ever it leads to.
• We encourage and help our professional investigators with leads, inside information etc. to help them.
• We in the Diaspora study case histories of such wealth recovery done by other victims such as Philippines, Tunisia, Chile, Egypt, Libya etc.
• Demand Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Clinton Foundation, World Bank, IMF and all other international organization make their books transparent regarding their dealings with the Government of Ethiopia.
• Respectfully ask my brother Obang to use his vast resources to look into the matter.

• Respectfully ask ESAT to use its journalistic knowhow to investigate and expose this national shame.

All the
above are not beyond our ability to accomplish. It is up to each one of us to
take the initiative to help our country and people recover what is stolen from
us. Three billion dollars is a lot of money and it could be used to open
schools, hospitals, improve water supply, and bring better sanitation service and
other needed projects to improve the life of our people. It is not fair or
morally right for one family to illegally take what belongs to all of us.

I am
afraid this is the tip of the iceberg. If the person in charge was helping
himself to the till we should also assume those around him were not sitting
idle. Thus the possibilities are more than excellent that top officials of TPLF
such as Seyoum Mesfin, Arkebe Uqbai, Berhane Gebre Kristos, Tedros Adhanom, are
sitting on a pile of money that cannot be explained easily. It is imperative we
demand a through explanation regarding their net worth, how they acquired it
and where exactly it is invested at the moment. As government officials they
are obliged to answer or face the consequences. They owe our nation an
explanation and it is not unfair to ask those who hold political power to
explain the source of their wealth. I am not accusing but as a citizen it is
our right and obligation to make sure no laws have been broken by those that
are supposed to enforce it.

I believe
this is a very important matter and cannot be ignored, laughing off or dismissing
it off hand is not good enough. When you consider the amount of money the
Diaspora remits to help their family and friends it is absolutely not fair that
those sitting in charge would just turn around and put it in their pockets for
personal and family use. The money the Diaspora makes comes by sacrifice, hard
work and plenty of sweat. It looks like our officials starting with the late PM
feel entitled and think nothing of putting their dirty fingers in the till. If
we let such criminal activity take place under our watch and do nothing about
it I am afraid we have no moral ground to call our country home, to carry the
flag and celebrate our gallant ancestors that paid a price to preserve what we
today call Ethiopia. When we let such criminal act and national abuse go
unchallenged I am afraid we we invite more abuse and we have no one to blame
but ourselves.  I used to think of the
late dictator murderer (Professor Asrat, Asefa Maru), Human Right abuser
(Kinijit leaders, Bertukan Mideksa, Eskinder Nega, Bekele Gerba,
Abubeker Ahmed) now I can add another designation to
his hall of shame – grand larceny.