Over the last eight years many of Ethiopia’s finest writers and editors have                
been collected under one roof—that of Kaliti prison in the capital, Addis Ababa. Behind its grey walls, political prisoners, including many of the country’s leading journalists, are housed alongside violent criminals.

Among them is Eskinder Nega, the 2012 winner of the prestigious PEN award, granted to international writers who have been persecuted or imprisoned for exercising the right to freedom of expression. The 43-year-old activist was unable to attend the awards ceremony as he was facing his seventh period of incarceration since he began work as an independent journalist in 1993. His wife, Serakalem Fasil, collected the prize
on his behalf and was invited to the White House to meet US President Barack Obama.
Their six-year-old son Nafkot accompanied her on the trip. He was born in prison when
the couple were jailed for 17 months, along with hundreds of other political prisoners in
the wake of the disputed 2005 elections.

The fate of Mr Nega, a prominent blogger who has been held at Kaliti since his
arrest in September 2011, has become emblematic of Ethiopia’s broader struggle for
media freedom.

While Ethiopia has been setting the economic pace in the Horn of Africa,
posting nearly a decade of annual growth figures topping 10%, it has also collected
a number of less-trumpeted firsts in censorship and repression of the media. Under
the stewardship of the late Meles Zenawi, the powerful prime minister for more than two decades prior to his death last year, the country jailed more journalists than any other in Africa apart from neighbouring Eritrea. It has also sunk to the bottom of the country rankings compiled by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), with the highest rate of exiled journalists in the world.

The state monopolises the broadcast media. The government runs all radio stations and the lone television network. More recently it has issued FM radio licenses to selected private individuals who, according to monitoring groups, enjoy close links to the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). Despite physical infrastructure gains, Ethiopia has one of the lowest levels of internet penetration in the

region (less than 2%). There is only one telecommunications company, which is stateowned, and mobile phone usage rates are low. Newspapers were the last trusted outlet for critical voices, with an estimated 150,000 readers in the capital with an estimated population of 4m people. But they have been closing in record numbers with 18 shut down since 2006.

Tom Rhodes, who covers East Africa for the CPJ, says Ethiopia’s media landscape has become increasingly bleak in recent years. “Most critical reporters have fled the country and the remaining independent voices are far and few.” Ethiopia has one of the “most progressive” constitutions on the continent and one that guarantees press freedom, points out Bereket Simon, the information minister. However, this freedom exists only on paper and is restricted in practice. The international watchdog Freedom House lists the country as “not free”.

An unexpectedly strong showing by the opposition in the 2005 elections led to protests and a police crackdown in which more than 150 people were killed and thousands more arrested. Since then, the regime in Addis Ababa has shut down any space for its critics in the media. It has passed a series of laws designed to dilute constitutional protections. First came the Freedom of the Mass Media and Access to Information Proclamation in 2008, which imposed new constraints and harsher penalties on journalists. The following year came the Proclamation for the Registration and Regulation of Charities and Societies, which heavily restricted foreign funding for free media in the country.

But the Anti-Terrorism Proclamation has had the greatest impact, says Zerihun Tesfaye, formerly with Addis Neger, a leading weekly before it was closed. The exiled reporter, who now lives in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, describes the 2009 proclamation as “the main instrument that leads journalists to self-censorship”.

Deploying vague language, the proclamation has been used for what Freedom House labels as “selective prosecutions”, including the 18-year prison sentence handed down to Mr Nega.

Much of the criticism of the statute focuses on the “encouragement of terrorism” article: “Whosoever publishes or causes the publication of a statement that is likely to be understood by some or all of the members of the public to whom it is published as a direct or indirect encouragement or other inducement to them to the commission or preparation or instigation of an act of terrorism...is punishable with rigorous imprisonment from 10 to 20 years.”

In practice, this law has placed the reporting of activities about banned groups on par with the groups’ actual actions. Among those jailed on terrorism charges is Reeyot Alemu, a schoolteacher and columnist for what had been one of the last remaining independent newspapers, Feteh. “I was preparing articles that oppose injustice,” she told the International Women’s Media Foundation. “When I did it, I knew that I would pay the price for my courage.”

Ms Alemu was arrested in June 2011 and convicted on three counts of terrorism the following January. An appeals court later reduced her sentence from 14 to 5 years. Her newspaper Feteh has since been closed altogether. Its editor, Temesghen Desalegn, has been summoned to court on a regular basis following the closure. All charges against him were dropped last year but the court warned him against any future offences. The CPJ denounced his most recent summons—where no charges were brought—as a case of: “We’ll find something to pin on you soon so watch out.”

The sudden death of Ethiopian premier Mr Meles and the appointment of the apparently moderate Hailemariam Desalegn in his stead prompted hopes in some quarters that the media restrictions might be eased. The release of two Swedish journalists, Johan Persson and Martin Schibbye, who had been sentenced to 11 years in prison for having illegally entered the Ogaden region in Ethiopia from Somalia briefly reinforced that optimism.

Remaining hopes are now pinned on Mr Nega’s appeal which, after several delays, is due to be heard in February. A heavy presence is expected from foreign diplomats, who hold the purse strings to some $4 billion in annual development aid to Ethiopia. The blogger, whose final column wondered if the peaceful protests of the Arab Spring might one day come to Ethiopia, will be hoping to have his sentence commuted.

gga

A well-known German foundation decamps from Ethiopia. Other long-time donors find new official agency and law restrictive and confusing.

Of the many outreach programs run here by Germany’s Heinrich Böll Foundation, one caused special alarm for an official new Ethiopian agency that is starting to block and restrict the promotion of civil society ideas.

The Böll program, “SurVivArt: Art for the Right to a Good Life,” dealt with notions of healthy, intelligent, and successful living, and illustrated differing concepts of home, food, and choice consumer goods – all done through sculpture and video arts.

To a Western-oriented eye, it seemed harmless.

But officials at the “Charities and Societies Agency” fairly flipped when they saw a word implying “rights” in the program title.

"'Why has this got right in it?' they asked," remembers Patrick Berg, the foundation's former Ethiopiadirector, who just returned to Germany after deciding that the agency and its zealous application of a restrictive new law made meaningful work impossible.

RECOMMENDED: Think you know Africa? Take our geography quiz.

For years, Heinrich Böll's activities included training regional parliamentarians, running a forum to discuss gender issues, and organizing a model African Union for students. But no more.

The new law, adopted several years ago but only now being enforced, bars charities that receive more than 10 percent of overseas funds from engaging in the promotion of a panoply of human rights ideas, including for children and disabled, for democratic education, and for other staples of civil society.

“First we were forced to abandon rights-based work, now even art has become suspicious," says Mr. Berg of the law, called the "Charities and Societies Proclamation," or CSO law.

Foreign charities and NGOs in Ethiopia are all currently undergoing an annual audit to weed out funding and ideas that break the law.

The law is a legacy of the late prime minister Meles Zenawi who wanted to curb foreign groups unaccountably advocating their own values in sensitive areas. The Ethiopian leader of 21 years, who died in August, said that Western societies evolved without external meddling, and so should Ethiopia.

But critics, while commending Ethiopia's desire to be independent, say in fact the law is being used as a political sledgehammer to thwart and crush dissent. Amnesty International argued in 2009 the law was hostile to freedom of expression and association and was harmful to Ethiopia’s fledgling civil society.

ONE OF WORLD'S POOREST NATIONS

Some NGOs and donors say the zeal of the new agency threatens to drive off assistance that likely helps the nation and, more particularly, vulnerable people. (The Monitor also reported today onEgyptian government efforts to clamp down on foreign-funding of NGOs.)

Some one-third of Ethiopia's 90 million people live on under $1.25 a day, making it one of the world's poorest nations and one of the top aid recipients. It received $3.6 billion in 2011 from donors, over 11 percent of national income, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

Part of the complaint against the new official restrictions are that they are applied willy nilly and are confusing. Many NGOs use “rights” as a standpoint of civil society virtue, such as a right to education, or clean water.

But one executive in a NGO that wished not to be named said the agency told his outfit not to promote the rights of girls and women not to be circumcised or forced into marriage – but that advocating for other rights seemed acceptable.

"Charities like ours are here to work with the government on improving the lives of Ethiopians," he says. "The uncertainty surrounding the law wastes time and prevents us from focusing fully on developing and delivering good programs."

The British government this month however was promised a written assurance that all organizations working on violence against women and issues like female genital mutilation will be allowed to continue.

STRINGENT BUDGET CONTROLS

Another major complaint is that new laws stipulate that only 30 percent of budgets go to administration, interpreted in 2011 to include most travel and training cost. This is proving unworkable. Some 80 percent of groups defaulted on these terms last year.

Of 29 charities funded by US Agency for International Development, 27 can't comply, according to knowledgeable sources.

Nigist Haile, an Ethiopian, runs the Center for African Women's Economic Empowerment (CAWEE) in the capital, Addis Ababa. The aim of the organization funded by Canada's development agency and theUnited Nations and WTO's International Trade Center is to help female entrepreneurs access international markets.

CAWEE is assisting Hilina Enriched Foods Processing Center develop a marketing strategy to export spicy peanuts to the Middle East by providing consultants. Boosting sales abroad is a crucial objective of a foreign-exchange starved country. Ethiopia's imports cost $7.5 billion more than exports last year.

“I think they are the only one who are working with women very practically," says Deputy General Manager Hilina Belete about CAWEE.

Ms. Nigist also hires consultants to train businesswomen. The law classifies the consultants' fees as an administrative cost, giving CAWEE a "very serious problem" in meeting the 30 percent administration rule. Unless special consideration is granted, sessions will be stopped, Nigist says.

"Again the women are suffering," she says. "We should be considered a development partner, but they are not seeing it that way."

Ethiopia's government has been popular with donors such as the US, EU, and UK partly because it's seen as prioritizing the poor and spending on them effectively. It is also seen as a reliable ally in the unstable Horn of Africa.

Daniel Bekele, director of Human Rights Watch's Africa division, says the agency and laws are not a rejection of international partners for Ethiopia, but about domestic politics and a response to the power shown by civil society groups in previous elections.

"I believe the CSO law was a response to 2005 [elections]," Mr. Bekele says, a time when voter education campaigns led to huge turnouts, civil society monitored polls and mediated disputes. "Unfortunately it was perceived as a political activity … or as a politically-biased activity."

Getachew Reda, a government spokesman says the law is needed to stop corrupt charities "running amok" and using "per diems for vacations in Honolulu."

If training is a "stock in trade" and done in a cost-efficient manner to benefit Ethiopians, then it won't be classed as an administrative cost, he says. But he adds that if charities make it their business to "criss-cross Africa paying all sorts of stipends to employees, then it will be."

yahoo

The sights and sounds of an African police state

When Erin Burnett of CNN visited Ethiopia in July 2012, she came face-to-face with the ugly face of an African police state:

We saw what an African police state looked like when I was in Ethiopia last month… At the airport, it took an hour to clear customs – not because of lines, but because of checks and questioning. Officials tried multiple times to take us to government cars so they’d know where we went. They only relented after forcing us to leave hundreds of thousands of dollars of TV gear in the airport…
Last week, reporter Solomon Kifle of the Voice of America (VOA-Amharic) heard the terrifying voice of an African police state from thousands of miles away. The veteran reporter was investigating

widespread allegations of targeted night time warrantless searches of homes belonging to Ethiopian Muslims in the capital Addis Ababa. Solomon interviewed victims who effectively alleged home invasion robberies by “federal police” who illegally searched their homes and took away cash, gold jewelry, cell phones, laptops, religious books and other items of personal property.

One of the police officials Solomon interviewed to get reaction and clarification was police chief Zemedkun of Bole (an area close to the international airport in the capital).
VOA: Are you in the area of Bole. The reason I called…
Police Chief Zemedkun: Yes. You are correct.
VOA: There are allegation that homes belonging to Muslim Ethiopians have been targeted for illegal search and seizure. I am calling to get clarification.
Police Chief Zemedkun: Yes (continue).
VOA: Is it true that you are conducting such a search?
Police Chief Zemedkun: No, sir. I don’t know about this. Who told you that?
VOA: Individuals who say they are victims of such searches; Muslims who live in the area.
Police Chief Zemedkun: If they said that, you should ask them.
VOA: I can tell you what they said.
Police Chief Zemedkun: What did they say?
VOA: They said “the search is conducted by police officers; they [the police] threaten us without a court order; they take our property, particularly they focus on taking our Holy Qurans and mobile phones. Such are the allegations and I am calling to get clarification.
Police Chief Zemedkun: Wouldn’t it be better to talk to the people who told you that? I don’t know anything about that.
VOA: I just told you about the allegations the people are making.
Police Chief Zemedkun: Enough! There is nothing I know about this.
VOA: I will mention (to our listeners) what you said Chief Zemedkun. Are you the police chief of the sub-district ( of Bole)?
Police Chief Zemedkun: Yes. I am something like that.
VOA: Chief Zemedkun, may I have your last name?
Police Chief Zemedkun: Excuse me!! I don’t want to talk to anyone on this type of [issue] phone call. I am going to hang up. If you call again, I will come and get you from your address. I want you to know that!! From now on, you should not call this number again. If you do, I will come to wherever you are and arrest you. I mean right now!!
VOA: But I am in Washington (D.C)?
Police Chief Zemedkun: I don’t care if you live in Washington or in Heaven. I don’t give a damn! But I will arrest you and take you. You should know that!!
VOA: Are you going to come and arrest me?
End of interview.
Meles’ legacy: mini Me-leses, Meles wannabes and a police state
Flying off the handle, exploding in anger and igniting into spontaneous self-combustion is the hallmark of the leaders of the dictatorial regime in Ethiopia. The late Meles Zenawi was the icon of spontaneous self- combustion. Anytime Meles was challenged on facts or policy, he would explode in anger and have a complete meltdown.
Just before Meles jailed virtually the entire opposition leadership, civil society leaders and human rights advocates following the 2005 elections for nearly two years, he did exactly what police chief Zemedkun threatened to do to VOA reporter Solomon. Congressman Christopher Smith, Chairman of the House Africa Subcommitte in 2005 could not believe his ears as Meles’ arrogantly threatened to arrest and jail opposition leaders and let them rot in jail. Smith reported:
Finally, when I asked the Prime Minister to work with the opposition and show respect and tolerance for those with differing views on the challenges facing Ethiopia he said, ‘I have a file on all of them; they are all guilty of treason.’ I was struck by his all-knowing tone. Guilty! They’re all guilty simply because Meles says so? No trial? Not even a Kangaroo court? I urged Prime Minister Meles not to take that route.
In 2010, Meles erupted at a press conference by comparing the Voice of America (Amharic) radio broadcasts to Ethiopia with broadcasts of Radio Mille Collines which directed some of the genocide in Rwanda in 1994. Pointing an accusatory finger at the VOA, Meles charged: “We have been convinced for many years that in many respects, the VOA Amharic Service has copied the worst practices of radio stations such as Radio Mille Collines of Rwanda in its wanton disregard of minimum ethics of journalism and engaging in destabilizing propaganda.” (It seems one of Meles’ surviving police chiefs is ready to make good on Meles’ threat by travelling to Washington, D.C. and arresting a VOA reporter.)
Meles routinely called his opponents “dirty”, “mud dwellers”, “pompous egotists” and good-for-nothing “chaff” and “husk.” He took sadistic pleasure in humiliating and demeaning parliamentarians who challenged him with probing questions or merely disagreed with him. His put-downs were so humiliating, few parliamentarians dared to stand up to his bullying.
When the European Union Election Observer Group confronted Meles with the truth about his theft of the May 2010 election by 99.6 percent, Meles had another public meltdown. He condemned the EU Group for preparing a “trash report that deserves to be thrown in the garbage.”
When Ken Ohashi, the former country director for the World Bank debunked Meles’ voodoo economics in July 2011, Meles went ballistic: “The individual [Ohashi) is used to giving directions along his neo-liberal views. The individual was on his way to retirement. He has no accountability in distorting the institutions positions and in settling his accounts. The Ethiopian government has its own view that is different from the individual.” (Meles talking about accountability is like the devil quoting Scripture.)
In a meeting with high level U.S. officials in advance of the May 2010 election, Meles went apoplectic telling the diplomats that “If opposition groups resort to violence in an attempt to discredit the election, we will crush them with our full force; they will all vegetate like Birtukan (Midekssa) in jail forever.”
Meles’ hatred for Birtukan Midekssa (a former judge and the first woman political party leader in Ethiopian history), a woman of extraordinary intelligence and unrivalled courage, was as incomprehensible as it was bottomless. After throwing Birtukan in prison in 2008 without trial or any form of judicial proceeding, Meles added insult to injury by publicly calling her a “chicken”. When asked how Birtukan was doing in prison, Meles, with sarcastic derision replied, “Birtukan Midiksa is fine but she may have gained weight due to lack of exercise.” (When Meles made the statement, Birtukan was actually in solitary confinement in Kality prison on the ridiculous charge that she “had denied receiving a pardon” when she was released in July 2007.) When asked if he might consider releasing her, Meles said emphatically and sadistically, “there will never be an agreement with anybody to release Birtukan. Ever. Full stop. That's a dead issue.”
Internationally acclaimed journalists Eskinder Nega, Reeyot Alemu, Woubshet Taye are all victims of arbitrary arrests and detentions. So are opposition party leaders and dissidents Andualem Arage, Nathnael Mekonnen, Mitiku Damte, Yeshiwas Yehunalem, Kinfemichael Debebe, Andualem Ayalew, Nathnael Mekonnen, Yohannes Terefe, Zerihun Gebre-Egziabher and many others.
Police chief Zemedkun is a mini-Me-les, a Meles wannabe. He is a mini tin pot tyrant. Like Meles, Zemedkun not only lost his cool but also all commonsense, rationality and proportionality. Like Meles, Zemedkun is filled with hubris (extreme arrogance which causes the person to lose contact with reality and feel invincible, unaccountable and above and beyond the law). Zemedkun, like Meles, is so full of himself that no one dare ask him a question: “I am the omnipotent police chief Zemedkun, the Absolute Master of Bole; the demigod with the power of arrest and detention. I am Police Chief Zemedkun created in the divine likeness of Meles Zenawi!”
What a crock of …!
When Meles massacred 193 unarmed protesters and wounded 763 others following the elections in 2005, he set the standard for official accountability, which happens to be lower than a snake’s knee. For over two decades, Meles created and nurtured a pervasive and ubiquitous culture of official impunity, criminality, untouchability, unaccountablity, brutality, incivility, illegality and immorality in Ethiopia.
The frightening fact of the matter is that today there are tens of thousands of mini-Me-leses and Meles wannabes in Ethiopia. What police chief Zemedkun did during the VOA interview is a simple case of monkey see, monkey do. Zemedkun could confidently threaten VOA reporter Solomon because he has seen Meles and his disciples do the same thing for over two decades with impunity. Zemedkun is not alone in trashing the human rights of Ethiopian citizens. He is not some rogue or witless policeman doing his thing on the fringe. Zemedkun is merely one clone of his Master. There are more wicked and depraved versions of Zemedkun masquerading as ministers of state. There are thousands of faceless and nameless “Zemedkunesque” bureaucrats, generals, judges and prosecutors abusing their powers with impunity. There are even soulless and heartless Zemedkuns pretending to be “holy men” of faith. But they are all petty tyrants who believe that they are not only above the law, but also that they are the personification of the law.
Article 12 and constitutional accountability
Article 12 of the Ethiopian Constitution requires accountability of all public officials: “The activities of government shall be undertaken in a manner which is open and transparent to the public… Any public official or elected representative shall be made accountable for breach of his official duties.”
Meles when he was alive, and his surviving disciples, police chiefs, generals and bureaucrats today are in a state of willful denial of the fact of constitutional accountability. (Meles believed accountability applied only to Ken Ohashi, the former World Bank country director.) The doltish police chief Zemedkun is clueless not only about constitutional standards of accountability for police search and seizure in private homes but also his affirmative constitutional obligation to perform his duties with transparency. This ignoramus-cum-police chief believes he is the Constitution, the law of the land, at least of Bole’s. He has the gall to verbally terrorize the VOA reporter, “I don’t care if you live in Washington or in Heaven. I don’t give a damn! But I will arrest you and take you. You should know that!!”
Freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention, unbeknown to police chief Zemedkun, is guaranteed by Article 17 (Liberty) of the Ethiopian Constitution: “No one shall be deprived of his liberty except in accordance with such procedures as are laid down by law. No one shall be arrested or detained without being charged or convicted of a crime except in accordance with such procedures as are laid down by law.” Article 19 (Rights of Persons under Arrest) provides, “Anyone arrested on criminal charges shall have the right to be informed promptly and in detail… the nature and cause of the charge against him... Everyone shall have the right to be… specifically informed that there is sufficient cause for his arrest as soon as he appears in court. Zemedkun is ready to arrest the VOA reporter simply because the reporter asked him for his last name. What arrogance! What chutzpah!
It is a mystery to police chief Zemedkun that arbitrary deprivation of liberty is also a crime against humanity. Article 9 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights decrees that “no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.” Article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights similarly provides: “no one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.” The deprivation of physical liberty (arbitrary arrest) constitutes a crime against humanity under Art. 7 (e) and (g) of the Rome Statute if there is evidence to show that the deprivation occurred as a result of systematic attack on a civilian population and in violation of international fair trial guarantees. The statements of the victims interviewed by VOA reporter Solomon appear to provide prima facie evidence sufficient to trigger an Article 7 investigation since there appears to be an official policy of systematic targeting of Muslims for arbitrary arrest and detention as part of a widespread campaign of religious persecution. The new prosecutor for the International Criminal Court, Fatou B. Bensouda, should launch such an investigation in proprio motu (on her own motion).
Meles has left an Orwellian legacy in Ethiopia. Police chief Zemedkun is only one policeman in a vast police state. He reaffirms the daily fact of life for the vast majority of Ethiopians that anyone who opposes, criticizes or disagrees with members of the post-Meles officialdom, however low or petty, will be picked up and jailed, and even tortured and killed. In “Mel-welliana” (the Orwellian police state legacy of Meles) Ethiopia, asking the name of a public official is a crime subject to immediate arrest and detention! In “Mel-welliana”, thinking is a crime. Dissent is a crime. Speaking the truth is a crime. Having a conscience is a crime. Peaceful protest is a crime. Refusing to sell out one’s soul is a crime. Standing up for democracy and human rights is a crime. Defending the rule of law is a crime. Peaceful resistance of state terrorism is a crime.
A police chief, a police thug and a police thug state
It seems police chief Zemedkun is more of a police thug than a police chief. But listening to Zemedkun go into full meltdown mode, one cannot help but imagine him to be a cartoonish thug. As comical as it may sound, police chief Zemedkun reminded me of Yosemite Sam, that Looney Tunes cartoon character known for his grouchiness, hair-trigger temper and readiness to “blast anyone to smithereens”. The not-so-comical part of this farce is that police chief Zemedkun manifests no professionalism, civility or ethical awareness. He is obviously clueless about media decorum. Listening to him, it is apparent that Zemedkun has the personality of a porcupine, the temper of a Tasmanian Devil, the charm of an African badger, the intelligence of an Afghan Hound and the social graces of a dung beetle. But the rest of the high and mighty flouting the Constitution and abusing their powers like Zemedkun are no different.
The singular hallmark -- the trademark -- of a police thug state is the pervasiveness and ubiquity of arbitrary arrests, searches and detentions of citizens. If any person can be arrested on the whim of a state official, however high or petty, that is a police state. If the rights of citizens can be taken or disregarded without due process of law, that is a dreadful police state. Where the rule of law is substituted by the rule of a police chief, that is a police thug state.
For well over a decade, international human rights organizations and others have been reporting on large scale arbitrary arrests and detentions in Ethiopia. The 2011 U.S. State Department Country Reports on Human Rights Practices (issued on May 24, 2012) reported:
Although the constitution and law prohibit arbitrary arrest and detention, the government often ignored these provisions in practice… The government rarely publicly disclosed the results of investigations into abuses by local security forces, such as arbitrary detention and beatings of civilians… Authorities regularly detained persons without warrants and denied access to counsel and in some cases to family members, particularly in outlying regions… Other human rights problems included torture, beating, abuse, and mistreatment of detainees by security forces; harsh and at times life-threatening prison conditions; arbitrary arrest and detention; detention without charge and lengthy pretrial detention; infringement on citizens’ privacy rights, including illegal searches…
In its 2013 World Report, Human Rights Watch reported: “Ethiopian authorities continued to severely restrict basic rights of freedom of expression, association, and assembly in 2012… The security forces responded to protests by the Muslim community in Oromia and Addis Ababa, the capital, with arbitrary arrests, detentions, and beatings.”
Rarely does one hear human rights abusers publicly showing their true faces and confirming their victims' allegations in such breathtakingly dramatic form. Police chief Zemedkun gave all Ethiopians a glimpse of the arrogant and lawless officialdom of Post-Meles Ethiopia. It is a glimpse of a police state in which an ignorant local police chief could feel so comfortable in his abuse of power that he believes he can travel to the United States of America and arrest and detain a journalist working for an independent agency of the United States Government. If this ill-mannered, ill-bred, cantankerous and boorish policeman could speak and act with such impunity, is it that difficult to imagine how the ministers, generals, prosecutors, judges and bureaucrats higher up the food chain feel about their abuses of power?
But one has to listen to and read the words of those whose heads are being crushed by the police in a police state. When it comes to crushing heads, themodus operandi is always the same. Use “robocops”. In 2005, Meles brought in hundreds of police and security men from different parts of the country who have limited proficiency in the country’s official language and used them to massacre 193 unarmed protesters and wound another 763. These “robocops” are pre-programmed killing machines, arresting machines and torture machines. They do what they are told. They ask no questions. They shoot and ask questions later. Hadid Shafi Ousman, a victim of illegal search and seizure, who spoke to VOA reporter Solomon, recounted in chilling detail what it meant to have one’s home searched by “robocop” thugs and goons who do not speak or have extremely limited understanding the official language of the country:
These are federal police. There are also civilian cadres. Sometimes they come in groups of 5-10. They are dressed in federal police uniform…. They are armed and carry clubs. They don’t have court orders. There are instances where they jump over fences and bust down doors… When they come, people are terrified. They come at night. You can’t say anything. They take mobile phones, laptops, the Koran and other things… They cover their faces so they can’t be identified. We try to explain to them. Isn’t this our country? If you are here to take anything, go ahead and take it…. They beat you up with clubs. If you ask questions, they beat you up and call you terrorists… First of all, these policemen do not speak Amharic well. So it is hard to understand them. When you ask them what we did wrong, they threaten to beat us. I told them I am a university student, so what is the problem? As a citizen, as a human being…Even they struggled and paid high sacrifices [fighting in the bush] to bring about good governance [to the people]. They did not do it so that some petty official could harass the people. When you say this to them, they beat you up…
Let there be no mistake. Zemedkun is not some isolated freakish rogue police chief in the Ethiopian police state. He is the gold standard for post-Meles governance. There are thousands of Zemedkuns that have infested the state apparatus and metastasized through the body politics of that country. For these Meles wannabes, constitutional accountability means personal impunity; illegal official activity means prosecutorial immunity; moral depravity means moral probity and crimes against humanity means legal impunity.
Cry, the beloved country
In 1948, the same year Apartheid became law in South Africa, Alan Paton wrote in “Cry, the Beloved Country”, his feeling of despair over the fate of South Africa:
Cry for the broken tribe, for the law and the custom that is gone. Aye, and cry aloud for the man who is dead, for the woman and children bereaved. Cry, the beloved country, these things are not yet at an end. The sun pours down on the earth, on the lovely land that man cannot enjoy. He knows only the fear of his heart.”
Cry for our beloved Ethiopia!!
Professor Alemayehu G. Mariam teaches political science at California State University, San Bernardino and is a practicing defense lawyer.
Previous commentaries by the author are available at:

http://open.salon.com/blog/almariam/

www.huffingtonpost.com/alemayehu-g-mariam/
Amharic translations of recent commentaries by the author may be found at:

http://www.ecadforum.com/Amharic/archives/category/al-mariam-amharic

http://ethioforum.org/?cat=24

somalilandpress

Ethiopia

The sudden death in August 2012 of Ethiopia’s long-serving and powerful prime minister, Meles Zenawi, provoked uncertainty over the country’s political transition, both domestically and among Ethiopia’s international partners. Ethiopia’s human rights record has sharply deteriorated, especially over the past few years, and although a new prime minister, Hailemariam Desalegn, took office in September, it remains to be seen whether the government under his leadership will undertake human rights reforms.

Ethiopian authorities continued to severely restrict basic rights of freedom of expression, association, and assembly in 2012. Thirty journalists and opposi- tion members were convicted under the country’s vague Anti-Terrorism Proclamation of 2009.The security forces responded to protests by the Muslim community in Oromia and Addis Ababa, the capital, with arbitrary arrests, detentions, and beatings.

The Ethiopian government continues to implement its “villagization” program: the resettlement of 1.5 million rural villagers in five regions of Ethiopia ostensi- bly to increase their access to basic services. Many villagers in Gambella region have been forcibly displaced, causing considerable hardship. The government is also forcibly displacing indigenous pastoral communities in Ethiopia’s Lower Omo Valley to make way for state-run sugar plantations.



Freedom of Expression, Association, and Assembly
Since the promulgation in 2009 of the Charities and Societies Proclamation (CSO Law), which regulates nongovernmental organizations, and the Anti- Terrorism Proclamation, freedom of expression, assembly, and association have been increasingly restricted in Ethiopia. The effect of these two laws, coupled with the government’s widespread and persistent harassment, threats, and intimidation of civil society activists, journalists, and others who comment on sensitive issues or express views critical of government policy, has been severe.

Ethiopia’s most important human rights groups have been compelled to dramat- ically scale-down operations or remove human rights activities from their man-

dates, and an unknown number of organizations have closed entirely. Several of the country’s most experienced and reputable human rights activists have fled the country due to threats. The environment is equally hostile for independent media: more journalists have fled Ethiopia than any other country in the world due to threats and intimidation in the last decade—at least 79, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

The Anti-Terrorism Proclamation is being used to target perceived opponents, stifle dissent, and silence journalists. In 2012, 30 political activists, opposition party members, and journalists were convicted on vaguely defined terrorism offenses. Eleven journalists have been convicted under the law since 2011.
On January 26, a court in Addis Ababa sentenced both deputy editor Woubshet Taye and columnist Reeyot Alemu of the now-defunct weekly Awramaba Times to 14 years in prison. Reeyot’s sentence was later reduced to five years upon appeal and most of the charges were dropped.

On July 13, veteran journalist and blogger Eskinder Nega, who won the presti- gious PEN America Freedom to Write Award in April, was sentenced to 18 years in prison along with other journalists, opposition party members, and political activists. Exiled journalists Abiye Teklemariam and Mesfin Negash were sen- tenced to eight years each in absentia under a provision of the Anti-Terrorism Law that has so far only been used against journalists. Andualem Arage, a mem- ber of the registered opposition party Unity for Democracy and Justice (UDJ), was sentenced to life for espionage, “disrupting the constitutional order,” and recruitment and training to commit terrorist acts.

In September, the Ethiopian Federal High Court ordered the property of Eskinder Nega, exiled journalist Abebe Belew, and opposition member Andualem Arage to be confiscated.

On July 20, after the government claimed that reports by the newspaper Feteh on Muslim protests and the prime minister’s health would endanger national security, it seized the entire print run of the paper. On August 24, Feteh’s editor, Temesghen Desalegn was arrested and denied bail. He was released on August 28, and all the charges were withdrawn pending further investigation.

WORLD REPORT 2013

Police on July 20 raided the home of journalist Yesuf Getachew, editor-in-chief of the popular Muslim magazine Yemuslimoche Guday (Muslim Affairs), and arrest- ed him that night. The magazine has not been published since, and at this writ- ing, Yesuf remained in detention.

On December 27, 2011, two Swedish journalists, Martin Schibbye and Johan Persson, were found guilty of supporting a terrorist organization after being arrested while traveling in eastern Ethiopia with the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), an outlawed armed insurgent group. They were also convicted of entering the country illegally. The court sentenced them to 11 years in prison. On September 10, they were pardoned and released along with more than 1,950 other prisoners as part of Ethiopia’s annual tradition of amnesty to celebrate the Ethiopian New Year.

On several occasions in July, federal police used excessive force, including beat- ings, to disperse largely Muslim protesters opposing the government’s interfer- ence with the country’s Supreme Council of Islamic Affairs. On July 13, police forcibly entered the Awalia mosque in Addis Ababa, smashing windows and fir- ing tear gas inside the mosque. On July 21, they forcibly broke up a sit-in at the mosque. From July 19 to 21, dozens of people were rounded up and 17 promi- nent leaders were held without charge for over a week. Many of the detainees complained of mistreatment in detention.

Forced Displacement
The Ethiopian government plans to relocate up to 1.5 million people under its “villagization” program, purportedly designed to improve access to basic servic- es by moving people to new villages in Ethiopia’s five lowland regions: Gambella, Benishangul-Gumuz, Afar, Southern Nations Nationalities and Peoples’ Region (SNNPR), and Somali Region. 
In Gambella and in the South Omo Valley, forced displacement is taking place without adequate consultation and compensation. In Gambella, Human Rights Watch found that relocations were often forced and that villagers were being moved from fertile to unfertile areas. People sent to the new villages frequently have to clear the land and build their own huts under military supervision, while

the promised services (schools, clinics, water pumps) often have not been put in place.
In South Omo, around 200,000 indigenous peoples are being relocated and their land expropriated to make way for state-run sugar plantations. Residents reported being moved by force, seeing their grazing lands flooded or ploughed up, and their access to the Omo River, essential for their survival and way of life, curtailed.

Extrajudicial Executions, Torture and other Abuses in Detention
An Ethiopian government-backed paramilitary force known as the “Liyu Police” executed at least 10 men who were in their custody and killed 9 other villagers in Ethiopia’s Somali Region on March 16 and 17 following a confrontation over an incident in Raqda village, Gashaamo district.

In April, unknown gunmen attacked a commercial farm owned by the Saudi Star company in Gambella that was close to areas that had suffered a high propor- tion of abuses during the villagization process. In responding to the attack, Ethiopian soldiers went house to house looking for suspected perpetrators and threatening villagers to disclose the whereabouts of the “rebels.” The military arbitrarily arrested many young men and committed torture, rape, and other abuses against scores of villagers while attempting to extract information.

Human Rights Watch continues to document torture at the federal police investi- gation center known as Maekelawi in Addis Ababa, as well as at regional deten- tion centers and military barracks in Somali Region, Oromia, and Gambella. There is erratic access to legal counsel and insufficient respect for other due process guarantees during detention, pre-trial detention, and trial phases of politically sensitive cases, placing detainees at risk of abuse.

Treatment of Ethiopian Migrant Domestic Workers
The videotaped beating and subsequent suicide on March 14 of Alem Dechasa- Desisa, an Ethiopian domestic worker in Lebanon, brought increased scrutiny to the plight of tens of thousands of Ethiopian women working in the Middle East.

Many migrant domestic workers incur heavy debts and face recruitment-related abuses in Ethiopia prior to employment abroad, where they risk a wide range of abuses from long hours of work to slavery-like conditions (see chapters on the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, and Lebanon).

Key International Actors
Under Meles Zenawi’s leadership, Ethiopia played an important role in regional affairs: deploying UN peacekeepers to Sudan’s disputed Abyei area, mediating between Sudan and South Sudan, and sending troops into Somalia as part of the international effort to combat al-Shabaab. Ethiopia’s relations with its neighbor Eritrea remain poor following the costly border war of 1998-2000. Eritrea accepted the ruling of an independent boundary commission that award- ed it disputed territory; Ethiopia did not.

Ethiopia is an important strategic and security ally for Western governments, and the biggest recipient of development aid in Africa. It now receives approxi- mately US$3.5 billion in long-term development assistance each year. Donor policies do not appear to have been significantly affected by the deteriorating human rights situation in the country.
The World Bank approved a new Country Partnership Strategy in September that takes little account of the human rights or good governance principles that it and other development agencies say are essential for sustainable development. It also approved a third phase of the Protection of Basic Services program (PBS III) without triggering safeguards on involuntary resettlement and indigenous peoples. 

HRW

New Arrivals: An estimated 6,232 Ethiopians made their way to Yemen in January 2013. Proportionally, Ethiopians dominate new arrival figures representing 79.4 % per cent of the total in January. Oromos remain the ethnic majority in the new arrivals cohort.

Refugees in Ethiopia: In January, 5,312 new refugee arrivals in Ethiopia were recorded. As a result, the total refugee population has risen slightly by 1.3% to 381,722 refugees hosted in Ethiopia. Over half of this group remain Somalis, followed by Sudanese, Eritreans, Kenyans, and refugees from the Democratic Republic of Congo.

IDPs: Human Rights Watch (HRW) reported that a villagization progamme in Ethiopia’s Gambella Province has left thousands homeless. The Government is pushing communities out of their ancestral land which they have leased to foreign horticultural companies. Some Ethiopian farmers allegedly report that confiscation of land without compensation by government officials had left them without means to support their families. High taxation has also been quoted as having informed decisions to leave. The Ethiopian government have normally been reluctant to state the number of IDPs in their country but recently one ministry reportedly claimed there were over 200,000 IDPs currently in Ethiopia.


Influx of Somali Refugees to Ethiopia: The Ethiopian Prime Minster announced at an AU Summit in January that Somali refugees should return to their homeland. A regular flow back and forth by refugees between the Dollo Ado refugee camp and Somalia is evident and continued in January. It has been speculated that the Somali refugees may be moving back to the camp to benefit from food rations.

International Labor Migration: Ethiopia continues to be a major source country for organized and regulated labour migration to the Arabian Peninsula and Middle East. The trends suggest labour migration is rising to meet the high demand for domestic workers in particular. In 2012, nearly 160,000 Ethiopian women went to work in Saudi Arabia by the end of July, which figure is 10 times the number of the previous year. A report by Bloomberg citing data from the Ethiopian Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs attributed the development to the dwindling traditional Asian labour migrant market.

Southward movement: Large numbers of Ethiopian migrants continue to move south through Kenya towards South Africa. However, migrants and asylum seekers from Ethiopia and Somalia are no longer as welcome as they were in the past. Routes and methods are changing, for example, smuggled migrants previously used boats along Lake Malawi in an effort to reach South Africa. However, as a result of increased police patrols and a radical redeployment of the police who were suspected of being involved in the smuggling syndicate in Malawi, migrants are now using the vast Nyika National Park transiting through Zambia, Mozambique or Zimbabwe to the Republic of South Africa. 

RMMS

Ethiopia bans NGOs 

Ethiopia on Friday banned three civic organisations accusing them of doing 'illegal religious activities.'

The ban came at a time when Ethiopian muslims are protesting against perceived government interference in their activities.



No further details were made available by the government on the alleged illegal activities that led to the ban.

Observers fear the latest move by the government would spark protests by muslims in the Horn of Africa country.



One Euro, Islamic Cultural and Research Center and Gohe Child, Youth and Women Development were affected by the ban.



Ethiopia has banned a number of non governmental organisations since it introduced the Civic Organisations Law two years ago.

The law seeks control operations of NGOs and their source of funding.



According to the law, any civic group that receives more than 10 percent of its funding from foreign sources cannot be involved in human rights advocacy or capacity building, among other activities.



The Ethiopia Civic Organizations Registrar said the banned organisations were using money from donors to fund personal affairs.

The agency said it had also sent a warning to some 109 civic organisations considered to be violating the law.



Ethiopia has 2,854 registered civic and charity organisations.

the africa report

For the last few Months, African Oil Corporation, an upstart oil company has been engaged in a propaganda stunt conspiring with the tyrannical Ethiopian regime in order to exploit Ogaden oil and try to bury and deny the documented human rights abuses committed by the Ethiopian Army in Ogaden.

On February 17, 2013, Keith C. Hill, President and CEO of African Oil, started to regurgitate Ethiopian government false propaganda in an interview with reporters from the Swedish Expressen Newspaper. He stated that “most of the ONLF has now basically made peace with government and laid down arms” and that “there is one faction left and they’re conducting talks with the new administration”. Mr Hill further claimed that the people of the Ogaden were happy and that his company was providing services to help them develop. Mr Hill made similar statements to Swedish journalists last in Sweden.

Then the journalists were  invited to visit Addis Ababa to interview Ethiopia’s Minister of Minerals, Mrs. Sinkinesh Ejigu, who, irritated by the journalists’ questions about the human rights violations in Ogaden, furiously responded by saying those making the accusations are “lying” and claimed that there was no a human-rights abuse or torture in Ogaden. The Journalist were then taken to Hargelle town, which was nothing more than few dusty huts, although it is classed as the  regional Capital of the Afdheer region, a vivid reminder of the legacy of systematic marginalization of the Ogaden. There, the journalists were led through an arranged tour of Hargelle  to meet with some of the town’s residents and ‘students’ who were assembled to give a well-choreographed Soviet-style speeches about how happy they were with African Oil’s presence in the region.  What the Ethiopian minister did not know was that the journalists had already visited Dadaab refugee camps and had seen victims who were tortured by the Ethiopian Army and forcefully displaced from their lands and communities!

Setting the record straight

ONLF wishes to categorically refute the false claims made by Africa Oil’s President and CEO Mr Keith C. Hill, that the majority of ONLF has laid down arms and made peace with the Ethiopian government; and the other absurd claim about the existence of one ONLF ‘faction’ which is conducting talks with the Ethiopian government. Furthermore, the Ogaden National Liberation Army and the Ethiopian government are currently engaged in an active armed combat and the Ogaden is a battle zone that is not safe for an oil company to operate. For more than ten years, this has been Ethiopian government propaganda and it is tasteless and immoral when the CEO of an international company decides to repeat it without any qualms.

First, ONLF has no factions and there are no ongoing talks between ONLF and the Ethiopian government, since the Ethiopian government stomped out of the Kenyan mediation efforts last October. The Ethiopian regime’s phantasmagorical creations will not stop the march of the Ogaden people towards attaining their self-determination, nor will such artless and outmoded machinations bring peace to the Horn of African region.

Secondly, the Ethiopian government is committing gross human rights violations in Ogaden and has refused to allow neutral international human rights organizations, such as Human Rights Watch, African Rights Monitor, Amnesty International, the ICRC, UN human rights rapporteurs and independent journalists to visit the Ogaden freely and investigate the state of affairs in Ogaden. Therefore, African Oil’s association with Ethiopian government constitutes a deliberate act of collaboration in the on-going violations in Ogaden as Ethiopia uses the money they receive from the oil company to fund its army and local militia who perpetrate human rights violations in Ogaden.

Therefore, ONLF calls upon African Oil to desist from paying blood money to Ethiopia until a just settlement of the conflict is achieved and the people of the Ogaden are in a position to be masters of their wealth and interest.

ONLF draws the attention of the UN and the international community to the fact that African Oil and cohorts are violating the norms “on the Responsibilities of Transnational Corporations and Other Business Enterprises with Regard to Human Rights (U.N. Doc. E/CN.4/Sub.2/2003/12/Rev.2 -2003)”,  by engaging in unscrupulous business in a conflict zone, where the Ethiopian government is committing violations against the Ogaden civilian population which is tantamount to genocide.

 Finally, ONLF calls on the UN and the Human Rights Commission to re-start the investigation on the rampant human rights violations that the Ethiopian government is committing in Ogaden.

Sources:

http://www.expressen.se/nyheter/kvinnorna-ar-nagra-av-oljebolagens-offer/

http://www.expressen.se/nyheter/trakigt-att-de-fick-sitta-sa-lange/

http://www.expressen.se/nyheter/gruvministern-det-finns-ingen-tortyr/

ONLF

Fears that construction of a mega hydroelectric plant in Ethiopia could stall owing to financial constraints have forced the authorities to turn to desperate measures to raise funds.

To ensure implementation of the Grand Renaissance dam project remains on course, the Ethiopian government in now turning to options like musical concerts, a lottery and an SMS campaign to raise funds after global financiers gave the project a wide berth.

A senior official says govern- ment is hoping to raise over $100-million through this strategy in the coming weeks to supplement funds being raised from donations and the sale of government bonds to finance the construction of the plant, which has a price tag of $4.8-billion. The project will have an installed capacity of 5 250 MW.

“As a country, we are com- mitted to implementing this project and the response from ordinary Ethiopians has been unprecedented,” says Fekadu Ketema, head of communication at the National Secretariat, which is overseeing the implementation of the project.

However, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has warned that mobilising large domestic resources and channelling them to one project could have dire effects on the economy.

Last year, IMF country representative in Ethiopia Jan Mikkelsen said the country’s determination to fund the dam from local resources was starving the rest of the economy of funds.

The caution from the IMF and other critics of the project has done little to slow down its implementation as Ethiopia has made it clear the plant is critical to pushing the economy forward and will end the dependence on agriculture.

According to Ketema, Ethiopians are determined to implement the project and $500-milllion has been raised from ordinary citizens.

International financial institutions refused to fund the project owing to the manner in which the Ethiopian government awarded the construction contract and its failure to undertake a comprehensive environmental-impact assessment.

By the end of last year, about 14% of construction works had been completed and it is expected the project will be 26% complete by the end of this year.

The project, which is the largest hydropower plant in Africa, is being constructed by Italian company Salini Costruttori and is slated for completion in 2015.

The dam is being constructed on the Blue Nile and is touted as the solution to Ethiopia’s perennial energy deficit.

engineeringnews

The strategic Horn of Africa country is one-third Muslim and two-thirds Christian; why is its state-TV ginning up religious tension?

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA

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.

RECOMMENDED: Think you know Africa? Take our geography quiz.

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.

  the christian science monitor