Ethiopia airs jihadi film amid sensitive Muslim protest trial

Ethiopia,
a US ally in the battle against Al Qaeda-affiliated militants in Somalia, added
to mounting worries about religious discord in the diverse east African state
by screening a provocative documentary on Islamic extremism.

Ethiopian Muslims are furious about the film, which they say dishonestly blurs
the distinction between legitimate political protest and violence by using
lurid images of foreign terrorists that have nothing to do with them.

The program, Jihadawi Harekat
(Holy War Movement), ran on state-TV at peak watching hours last week, and it
associates local Muslim protesters now on trial with militant groups such as
Nigeria’s brutal Boko Harammovement
and Somalia’s Al Shabab, as well as unrelated
Ethiopian militants.

Currently, 29 leaders of a Muslim protest movement, and representatives of two
Islamic charities are on trial in Addis Ababa, facing charges of plotting
violence to create an Islamic state. The trial is being held behind closed
doors in order to protect some 200 witnesses, according to the government.

The Muslim defendants were arrested in August after nearly a year of nonviolent
protests over what they allege is unconstitutional Ethiopian state meddling in
Islamic affairs.

“The risks posed by violent religious radicalism in Ethiopia are not
imaginary,” says Jon Abbink, senior researcher
from the African studies center at Leiden University in the Netherlands.
“But the documentary is probably over-doing it; the susceptibility of
Muslims in Ethiopia to Al Qaeda-like radicalization is slim,” he says,
adding that the film would appear to “delegitimize” peaceful
political disagreements by Muslims and set up the possibility of a
“backlash.”

Ethiopia is considered a stronghold of Sufism, an approach to the practice of
Islam sharply at odds with that of Al Qaeda and aligned groups. The area has
been heralded for centuries for the largely peaceful co-existence of its varied
religious communities – though concerns are rising over extremism. Twice in
recent years the Army has invaded Somalia to pursue and combat Islamist
militants and salafis whose influence is said to be
increasing on the Ethiopian side of the border.

Muslims make up a third of a population of around 90 million in sub-Saharan
Africa’s second-most populous nation, according to CIA statistics. There are an
estimated 57 million Christians.

Ethiopia’s key position in the Horn of Africa – adjacent to volatile Somalia
and Sudan and in close proximity to the Middle East and North Africa – gives it
an importance in the eyes of Western nations. It receives some $3 billion in
strategic aid from various donors and Washington has looked on approvingly as
Ethiopian troops take on militants in Somalia and as its peacekeepers patrol
the flash-point Sudanese region of Abyei.

In return, Ethiopia allows the US to fly surveillance drones over Somalia from
the southern Ethiopian city of Arba Minch.

Stoking tensions

The Muslims who protested (largely peacefully) for nearly a year are led by a
17-man committee from the Awalia Muslim Mission school.

Those on trial say the state is leading a coercive campaign, pushing the
nation’s 31 million Muslims towards identifying with a more moderate strain of
Islam called Al Ahbash. They allege the government is
fearful of a perceived new radical Islamic impulse and is attempting to
strengthen its control of Ethiopia’s main Islamic national council.

The group is demanding that Muslims be allowed to run their own affairs, and
for their leaders to be released.

Government officials claim the campaign is a stalking-horse for extremists
planning an Islamic takeover.

Last week, in the midst of hot debate over the trial of the 29, Ethiopian
Television [ETV] ran the hour long documentary, and then repeated it on
consecutive days at peak-time after the news.

While authorities may have intended their documentary to be informative, it has
in fact stoked fears among Christians about Muslim intentions, and reignited
mass protests by Muslims at mosques.

The film starts with shots of Al Shabab fighters in
Somalia and scenes of carnage following Boko Haram
bomb attacks in Nigeria. Then it segued to interviews with alleged militants,
some from a cell of 15 Ethiopians recently arrested.

In the film, one man, Aman Assefa,
told the cameras they were planning attacks in Ethiopia after being trained and
armed by Al Shabab.

Then, inexplicably, clips of interviews with some of the 29 on trial and of
speeches from Awalia leaders followed. Then
interviews with ordinary Ethiopian citizens appeared, saying that the Muslim
group’s demands for more religious autonomy were bogus because there is ample
religious freedom in Ethiopia.

In a phone interview after the film was aired, government spokesman Shimeles Kemal said the documentary revealed “loosely
connected terror networks” in Ethiopia, with shared objectives.

“The whole thing was coordinated by the government,” says Kedir Mohammed, a taxi driver, expressing skepticism.

In recent days, some 90,000 Muslims, the biggest grouping since Ramadan in
August, gathered around Grand Anwar, the largest mosque in Ethiopia, located in
the Muslim-majority market area of Addis Ababa, after Friday prayers last week
to respond. Signs proclaimed “ETV is a liar” and “ETV. Made in False.”

“This is going to increase more and more until those people are
released,” says Mr. Kedir the taxi driver.

“There’s no fear but people became more angry
with the government,” says 17-year-old trader Abdulkarim
Mohammed.

Propaganda or public information?

Opposition politicians were similarly outraged when ETV, the only Ethiopian
broadcaster, screened a comparably skewed program, Akeldama
[Field of Blood], just as charismatic critics of the government Eskinder Nega and Andualem Arage were being
prosecuted last year.

Dissidents view the latest broadcast as the natural act of a police state that
is intolerant of dissent and dependent on divisive propaganda to focus public
attention away from its misrule.

“Keep on recording at least half of your crimes, that is part of our collective
memory,” exiled Addis Neger newspaper editor Mesfin Negash wrote in a
statement addressed to “Dear Oppressors” onFacebook.

“The only thing I like about your court drama is this aspect of recording
your history of injustice and the crime you are committing in the name of
justice.”

Many ordinary citizens were divided over the film. Even some who are
sympathetic to the government have questioned its timing in the midst of a high
profile trial. Others have praised it.

”After watching the documentary my mother said something like ‘I didn’t know
terrorist were that organized in Ethiopia and a threat to our country,’ ”
says one viewer who said she considered the program “ridiculous”
propaganda. “She said the government has done the
right thing to crackdown before it gets worse.”

A middle-aged rental agent from a Christian family alleged that a quarter of
Muslims support extremists and that many newly wealthy Muslims are building
mosques with cash from Gulf states, in a comment expressing typical frustration
and suspicions among Christians.

“The government is trying to reduce the power of Muslims,” he says,
after asking for the interview to be moved away from a Muslim-owned property.