Tuesday, March 18, 2014
የቁልቁለት መንገድ! – ጋዜጠኛ ተመስገን ደሳለኝ
በማስመሰል ታጥሮ መሆን በጠፋበት
ምን አገባኝ የሚል በተከማቸበት
የባይተዋር መንፈስ ከሞላ ባገሩ
ዘመኑን ማወቂያ ይሄ ነው ሚስጥሩ
ይሄን ጊዜ ጠርጥር እንደጠፋ ዘሩ፡፡
(ገጣሚ ደምሰው መርሻ/ያልታተመ)
አዎን፣ ገጣሚ ደምሰው እንዳለው እኔም በዚህ ዘመን “ዘሩ እንደጠፋ” አሊያም ሊጠፋ እንደተቃረበ እጠረጥራለሁ፡፡
ስለምን? ቢሉ …በኢትዮጵያችን ለህሊናው፣ ለሕዝብና ለሀገሩ የሚቆረቆር፣ የእውነት ተሟጋችና የሞራል ልዕልናን የተቀዳጀ ሙሉ ሰው ፈልጎ ማግኘት እጅግ አተካች ሆኗልና፡፡ የግል ጥቅም አሳዳጅ፣ አፋሽ-አጎንባሽ በሞላበት፣ እንደ ቴዎድሮስ ለሀገር ቤዛ መሆን፤ እንደ ግርማሜዎቹ እና ወርቅነህ የራስን ምቾት ወዲያ ጥሎ በጠገበ ሆድ ከወገን ጋር መራብና ከጎኑ መቆም፤ እንደ አቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ አስፈሪ ሞት ከከበበው ሸለቆ ውስጥ በህይወት ለመውጣት ሲባል የጠላትን ጫማ ከመላስና ያላመኑበትን ተናግሮ ምህረት ከመጠየቅ ይልቅ በድፍረት ሞትን ፊት ለፊት መጋፈጥ ወይም ግንባርን ለአረር መስጠት እንደ ተረታ-ተረት ከተቆጠረ ዘመናት አልፏል (አቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ ማን ናቸው? ለሚለኝ አንባቢዬ ‹‹የታኀሣሡ ግርግር እና መዘዙ›› የተሰኘውን የብርሃኑ አስረስ መጽሐፍ ገፅ 302ን እንዲያነብ እጋብዘዋለሁ) አሊያም ደግሞ የሰው ዘር በመሆን ብቻ የሚገኘውን የሞራል ልዕልና ከትውልድና ሀገር ጥቅም አኳያ ለማጠየቅ በዚህ አውድ ለማነሳው ተጠየቅ በአንፅሮ ለማፍታታት ይጠቅመኝ ዘንድ እኔው ራሴ እዚሁ ጠቅሼው አልፋለሁ፡፡
የመጽሐፉ ደራሲ ‹‹በመፈንቅለ መንግስት ሙከራ ጊዜ የድጋፍ ንግግር አድርጋችኋል በማለት በመንግስት ተይዘው ከድሬዳዋ ወደ አዲስ አበባ ከተላኩት አንዱ የሆኑት…›› ብለው ከአቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ ጋር ከአስተዋወቁን በኋላ እንዲህ በማለት ትርክታቸውን ይቀጥላሉ፡- ‹‹…አቶ ሽፈራው ከድሬዳዋ ወደ አዲስ አበባ ተልከው ለፖሊስ ቃላቸውን ሰጥተው ፍርድ ቤት ቀረቡ፡፡ የእምነት ክህደት ቃል ሲጠየቁ ዳኛው ‹ሠርተሃል ለተባለው ወንጀል ጥፋተኛ ነህ፣ አይደለህም?› ይላቸዋል፡፡ ‹የቱን ወንጀል?› ሲሉ አቶ ሽፈራው ዳኛውን ይጠይቃሉ፡፡ ዳኛው አቶ ሽፈራው ሠርተዋል የተባለውን የወንጀል ቃል ሊናገሩት አልወደዱም አልደፈሩምምና ‹አንተ የሠራኸውን?› ብለው ጠየቁ፡፡ አቶ ሽፈራው ‹እስቲ ወንጀል የተባለው ይነበብልኝ› ብለው አጥብቀው ይጠይቃሉ፡፡ ይሄን ጊዜ ዳኛው ሳይወዱ ‹ይህን ጣሳ እግዚአብሔር ገላገለን፣ አወረደልን ማለትህን፤ …ለዚህ ጥፋተኛ ነህ አይደለህም?› ይሏቸዋል፡፡ ‹የለም ተስተካክሎ ይጻፍልኝና እምነት ክህደቴን ልናገር› ይላሉ፡፡ ‹የለም በዚህ ላይ ጥፋተኛ ነኝ በል› ይሏቸዋል፡፡ ‹ትክክለኛ ቃሌ ይጻፍና ነው እንጂ እንዲሁ ጥፋተኛ ነኝ፤ አይደለሁም፤ አልልም› ብለው ይመልሳሉ፡፡ ‹እሺ ምን ተብሎ ይስተካከል› ሲሏቸው፤ ‹ይህን የበሰበሰ የተጠረማመሰ አሮጌ ጣሳ እግዚአብሔር ገላገለን ነው ያልኩት› ሲሉ ዳኞቹ የተባለውን አልሰማንም ለማለት ራሳቸውን ጠረጴዛ ስር አግብተው ተደበቁ፡፡››
በዚህ ዘመን ራሳቸውን ጠረጴዛ ስር አግብተው እንደ ሰጎን አንገታቸውን ቀብረው በፍርሃት የሚኖሩ አድር፣ እበላ-ባይ፣ ፈሪ ሰዎች የአቶ ሽፈራውን ባመኑበት መቆም እንደ አጎል ጀብደኝነትና ሞኝነት ቢቆጥሩት አስገራሚ አይሆንም፡፡ የሆነው ሆኖ እንደ ብልህነት አሊያም ብልጥነት ተደርጎ የሚወሰደውን የአድርባይነት ‹‹ስልት›› ለማሳየት አንዲት ሀገርኛ ምሳሌ እዚህ ጋ ለንፅፅር ላቅርብና እንደ ፕሮፌሰር መስፍን ለራሴ ጽሑፍ ‹‹F›› ከመስጠቴ በፊት ወደ አጀንዳዬ ልዝለቅ፡፡
ታሪኩ ዝናው በስፋት የናኘ ሽፍታ የመሸገበትን (ግዛቱ ያደረገ) ጥቅጥቅ ያለ ጫካ አቋርጦ ስለሚያልፍ መንገደኛ ገጠመኝ ነው፡፡ መንገደኛው ለሰዓታት ከተጓዘ በኋላ ድንገት ሽፍታው እጅ ይወድቅና ስንቅ የቋጠረበትን ስልቻ ጨምሮ ከላይ እስከታች ይበረበራል፤ ሆኖም ሰባራ ሳንቲም ሊያገኝበት ባለመቻሉ ከመጠን በላይ የተበሳጨው አያ ሽፍታ ሆዬ ንዴቱን ለማብረድ ሲል ‹‹ውዳሴ ዜማ አቅርብልኝ!›› በማለት ቀጭን ትዕዛዝ ይሰጠዋል፤ በፍርሃት ነፍሱ እጉሮሮው የተወተፈችበት መንገደኛም ተንፈስ ብሎ ለመረጋጋት እየሞከረ እንዲህ ሲል አቀነቀነለት ይባላል፡-
‹‹አይኑ የተኳለ ጠላት የሚጋረፍ
ጋዜጠኛ ተመስገን ደሳለኝ 2
ጠብ-መንጃ ገስጋሽ ጉብታ ተሻግሮ
ከዘብጥ የሚናደፍ
እንደሚካኤል ነህ ጠላትህም አይተርፍ!››
እነሆም የሀገሬ ምድር እንዲህ ባሉ ሀሞተ-ቢስ አወዳሾችና አስመሳዮች ተጥለቅልቃ እጆቿን ወደ ሰማይ ከዘረጋች (ሱባኤ ለመግባት) ሰነበተች፡፡ በርግጥም ከብዙሀኑ በተሻለ ማንሰላሰል ይሳናቸዋል ተብለው የማይታሰቡ ‹‹ምሁራን››ም ሆኑ ‹‹መንፈሳዊ››ነታቸው የበዛ የኃይማኖት መሪዎች በግል ጥቅመኝነት ታውረው ከስርዓቱ ጋር እጅና ጓንት በመሆን የጭቆና አገዛዙን ዕድሜ ለማራዘም በሀሰት መስካሪነት የቅጥፈት ምላሳቸውን ሲያንበለብሉ መስማት ‹እግዚኦ› የሚያስብል አስደንጋጭ መናፍቅነት መሆኑ ቀርቶ እንደ ተራ ነጋዴ ንግግር፣ ተራ የዕለት ተዕለት አጋጣሚ ከሆነ ዘመናት ተቆጠሩ፡፡ ‹‹መንፈሳዊያን›› አባቶች በተከበረው ቤተ-መቅደስ ምኩራብ ላይ ከመእምናኑ ፊት ለፊት ቆመው ቃየልን ‹‹አቤል››፣ በርባንን ‹‹መሲህ›› በማለት ሲሰብኩም ለአመል እንኳ ድንቅፍ አያደርጋቸውም፤ ከግላዊ ጥቅማቸው አሻግረው የግፉአንን የስቃይ እሮሮ ማድመጥም ሆነ ለሌላው ማሳወቅ ጭራሹንም አይሞክሩትም፡፡ ‹‹ምሁራን›› ተብዬዎቹም አርቲስት ሰለሞን ተካልኝ ‹‹ውበት ከቅንድቡ የሚፈስ›› እንዲል፤ ‹አይኑ የተኳለ› እያሉ በሕፃናት ደም ሳይቀር የጨቀየውን ኢህአዴግ መራሹን መንግስት እንዴት እንዴት ‹ብፁእ› አድርገው የውዳሴ ከበሮ ሲመቱለት እንደሚያድሩ እዚህ ጋ ዘርዝሮ ለማቅረብ ማሰብ አባይን በጭልፋ አጋብቶ ለመጨረስ እንደመሞከር ያለ ዕብደት ያስቆጥራል፡፡
ወጣም ወረደ እንዲህ አይነቱ የሞራል ዝቅጠት በትላንት ወይም በዛሬ የእድሜ ገደብ የሚለካ አለመሆኑን በድፍረት መናገር ይቻላል፤ ምክንያቱም በነገሥታቱ የአገዛዝ ዘመን የጀመረና በጣሊያን የአምስት ዓመቱ የወረራ ወቅት እንደወረርሽኝ የተስፋፋ ስለመሆኑ በቂ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡ ይህ እንግዲህ ‹‹ሀገር›› ለተሰኘ ማህተም መስዋዕት የሆኑትን አቡነ ጴጥሮስን የመሳሰሉ ታሪክ በታላቅ አክብሮት የሚዘክራቸውን ቀዳማይ አባቶችና እናቶችን ሳንዘነጋ ነው፡፡ እናም የሩቁን ትተን ከ1983ቱ የመንግስት ለውጥ ወዲህ ያለውን እንኳ ብንመለከት ይህን መሰሉ ክስረት ዙሪያችንን ከቦ ሊውጠን የቀረው ስንዝር ታህል ርቀት ብቻ መሆኑን ለመረዳት የማሕበራዊ ሳይንስ ምሁራን ትንታኔን ማገላበጥ አይጠይቅም፡፡ ያኔ ገና በለውጡ ማግስት ህወሓት እና ሻዕቢያ በአንድ አንቀልባ ካልታዘልን በሚሉበት የ‹‹ጫጉላ›› ዘመን፣ ከኤርትራ ምድር የወርቅ ጥርሳቸው ሳይቀር በጭካኔ ወልቆ ባዶ እጃቸውን የተባረሩ ኢትዮጵያውያንን በተመለከተ በጉምቱው ምሁር ፕሮፌሰር እንድሪያስ እሸቴ የተመራው አጣሪ ቡድን ‹‹ውሸት ነው! ይህ አይነቱ የሰብዓዊ መብት ጥሰት ኤርትራ ይኖሩ
በነበሩ ኢትዮጵያውያን ላይ አልተፈፀመም!!›› በማለት አይኑን በጨው አጥቦ በድፍረት ሲያስተባብል፣ አንጀታችን እያረረ ‹‹ይሁና!›› ብለን በትዝብት ማለፋችን እውነት ቢሆንም፤ የዝምታችን ውስጠ-መልዕክት ያልገባው ፕሮፌሰሩ ግን ያረረው አንጀታችን ይበልጥ እርር ይል ዘንድ በተለመደው ቅጥፈቱ ታላቁ የዐድዋ ድል ባለቤትነትን ከሀገር ከፍታ፣ ቁልቁል ወደ ጎጥ ለማውረድ ያልፈነቀለው ቋጥኝ፣ ያልማሰው ስር አልነበረም (በነገራችን ላይ ህወሓት ዛሬም ከዐድዋ ድል ጀግኖች ጋር ጥቁር ደም እንደተቃባ በግላጭ የሚያመላክተው በዘንድሮው 118ኛው ክብረ በዓል ላይ የተስተዋለው አሳፋሪ ትእይንት ነው፡፡ ይኸውም በታሪካዊቷ ዐድዋ ከተማ በሚገኘው ሶሎዳ ተራራ ስር ‹ድሉን ለመዘከር› ከተሰቀሉት የእቴጌ ጣይቱ፣ የራስ አሉላ አባነጋ፣ የባልቻ አባነፍሶ እና የባሻ አውዓሎም ግዙፍ ምስሎች መሀል የተሸናፊው ሀገር ህዝብ ሳይቀር በድሉ ዕለት ሮማ በተሰኘው አደባባዩ ‹‹ቪቫ ምኒሊክ›› እያለ በታላቅ ጩኸት ያወደሰው የታላቁ ንጉሠ ነገሥት ምስል አለመካተቱ ነው፡፡ …መቼም ይህ ለምን ሆነ? ብለን የክልሉን አስተዳዳሪ ጓድ አባይ ወልዱን ብንጠይቀው ‹‹በጦርነቱ ወቅት ምኒሊክ መሸሽ ጀምሮ ነበር›› የሚለውን ዝነኛ ህወሓታዊ ትርክት ገልብጦ፣ ‹‹በስራ መደራረብ በተፈጠረ ስህተት ነው›› ብሎ በክፍለ ዘመኑ ታላቅ ሽርደዳ አንጀታችንን ይበልጥ ድብን እንደሚያደርገው ቅንጣት ታህል አትጠራጠሩ)
ለማንኛውም እንደ ፕሮፌሰር እንድሪያስ ያሉ በድሃው ሕዝብ ጥሪት የከፍተኛ ደረጃ የትምህርት ዕድል ማግኘት የቻሉ በርካታ እበላ-ባይ ‹‹ምሁራን›› ስርዓቱ የሥልጣን ዘመኑን ለማራዘም የሚያምታታበትን ‹‹የሁለት ዲጂት የኢኮኖሚ ዕድገት›› የፈረንጅ ጥናቶችን በጥራዝ-ነጠቅነት እያጣቀሱ ምክንያታዊ መስለው ሊያሳምኑን በከንቱ ብዙ ደክመዋል፡፡ በአናቱም የመከላከያ ሠራዊቱ ለባዕድ ሀገር ጥቅም ሲባል ሶማሊያን በወረረበት ወቅት አንዳንድ የዩንቨርስቲ መምህራን እና ‹‹የፖለቲካ ተንታኞች›› በመሬት ያለውን ተጨባጭ እውነታ ይሁነኝ ብለው ወደጎን ገፍተው አገዛዙ ቀን ከሌት ‹‹እመኑኝ!›› በሚል ጩኸት ያሰለቸንን ሰበብ፣ በጥናት እንደተረጋገጠ አስመስለው ለመተንተን ያደርጉት የነበረው እሽቅድምድም ሁሌም በሀዘን የምናስታውሰው ነው፡፡
የኃይማኖት መሪዎችም ምንም እንኳ በነቢብ የአገልግሎታቸው ዋጋ በፈጣሪ መንግስት መሆኑን ደጋግመው ቢነግሩንም፣ በሀልዮ የሚታየው የአሸርጋጅነት ግብራቸው ግን ምድራዊውን ጨቋኝ ስርዓት ደግፎ የሚይዝ ምሰሶና አቅፎ የሚያሞቅ ክንድ ከሆነ በርካታ አስርታት ተቆጥረዋል፡፡ የእስልምና እምነት የበላይ ወሳኝ አካል የሆነው መጅሊስ መእምናኑ ያነሱት ፍትሃዊው የመብት ጥያቄ ተቀልብሶ፣ ሕዝባዊ ውክልና የተሰጣቸው የኮሚቴ አባላት ለአስከፊው የቃሊቲ ማረሚያ ቤት የተዳረጉበትን መንግስታዊ ሽብርተኝነት ለመሸፋፈን ከመተባበርም አልፎ ቅዱስ ቁራንን አዛብቶ እስከመጥቀስ መድረሱ በትዝብት ያሳለፍነው የትላንት ኩነት ነው፡፡ የክርስትና እምነት መሪዎችም በተመሳሳይ ሁናቴ የስርዓቱን የጭካኔ እርምጃዎች እንደ ቅዱስ ተግባር ለማፅደቅ ያልረጩት ጠበል፣ ያልጠቀሱት የመጽሐፍ ቅዱስ ቃል አልነበረም፡፡ ሌላ ሌላውን እንኳን ትተን በቅርቡ ህይወቱ ያለፈው የኦሮሚያ ክልል አስተዳዳሪ የአለማየሁ አቱምሳ ስርዓተ ቀብር ላይ ፓትርያርክ ብፁእ ወቅዱስ አቡነ ማቲያስ ‹ዲሞክራሲን ለማስፈን መስዋዕትነት የከፈለ፤ ሩጫውን የጨረሰ፤ ተጋድሎውን
በብቃትና በንቃት የተወጣ…› እያሉ አፋቸውን ሞልተው የምስክርነት ቃላቸውን ሲሰጡ ሀፍረት ብሎ ነገር ለቅፅበት እንኳን ዝር 3 አላለባቸውም፡፡ ጠቅላይ ሚኒስትሩም ሆነ በሰውየው ህልፈት እጃቸው እንዳለበት የሀሜት ወሬ የሚናፈስባቸው እነዚያ ጲላጦሳውያን ጓዶቹ እንዳሻቸው ቢያንቆለጳጵሱት መቼስ የፕሮፓጋንዳ ስራ ነው ብሎ በቸልታ ማለፍ ይቻል ይሆናል፡፡ ነገር ግን የሰማዩን መንግስት ብቻ ያገለግሉ ዘንድ በቃሉ እንዲመላለሱ ግድ የሚላቸው ‹‹መንፈሳውያን››፣ እንዲያ የገዛ ወገኑን ‹‹ኦነግ!›› በሚል የሀሰት ውንጀላ በጥይት ሲደበድብና ሲያስደበድብ፤ መከራን በሕዝብ ላይ እንደምርጊት ሲለስን፤ አምባገነን ስርዓቱን በታማኝነት ሲያገለግል… ያለፈን ሰው ‹‹ዲሞክራት›› እያሉ በአደባባይ ማወደስ በቤተ-ክርስቲያኒቱ አስተምህሮ ራሱ የተነቀፈውን ለእግዚአብሔርና ለቄሳር ዕኩል መገዛትን እንደትክክለኛ ተግባር አምኖ መቀበል ነው ወደሚል ጠርዝ መገፋታችን አይቀርም፡፡
በግልባጩ በሁሉም እምነት ያሉ ‹‹መንፈሳዊ›› መሪዎች ስርዓቱ በድህረ-ምርጫ 97ም ሆነ በተከታዮቹ ዓመታት የተቃዋሚ ፓርቲ የአመራር አባላትን እና ጋዜጠኞችን እንደ ጥጃ እያሰረ በግፍ ሲያሰቃይ ድርጊቱን ለመንቀፍም ሆነ ዘላቂ ዕርቅ እንዲወርድ ለመማለድ አንዳች ሙከራ አለማድረጋቸው በታሪክ ጥቁር መዝገብ በጉልህ ቀለማት ሰፍሮ የሚኖር ሀጢያታቸው ነው (የቅንጅት እስረኞችን ለማስፈታት የተሄደበት የ‹‹ሽምግልና›› መንገድ የአቶ መለስ ዜናዊ ቧልት ስለመሆኑ ከቶም ማንም ሊጠራጠረው አይችልምና እዚህ መጥቀሱ አስፈላጊ አይመስለኝም)
ሌላው የማሕበረሰባችን የሞራል እሴት በእጅጉ መዝቀጡን የሚያስረግጥልን ብዙሀኑ የኪነ-ጥበብ ባለሙያዎች በተዘፈነበት ለመደነስ፣ በተደገሰበት አሳላፊ ለመሆን የሚያደርጉትን መገፋፋት ስናስተውል ነው፡፡ ስርዓቱ ከሚያራምደው ‹‹አብዮታዊ ዲሞክራሲ›› ርዕዮተ-አለም የተቀመረውን ‹‹ፌደራሊዝም አወቃቀር››ን ተንተርሶ ሀገሪቱን በዘውግ ከፋፍሎ እና በሕዝብ መካከል የጥርጣሬ መንፈስ አንብሮ የሥልጣን ዕድሜ ማራዘሙን በግጥምና ዜማ ማወደስ የእህል-ውሃ ጥያቄ ካደረጉት በርካታ ዓመታት ነጉደዋል፡፡ እንዲህ አይነት የሙዚቃ ስራ በአንዳንድ ክልሎች መሬት የሚያሸልም ፈጣን አዋጪ አድርባይትመንት (ኢንቨስትመንት ላለማለት ነው) እስከ መሆን መድረሱ ከታፊና ነጋዴ አርቲስቶች በዘውጉ ዙሪያ ይረባረቡ ዘንድ ታላቅ ልማታዊ አብነት ሆኗቸዋል፡፡ ይህ ሁናቴም በኢትዮጵያ ኪነ-ጥበብን የንፁሃን መታጣት ከድንጋይ ወገራ የታደጋትን የኦሪቷ ዘማዊት ከማስመሰልም አልፎ እንደ ነገሥታቱ ዘመን የአዝማሪ ጨዋታ፤ የቤተ-መንግስቱ መዝናኛ እና አጀንዳ ማራገቢያነት እስከ መሆን ሞዴል ተሸላሚ አድርጓታል፡፡ ይሁንና ቁጥራቸው ጥቂት ቢሆንም ቴዎድሮስ
ካሳሁንን (ቴዲ አፍሮን) የመሳሰሉ መክሊታቸውን እንደ ጉሊት ሽንኩርት ለሽያጭ ያላቀረቡ ከያኒያን፣ ደራሲያን፣ ገጣሚያን… የመኖራቸውን እውነታ ሳንዘነጋ፤ ሀገሪቱ ‹‹ሰው አይብቀልብሽ!›› ተብላ የተረገመች እስኪመስል ድረስ ብሔራዊ ጥቅም፣ ህሊና፣ ሞራል፣ እውነት የረከሱበትና የተዋረዱበት ዘመን ላይ መድረሷን የሚያስረግጡልን በርካታ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡
ከጥቂት ወራት በፊት በብአዴኑ ካሳ ተክለብርሃን ፊት-አውራሪነት የሶማሌ ክልልን የጎበኙት አርቲስቶቻችን፣ ገና ድሮ ጆርጅ ኦርዌል ‹‹Animal Farm›› ብሎ በሰየመው መጽሐፉ ‹‹አራት እግር ጥሩ፤ ሁለት እግር መጥፎ›› እያሉ በመንጫጫት ስብሰባን ለመረበሽና ተቃውሞን ለማጨናገፍ አሳማው ናፖሊዮን እንዳሰለጠናቸው አይነት በጎች፤ ኢህአዴግ በጎጥ የካፋፈለውን ሕዝብ ‹‹በታሪኩ ከመቼውም ጊዜ በላይ አሁን አንድ ሆኗል!!›› በማለት በሬ ወለደ የሀሰት ምስክርነታቸውን አምነን እንድንቀበል ለማድረግ ለሳምንታት ተንጫጭተው ሊያደነቁሩን ሞክረዋል፡፡ እነዚህ የኪነ-ጥበብ ባለሙያዎች የክልሉ ነዋሪዎች ገና ዛሬ (በኢህአዴግ እፁብ ድንቅ እና ፍትሀዊ አስተዳደር) ኢትዮጵያዊነት እንደተሰማቸው፤ ገና ዛሬ በፍቃደኝነት ኢትዮጵያውያን እንደሆኑ አስመስለው ለማሳመን የሄዱበት የቁልቁለት መንገድ አጥንት ድረስ በሚዘልቅ ሀዘን እንዳኮራመተን እነርሱም ይጠፋቸዋል ብዬ አላስብም፡፡ ጉዳዩ ሆድ ሌላ፣ እውነት ሌላ ሆኖባቸው እንጂ፡፡ ግና፣ የቄሳሩ ጲላጦስም ‹‹እውነት ምንድር ነች?›› እንዲል፣ እውነት ለእነርሱ ዋጋዋ ስንት ነው? መቼም ከእውነት ይልቅ ግድ የሚሰጣቸው የሆድ ነገር ነው፤ እበላ አዳሪዎች ናቸውና፡፡
በጥቅሉ በኢትዮጵያችን ከምሁር እስከ ተርታው፤ ከጳጳሳት (ፓስተራት) እና ሼሆች እስከ መናፍቃውያን፤ ከልሂቅ እስከ ደቂቅ፤ ከጄነራል እስከ ወታደር፤ ከከያኒ እስከ ጽሑፍ ገልባጭ፤ ከቱጃር እስከ ጥሮ-ግሮ አዳሪ፤ ከመምህር እስከ ተማሪ… ስር የሰደደ አድርባይነት እና የሞራል ክስረት ለመንሰራፋቱ አይነተኛ ማሳያው አምባገነኑ ኢህአዴግ እንዲህ ሚሊዮኖችን ረግጦ እየጨፈለቀ፣ አስሮ እያንገላታ፣ ከሀገር እያሰደደና እየገደለ… ከሁለት አስርት በላይ መቆየት የመቻሉ ምስጢር ነው፡፡ ግና፣ የሕዝብን መከራ በማራዘም ኪስን ማደለብ፣ ግላዊ ፍላጎትን ማርካት ሁሌም አትራፊ ሊሆን እንደማይቻል መዘንጋት የለበትም፡፡ ማን ነበር ‹የተከፋፋለና አድርባይ ሕዝብን ከጭቆና ማላቀቅ፣ ሰማይን የማረስ ያህል አዳጋች ነው!› ያለው?
አዎን፣ ከ20ኛው ክፍለ ዘመን መባቻ ጀምሮ በጉልበታም ስርዓታት የጭካኔ መዳፍም ሆነ በግላዊ ጥቅመኝነት እየተናዱ የመጡት የባህል እና የሞራል እሴቶች ትውልዱን ዛሬ ላይ ለደረሰበት አስከፊ ማሕበራዊ ቀውስ መዳረጋቸው አሌ የማይባል ነው፡፡ ርግጥ ነው የችግሩ ስፋትና ጥልቀት እንደ ስርዓቱ የፖለቲካ ፍልስፍና በዘውግ የተከፋፈለ አይደለም፤ ብዙሀን እና ህዳጣን የሚል መስፈርትንም የተከተለ አይደለም፤ ኃይማኖታዊ መለያም የለውም፤ በሁሉም የሀገሪቱ አካባቢዎች አለቅጥ መንሰራፋቱ በግላጭ ይታያልና፡፡ ይህም ነው መፍትሔውን ስር ነቀል የማሕበራዊ አብዮት (ለውጥ) ብቻ እንዲሆን ያስገድደው፡፡
የቀደሙት ሁለት አብዮቶች በዋናነት ያነሷቸው የብሔር እና የመሬት ጥያቄ መክሸፋቸው (መቀልበሳቸው) ዛሬም ሶስተኛ አብዮትን የማይቀር ዕዳ አድርጎ የመውሰዱ ሁነት እንደተጠበቀ ሆኖ፤ ሥራ-አጥነት፣ ከነባሩ ባህል ማፈንገጥ፣ ሙስና፣ በሕብረተሰቡ ዘንድ አክብሮትና 4 ተሰሚነት ያላቸው ታላላቆችን አለማደመጥ፣ አድርባይነት፣ ደንታቢስነት፣ ዶሮ ሳይጮኽ ደጋግሞ መክዳት፣ የ‹‹ስቀሎ፣ ስቀሎ…›› ሀሰተኛ ድምፅ መበራከት፣ ኢ-ሞራላዊ ድርጊቶች እና የመሳሳሉት ትውልድና ሀገር ገዳይ ደዌዎችን ለመፈወስ ከማሕበራዊ አብዮት ያነሰ መፍትሔ እንደሌለ ከተለያዩ ሀገራት ታሪክ መረዳት ይቻላል፡፡ በነገራችን ላይ ኢህአዴግ በየትኛውም የዓለማችን ሀገራት የተከሰተ ሕዝባዊ አብዮት እንቅልፍ እንደሚነሳው በርካታ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡ ባሳለፍነው ሳምንት የኢትዮጵያ ቴሌቭዥን ለተከታታይ ቀናት ‹‹ተንታኝ›› ጭምር በመጋበዝ፣ ምስራቅ አውሮፓ ድረስ ተጉዞ የተሳካውን የዩክሬን አብዮት ከቀለም ጋር በማያያዝ ለማውገዝ ያቀረባቸው ፕሮግራሞች የፍርሃቱ መጠን አንዱ ማሳያ ተደርገው ሊወሰዱ ይችላል፡፡ ግና፣ እውነት እውነት እልሀለሁ በመቶ ሺህ የሚቆጠር የታጠቀ ኃይል ቢሰለፍ፣ እልፍ አእላፍ ፊርማቶሪዎች በሕዝብ መሀል ቢሰገሰጉ፣ ሚሊዮናት ካድሬዎች ሀገር-ምድሩን ቢያጥለቀልቁ፤ አገዛዛዊ ጭቆና እና ማሕበራዊ ክስረት እስካለ ድረስ የጊዜ ጉዳይ ካልሆነ፣ የትኛውም ምድራዊ ኃይል ሊያመክነው የማይችል አብዮት መቀጣጠሉ የማይቀር ጉዳይ ነው፡፡ በመጨረሻም ይህንን ጽሑፍ ጄነራል መንግስቱ ነዋይ በተለምዶ ‹‹የታሕሳስ ግርግር›› እየተባለ የሚጠራውን የመፈንቅለ መንግስት ሙከራ መክሸፍ ተከትሎ ፍርድ ቤት በቀረበበት ወቅት በሰጠው ቃል እቋጨዋለሁ፡-
‹‹…ዋ! ዋ! ዋ! ለእናንተም ለግዥአችሁ የኢትዮጵያ ሕዝብ ሀሳቤ በዝርዝር ገብቶት በአንድነት በሚነሳበት ጊዜ የሚደርስባችሁ መዓት የሚያሳቅቅ ይሆናል፡፡››
ትንቢቱ ከ13 ዓመት በኋላ ከእጥፍ በላይ መፈፀሙን ስናስታውስ፣ በጥቅመኝነት ስሌት ከስርዓቱ ጋር ተወዳጅተው የግፉአንን የመከራ ዕድሜ የሚያራዝሙ አድርባዮችም ሆኑ የአገዛዙ ልሂቃን ሕዝቡ ‹‹ሆ!›› ብሎ በአንድነት የተነሳ ዕለት ከመዓቱ ያመልጡ ዘንድ አይቻላቸውምና ዛሬውኑ ‹ንሰሀ ግቡ!› ብሎ ማሳሰብ ግድ ይላል፡፡ …ዋ! ዋ!! ዋ!!!
ኢትዮጵያ ለዘላለም ትኑር!
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ምን አገባኝ የሚል በተከማቸበት
የባይተዋር መንፈስ ከሞላ ባገሩ
ዘመኑን ማወቂያ ይሄ ነው ሚስጥሩ
ይሄን ጊዜ ጠርጥር እንደጠፋ ዘሩ፡፡
(ገጣሚ ደምሰው መርሻ/ያልታተመ)
አዎን፣ ገጣሚ ደምሰው እንዳለው እኔም በዚህ ዘመን “ዘሩ እንደጠፋ” አሊያም ሊጠፋ እንደተቃረበ እጠረጥራለሁ፡፡
ስለምን? ቢሉ …በኢትዮጵያችን ለህሊናው፣ ለሕዝብና ለሀገሩ የሚቆረቆር፣ የእውነት ተሟጋችና የሞራል ልዕልናን የተቀዳጀ ሙሉ ሰው ፈልጎ ማግኘት እጅግ አተካች ሆኗልና፡፡ የግል ጥቅም አሳዳጅ፣ አፋሽ-አጎንባሽ በሞላበት፣ እንደ ቴዎድሮስ ለሀገር ቤዛ መሆን፤ እንደ ግርማሜዎቹ እና ወርቅነህ የራስን ምቾት ወዲያ ጥሎ በጠገበ ሆድ ከወገን ጋር መራብና ከጎኑ መቆም፤ እንደ አቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ አስፈሪ ሞት ከከበበው ሸለቆ ውስጥ በህይወት ለመውጣት ሲባል የጠላትን ጫማ ከመላስና ያላመኑበትን ተናግሮ ምህረት ከመጠየቅ ይልቅ በድፍረት ሞትን ፊት ለፊት መጋፈጥ ወይም ግንባርን ለአረር መስጠት እንደ ተረታ-ተረት ከተቆጠረ ዘመናት አልፏል (አቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ ማን ናቸው? ለሚለኝ አንባቢዬ ‹‹የታኀሣሡ ግርግር እና መዘዙ›› የተሰኘውን የብርሃኑ አስረስ መጽሐፍ ገፅ 302ን እንዲያነብ እጋብዘዋለሁ) አሊያም ደግሞ የሰው ዘር በመሆን ብቻ የሚገኘውን የሞራል ልዕልና ከትውልድና ሀገር ጥቅም አኳያ ለማጠየቅ በዚህ አውድ ለማነሳው ተጠየቅ በአንፅሮ ለማፍታታት ይጠቅመኝ ዘንድ እኔው ራሴ እዚሁ ጠቅሼው አልፋለሁ፡፡
የመጽሐፉ ደራሲ ‹‹በመፈንቅለ መንግስት ሙከራ ጊዜ የድጋፍ ንግግር አድርጋችኋል በማለት በመንግስት ተይዘው ከድሬዳዋ ወደ አዲስ አበባ ከተላኩት አንዱ የሆኑት…›› ብለው ከአቶ ሽፈራው ደሳለኝ ጋር ከአስተዋወቁን በኋላ እንዲህ በማለት ትርክታቸውን ይቀጥላሉ፡- ‹‹…አቶ ሽፈራው ከድሬዳዋ ወደ አዲስ አበባ ተልከው ለፖሊስ ቃላቸውን ሰጥተው ፍርድ ቤት ቀረቡ፡፡ የእምነት ክህደት ቃል ሲጠየቁ ዳኛው ‹ሠርተሃል ለተባለው ወንጀል ጥፋተኛ ነህ፣ አይደለህም?› ይላቸዋል፡፡ ‹የቱን ወንጀል?› ሲሉ አቶ ሽፈራው ዳኛውን ይጠይቃሉ፡፡ ዳኛው አቶ ሽፈራው ሠርተዋል የተባለውን የወንጀል ቃል ሊናገሩት አልወደዱም አልደፈሩምምና ‹አንተ የሠራኸውን?› ብለው ጠየቁ፡፡ አቶ ሽፈራው ‹እስቲ ወንጀል የተባለው ይነበብልኝ› ብለው አጥብቀው ይጠይቃሉ፡፡ ይሄን ጊዜ ዳኛው ሳይወዱ ‹ይህን ጣሳ እግዚአብሔር ገላገለን፣ አወረደልን ማለትህን፤ …ለዚህ ጥፋተኛ ነህ አይደለህም?› ይሏቸዋል፡፡ ‹የለም ተስተካክሎ ይጻፍልኝና እምነት ክህደቴን ልናገር› ይላሉ፡፡ ‹የለም በዚህ ላይ ጥፋተኛ ነኝ በል› ይሏቸዋል፡፡ ‹ትክክለኛ ቃሌ ይጻፍና ነው እንጂ እንዲሁ ጥፋተኛ ነኝ፤ አይደለሁም፤ አልልም› ብለው ይመልሳሉ፡፡ ‹እሺ ምን ተብሎ ይስተካከል› ሲሏቸው፤ ‹ይህን የበሰበሰ የተጠረማመሰ አሮጌ ጣሳ እግዚአብሔር ገላገለን ነው ያልኩት› ሲሉ ዳኞቹ የተባለውን አልሰማንም ለማለት ራሳቸውን ጠረጴዛ ስር አግብተው ተደበቁ፡፡››
በዚህ ዘመን ራሳቸውን ጠረጴዛ ስር አግብተው እንደ ሰጎን አንገታቸውን ቀብረው በፍርሃት የሚኖሩ አድር፣ እበላ-ባይ፣ ፈሪ ሰዎች የአቶ ሽፈራውን ባመኑበት መቆም እንደ አጎል ጀብደኝነትና ሞኝነት ቢቆጥሩት አስገራሚ አይሆንም፡፡ የሆነው ሆኖ እንደ ብልህነት አሊያም ብልጥነት ተደርጎ የሚወሰደውን የአድርባይነት ‹‹ስልት›› ለማሳየት አንዲት ሀገርኛ ምሳሌ እዚህ ጋ ለንፅፅር ላቅርብና እንደ ፕሮፌሰር መስፍን ለራሴ ጽሑፍ ‹‹F›› ከመስጠቴ በፊት ወደ አጀንዳዬ ልዝለቅ፡፡
ታሪኩ ዝናው በስፋት የናኘ ሽፍታ የመሸገበትን (ግዛቱ ያደረገ) ጥቅጥቅ ያለ ጫካ አቋርጦ ስለሚያልፍ መንገደኛ ገጠመኝ ነው፡፡ መንገደኛው ለሰዓታት ከተጓዘ በኋላ ድንገት ሽፍታው እጅ ይወድቅና ስንቅ የቋጠረበትን ስልቻ ጨምሮ ከላይ እስከታች ይበረበራል፤ ሆኖም ሰባራ ሳንቲም ሊያገኝበት ባለመቻሉ ከመጠን በላይ የተበሳጨው አያ ሽፍታ ሆዬ ንዴቱን ለማብረድ ሲል ‹‹ውዳሴ ዜማ አቅርብልኝ!›› በማለት ቀጭን ትዕዛዝ ይሰጠዋል፤ በፍርሃት ነፍሱ እጉሮሮው የተወተፈችበት መንገደኛም ተንፈስ ብሎ ለመረጋጋት እየሞከረ እንዲህ ሲል አቀነቀነለት ይባላል፡-
‹‹አይኑ የተኳለ ጠላት የሚጋረፍ
ጋዜጠኛ ተመስገን ደሳለኝ 2
ጠብ-መንጃ ገስጋሽ ጉብታ ተሻግሮ
ከዘብጥ የሚናደፍ
እንደሚካኤል ነህ ጠላትህም አይተርፍ!››
እነሆም የሀገሬ ምድር እንዲህ ባሉ ሀሞተ-ቢስ አወዳሾችና አስመሳዮች ተጥለቅልቃ እጆቿን ወደ ሰማይ ከዘረጋች (ሱባኤ ለመግባት) ሰነበተች፡፡ በርግጥም ከብዙሀኑ በተሻለ ማንሰላሰል ይሳናቸዋል ተብለው የማይታሰቡ ‹‹ምሁራን››ም ሆኑ ‹‹መንፈሳዊ››ነታቸው የበዛ የኃይማኖት መሪዎች በግል ጥቅመኝነት ታውረው ከስርዓቱ ጋር እጅና ጓንት በመሆን የጭቆና አገዛዙን ዕድሜ ለማራዘም በሀሰት መስካሪነት የቅጥፈት ምላሳቸውን ሲያንበለብሉ መስማት ‹እግዚኦ› የሚያስብል አስደንጋጭ መናፍቅነት መሆኑ ቀርቶ እንደ ተራ ነጋዴ ንግግር፣ ተራ የዕለት ተዕለት አጋጣሚ ከሆነ ዘመናት ተቆጠሩ፡፡ ‹‹መንፈሳዊያን›› አባቶች በተከበረው ቤተ-መቅደስ ምኩራብ ላይ ከመእምናኑ ፊት ለፊት ቆመው ቃየልን ‹‹አቤል››፣ በርባንን ‹‹መሲህ›› በማለት ሲሰብኩም ለአመል እንኳ ድንቅፍ አያደርጋቸውም፤ ከግላዊ ጥቅማቸው አሻግረው የግፉአንን የስቃይ እሮሮ ማድመጥም ሆነ ለሌላው ማሳወቅ ጭራሹንም አይሞክሩትም፡፡ ‹‹ምሁራን›› ተብዬዎቹም አርቲስት ሰለሞን ተካልኝ ‹‹ውበት ከቅንድቡ የሚፈስ›› እንዲል፤ ‹አይኑ የተኳለ› እያሉ በሕፃናት ደም ሳይቀር የጨቀየውን ኢህአዴግ መራሹን መንግስት እንዴት እንዴት ‹ብፁእ› አድርገው የውዳሴ ከበሮ ሲመቱለት እንደሚያድሩ እዚህ ጋ ዘርዝሮ ለማቅረብ ማሰብ አባይን በጭልፋ አጋብቶ ለመጨረስ እንደመሞከር ያለ ዕብደት ያስቆጥራል፡፡
ወጣም ወረደ እንዲህ አይነቱ የሞራል ዝቅጠት በትላንት ወይም በዛሬ የእድሜ ገደብ የሚለካ አለመሆኑን በድፍረት መናገር ይቻላል፤ ምክንያቱም በነገሥታቱ የአገዛዝ ዘመን የጀመረና በጣሊያን የአምስት ዓመቱ የወረራ ወቅት እንደወረርሽኝ የተስፋፋ ስለመሆኑ በቂ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡ ይህ እንግዲህ ‹‹ሀገር›› ለተሰኘ ማህተም መስዋዕት የሆኑትን አቡነ ጴጥሮስን የመሳሰሉ ታሪክ በታላቅ አክብሮት የሚዘክራቸውን ቀዳማይ አባቶችና እናቶችን ሳንዘነጋ ነው፡፡ እናም የሩቁን ትተን ከ1983ቱ የመንግስት ለውጥ ወዲህ ያለውን እንኳ ብንመለከት ይህን መሰሉ ክስረት ዙሪያችንን ከቦ ሊውጠን የቀረው ስንዝር ታህል ርቀት ብቻ መሆኑን ለመረዳት የማሕበራዊ ሳይንስ ምሁራን ትንታኔን ማገላበጥ አይጠይቅም፡፡ ያኔ ገና በለውጡ ማግስት ህወሓት እና ሻዕቢያ በአንድ አንቀልባ ካልታዘልን በሚሉበት የ‹‹ጫጉላ›› ዘመን፣ ከኤርትራ ምድር የወርቅ ጥርሳቸው ሳይቀር በጭካኔ ወልቆ ባዶ እጃቸውን የተባረሩ ኢትዮጵያውያንን በተመለከተ በጉምቱው ምሁር ፕሮፌሰር እንድሪያስ እሸቴ የተመራው አጣሪ ቡድን ‹‹ውሸት ነው! ይህ አይነቱ የሰብዓዊ መብት ጥሰት ኤርትራ ይኖሩ
በነበሩ ኢትዮጵያውያን ላይ አልተፈፀመም!!›› በማለት አይኑን በጨው አጥቦ በድፍረት ሲያስተባብል፣ አንጀታችን እያረረ ‹‹ይሁና!›› ብለን በትዝብት ማለፋችን እውነት ቢሆንም፤ የዝምታችን ውስጠ-መልዕክት ያልገባው ፕሮፌሰሩ ግን ያረረው አንጀታችን ይበልጥ እርር ይል ዘንድ በተለመደው ቅጥፈቱ ታላቁ የዐድዋ ድል ባለቤትነትን ከሀገር ከፍታ፣ ቁልቁል ወደ ጎጥ ለማውረድ ያልፈነቀለው ቋጥኝ፣ ያልማሰው ስር አልነበረም (በነገራችን ላይ ህወሓት ዛሬም ከዐድዋ ድል ጀግኖች ጋር ጥቁር ደም እንደተቃባ በግላጭ የሚያመላክተው በዘንድሮው 118ኛው ክብረ በዓል ላይ የተስተዋለው አሳፋሪ ትእይንት ነው፡፡ ይኸውም በታሪካዊቷ ዐድዋ ከተማ በሚገኘው ሶሎዳ ተራራ ስር ‹ድሉን ለመዘከር› ከተሰቀሉት የእቴጌ ጣይቱ፣ የራስ አሉላ አባነጋ፣ የባልቻ አባነፍሶ እና የባሻ አውዓሎም ግዙፍ ምስሎች መሀል የተሸናፊው ሀገር ህዝብ ሳይቀር በድሉ ዕለት ሮማ በተሰኘው አደባባዩ ‹‹ቪቫ ምኒሊክ›› እያለ በታላቅ ጩኸት ያወደሰው የታላቁ ንጉሠ ነገሥት ምስል አለመካተቱ ነው፡፡ …መቼም ይህ ለምን ሆነ? ብለን የክልሉን አስተዳዳሪ ጓድ አባይ ወልዱን ብንጠይቀው ‹‹በጦርነቱ ወቅት ምኒሊክ መሸሽ ጀምሮ ነበር›› የሚለውን ዝነኛ ህወሓታዊ ትርክት ገልብጦ፣ ‹‹በስራ መደራረብ በተፈጠረ ስህተት ነው›› ብሎ በክፍለ ዘመኑ ታላቅ ሽርደዳ አንጀታችንን ይበልጥ ድብን እንደሚያደርገው ቅንጣት ታህል አትጠራጠሩ)
ለማንኛውም እንደ ፕሮፌሰር እንድሪያስ ያሉ በድሃው ሕዝብ ጥሪት የከፍተኛ ደረጃ የትምህርት ዕድል ማግኘት የቻሉ በርካታ እበላ-ባይ ‹‹ምሁራን›› ስርዓቱ የሥልጣን ዘመኑን ለማራዘም የሚያምታታበትን ‹‹የሁለት ዲጂት የኢኮኖሚ ዕድገት›› የፈረንጅ ጥናቶችን በጥራዝ-ነጠቅነት እያጣቀሱ ምክንያታዊ መስለው ሊያሳምኑን በከንቱ ብዙ ደክመዋል፡፡ በአናቱም የመከላከያ ሠራዊቱ ለባዕድ ሀገር ጥቅም ሲባል ሶማሊያን በወረረበት ወቅት አንዳንድ የዩንቨርስቲ መምህራን እና ‹‹የፖለቲካ ተንታኞች›› በመሬት ያለውን ተጨባጭ እውነታ ይሁነኝ ብለው ወደጎን ገፍተው አገዛዙ ቀን ከሌት ‹‹እመኑኝ!›› በሚል ጩኸት ያሰለቸንን ሰበብ፣ በጥናት እንደተረጋገጠ አስመስለው ለመተንተን ያደርጉት የነበረው እሽቅድምድም ሁሌም በሀዘን የምናስታውሰው ነው፡፡
የኃይማኖት መሪዎችም ምንም እንኳ በነቢብ የአገልግሎታቸው ዋጋ በፈጣሪ መንግስት መሆኑን ደጋግመው ቢነግሩንም፣ በሀልዮ የሚታየው የአሸርጋጅነት ግብራቸው ግን ምድራዊውን ጨቋኝ ስርዓት ደግፎ የሚይዝ ምሰሶና አቅፎ የሚያሞቅ ክንድ ከሆነ በርካታ አስርታት ተቆጥረዋል፡፡ የእስልምና እምነት የበላይ ወሳኝ አካል የሆነው መጅሊስ መእምናኑ ያነሱት ፍትሃዊው የመብት ጥያቄ ተቀልብሶ፣ ሕዝባዊ ውክልና የተሰጣቸው የኮሚቴ አባላት ለአስከፊው የቃሊቲ ማረሚያ ቤት የተዳረጉበትን መንግስታዊ ሽብርተኝነት ለመሸፋፈን ከመተባበርም አልፎ ቅዱስ ቁራንን አዛብቶ እስከመጥቀስ መድረሱ በትዝብት ያሳለፍነው የትላንት ኩነት ነው፡፡ የክርስትና እምነት መሪዎችም በተመሳሳይ ሁናቴ የስርዓቱን የጭካኔ እርምጃዎች እንደ ቅዱስ ተግባር ለማፅደቅ ያልረጩት ጠበል፣ ያልጠቀሱት የመጽሐፍ ቅዱስ ቃል አልነበረም፡፡ ሌላ ሌላውን እንኳን ትተን በቅርቡ ህይወቱ ያለፈው የኦሮሚያ ክልል አስተዳዳሪ የአለማየሁ አቱምሳ ስርዓተ ቀብር ላይ ፓትርያርክ ብፁእ ወቅዱስ አቡነ ማቲያስ ‹ዲሞክራሲን ለማስፈን መስዋዕትነት የከፈለ፤ ሩጫውን የጨረሰ፤ ተጋድሎውን
በብቃትና በንቃት የተወጣ…› እያሉ አፋቸውን ሞልተው የምስክርነት ቃላቸውን ሲሰጡ ሀፍረት ብሎ ነገር ለቅፅበት እንኳን ዝር 3 አላለባቸውም፡፡ ጠቅላይ ሚኒስትሩም ሆነ በሰውየው ህልፈት እጃቸው እንዳለበት የሀሜት ወሬ የሚናፈስባቸው እነዚያ ጲላጦሳውያን ጓዶቹ እንዳሻቸው ቢያንቆለጳጵሱት መቼስ የፕሮፓጋንዳ ስራ ነው ብሎ በቸልታ ማለፍ ይቻል ይሆናል፡፡ ነገር ግን የሰማዩን መንግስት ብቻ ያገለግሉ ዘንድ በቃሉ እንዲመላለሱ ግድ የሚላቸው ‹‹መንፈሳውያን››፣ እንዲያ የገዛ ወገኑን ‹‹ኦነግ!›› በሚል የሀሰት ውንጀላ በጥይት ሲደበድብና ሲያስደበድብ፤ መከራን በሕዝብ ላይ እንደምርጊት ሲለስን፤ አምባገነን ስርዓቱን በታማኝነት ሲያገለግል… ያለፈን ሰው ‹‹ዲሞክራት›› እያሉ በአደባባይ ማወደስ በቤተ-ክርስቲያኒቱ አስተምህሮ ራሱ የተነቀፈውን ለእግዚአብሔርና ለቄሳር ዕኩል መገዛትን እንደትክክለኛ ተግባር አምኖ መቀበል ነው ወደሚል ጠርዝ መገፋታችን አይቀርም፡፡
በግልባጩ በሁሉም እምነት ያሉ ‹‹መንፈሳዊ›› መሪዎች ስርዓቱ በድህረ-ምርጫ 97ም ሆነ በተከታዮቹ ዓመታት የተቃዋሚ ፓርቲ የአመራር አባላትን እና ጋዜጠኞችን እንደ ጥጃ እያሰረ በግፍ ሲያሰቃይ ድርጊቱን ለመንቀፍም ሆነ ዘላቂ ዕርቅ እንዲወርድ ለመማለድ አንዳች ሙከራ አለማድረጋቸው በታሪክ ጥቁር መዝገብ በጉልህ ቀለማት ሰፍሮ የሚኖር ሀጢያታቸው ነው (የቅንጅት እስረኞችን ለማስፈታት የተሄደበት የ‹‹ሽምግልና›› መንገድ የአቶ መለስ ዜናዊ ቧልት ስለመሆኑ ከቶም ማንም ሊጠራጠረው አይችልምና እዚህ መጥቀሱ አስፈላጊ አይመስለኝም)
ሌላው የማሕበረሰባችን የሞራል እሴት በእጅጉ መዝቀጡን የሚያስረግጥልን ብዙሀኑ የኪነ-ጥበብ ባለሙያዎች በተዘፈነበት ለመደነስ፣ በተደገሰበት አሳላፊ ለመሆን የሚያደርጉትን መገፋፋት ስናስተውል ነው፡፡ ስርዓቱ ከሚያራምደው ‹‹አብዮታዊ ዲሞክራሲ›› ርዕዮተ-አለም የተቀመረውን ‹‹ፌደራሊዝም አወቃቀር››ን ተንተርሶ ሀገሪቱን በዘውግ ከፋፍሎ እና በሕዝብ መካከል የጥርጣሬ መንፈስ አንብሮ የሥልጣን ዕድሜ ማራዘሙን በግጥምና ዜማ ማወደስ የእህል-ውሃ ጥያቄ ካደረጉት በርካታ ዓመታት ነጉደዋል፡፡ እንዲህ አይነት የሙዚቃ ስራ በአንዳንድ ክልሎች መሬት የሚያሸልም ፈጣን አዋጪ አድርባይትመንት (ኢንቨስትመንት ላለማለት ነው) እስከ መሆን መድረሱ ከታፊና ነጋዴ አርቲስቶች በዘውጉ ዙሪያ ይረባረቡ ዘንድ ታላቅ ልማታዊ አብነት ሆኗቸዋል፡፡ ይህ ሁናቴም በኢትዮጵያ ኪነ-ጥበብን የንፁሃን መታጣት ከድንጋይ ወገራ የታደጋትን የኦሪቷ ዘማዊት ከማስመሰልም አልፎ እንደ ነገሥታቱ ዘመን የአዝማሪ ጨዋታ፤ የቤተ-መንግስቱ መዝናኛ እና አጀንዳ ማራገቢያነት እስከ መሆን ሞዴል ተሸላሚ አድርጓታል፡፡ ይሁንና ቁጥራቸው ጥቂት ቢሆንም ቴዎድሮስ
ካሳሁንን (ቴዲ አፍሮን) የመሳሰሉ መክሊታቸውን እንደ ጉሊት ሽንኩርት ለሽያጭ ያላቀረቡ ከያኒያን፣ ደራሲያን፣ ገጣሚያን… የመኖራቸውን እውነታ ሳንዘነጋ፤ ሀገሪቱ ‹‹ሰው አይብቀልብሽ!›› ተብላ የተረገመች እስኪመስል ድረስ ብሔራዊ ጥቅም፣ ህሊና፣ ሞራል፣ እውነት የረከሱበትና የተዋረዱበት ዘመን ላይ መድረሷን የሚያስረግጡልን በርካታ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡
ከጥቂት ወራት በፊት በብአዴኑ ካሳ ተክለብርሃን ፊት-አውራሪነት የሶማሌ ክልልን የጎበኙት አርቲስቶቻችን፣ ገና ድሮ ጆርጅ ኦርዌል ‹‹Animal Farm›› ብሎ በሰየመው መጽሐፉ ‹‹አራት እግር ጥሩ፤ ሁለት እግር መጥፎ›› እያሉ በመንጫጫት ስብሰባን ለመረበሽና ተቃውሞን ለማጨናገፍ አሳማው ናፖሊዮን እንዳሰለጠናቸው አይነት በጎች፤ ኢህአዴግ በጎጥ የካፋፈለውን ሕዝብ ‹‹በታሪኩ ከመቼውም ጊዜ በላይ አሁን አንድ ሆኗል!!›› በማለት በሬ ወለደ የሀሰት ምስክርነታቸውን አምነን እንድንቀበል ለማድረግ ለሳምንታት ተንጫጭተው ሊያደነቁሩን ሞክረዋል፡፡ እነዚህ የኪነ-ጥበብ ባለሙያዎች የክልሉ ነዋሪዎች ገና ዛሬ (በኢህአዴግ እፁብ ድንቅ እና ፍትሀዊ አስተዳደር) ኢትዮጵያዊነት እንደተሰማቸው፤ ገና ዛሬ በፍቃደኝነት ኢትዮጵያውያን እንደሆኑ አስመስለው ለማሳመን የሄዱበት የቁልቁለት መንገድ አጥንት ድረስ በሚዘልቅ ሀዘን እንዳኮራመተን እነርሱም ይጠፋቸዋል ብዬ አላስብም፡፡ ጉዳዩ ሆድ ሌላ፣ እውነት ሌላ ሆኖባቸው እንጂ፡፡ ግና፣ የቄሳሩ ጲላጦስም ‹‹እውነት ምንድር ነች?›› እንዲል፣ እውነት ለእነርሱ ዋጋዋ ስንት ነው? መቼም ከእውነት ይልቅ ግድ የሚሰጣቸው የሆድ ነገር ነው፤ እበላ አዳሪዎች ናቸውና፡፡
በጥቅሉ በኢትዮጵያችን ከምሁር እስከ ተርታው፤ ከጳጳሳት (ፓስተራት) እና ሼሆች እስከ መናፍቃውያን፤ ከልሂቅ እስከ ደቂቅ፤ ከጄነራል እስከ ወታደር፤ ከከያኒ እስከ ጽሑፍ ገልባጭ፤ ከቱጃር እስከ ጥሮ-ግሮ አዳሪ፤ ከመምህር እስከ ተማሪ… ስር የሰደደ አድርባይነት እና የሞራል ክስረት ለመንሰራፋቱ አይነተኛ ማሳያው አምባገነኑ ኢህአዴግ እንዲህ ሚሊዮኖችን ረግጦ እየጨፈለቀ፣ አስሮ እያንገላታ፣ ከሀገር እያሰደደና እየገደለ… ከሁለት አስርት በላይ መቆየት የመቻሉ ምስጢር ነው፡፡ ግና፣ የሕዝብን መከራ በማራዘም ኪስን ማደለብ፣ ግላዊ ፍላጎትን ማርካት ሁሌም አትራፊ ሊሆን እንደማይቻል መዘንጋት የለበትም፡፡ ማን ነበር ‹የተከፋፋለና አድርባይ ሕዝብን ከጭቆና ማላቀቅ፣ ሰማይን የማረስ ያህል አዳጋች ነው!› ያለው?
አዎን፣ ከ20ኛው ክፍለ ዘመን መባቻ ጀምሮ በጉልበታም ስርዓታት የጭካኔ መዳፍም ሆነ በግላዊ ጥቅመኝነት እየተናዱ የመጡት የባህል እና የሞራል እሴቶች ትውልዱን ዛሬ ላይ ለደረሰበት አስከፊ ማሕበራዊ ቀውስ መዳረጋቸው አሌ የማይባል ነው፡፡ ርግጥ ነው የችግሩ ስፋትና ጥልቀት እንደ ስርዓቱ የፖለቲካ ፍልስፍና በዘውግ የተከፋፈለ አይደለም፤ ብዙሀን እና ህዳጣን የሚል መስፈርትንም የተከተለ አይደለም፤ ኃይማኖታዊ መለያም የለውም፤ በሁሉም የሀገሪቱ አካባቢዎች አለቅጥ መንሰራፋቱ በግላጭ ይታያልና፡፡ ይህም ነው መፍትሔውን ስር ነቀል የማሕበራዊ አብዮት (ለውጥ) ብቻ እንዲሆን ያስገድደው፡፡
የቀደሙት ሁለት አብዮቶች በዋናነት ያነሷቸው የብሔር እና የመሬት ጥያቄ መክሸፋቸው (መቀልበሳቸው) ዛሬም ሶስተኛ አብዮትን የማይቀር ዕዳ አድርጎ የመውሰዱ ሁነት እንደተጠበቀ ሆኖ፤ ሥራ-አጥነት፣ ከነባሩ ባህል ማፈንገጥ፣ ሙስና፣ በሕብረተሰቡ ዘንድ አክብሮትና 4 ተሰሚነት ያላቸው ታላላቆችን አለማደመጥ፣ አድርባይነት፣ ደንታቢስነት፣ ዶሮ ሳይጮኽ ደጋግሞ መክዳት፣ የ‹‹ስቀሎ፣ ስቀሎ…›› ሀሰተኛ ድምፅ መበራከት፣ ኢ-ሞራላዊ ድርጊቶች እና የመሳሳሉት ትውልድና ሀገር ገዳይ ደዌዎችን ለመፈወስ ከማሕበራዊ አብዮት ያነሰ መፍትሔ እንደሌለ ከተለያዩ ሀገራት ታሪክ መረዳት ይቻላል፡፡ በነገራችን ላይ ኢህአዴግ በየትኛውም የዓለማችን ሀገራት የተከሰተ ሕዝባዊ አብዮት እንቅልፍ እንደሚነሳው በርካታ ማሳያዎች አሉ፡፡ ባሳለፍነው ሳምንት የኢትዮጵያ ቴሌቭዥን ለተከታታይ ቀናት ‹‹ተንታኝ›› ጭምር በመጋበዝ፣ ምስራቅ አውሮፓ ድረስ ተጉዞ የተሳካውን የዩክሬን አብዮት ከቀለም ጋር በማያያዝ ለማውገዝ ያቀረባቸው ፕሮግራሞች የፍርሃቱ መጠን አንዱ ማሳያ ተደርገው ሊወሰዱ ይችላል፡፡ ግና፣ እውነት እውነት እልሀለሁ በመቶ ሺህ የሚቆጠር የታጠቀ ኃይል ቢሰለፍ፣ እልፍ አእላፍ ፊርማቶሪዎች በሕዝብ መሀል ቢሰገሰጉ፣ ሚሊዮናት ካድሬዎች ሀገር-ምድሩን ቢያጥለቀልቁ፤ አገዛዛዊ ጭቆና እና ማሕበራዊ ክስረት እስካለ ድረስ የጊዜ ጉዳይ ካልሆነ፣ የትኛውም ምድራዊ ኃይል ሊያመክነው የማይችል አብዮት መቀጣጠሉ የማይቀር ጉዳይ ነው፡፡ በመጨረሻም ይህንን ጽሑፍ ጄነራል መንግስቱ ነዋይ በተለምዶ ‹‹የታሕሳስ ግርግር›› እየተባለ የሚጠራውን የመፈንቅለ መንግስት ሙከራ መክሸፍ ተከትሎ ፍርድ ቤት በቀረበበት ወቅት በሰጠው ቃል እቋጨዋለሁ፡-
‹‹…ዋ! ዋ! ዋ! ለእናንተም ለግዥአችሁ የኢትዮጵያ ሕዝብ ሀሳቤ በዝርዝር ገብቶት በአንድነት በሚነሳበት ጊዜ የሚደርስባችሁ መዓት የሚያሳቅቅ ይሆናል፡፡››
ትንቢቱ ከ13 ዓመት በኋላ ከእጥፍ በላይ መፈፀሙን ስናስታውስ፣ በጥቅመኝነት ስሌት ከስርዓቱ ጋር ተወዳጅተው የግፉአንን የመከራ ዕድሜ የሚያራዝሙ አድርባዮችም ሆኑ የአገዛዙ ልሂቃን ሕዝቡ ‹‹ሆ!›› ብሎ በአንድነት የተነሳ ዕለት ከመዓቱ ያመልጡ ዘንድ አይቻላቸውምና ዛሬውኑ ‹ንሰሀ ግቡ!› ብሎ ማሳሰብ ግድ ይላል፡፡ …ዋ! ዋ!! ዋ!!!
ኢትዮጵያ ለዘላለም ትኑር!
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Letter to My Son (By Eskinder Nega)
Kaliti Prison
The mistakes of my life. Ah! I could go on and on and on about them. (Warning, I am aiming for your sympathy.) There are the missed opportunities. (God is generous, I squandered them all, literally.) There are the wrong choices (Hey there is at least the adrenaline rush that comes with every wrong move.) There is the conceited self-absorption (Obviously more and more as I rush through middle age.) There is the lack of direction (Bitter to admit, but true.) There is the incapacitating self-doubt. (Question: are you teary-eyed or disgusted?)
But here is what my strategy is not: a crafty debasement of expectation at the outset, so that by the end the balance of sympathy could sway no way but in my favor. I simply hanker honesty.
Indeed, I too yearn to be a hero in my son’s eye. Somehow privy to the notion that a male child’s first hero is the father, I dream to play the role. That this phase of the child is posed to pass quickly matters not an iota to me. I insist on my 15 minutes of fame. But I am also interested in the most enduring kind of appraisal, that of respect. While the former, unexplored adoration, is innate in every child, the latter, empathy and regard of the person, is the result of a complex process. And it has to be earned. Whether I merit this honor should be clear by the end of this letter.
I have reluctantly become an absent father because I ache for what the French in the late 18th century expressed in three simple words: liberté, egalité, fraternité. Before the advent of my son in my life, I was a nonchalant prisoner of conscience on at least seven occasions. The blithe was hardly unnoticed by my incarcerators.
It troubled them greatly because they did not know how to defeat it. Tyranny is a function of fear: the terror of state violence, the menace of imprisonment, the dread of imposed penury. None of these, however, could be applied against an entire population. But strike only against a handful and copious number of peoples are hypnotized into inaction. Our collective dignity, as the world’s oldest black nation, demands that this spell be broken irrevocably.
No myth has had wider resonance than the supposed gulf in history, lifestyle, psychology and hence politics between nations. Indeed the measure of progress has trended at varying pace for disparate peoples. But between antiquity and the 16th century, when the first flicker of scientific revolution appeared with the works of Copernicus in astronomy, the rift between the most advanced and the primal was inconsequential. It took two more centuries, until the invention of the steam engine in 1789 in Britain, before science commenced to transform society. Up to this time, the structural gap between Europe, the most advanced, and Africa, perhaps the least developed, was no more dramatic than the cleavage between rural and urban Europe itself. Only in the last 100-150 years was there a recognizable paradigm shift, with rural Europe finally overtaken by the rise of cities.
No country save the British, with their Magna Carta in 1215 and bill of rights in 1689, could claim centuries old evolution of democratic institutions. The rest of the world plunged haphazardly and unceremoniously into an unexplored world of democratic reconfiguration. The trail blazer, revolutionary France, in 1789, did not seek space for evolution to abscond from the bosom of one of Europe’s most strident monarchy to the enduringly seminal rights of men men and citizen; which enshrined not merely for France but for all humanity the principle of a government constrained by law. No less significantly France and many parts of Western Europe were democratic well before a sizable middle class emerged. The same holds for Britain. The U.S., too, was not only securely democratic in the early 19th century, but was also a nation with an overwhelmingly rural citizenry.
But fast forward to the mid-20th century and democratic countries were still far from the norm. It took a world war between 1939 and 1945 for democracy to reverse catastrophic slide and settle for an uneasy parity with ascending totalitarianism in Europe. An additional four-decades long cold war, spanning 1945 to 1990, was needed to decide the winner convincingly. Only then did democracy attain momentum.
Despite the popular convention mischievously amplified by most autocrats, to deter demands for rights, no people or country could plausibly claim an extended tradition of democracy. Unless, that is, the last 200 years of humanity’s 5,000 years of communal history is deemed as elongated.
And it seems Africa has finally moved to aptly realign with history. The tempo is to boldly march the French way. The result is breathtaking. Over two decades, the period between the collapse of Communisim, in 1989, to the end of the first decade of the new millennium, Africa was transfigured from a repository of fatuous dictators to a stronghold of more democracies than Asia, the continent with the fastest growing middle class in history. How Ethiopia lagged in this transformative saga of African renaissance and reformation accounts for my imprisonment, cruelly and yet impersonally imperiling my prized duty as a father.
My parents brief matrimony was an early causalty of the intractable tension between tradition and modernity in post-liberation Ethiopia. Gruesome though the Italian occupation was, in the late 1930s, it tore down a smug culture of complacency. The need to modernize, to embrace the know-how of the outside world, was no more in doubt. The ease with which the nation had fallen to fascist Italy was proof beyond reproach. That my parents, both hailing from profoundly conservative Orthodox families, who traditionally equated modern education with Catholicism, were allowed to attend school is testimony of how deep feelings run.
Modern Singapore’s founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, idealizes, by way of his still ongoing great marriage debate, the kind of union my parents forged. Highly intelligent, both had won super-competitive scholarships to do tertiary studies in American universities. Father was in New Jersey at Rutgers University for six years. Mother’s tenure at the American University of Beirut, the jewel of higher education in the Middle East, was shorter, having pursued post-graduate studies for a year. Both returned home full of energy, with [a] plethora of bright ideas, and a healthy dose of the sanguine optimism of the inexperienced.
Like many of htier contemporaries, their rise was swift, easy and assimilated in style. Both were successful, upwardly mobile, and still hungry for more when they met. The only predicament was in how they personally embraced modernity, an allegory of the dilemma at the national level.
To his credit father did not yield to the sentiment which Lee Kuan Yew ruefully laments about: the compulsion of educated young men to marry down. In mother he met a remarkably rare Ethiopian woman: financially independent, educated, emotionally secure as a single woman, and no less ambitious than himself. But unlike many of his peers he did not dive for cover. He was in fact a persistent pursuer, her repeated protestation notwithstanding. She was not particularly wary of him, rather she was circumspect of her odds in a primeval society. But in the end, I presume, his charm, and certainly family pressure, inexorably prevailed. A lavish wedding sealed the pact.
Unlike virtually all the women of her generation, education had emancipated mother not only financially, but crucially, emotionally. Reversal of either was unsavory, to be fended off at any cost. She was in a sense a feminist, absent the creed. There was little of the past she cared for. To exemplify her feelings, she started smoking, though discretely. Had he known, her devoutly religious father would have simply died of grief. Neither, as far as I could discern, did father. He would have certainly balked at the prospect of a smoking wife. Even if he had wanted to oblige her, society, his friends and kin would have censured him. But every puff was an exhilarating expression of freedom for her. Freedom not from want, but the strictures imposed by tradition. When she finally stopped, after her divorce, it was for my sake. I was trying to emulate the only parent I knew. And by this time she also had a more serious diversion to engage her energy; the quest, unprecedented in Ethiopia, to prove that there can be a better life for a single woman after a divorce. Her vindication came, in little over five years, by way of the most successful clinic in the country, which she owned and managed. Father, awed and embarrassed, could only watch from the sidelines. A rebellious wife customarily returned to her husband chastened and humbled.
To all appearances, father was the quintessential modern man. He was moderately liberal, he lived in the right neighborhood, he dressed fashionably, his English was faultless, and until the rise of communism drove the latest cars. And he had money. But this was only the façade. His acquiescence to modernity extended only slightly beyond these parameters. The nucleus of the values he internalized from society, which were in need of metamorphosis to complement his public image, remained intact.
In this sense his profiles outlines the paradox that is the modern Ethiopian intellectual. There is the fixation with the façade of modernity—the technology, the infrastructure, the economy, the lifestyl. But there is also the corresponding resistance to its essential modus operandi—a radically transformed worldview. This means redefined relationships between husband and wife; parents and children; individual and society; the state and its citizens.
To mother, on the other hand, most established values were anachronistic. She had no compunction discarding them. In their place, a singular fixation with independence took hold. Society was, of course, less than ready to accommodate her. Though unexpressed, her husband had expected blunting of the fiery spirit, a gradual but inevitable acceptance of a place in life as a stay-at-home-mom. She thought otherwise. Forsaking a secure and well-paying job, when females with jobs were a rarity, for a precarious entrepreneurial venture was inexplicable. Both departures from convention were broadly misread as expressions of aggressive disposition. Few were able to see an indomitable spirit of individualism that make a modern society possible. This discord between a cumbersome past and a future grappling to unfold is also at the core of our national dispute over democracy.
A coarse encounter between the novel and the archaic is as old as history itself. The anecdotal evidence is rarely for the new to relinquish to the old. After all, women no[w] live in a far more liberate milieu than the yesteryears when few brave souls like mother were challenging convention.
Our modern politics has its genesis in a coup attempt in 1960. Though overwhelmed with relative ease, it left a lasting imprint on history by precipitating the rise of a fiery student movement, a precursor to the nation’s major political parties. Inspired by Egypt’s much romanticized coup, in 1952, which propelled young left-leaning revolutionary officers to power, Ethiopia’s was the first shot by soldiers to seize state power in black Africa. But while Egypt’s was conscientiously planned and executed to eschew violence, Ethiopia’s was marred by wanton carnage. Thus the debut of modern Ethiopian politics shadowed by unbridled violence. Fifty years later, the menace of brute force still lies at the heart of politics.
By the reckoning of the imperial government, father, like many of the intelligentsia, harbored suspect reformist sentiments. Though rewarded with high positions at an early age, there was tension in his relationship with the government. But it was tension devoid of danger for both sides. For the government, father and many of the young Turks, as they were propitiously called by some, posed no danger of subversion. They were impatient for hasty reform from inside, not calamitous revolution from outside. Even if the young Turks had their way, the result would be far less than catastrophic, with some measure of discomfort, they were tolerated. And indeed no sedition was ever intended by the young Turks. All they wanted was to upgrade, not change, the software. This somewhat cozy but uneasy bond between government and intelligentsia was upstaged the day university students flooded the streets in support of the coup attempt.
In 1960, the year of the coup attempt, Ethiopia’s elite center of learning was cloistered in a lone university college. A full-fledged university had yet to be realized. This was almost a generation after liberation from the Italians. In about the same interval, war-ravaged Germany and Japan had not only reconstructed but were on the verge of crossing new economic frontiers. Ethiopia’s shortcoming was manifestly evident. And finally a new generation scandalized by the inertia, indolence, stoicism and cynicism had risen. It was palpably time for change.
The 1960s could be credibly dubbed as the decade of student movements. But at its dawn, students nurtured no greater ambition than to be part of the global post-war economic boom. The revered genre of the silent, strong male, which dominated the 1950s, was still paramount. By the mid-1960s, Vietnam radicalized American youth, primarily on its colleges and universities. In France it was another war, Algeria, that was the impetus for campus militancy. In Iran and Europe [think he meant Ethiopia] it was a coup, successful in the case of the former, [a] debacle in the latter. The quartet gave the world the most animated students in history. By the mid-1970s, however, the Americans and French had fizzled out. The Ethiopians and Iranians peaked in the late 1970s, and quietly faded into oblivion in the early 1980s.
But their fleeting existence notwithstanding they left behind powerful legacies. The backlash against the counter-culture (contempt for authority and tradition) the students triggered in the US made the seminal presidencies of Nixon and Reagan possible. It took the coalition forged by Obama to win a second term to alter the dynamics of American politics. At their peak, Iranian students mesmerized the world by storming the US embassy in Tehran and humiliating a proud superpower. In less than a decade and a half, Ethiopian students inspired a nation to uproot a monarchy that had preserved for a millennium.
Though they were from four far-flung continents, had distinct histories, and promoted radically different visions, the students shared a common denominator: disdain for the status-quo. To the Americans no one older than 30 was trustworthy. As a way to unshackle tradition, they attacked its prudish sexual mores. The French were unduly agitated against their government, and vented their anger on the streets of Paris with passion unseen since the storming of the Bastille. After rejecting the modernizing pretensions of their foreign-tainted monarch, Iranian students yearned for the purity of a lost age. To the Ethiopian students, groomed by rote learning rather than critical thinking, Marxism became the Holy Grail, the panacea to all the nation’s ills.
But a pivotal divide also separated them. The Americans and the French lived in free societies. There were adept political parties, vibrant free press, useful civic organizations, multitude of professional and trade unions to channel grievances and represent interests. None of these were about to be supplanted by students. The Ethiopians and Iranians lived in tired monarchies. There were no conduits for dissent. Here was an opening for transformative impact.
Unlike the Japanese and the Chinese after the madness of the Cultural Revolution, Ethiopian students never really made the crucial connection between the indigenization of science and development. They saw national redemption primarily in the social sciences, and many of the best students flocked to them in droves despite steady underperformance on standardized reading and comprehension tests. To father and his generation, the monarchy was sacrosanct. Very few of them flirted with republicanism. Their ideal was a British monarchy. To the students who were embittered and abruptly radicalized by the events of 1960, the monarchy, and the US, which was implicated in the reversal of the coup attempt, became loathed icons. Embracing socialism seemed only logical and inevitable. And here is where an academic culture chronically short on critical thinking was to have detrimental effect. Whereas in the U.S. and France deep scholarly foundations mitigated against the swamping of the student majority by extremism, in Ethiopia and Iran intellectual buffers against infantile radicalization were ominously absent. But while Iranian students rallied around grassroot sentiments for religious chastity and nationalism, only Ethiopian students militated against all things aboriniginal. Nothing was sacred to them. The emperor was lampooned. Religion was rejected. Culture was mocked. Tradition was attacked. History was disputed. Ethnicity was politicized. It was a tsunami at full thrust against all things established. A good measure of excitement was the intriguing possibility of engineering society from scratch.
But rejection is virtually a carefree venture. There is little strenuous intellectual effort involved. The demanding undertaking lies in the pursuit and nourishment of an alternative consensus. Ultimately, this is where the students failed calamitously. Singularly transfixed with rebellion, and only perfunctorily with its aftermath, they were governed by no moral codes, were disciplined by no hierarchy, and were direly lacking sense of proportion to temper emotions. In this sense, they had no analogue in the Americans or the French. Nor indeed in the Iranians. The Americans and the French were ultimately anchored by nationalism and ingrained identity. The Iranians of course had religion. Having rejected both nationalism and religion, Ethiopian students had nothing durably satiating to replace them with. This was the pristine environment in which militancy thrived. Extremism thus became not a mere idiosyncrasy, but rather the structural building block of the movement. Tragically, what the Ethiopians radicalized was really nothing more than nihilism. The mania was to tear down an existing order. In the end, after the collapse of the imperial order, only a small minority, by now metamorphasized into armed insurgents, had the energy to tread o. The majority was too exhausted to continue, opting for exile and a well-earned rest in the West.
Of [A] multitude of vague memories from my distant childhood, the sense of dread that permanently enveloped my grandmother’s home, where my mother and I lived intermittently after the divorce, still lingers with me. Years later, in the 1990s, I was to learn, rather to my shock, ours was only one of a handful of families in the neighborhood that mourned the fall of Haile Selassie, the diminutive king who had held sway over the nation for over half a century. Initially I thought it was loss of privilege that explained our anomalous. But I know now there was more.
If one word was to render the spirit of the revolution, it would certainly be equality. An inordinate passion for equality suddenly bewitched the public—what in theory could only have meant equality of opportunity was in practice subverted to imply equality of merit. Not even the elderly, the repository of wisdom in traditional thinking, were to be deferred to anymore. The nation’s best and brightest, whose income, lifestyle and manners marked them from the majority, became more subjects of derision than role models. They were no more in vogue. It was time to celebrate mediocrity, to artificially elevate it to a higher podium. This atmosphere endured, with disastrous consequences for the entire reign of the military dictatorship, the guardian of the revolution and still influences the present. It is this pauperization of value that lies at the provenance o fthe national malaise that has numbed the intellectual elite.
To be fair, many nations, including the meritocratic U.S., where guilt-ridden 2008 (2012?) presidential candidate Mitt Romney was bullied for his wealth, occasionally toy with debased populism, but rarely has it persisted with the kind of intensity evident in Ethiopia. It was this slide to debauched populism that distressed grandmother’s household. It was a prescient reserve that anticipated an impending moral morass.
The ultimate failure of the military dictatorship, including its gross human rights violations, is the failure of Communism. But even within the narrow constraints of communism, more was possible. The Soviets failed broadly but compensated with a world-class military-industrial complex. Nothing works in Cuba except health services, one of the best in Latin America. Mao’s China at least liberated a billion plus mass of humanity from worry about its quotidian meals. Ditto for many Communist countries, where a lone bright spot attested to the restrained potential of an oppressed people. But because the principal consensus in post-revolutionary Ethiopia had been an unremitting joy derived from the leveling of society, a culture against exceptionalism gained traction. Blending became the default modus operandi both at the individual and group levels. No distinction was made between superiority stemming from privilege and superiority attained by merit. For a government fighting multiple insurgencies, this was a fatal shortcoming. Unable to build a professional army based on merit, it eventually succumbed not to superior force but to weaker adversaries who had assembled meritocratic fighting machines. It took seventeen years, but there was no avoiding it: grandmother was vindicated. And she lived to see it all. God bless her soul.
Sadly, the implosion of the military dictatorship did not necessarily entail reorientation of national disposition. On the contrary, unlike their less fortunate, American, French and Iranian brethren, Ethiopian students, untempered by outside influence, ascended to power in 1991 and had their nation at their complete mercy. And they did what was unthinkable to everyone but the puritan nihilist: facilitated—nay, promoted—the secession of Eritrea, the heartland of historical Ethiopia. Whether the nation will survive the shock that ensued is still an open question.
But while this is where we are, our future is not predestined. The future is malleable, at least in its mid to long-term facets. This is God’s way of internalizing hope into our existence. And best of all, the age of the students is fading. Consider recent events.
Even in sane democracies, the death of a nation’s leader can be the slow motion drama that it customarily is in autocracies. In contentedly democratic Ghana, where the specter of succession no more bodes the possibility of bloodletting, the president’s ill-health was the state’s most guarded secret. When John Atta Mills finally spoke of his illness, it was to insist of a successful cure. In the spirit of the famous adage, he wanted a return to normalcy. What he lacked, though, was an obliging public. This is Ghana, after all. Cynicism, one could argue plausibly, is a national brand. But in the end, even his deputy and successor, John Mahama, could not help but be caught unawares by his boss’s abrupt transition.
In increasingly Orwellian Ethiopia, the mere mention of the leader’s ailment required a radical departure from an entrenched—and prized—ethos of opacity. The enduringly hapless Ethiopian public does not expect to be told the truth by its government. The absence, not the histrionics itself, would have surprised Ethiopians. Thus only the hopelessly guileless were surprised by the delayed news of the leader’s death.
The paranoia is hardly misplaced. The death of despots has altered the course of national histories scores of times, and sometimes even world history.
One of the greatest empires in world history, that of Alexander the Great, simply collapsed with news of his early death; clearing the path for the rise of the Romans. The inopportune death of Odedai Khan saved Europe from an unstoppable Mongolian invading army in 1241. Had the Mongolians overrun Europe as they did China, world history would have changed beyond recognition. Along with the body of Oliver Cromwell was buried the political prospect of republicanism in 17th century England. Ominously, cautionary tales from local history are hardly in want. The legacies of Ethiopia’s last four kings, stretching from mid-19th century to mid-20th century, have all been marred by lack of continuity. And now there is the instinctive inkling by Ethiopia’s ruling party that history is about to repeat itself. But this time, absence of an enduring legacy awaits not merely a leader or party but an entire generation, the spirited students of the 1960s. Theirs will mostly be a legacy of infamy. To paraphrase Reagan, a legacy meant for the trash bin of history.
Life is tragically short. But only when challenged by a mid-life crisis, or when shock is triggered by illness or accident, does existence’s fleeting status dominate consciousness. How people react to the challenge is a measure of character. The broad motions people go through, however, are well established. There is the initial dazed realization of how disloyally momentary life is, then a reaction abounds, and finally, either stoically or grudgingly, acceptance of the inevitable assumes primacy. Prison has been the triggering element for me. And however exalted, the cause of justice is that has landed me here. I miss you and your mother terribly. The pain is almost physical. But in this plight of our family is embedded hope of a long suffering people. There is no greater honor. We must bear any pain, travel any distance, climb any mountain, cross any ocean to complete this journey to freedom. Anything less is impoverishment of our soul. God bless you, my son. You will always be in my prayers.
The mistakes of my life. Ah! I could go on and on and on about them. (Warning, I am aiming for your sympathy.) There are the missed opportunities. (God is generous, I squandered them all, literally.) There are the wrong choices (Hey there is at least the adrenaline rush that comes with every wrong move.) There is the conceited self-absorption (Obviously more and more as I rush through middle age.) There is the lack of direction (Bitter to admit, but true.) There is the incapacitating self-doubt. (Question: are you teary-eyed or disgusted?)
But here is what my strategy is not: a crafty debasement of expectation at the outset, so that by the end the balance of sympathy could sway no way but in my favor. I simply hanker honesty.
Indeed, I too yearn to be a hero in my son’s eye. Somehow privy to the notion that a male child’s first hero is the father, I dream to play the role. That this phase of the child is posed to pass quickly matters not an iota to me. I insist on my 15 minutes of fame. But I am also interested in the most enduring kind of appraisal, that of respect. While the former, unexplored adoration, is innate in every child, the latter, empathy and regard of the person, is the result of a complex process. And it has to be earned. Whether I merit this honor should be clear by the end of this letter.
I have reluctantly become an absent father because I ache for what the French in the late 18th century expressed in three simple words: liberté, egalité, fraternité. Before the advent of my son in my life, I was a nonchalant prisoner of conscience on at least seven occasions. The blithe was hardly unnoticed by my incarcerators.
It troubled them greatly because they did not know how to defeat it. Tyranny is a function of fear: the terror of state violence, the menace of imprisonment, the dread of imposed penury. None of these, however, could be applied against an entire population. But strike only against a handful and copious number of peoples are hypnotized into inaction. Our collective dignity, as the world’s oldest black nation, demands that this spell be broken irrevocably.
No myth has had wider resonance than the supposed gulf in history, lifestyle, psychology and hence politics between nations. Indeed the measure of progress has trended at varying pace for disparate peoples. But between antiquity and the 16th century, when the first flicker of scientific revolution appeared with the works of Copernicus in astronomy, the rift between the most advanced and the primal was inconsequential. It took two more centuries, until the invention of the steam engine in 1789 in Britain, before science commenced to transform society. Up to this time, the structural gap between Europe, the most advanced, and Africa, perhaps the least developed, was no more dramatic than the cleavage between rural and urban Europe itself. Only in the last 100-150 years was there a recognizable paradigm shift, with rural Europe finally overtaken by the rise of cities.
No country save the British, with their Magna Carta in 1215 and bill of rights in 1689, could claim centuries old evolution of democratic institutions. The rest of the world plunged haphazardly and unceremoniously into an unexplored world of democratic reconfiguration. The trail blazer, revolutionary France, in 1789, did not seek space for evolution to abscond from the bosom of one of Europe’s most strident monarchy to the enduringly seminal rights of men men and citizen; which enshrined not merely for France but for all humanity the principle of a government constrained by law. No less significantly France and many parts of Western Europe were democratic well before a sizable middle class emerged. The same holds for Britain. The U.S., too, was not only securely democratic in the early 19th century, but was also a nation with an overwhelmingly rural citizenry.
But fast forward to the mid-20th century and democratic countries were still far from the norm. It took a world war between 1939 and 1945 for democracy to reverse catastrophic slide and settle for an uneasy parity with ascending totalitarianism in Europe. An additional four-decades long cold war, spanning 1945 to 1990, was needed to decide the winner convincingly. Only then did democracy attain momentum.
Despite the popular convention mischievously amplified by most autocrats, to deter demands for rights, no people or country could plausibly claim an extended tradition of democracy. Unless, that is, the last 200 years of humanity’s 5,000 years of communal history is deemed as elongated.
And it seems Africa has finally moved to aptly realign with history. The tempo is to boldly march the French way. The result is breathtaking. Over two decades, the period between the collapse of Communisim, in 1989, to the end of the first decade of the new millennium, Africa was transfigured from a repository of fatuous dictators to a stronghold of more democracies than Asia, the continent with the fastest growing middle class in history. How Ethiopia lagged in this transformative saga of African renaissance and reformation accounts for my imprisonment, cruelly and yet impersonally imperiling my prized duty as a father.
My parents brief matrimony was an early causalty of the intractable tension between tradition and modernity in post-liberation Ethiopia. Gruesome though the Italian occupation was, in the late 1930s, it tore down a smug culture of complacency. The need to modernize, to embrace the know-how of the outside world, was no more in doubt. The ease with which the nation had fallen to fascist Italy was proof beyond reproach. That my parents, both hailing from profoundly conservative Orthodox families, who traditionally equated modern education with Catholicism, were allowed to attend school is testimony of how deep feelings run.
Modern Singapore’s founding father, Lee Kuan Yew, idealizes, by way of his still ongoing great marriage debate, the kind of union my parents forged. Highly intelligent, both had won super-competitive scholarships to do tertiary studies in American universities. Father was in New Jersey at Rutgers University for six years. Mother’s tenure at the American University of Beirut, the jewel of higher education in the Middle East, was shorter, having pursued post-graduate studies for a year. Both returned home full of energy, with [a] plethora of bright ideas, and a healthy dose of the sanguine optimism of the inexperienced.
Like many of htier contemporaries, their rise was swift, easy and assimilated in style. Both were successful, upwardly mobile, and still hungry for more when they met. The only predicament was in how they personally embraced modernity, an allegory of the dilemma at the national level.
To his credit father did not yield to the sentiment which Lee Kuan Yew ruefully laments about: the compulsion of educated young men to marry down. In mother he met a remarkably rare Ethiopian woman: financially independent, educated, emotionally secure as a single woman, and no less ambitious than himself. But unlike many of his peers he did not dive for cover. He was in fact a persistent pursuer, her repeated protestation notwithstanding. She was not particularly wary of him, rather she was circumspect of her odds in a primeval society. But in the end, I presume, his charm, and certainly family pressure, inexorably prevailed. A lavish wedding sealed the pact.
Unlike virtually all the women of her generation, education had emancipated mother not only financially, but crucially, emotionally. Reversal of either was unsavory, to be fended off at any cost. She was in a sense a feminist, absent the creed. There was little of the past she cared for. To exemplify her feelings, she started smoking, though discretely. Had he known, her devoutly religious father would have simply died of grief. Neither, as far as I could discern, did father. He would have certainly balked at the prospect of a smoking wife. Even if he had wanted to oblige her, society, his friends and kin would have censured him. But every puff was an exhilarating expression of freedom for her. Freedom not from want, but the strictures imposed by tradition. When she finally stopped, after her divorce, it was for my sake. I was trying to emulate the only parent I knew. And by this time she also had a more serious diversion to engage her energy; the quest, unprecedented in Ethiopia, to prove that there can be a better life for a single woman after a divorce. Her vindication came, in little over five years, by way of the most successful clinic in the country, which she owned and managed. Father, awed and embarrassed, could only watch from the sidelines. A rebellious wife customarily returned to her husband chastened and humbled.
To all appearances, father was the quintessential modern man. He was moderately liberal, he lived in the right neighborhood, he dressed fashionably, his English was faultless, and until the rise of communism drove the latest cars. And he had money. But this was only the façade. His acquiescence to modernity extended only slightly beyond these parameters. The nucleus of the values he internalized from society, which were in need of metamorphosis to complement his public image, remained intact.
In this sense his profiles outlines the paradox that is the modern Ethiopian intellectual. There is the fixation with the façade of modernity—the technology, the infrastructure, the economy, the lifestyl. But there is also the corresponding resistance to its essential modus operandi—a radically transformed worldview. This means redefined relationships between husband and wife; parents and children; individual and society; the state and its citizens.
To mother, on the other hand, most established values were anachronistic. She had no compunction discarding them. In their place, a singular fixation with independence took hold. Society was, of course, less than ready to accommodate her. Though unexpressed, her husband had expected blunting of the fiery spirit, a gradual but inevitable acceptance of a place in life as a stay-at-home-mom. She thought otherwise. Forsaking a secure and well-paying job, when females with jobs were a rarity, for a precarious entrepreneurial venture was inexplicable. Both departures from convention were broadly misread as expressions of aggressive disposition. Few were able to see an indomitable spirit of individualism that make a modern society possible. This discord between a cumbersome past and a future grappling to unfold is also at the core of our national dispute over democracy.
A coarse encounter between the novel and the archaic is as old as history itself. The anecdotal evidence is rarely for the new to relinquish to the old. After all, women no[w] live in a far more liberate milieu than the yesteryears when few brave souls like mother were challenging convention.
Our modern politics has its genesis in a coup attempt in 1960. Though overwhelmed with relative ease, it left a lasting imprint on history by precipitating the rise of a fiery student movement, a precursor to the nation’s major political parties. Inspired by Egypt’s much romanticized coup, in 1952, which propelled young left-leaning revolutionary officers to power, Ethiopia’s was the first shot by soldiers to seize state power in black Africa. But while Egypt’s was conscientiously planned and executed to eschew violence, Ethiopia’s was marred by wanton carnage. Thus the debut of modern Ethiopian politics shadowed by unbridled violence. Fifty years later, the menace of brute force still lies at the heart of politics.
By the reckoning of the imperial government, father, like many of the intelligentsia, harbored suspect reformist sentiments. Though rewarded with high positions at an early age, there was tension in his relationship with the government. But it was tension devoid of danger for both sides. For the government, father and many of the young Turks, as they were propitiously called by some, posed no danger of subversion. They were impatient for hasty reform from inside, not calamitous revolution from outside. Even if the young Turks had their way, the result would be far less than catastrophic, with some measure of discomfort, they were tolerated. And indeed no sedition was ever intended by the young Turks. All they wanted was to upgrade, not change, the software. This somewhat cozy but uneasy bond between government and intelligentsia was upstaged the day university students flooded the streets in support of the coup attempt.
In 1960, the year of the coup attempt, Ethiopia’s elite center of learning was cloistered in a lone university college. A full-fledged university had yet to be realized. This was almost a generation after liberation from the Italians. In about the same interval, war-ravaged Germany and Japan had not only reconstructed but were on the verge of crossing new economic frontiers. Ethiopia’s shortcoming was manifestly evident. And finally a new generation scandalized by the inertia, indolence, stoicism and cynicism had risen. It was palpably time for change.
The 1960s could be credibly dubbed as the decade of student movements. But at its dawn, students nurtured no greater ambition than to be part of the global post-war economic boom. The revered genre of the silent, strong male, which dominated the 1950s, was still paramount. By the mid-1960s, Vietnam radicalized American youth, primarily on its colleges and universities. In France it was another war, Algeria, that was the impetus for campus militancy. In Iran and Europe [think he meant Ethiopia] it was a coup, successful in the case of the former, [a] debacle in the latter. The quartet gave the world the most animated students in history. By the mid-1970s, however, the Americans and French had fizzled out. The Ethiopians and Iranians peaked in the late 1970s, and quietly faded into oblivion in the early 1980s.
But their fleeting existence notwithstanding they left behind powerful legacies. The backlash against the counter-culture (contempt for authority and tradition) the students triggered in the US made the seminal presidencies of Nixon and Reagan possible. It took the coalition forged by Obama to win a second term to alter the dynamics of American politics. At their peak, Iranian students mesmerized the world by storming the US embassy in Tehran and humiliating a proud superpower. In less than a decade and a half, Ethiopian students inspired a nation to uproot a monarchy that had preserved for a millennium.
Though they were from four far-flung continents, had distinct histories, and promoted radically different visions, the students shared a common denominator: disdain for the status-quo. To the Americans no one older than 30 was trustworthy. As a way to unshackle tradition, they attacked its prudish sexual mores. The French were unduly agitated against their government, and vented their anger on the streets of Paris with passion unseen since the storming of the Bastille. After rejecting the modernizing pretensions of their foreign-tainted monarch, Iranian students yearned for the purity of a lost age. To the Ethiopian students, groomed by rote learning rather than critical thinking, Marxism became the Holy Grail, the panacea to all the nation’s ills.
But a pivotal divide also separated them. The Americans and the French lived in free societies. There were adept political parties, vibrant free press, useful civic organizations, multitude of professional and trade unions to channel grievances and represent interests. None of these were about to be supplanted by students. The Ethiopians and Iranians lived in tired monarchies. There were no conduits for dissent. Here was an opening for transformative impact.
Unlike the Japanese and the Chinese after the madness of the Cultural Revolution, Ethiopian students never really made the crucial connection between the indigenization of science and development. They saw national redemption primarily in the social sciences, and many of the best students flocked to them in droves despite steady underperformance on standardized reading and comprehension tests. To father and his generation, the monarchy was sacrosanct. Very few of them flirted with republicanism. Their ideal was a British monarchy. To the students who were embittered and abruptly radicalized by the events of 1960, the monarchy, and the US, which was implicated in the reversal of the coup attempt, became loathed icons. Embracing socialism seemed only logical and inevitable. And here is where an academic culture chronically short on critical thinking was to have detrimental effect. Whereas in the U.S. and France deep scholarly foundations mitigated against the swamping of the student majority by extremism, in Ethiopia and Iran intellectual buffers against infantile radicalization were ominously absent. But while Iranian students rallied around grassroot sentiments for religious chastity and nationalism, only Ethiopian students militated against all things aboriniginal. Nothing was sacred to them. The emperor was lampooned. Religion was rejected. Culture was mocked. Tradition was attacked. History was disputed. Ethnicity was politicized. It was a tsunami at full thrust against all things established. A good measure of excitement was the intriguing possibility of engineering society from scratch.
But rejection is virtually a carefree venture. There is little strenuous intellectual effort involved. The demanding undertaking lies in the pursuit and nourishment of an alternative consensus. Ultimately, this is where the students failed calamitously. Singularly transfixed with rebellion, and only perfunctorily with its aftermath, they were governed by no moral codes, were disciplined by no hierarchy, and were direly lacking sense of proportion to temper emotions. In this sense, they had no analogue in the Americans or the French. Nor indeed in the Iranians. The Americans and the French were ultimately anchored by nationalism and ingrained identity. The Iranians of course had religion. Having rejected both nationalism and religion, Ethiopian students had nothing durably satiating to replace them with. This was the pristine environment in which militancy thrived. Extremism thus became not a mere idiosyncrasy, but rather the structural building block of the movement. Tragically, what the Ethiopians radicalized was really nothing more than nihilism. The mania was to tear down an existing order. In the end, after the collapse of the imperial order, only a small minority, by now metamorphasized into armed insurgents, had the energy to tread o. The majority was too exhausted to continue, opting for exile and a well-earned rest in the West.
Of [A] multitude of vague memories from my distant childhood, the sense of dread that permanently enveloped my grandmother’s home, where my mother and I lived intermittently after the divorce, still lingers with me. Years later, in the 1990s, I was to learn, rather to my shock, ours was only one of a handful of families in the neighborhood that mourned the fall of Haile Selassie, the diminutive king who had held sway over the nation for over half a century. Initially I thought it was loss of privilege that explained our anomalous. But I know now there was more.
If one word was to render the spirit of the revolution, it would certainly be equality. An inordinate passion for equality suddenly bewitched the public—what in theory could only have meant equality of opportunity was in practice subverted to imply equality of merit. Not even the elderly, the repository of wisdom in traditional thinking, were to be deferred to anymore. The nation’s best and brightest, whose income, lifestyle and manners marked them from the majority, became more subjects of derision than role models. They were no more in vogue. It was time to celebrate mediocrity, to artificially elevate it to a higher podium. This atmosphere endured, with disastrous consequences for the entire reign of the military dictatorship, the guardian of the revolution and still influences the present. It is this pauperization of value that lies at the provenance o fthe national malaise that has numbed the intellectual elite.
To be fair, many nations, including the meritocratic U.S., where guilt-ridden 2008 (2012?) presidential candidate Mitt Romney was bullied for his wealth, occasionally toy with debased populism, but rarely has it persisted with the kind of intensity evident in Ethiopia. It was this slide to debauched populism that distressed grandmother’s household. It was a prescient reserve that anticipated an impending moral morass.
The ultimate failure of the military dictatorship, including its gross human rights violations, is the failure of Communism. But even within the narrow constraints of communism, more was possible. The Soviets failed broadly but compensated with a world-class military-industrial complex. Nothing works in Cuba except health services, one of the best in Latin America. Mao’s China at least liberated a billion plus mass of humanity from worry about its quotidian meals. Ditto for many Communist countries, where a lone bright spot attested to the restrained potential of an oppressed people. But because the principal consensus in post-revolutionary Ethiopia had been an unremitting joy derived from the leveling of society, a culture against exceptionalism gained traction. Blending became the default modus operandi both at the individual and group levels. No distinction was made between superiority stemming from privilege and superiority attained by merit. For a government fighting multiple insurgencies, this was a fatal shortcoming. Unable to build a professional army based on merit, it eventually succumbed not to superior force but to weaker adversaries who had assembled meritocratic fighting machines. It took seventeen years, but there was no avoiding it: grandmother was vindicated. And she lived to see it all. God bless her soul.
Sadly, the implosion of the military dictatorship did not necessarily entail reorientation of national disposition. On the contrary, unlike their less fortunate, American, French and Iranian brethren, Ethiopian students, untempered by outside influence, ascended to power in 1991 and had their nation at their complete mercy. And they did what was unthinkable to everyone but the puritan nihilist: facilitated—nay, promoted—the secession of Eritrea, the heartland of historical Ethiopia. Whether the nation will survive the shock that ensued is still an open question.
But while this is where we are, our future is not predestined. The future is malleable, at least in its mid to long-term facets. This is God’s way of internalizing hope into our existence. And best of all, the age of the students is fading. Consider recent events.
Even in sane democracies, the death of a nation’s leader can be the slow motion drama that it customarily is in autocracies. In contentedly democratic Ghana, where the specter of succession no more bodes the possibility of bloodletting, the president’s ill-health was the state’s most guarded secret. When John Atta Mills finally spoke of his illness, it was to insist of a successful cure. In the spirit of the famous adage, he wanted a return to normalcy. What he lacked, though, was an obliging public. This is Ghana, after all. Cynicism, one could argue plausibly, is a national brand. But in the end, even his deputy and successor, John Mahama, could not help but be caught unawares by his boss’s abrupt transition.
In increasingly Orwellian Ethiopia, the mere mention of the leader’s ailment required a radical departure from an entrenched—and prized—ethos of opacity. The enduringly hapless Ethiopian public does not expect to be told the truth by its government. The absence, not the histrionics itself, would have surprised Ethiopians. Thus only the hopelessly guileless were surprised by the delayed news of the leader’s death.
The paranoia is hardly misplaced. The death of despots has altered the course of national histories scores of times, and sometimes even world history.
One of the greatest empires in world history, that of Alexander the Great, simply collapsed with news of his early death; clearing the path for the rise of the Romans. The inopportune death of Odedai Khan saved Europe from an unstoppable Mongolian invading army in 1241. Had the Mongolians overrun Europe as they did China, world history would have changed beyond recognition. Along with the body of Oliver Cromwell was buried the political prospect of republicanism in 17th century England. Ominously, cautionary tales from local history are hardly in want. The legacies of Ethiopia’s last four kings, stretching from mid-19th century to mid-20th century, have all been marred by lack of continuity. And now there is the instinctive inkling by Ethiopia’s ruling party that history is about to repeat itself. But this time, absence of an enduring legacy awaits not merely a leader or party but an entire generation, the spirited students of the 1960s. Theirs will mostly be a legacy of infamy. To paraphrase Reagan, a legacy meant for the trash bin of history.
Life is tragically short. But only when challenged by a mid-life crisis, or when shock is triggered by illness or accident, does existence’s fleeting status dominate consciousness. How people react to the challenge is a measure of character. The broad motions people go through, however, are well established. There is the initial dazed realization of how disloyally momentary life is, then a reaction abounds, and finally, either stoically or grudgingly, acceptance of the inevitable assumes primacy. Prison has been the triggering element for me. And however exalted, the cause of justice is that has landed me here. I miss you and your mother terribly. The pain is almost physical. But in this plight of our family is embedded hope of a long suffering people. There is no greater honor. We must bear any pain, travel any distance, climb any mountain, cross any ocean to complete this journey to freedom. Anything less is impoverishment of our soul. God bless you, my son. You will always be in my prayers.
Eskinder Nega
Kaliti Prison
Ze-Habesha Website may contain advice, opinions, and statements of various information and content providers. The Website neither represents nor endorses the accuracy of information or endorses the contents provided by external sources. All blog posts and comments are the opinion of the authors.
Kaliti Prison
Ze-Habesha Website may contain advice, opinions, and statements of various information and content providers. The Website neither represents nor endorses the accuracy of information or endorses the contents provided by external sources. All blog posts and comments are the opinion of the authors.
በነፃነት ቀን ነፃነት ማጣት!
ይድነቃቸው ከበደ
ሰብአዊ መብቶች እያንዳንዳችን ሰው በመሆናችን ብቻ የሚገቡን ከሰብአዊነታችን ተለይተው ሊታዩ የማያችሉ መብቶች ናቸው፡፡ መንግስታት እነዚህን በአለም አቀፍ ደረጃ እውቅና የተሰጣቸውን ሰብአዊ መብቶች ለማክበር ለማስከበርና ለማሟላት በቀዳሚነት ኃላፊነት አለባቸው፡፡ በዚህም መሰረት ኃላፊነት ከፈረሙ ቀደምት አገራት መካከል ኢትዩጵያ ትገኝበታላች፡፡
ይሁን እንጂ የሴቶች ሰብአዊ መብቶች በሚፈለገው መልኩ ተግባራዊ ካለመሆኑ ባሻገር ኢ-ፍትሃዊነት እጅግ የበዛ ነው፡፡ ይህም በመሆኑም እ.ኤ.አ. በ1908 በአሜሪካ ኒወርክ ከተማ በጨርቃ ጨርቅ ፋብሪካ ይሰሩ የነበሩ ላብአደር ሴቶች ‹‹ለእኩል ሥራ እኩል ክፍያና የተመቻቸ የሥራ ሰዓት ለሴቶች›› በሚል መፈክር የሥራ ማቆም አድማ በማካሄድ የሴቶች ድምፅ እንዲስተጋባ አድርገዋል፡፡ ይህን ተከትሎ የዓለም ሴቶች በማህበር በመደራጀት ትግላቸውን በማጠናከራቸው የዓለም መንግስታትን አስተሳሰብ በመለወጥ የተባበሩት መንግስታት ድርጅት አባል አገሮች የሴቶች መብት ስምምነት/ኮንቪክሽን/ እንዲፈራረሙ እብይ ምክንያት ሆነዋል፡፡
እ.ኤ.አ. በ1910 በኮፕን አገር ከተማ በተደረገው ሁለተኛው ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ጉባሄ ላይ የመነሻ ሃሳብ በማቅረብ ማርች 8 በየዓመቱ እንዲከበር ያደረጉት ሴቶች ለመብታቸው ያደረጉትን አስታውጾ ለመዘከር ዓለም አቀፍ መድረክ ለማመቻቸት በመቻላቸው ስማቸው በአክብሮት ይነሳል፡፡ ለመጀመሪያ ጊዜ በዓሉን ያከበሩት ጀርመን፣አውስትራሊያ፣ሲውዘርላንድ እና ዴንማርክ ለመሆናቸው መረጃዎች ይጠቁማሉ፡፡
ከዚሁ የአንድነት ተምሳሌትነት በመነሳት በዓለማ አቀፍ ደረጃ ማርች 8 የሴቶች ቀን በማድረግ ዓለም አቀፍ ስያሜዎችን በመስጠት አገራችን ኢትዮጵያ ጨምሮ በተለያየ መልክ ሲከበር አመታትን እቆጥሯል፡፡ የዘንድሮዉም ማርች 8 አለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን እስከ ዛሬ በአገራችን በተከታታይ የኢትዮጵያ ሴቶች ካከበሩት በዓላት የሚለየው ሁሌም የምኮራባቸው የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ሠላማዊ ታጋይ ሴቶች የፈፀሙት ገድል ነው፡፡
በአገራችን ኢትዮጵያ የዜጎች መብት በእኩልነት ተጠብቆ በሴቶች ላይ አጥልቶ የኖረው የጾታ ጭቆና እስከዛሬ ምላሽ ያላገኘ መሆኑ የሚታወቅ ነው፡፡በተለይ በወያኔ/ኢህአዴግ መንግስት የስልጣን ዘመን የሴቶች ጭቆና እና የመብት እረገጣ በህግ ማቀፍ ውስጥ መሆኑ ይብልጥ አሳሳቢ ያደርገዋል፡፡ ይህን ለማለት የሚያስደፍረው የህጎች ሁሉ የበላይ ህግ ነው በሚባለው ህገመንግሰት የፆታን አድልዎ የሚቀርፍ እና የሴቶችን መብት የሚያመላክት ድንጋጌዎች በውስጡ አካቶ የያዘ ቢሆንም ተግባሪዊነቱ ፕ/ር መስፍን እንዳሉት ‹‹የተፃፈበትን ወረቀት ያህል ዋጋ የማያወጣ ነው››፡፡ ዋጋ አለው እንኳን ከተባለ የትርፉ ተካፋይ የሆኑት የገዥው መንግሰት አጨብጫቢዎች እና የጡት ልጆች ብቻ ናቸው፡፡
በአገራችን መከበር ከጀመረ ከሦት አስርታት በላይ ያስቆጠረው ማርች 8 ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን ለሴቶች በሴትነታቸው ከሚደርስባቸው ጾታዊ በደል እና የሰብአዊ መብት ጥሰት ያስቀረላቸው አንድም ነገር የለም፡፡ በተለይ ከላይ እንደተገለፀው በወያኔ/ኢህአዴግ መንግሰት ሴቶች በህግ እና በመብት ጥላ ስር ከፍተኛ የሰብአዊና የዲሞክራሲ ጥሰት እየተፈፀመባቸው ይገኛል፡፡
እጅግ አስገራሚው ክስተት ደግሞ የኢህአዲግ ሴቶች ሊግ ፣ የሴቶች ፎረም ኢህአዲግ የሚያዘው እና አገዛዙ ያስተባበራቸው በርካታ የሴት ማህበራት ተጠሪነታቸው በቀጥታ ለወያኔ መንግስት ስርአት ነው፡፡ ስርአቱ ደግሞ የመላው ኢትዮጵያዊያን ድጋፍ እና ይሁንታ ያላገኘ መሆኑ ነው፡፡ ነገሩን ይበልጥ አሳሳቢ የሚያደርገው ደግሞ ኢትዮጵያዊያን ሴቶች ከመንግስት ድጋፍ ውጪ በራሳቸው ፍቃድና አቅም አንድም የተደራጀ ማህብር የሌላቸው መሆኑ ነው፡፡ እርግጥ ነው የሴቶች የፅዋ እና የእድር እንዲሁም የዕቁብ ማህበራት በአገራችን ለቁጥር የሚታክቱ ነው፤ግን እነዚህ ማህበራት የሴቶችን ሁለንተናዊ ችግሮችን የሚቀርፉ አይደለም፡፡
ለመደራጀት ሳይሆን ለማደራጀት ትኩረት እና ድጋፍ የሚሰጠው መንግሰት በሴቶች ላይ ማላገጥን ስራዬ ብሎ ተያይዞታል፡፡ለዚህም እንደማሳያ ከታችኛው የቀበሌ ባለስልጣን ጀምሮ እስከላይኛው የአገር መሪ የሴቶች እኩልነት እና የመደራጀት መብት በህግ የተጠበቀ እንደሆነ ሳይታክቱ የሚገልፁት ነገር ነው፡፡ይሁን እንጂ የሴቶች እኩልነት እና የመደራጀት መብት ለኢህአዴግ አባልነት እና ቤት ለቤት ቡና እያጣጡ የተነገራቸው መልሰው ከማውራት ከቅያስ ወይም ከጎሮ ከድሬነት ያለፍ ተሳትፎ ከተደራጁበት ሳይሆን ከደራጃቸው አካል ያተረፉት ነገር የለም፡፡ ከላይ የተጠቀሰው አሳብ ለመረዳት እና ለመታዘብ ብዙ መራቅ አያስፈልግም በህገመንግስቱ መሰረት ተደራጅተዋል የተባሉ ማናቸውም እንዲሁም በየትኛውም ቦታ የሚገኙ የሴት ማህበራት ከመንግሰት ተፅኖ ውጪ ላለመሆናቸው ከማህበራቸው የስም አወጣጥ ጀምሮ ተግባራቸው በመመልከት በቀላሉ ማህበሩ እና ማህበርተኞችን እነማን እንደሆኑ ለመረዳት ይቻላል፡፡
ለዚህ ፁሑፍ መነሻ የሆነው አሳብ ዘንድሮ ተከብሮ ሳይሆን ተደፍሮ ለማለት በሚያስችል ሁኔታ ማርች 8 መሰረት ያደረግ ነው፡፡ እንደሚታወቀው የባለፈው እሁድ ማርች 8 አስመልክቶ የሴቶች 5 ሺህ ኪ.ሜ ሩጫ ውድድር ተካሂዶአል፡፡ በውድድሩ ላይ ቁጥራቸው የበዛ ሴቶች ተሳትፈዋል ፤ከተሳታፊዎቹ ብዛት ቁጥራቸው ቀላል የማይባሉ በአነስተኛ እና ጥቃቅን መንግስት ያደራጃቸው ሴቶች ናቸው፡፡ እነዚህ ሴቶች አደባባይ ይዘው የወጡት አሳብ ጥቃቅን መሆኑ በእርግጥም ማህበርተኞቹ ምን ያህል አንድ ለአምስት ‹‹እደተጠረነፉ›› የሚያሳይ ነው፡፡ የጉዳዩ አሳሳቢነት የሚጀምረው እነኚህ ጢቂት ‹‹የተጠረነፉ›› ሴቶች በነፃነት ቀናቸው ነፃነት የተነፈጋቸው መሆኑ ነው፡፡ ምክንያቱ ደግሞ እሩጫው ላይ የተሳተፉት በራሳቸው ፍቃድ ሳይሆን በድረጅታቸው ትዕዛዝ ነው ሊያስብል የሚያስችል የተለያየ ‹‹ልማታዊ›› የሆነ መፈክሮችን ሲያሰሙ ተደምጠዋል፡፡በመንግሰት ልዩ ድጋፋ የተደረገላቸው እነኚህ ሴቶች ለሚደግፉት ሳይሆን ለተገደዱበት ዓላማ የመሰላቸውን መፈክር እና ቀረርቶ በማሰማት እንዲሁም የተለያዩ ፖስተሮችን በመያዝ በዕለቱ ሲንቀሳቀሱ ታይተዋል፡፡
ይሁን እንጂ ለመንግስት ደጋፊዎች የተፈቀደው ለሌሎች ለመንግሰት ተቃዎሚ ሴቶች ፖሊስ ያደረገው ክልከላ እና እስራት ክስተቱን አስገራሚ ብቻ ሳይሆን አሳሳቢያ ደርገዋል፡፡ እንደሚታወቀው ማርች 8 ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን ነው፤ ይህ ቀን ሴቶች ተሰባስበው ከበሮ ይዘው የሚደልቁበት ቀን ሳይሆን ለነፃነታቸው ቀደምት ሴቶች ያደረጉትን ተጋድሎ በመዘከር ያሁኖቹ ሴቶች ለበለጠ እኩልነት እና ነፃነት በጋራ የሚቆሙበት የቃል ኪዳን ቀን ነው፡፡ ይህም እንደሆነ የተረዱ ሴቶች በነፃነት ቀናቸው ስለነፃነታቸው ከፍ ባለ ድምፅ ሲዘምሩ ማየት ምንኛ መታደል ነው ! ይህን በድፍረት ላደረጉት የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ወጣት ሴቶች አድናቆት ሊቸራቸው እና ድጋፍ ሊሰጣቸው ይገባል፡፡
ከዚህም በተጨማሪ ሴቶች በፖለቲካ አመለካከታቸው ብቻ በአደባባይ ታፍሰው ለእስር የበቁት በእኔ ዘመን ይህ የመጀመሪያ ነው ፡፡የኔ ዘመን ደግሞ 23 ዓመት ሙሉ የሴቶች የፖለቲካ ተሳትፎ የበላው ጅብ አልጮው ብሎ ተቸግረን የከረምንበት ወቅት ነው፡፡ እርግጥ ነው ይህ የሆነበት ምክንያት ለማወቅ እና ለመዘርዘር ሰፊ ጥናት ያስፈልጋል፡፡ የችግሩ አሳሳቢነት እንደተጠበቀ ሆኖ እንቢ ለነፃነቴ በማላት አደባባይ በመውጣት የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ወጣት ሴቶች ‹‹ እኔ የጣይቱ ልጅ ነኝ ! እስክንድር ይፈታ ! እርዮት ትፈታ ! አብበከር ይፈታ ! አንዱአለም ይፈታ ! መብራት እና ውሃ ናፈቀን ! ፍትህ እንፈልጋለን ! ›› እና የመሳሰሉትን መፈክር በልበ ሙሉነት በማሰማት ያሳዩት ቆራጥነት ታሪክ መቼም የሚዘነጋው አይደለም፡፡ በይበልጥ ደግም በዚሁ የፖለቲካ አመለካከታቸው ምክንያት ብቻ ለእስር መዳረጋቸው የመንግስት ስርዓት ምን ያህል አምባገነን እና ጨቋኝ እንደሆን በግልፅ የሚያሳይ ነው፡፡
ሰብአዊ መብቶች እያንዳንዳችን ሰው በመሆናችን ብቻ የሚገቡን ከሰብአዊነታችን ተለይተው ሊታዩ የማያችሉ መብቶች ናቸው፡፡ መንግስታት እነዚህን በአለም አቀፍ ደረጃ እውቅና የተሰጣቸውን ሰብአዊ መብቶች ለማክበር ለማስከበርና ለማሟላት በቀዳሚነት ኃላፊነት አለባቸው፡፡ በዚህም መሰረት ኃላፊነት ከፈረሙ ቀደምት አገራት መካከል ኢትዩጵያ ትገኝበታላች፡፡
ይሁን እንጂ የሴቶች ሰብአዊ መብቶች በሚፈለገው መልኩ ተግባራዊ ካለመሆኑ ባሻገር ኢ-ፍትሃዊነት እጅግ የበዛ ነው፡፡ ይህም በመሆኑም እ.ኤ.አ. በ1908 በአሜሪካ ኒወርክ ከተማ በጨርቃ ጨርቅ ፋብሪካ ይሰሩ የነበሩ ላብአደር ሴቶች ‹‹ለእኩል ሥራ እኩል ክፍያና የተመቻቸ የሥራ ሰዓት ለሴቶች›› በሚል መፈክር የሥራ ማቆም አድማ በማካሄድ የሴቶች ድምፅ እንዲስተጋባ አድርገዋል፡፡ ይህን ተከትሎ የዓለም ሴቶች በማህበር በመደራጀት ትግላቸውን በማጠናከራቸው የዓለም መንግስታትን አስተሳሰብ በመለወጥ የተባበሩት መንግስታት ድርጅት አባል አገሮች የሴቶች መብት ስምምነት/ኮንቪክሽን/ እንዲፈራረሙ እብይ ምክንያት ሆነዋል፡፡
እ.ኤ.አ. በ1910 በኮፕን አገር ከተማ በተደረገው ሁለተኛው ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ጉባሄ ላይ የመነሻ ሃሳብ በማቅረብ ማርች 8 በየዓመቱ እንዲከበር ያደረጉት ሴቶች ለመብታቸው ያደረጉትን አስታውጾ ለመዘከር ዓለም አቀፍ መድረክ ለማመቻቸት በመቻላቸው ስማቸው በአክብሮት ይነሳል፡፡ ለመጀመሪያ ጊዜ በዓሉን ያከበሩት ጀርመን፣አውስትራሊያ፣ሲውዘርላንድ እና ዴንማርክ ለመሆናቸው መረጃዎች ይጠቁማሉ፡፡
ከዚሁ የአንድነት ተምሳሌትነት በመነሳት በዓለማ አቀፍ ደረጃ ማርች 8 የሴቶች ቀን በማድረግ ዓለም አቀፍ ስያሜዎችን በመስጠት አገራችን ኢትዮጵያ ጨምሮ በተለያየ መልክ ሲከበር አመታትን እቆጥሯል፡፡ የዘንድሮዉም ማርች 8 አለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን እስከ ዛሬ በአገራችን በተከታታይ የኢትዮጵያ ሴቶች ካከበሩት በዓላት የሚለየው ሁሌም የምኮራባቸው የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ሠላማዊ ታጋይ ሴቶች የፈፀሙት ገድል ነው፡፡
በአገራችን ኢትዮጵያ የዜጎች መብት በእኩልነት ተጠብቆ በሴቶች ላይ አጥልቶ የኖረው የጾታ ጭቆና እስከዛሬ ምላሽ ያላገኘ መሆኑ የሚታወቅ ነው፡፡በተለይ በወያኔ/ኢህአዴግ መንግስት የስልጣን ዘመን የሴቶች ጭቆና እና የመብት እረገጣ በህግ ማቀፍ ውስጥ መሆኑ ይብልጥ አሳሳቢ ያደርገዋል፡፡ ይህን ለማለት የሚያስደፍረው የህጎች ሁሉ የበላይ ህግ ነው በሚባለው ህገመንግሰት የፆታን አድልዎ የሚቀርፍ እና የሴቶችን መብት የሚያመላክት ድንጋጌዎች በውስጡ አካቶ የያዘ ቢሆንም ተግባሪዊነቱ ፕ/ር መስፍን እንዳሉት ‹‹የተፃፈበትን ወረቀት ያህል ዋጋ የማያወጣ ነው››፡፡ ዋጋ አለው እንኳን ከተባለ የትርፉ ተካፋይ የሆኑት የገዥው መንግሰት አጨብጫቢዎች እና የጡት ልጆች ብቻ ናቸው፡፡
በአገራችን መከበር ከጀመረ ከሦት አስርታት በላይ ያስቆጠረው ማርች 8 ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን ለሴቶች በሴትነታቸው ከሚደርስባቸው ጾታዊ በደል እና የሰብአዊ መብት ጥሰት ያስቀረላቸው አንድም ነገር የለም፡፡ በተለይ ከላይ እንደተገለፀው በወያኔ/ኢህአዴግ መንግሰት ሴቶች በህግ እና በመብት ጥላ ስር ከፍተኛ የሰብአዊና የዲሞክራሲ ጥሰት እየተፈፀመባቸው ይገኛል፡፡
እጅግ አስገራሚው ክስተት ደግሞ የኢህአዲግ ሴቶች ሊግ ፣ የሴቶች ፎረም ኢህአዲግ የሚያዘው እና አገዛዙ ያስተባበራቸው በርካታ የሴት ማህበራት ተጠሪነታቸው በቀጥታ ለወያኔ መንግስት ስርአት ነው፡፡ ስርአቱ ደግሞ የመላው ኢትዮጵያዊያን ድጋፍ እና ይሁንታ ያላገኘ መሆኑ ነው፡፡ ነገሩን ይበልጥ አሳሳቢ የሚያደርገው ደግሞ ኢትዮጵያዊያን ሴቶች ከመንግስት ድጋፍ ውጪ በራሳቸው ፍቃድና አቅም አንድም የተደራጀ ማህብር የሌላቸው መሆኑ ነው፡፡ እርግጥ ነው የሴቶች የፅዋ እና የእድር እንዲሁም የዕቁብ ማህበራት በአገራችን ለቁጥር የሚታክቱ ነው፤ግን እነዚህ ማህበራት የሴቶችን ሁለንተናዊ ችግሮችን የሚቀርፉ አይደለም፡፡
ለመደራጀት ሳይሆን ለማደራጀት ትኩረት እና ድጋፍ የሚሰጠው መንግሰት በሴቶች ላይ ማላገጥን ስራዬ ብሎ ተያይዞታል፡፡ለዚህም እንደማሳያ ከታችኛው የቀበሌ ባለስልጣን ጀምሮ እስከላይኛው የአገር መሪ የሴቶች እኩልነት እና የመደራጀት መብት በህግ የተጠበቀ እንደሆነ ሳይታክቱ የሚገልፁት ነገር ነው፡፡ይሁን እንጂ የሴቶች እኩልነት እና የመደራጀት መብት ለኢህአዴግ አባልነት እና ቤት ለቤት ቡና እያጣጡ የተነገራቸው መልሰው ከማውራት ከቅያስ ወይም ከጎሮ ከድሬነት ያለፍ ተሳትፎ ከተደራጁበት ሳይሆን ከደራጃቸው አካል ያተረፉት ነገር የለም፡፡ ከላይ የተጠቀሰው አሳብ ለመረዳት እና ለመታዘብ ብዙ መራቅ አያስፈልግም በህገመንግስቱ መሰረት ተደራጅተዋል የተባሉ ማናቸውም እንዲሁም በየትኛውም ቦታ የሚገኙ የሴት ማህበራት ከመንግሰት ተፅኖ ውጪ ላለመሆናቸው ከማህበራቸው የስም አወጣጥ ጀምሮ ተግባራቸው በመመልከት በቀላሉ ማህበሩ እና ማህበርተኞችን እነማን እንደሆኑ ለመረዳት ይቻላል፡፡
ለዚህ ፁሑፍ መነሻ የሆነው አሳብ ዘንድሮ ተከብሮ ሳይሆን ተደፍሮ ለማለት በሚያስችል ሁኔታ ማርች 8 መሰረት ያደረግ ነው፡፡ እንደሚታወቀው የባለፈው እሁድ ማርች 8 አስመልክቶ የሴቶች 5 ሺህ ኪ.ሜ ሩጫ ውድድር ተካሂዶአል፡፡ በውድድሩ ላይ ቁጥራቸው የበዛ ሴቶች ተሳትፈዋል ፤ከተሳታፊዎቹ ብዛት ቁጥራቸው ቀላል የማይባሉ በአነስተኛ እና ጥቃቅን መንግስት ያደራጃቸው ሴቶች ናቸው፡፡ እነዚህ ሴቶች አደባባይ ይዘው የወጡት አሳብ ጥቃቅን መሆኑ በእርግጥም ማህበርተኞቹ ምን ያህል አንድ ለአምስት ‹‹እደተጠረነፉ›› የሚያሳይ ነው፡፡ የጉዳዩ አሳሳቢነት የሚጀምረው እነኚህ ጢቂት ‹‹የተጠረነፉ›› ሴቶች በነፃነት ቀናቸው ነፃነት የተነፈጋቸው መሆኑ ነው፡፡ ምክንያቱ ደግሞ እሩጫው ላይ የተሳተፉት በራሳቸው ፍቃድ ሳይሆን በድረጅታቸው ትዕዛዝ ነው ሊያስብል የሚያስችል የተለያየ ‹‹ልማታዊ›› የሆነ መፈክሮችን ሲያሰሙ ተደምጠዋል፡፡በመንግሰት ልዩ ድጋፋ የተደረገላቸው እነኚህ ሴቶች ለሚደግፉት ሳይሆን ለተገደዱበት ዓላማ የመሰላቸውን መፈክር እና ቀረርቶ በማሰማት እንዲሁም የተለያዩ ፖስተሮችን በመያዝ በዕለቱ ሲንቀሳቀሱ ታይተዋል፡፡
ይሁን እንጂ ለመንግስት ደጋፊዎች የተፈቀደው ለሌሎች ለመንግሰት ተቃዎሚ ሴቶች ፖሊስ ያደረገው ክልከላ እና እስራት ክስተቱን አስገራሚ ብቻ ሳይሆን አሳሳቢያ ደርገዋል፡፡ እንደሚታወቀው ማርች 8 ዓለም አቀፍ የሴቶች ቀን ነው፤ ይህ ቀን ሴቶች ተሰባስበው ከበሮ ይዘው የሚደልቁበት ቀን ሳይሆን ለነፃነታቸው ቀደምት ሴቶች ያደረጉትን ተጋድሎ በመዘከር ያሁኖቹ ሴቶች ለበለጠ እኩልነት እና ነፃነት በጋራ የሚቆሙበት የቃል ኪዳን ቀን ነው፡፡ ይህም እንደሆነ የተረዱ ሴቶች በነፃነት ቀናቸው ስለነፃነታቸው ከፍ ባለ ድምፅ ሲዘምሩ ማየት ምንኛ መታደል ነው ! ይህን በድፍረት ላደረጉት የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ወጣት ሴቶች አድናቆት ሊቸራቸው እና ድጋፍ ሊሰጣቸው ይገባል፡፡
ከዚህም በተጨማሪ ሴቶች በፖለቲካ አመለካከታቸው ብቻ በአደባባይ ታፍሰው ለእስር የበቁት በእኔ ዘመን ይህ የመጀመሪያ ነው ፡፡የኔ ዘመን ደግሞ 23 ዓመት ሙሉ የሴቶች የፖለቲካ ተሳትፎ የበላው ጅብ አልጮው ብሎ ተቸግረን የከረምንበት ወቅት ነው፡፡ እርግጥ ነው ይህ የሆነበት ምክንያት ለማወቅ እና ለመዘርዘር ሰፊ ጥናት ያስፈልጋል፡፡ የችግሩ አሳሳቢነት እንደተጠበቀ ሆኖ እንቢ ለነፃነቴ በማላት አደባባይ በመውጣት የሰማያዊ ፓርቲ ወጣት ሴቶች ‹‹ እኔ የጣይቱ ልጅ ነኝ ! እስክንድር ይፈታ ! እርዮት ትፈታ ! አብበከር ይፈታ ! አንዱአለም ይፈታ ! መብራት እና ውሃ ናፈቀን ! ፍትህ እንፈልጋለን ! ›› እና የመሳሰሉትን መፈክር በልበ ሙሉነት በማሰማት ያሳዩት ቆራጥነት ታሪክ መቼም የሚዘነጋው አይደለም፡፡ በይበልጥ ደግም በዚሁ የፖለቲካ አመለካከታቸው ምክንያት ብቻ ለእስር መዳረጋቸው የመንግስት ስርዓት ምን ያህል አምባገነን እና ጨቋኝ እንደሆን በግልፅ የሚያሳይ ነው፡፡
መንግስት ስለ ጣይቱ ልጆች ጨንቆት ዋለ (Semayawi Party Update)
Semayawi Party- Ethiopia (Update)
ምንም የረባ መከራክሪያ ያላቀረበው ፖሊስ መናገር አቅቶት ሲንተባተብ ነው የዋለው በተጨማሪ ሌሎች መያዝ የልቻልናቸው 20 እሩጫው ላይ የነበሩ ሴቶች ስላሉ በማለት የ14 ቀን የጊዜ ቀጠሮ ጠይቋል ሲጀምር ችሎቱ የታየው በጽ/ቤት ነው የነበረው የሰዉ ብዛት ያስጨነቀው መንግስት ሰዉ በችሎት እንዳይታደም ክርክሩን እንዳይሰማ በጣም ጠባብ በሆነችው ቢሮ ከአቅሙዋ በላይ የሆኑ ተከሳሾችን ለማሰተናገድ ተገዳለች ውሳኔ መስጠት የማይችለው ዳኛ ለነገ መጋቢት 10/2006 በመደበኛ ይታይ በሚል ተልካሻ ምክንያት ቀጥሮአቸዋል የጣይቱ ልጆች ግን በጣም በሚያሰድሰት ሞራልና የትግለ ሰሜት ላይ ሆነው ለማየት ችለናል፡፡
ችሎቱንም ለመከታተል የተለያዩ ሀገራት የኢንባሲ ተወካዮች፤ የሰማያዊ ፓረቲ አባላትና ደጋፊዎች እነዲሁም ጋዜጠኞች ተገኝተዋል
እወነት ሁሌም ታሸንፋለች ሁሌም ከጎናችሁ ነን!!!
ምንም የረባ መከራክሪያ ያላቀረበው ፖሊስ መናገር አቅቶት ሲንተባተብ ነው የዋለው በተጨማሪ ሌሎች መያዝ የልቻልናቸው 20 እሩጫው ላይ የነበሩ ሴቶች ስላሉ በማለት የ14 ቀን የጊዜ ቀጠሮ ጠይቋል ሲጀምር ችሎቱ የታየው በጽ/ቤት ነው የነበረው የሰዉ ብዛት ያስጨነቀው መንግስት ሰዉ በችሎት እንዳይታደም ክርክሩን እንዳይሰማ በጣም ጠባብ በሆነችው ቢሮ ከአቅሙዋ በላይ የሆኑ ተከሳሾችን ለማሰተናገድ ተገዳለች ውሳኔ መስጠት የማይችለው ዳኛ ለነገ መጋቢት 10/2006 በመደበኛ ይታይ በሚል ተልካሻ ምክንያት ቀጥሮአቸዋል የጣይቱ ልጆች ግን በጣም በሚያሰድሰት ሞራልና የትግለ ሰሜት ላይ ሆነው ለማየት ችለናል፡፡
ችሎቱንም ለመከታተል የተለያዩ ሀገራት የኢንባሲ ተወካዮች፤ የሰማያዊ ፓረቲ አባላትና ደጋፊዎች እነዲሁም ጋዜጠኞች ተገኝተዋል
እወነት ሁሌም ታሸንፋለች ሁሌም ከጎናችሁ ነን!!!
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