Re: Annan blames Ethiopia...

Sorry about posting again -- I said I wouldn't write again, but this is on
the topic of Ethiopia, not on nationalism, etc.  I don't understand the
reference to "waiting for the worker's paradise to come."  Who said that? Of
course steps should be taken to oppose the current Ethiopian government's
policies, including this outrageous war, and of course steps should be taken
to alleviate the famine.

But the following comment: "Mixing and confusing all these issues is worse
than doing nothing and something that only ivory tower academics in the West
can afford.   Polemics can wait!"

is very misguided. It is ALWAYS time to offer political critique and
analysis. Or do we just want to endlessly repeat the cycles of imperialist
oppression, famine, and wars, again and agan, because each "new" situation
creates an urgency that says that we should not take the time to understand
HOW the situation came about? Understanding thes developments is actually
MORE IMPORTANT for the direct victims of these tragedies than it is for the
so-called "ivory tower academics in the West."  Or do we think that the
victims aren't smart enough to understand these issues and should simply be
brought food without "bothering them" with ideas?

Alan Spector

-----Original Message-----
From: alexy2k gerard <alexandragerard@hotmail.com>
To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
Date: Tuesday, April 11, 2000 8:34 AM
Subject: Re: Annan blames Ethiopia...


>
>
>While we wait for the worker's paradise to come, what do we do about the
>immediate burning issues?  Let us please remember that the victims of the
>region in question do not have the luxury to wait.  they look and wait for
>concrete action and help.  And I can bet that they won't appreciate grand
>ideological discussions, no matter how lofty, and that only serve to
>obstruct their plight and dire situation.  No one here is defending
>dictators and gangsters!  But there are priorities, long term versus
>immediate problems. There are gangsters who are retreating for whatever
>reason and gangsters who are currently aggressive and exacerbating a bad
>situation to worse.  Mixing and confusing all these issues is worse than
>doing nothing and something that only ivory tower academics in the West can
>afford.   Polemics can wait!
>
>Alexy
>
>Ethiopia: Famine, War, and Environmental Destruction - Nature to Blame?
>
>By Seyoum Hameso
>
>As it happened in the seventies and the eighties, the western media is once
>again focusing in a
>disaster situation in Ethiopia. Only a few months into the new millennium,
a
>potentially devastating
>event is unfolding. While international attention is useful in leading to
>temporary relief measures,
>it fails to address the fundamental problems that cause the recurrence of
>such
>emergencies.
>
>In this brief article, I ask if all is gloom and doom imposed by nature or
>if
>the hands of people
>gave added impetus for destruction. In other words, are the people of that
>area
>destined to doom and
>stories of doom or is it something that can be solved, given the human
will?
>
>The working assumption here is that while it is easy to blame nature (for
>one it
>dos not know how to
>enter into dispute), the problem at hand is as much man-made. The readily
>available hands for
>implication are of those people who are in a position to do something,
those
>who
>can decide and
>devise social, political and economic policies that bedevil the lives of
>ordinary people.
>
>It should be clear from the outset that drought and other natural
calamities
>do
>strike in any part
>of the world. It is the policy of the governments that lessens their
>impacts.
>Drought does not
>translate itself directly to famine if the people have enough reserves, if
>distribution of resources
>including food materials is fair. But that is not the case with the
>consecutive
>Ethiopian regimes
>who care for something other than the peoples.
>
>One would argue that these regimes brought famine conditions to the
>population
>groups. For example,
>Menelik was preoccupied with his expansionary war to the south when a Great
>Famine struck in 1896.
>According to imperial chronicles, the situation was so bad that, in these
>days,
>some form of
>cannibalism was practised.
>
>A little over a half a century, Haile Selassie had a badly reported fight
in
>his
>hands with Ogaden
>and Eritrea when nearly a million people perished in 1973-74. The regime
>that
>was supported by the
>West did crumble by the combination of Western camera exposure and
>overbearing
>local dissent. The
>places that famine struck hard, including Wollo and Tigray were not the
>regime’s
>favourite areas, as
>they were complicated by traditional feudal power rivalries. Unhealthy
>distribution of resources,
>mainly land and destructive exploitation of nature and people led to a
>situation
>where peasant
>farmers were in no position to resist any drought condition. In other
words,
>they lost their
>resilience to natural hazards. War worked to complicate matters.
>Traditionally
>northern warlords of
>Ethiopia thrived in the business if war and banditry which is only
>‘modernised’
>by imperial
>centralisation. Here as elsewhere the first victims of banditry are
>peasants. So
>they were in 1973.
>
>In 1984, the world media was again preoccupied with another round of gloom.
>Famine was back again.
>The military regime of Mengistu Hailemariam had one vision: build a
>communist
>empire. Revolution was
>what his regime proclaimed as it toppled the dying feudal autocracy. No one
>asked the cost, and no
>one cared to measure it. The slogan was: build ‘it’ at any cost. It did not
>matter if that cost was
>the loss of millions of lives, or dashed hopes and opportunities. The word
>‘building’ seemed
>positive, but the actions were about destruction of humanity.The 1984
famine
>follwed a protracted
>war in different parts of the Ethiopian empire: war with Ogaden, war with
>Eritrea and Tigray, war
>within the establishment, the red terror, etc… Mengistu’s atrocities did
not
>end
>there. The
>villagisation and resettlement programmes were projects that would be
>planned by
>devils. And all
>Ethiopian regimes have been closer to one. The villagasation programme was
a
>communist experiment in
>a terribly poor empire. It made everyone equally destitute, and Mengistu
>learned
>the lessons long
>after M. Gorbachev of the then Soviet Union. The poverty that visited upon
>the
>rural families by
>ruthless policies, the environmental damage that malicious resettlement
>programs
>engendered, and the
>ruthless execution of war which led to famine was openly described by the
>western journalists. They
>declared the place something nearer to hell on hearth. For millions of
>people
>whose voices are
>crushed and repressed, the place has been a hell for nearly a century.
>
> zNow come the year 2000. No one reported in 1973 and 1984 that the
>magnitude of the problem
>is as huge as it is today. About eight million people are threatened with
>famine. The world is now
>surprised why all this is happening in the lands where only a few years ago
>the
>regime’s officials
>were outspoken in saying their programs help rural communities (where more
>than
>85% of the whole
>populations live), that food self-sufficiency was achieved.
>
>The current Tigrean ethno-national regime is only nearly a decade long, but
>the
>blunders it commits
>have no proportions or precedents. No one community or national group is at
>ease
>with the policies
>of TPLF/EPRDF regime. Since its coming to power in 1991, all aspects of
life
>are
>politicised. Its
>‘federal’ regional policies are a sham, as The Economist magazine has once
>noted. Its democratic
>record is a shambles. Its human rights record are, if anything, worse. Its
>economic policies are
>full of contradictions; they are full of favouritism and open disregard of
>humane change and
>socio-political balance. Political corruption is rife while the regime’s
>evaluation and transparency
>measures focus on political loyalty more than on anything else.
>
>For over a period of years the regime went into war with neighbouring
>countries
>using all the
>pretexts it can manipulate. At one time it fights ‘Islamic fundamentalism’
>(e.g.
>Somalia), a
>crusader of the 20th century. At another time, it becomes a peacemaker
>fighting
>lawlessness outside
>its jurisdiction (e.g. in Kenya and Somalia). All along, since 1992, it
>caries
>out low level wars
>with organised groups that demand self-determination for their people.
Today
>the
>people who live in
>the areas where this demand is strong face famine (e.g. Ogaden and Oromia
>regions).
>
>Only a few months ago massive fires consumed large forests, the plight of
>which
>was not properly
>addressed. Again the areas of this calamity are the southern areas such as
>Bale
>and Borana in
>Oromia, Qoreleh in Ogaden, Malagawondo and Meme in Sidama, and scores of
>areas
>in the west as in
>Benishangul. The cause of the fires remains suspect but the reasons such as
>windy, long dry seasons,
>honey collection and land scramble by local populations is lame. Students
>demonstrated against the
>government’s handling of the fire crisis and they faced hostile response. A
>few
>students died in
>Ambo, central region of Oromia. Whatever caused the fire, the destruction
of
>the
>forests will have
>huge environmental consequences not only for the areas involved concerned
>but
>for the region as a
>whole. In this regard, one would only appeal to international humanitarian
>and
>environmental groups
>to pursue the matter and pre-empt further destruction.
>
>The problems do not stop at fires and famine. The regime’s policies of
>inciting
>ethno-national
>conflicts has displaced thousands among Gedeo and Guji Oromo communities.
>The
>regime encourages
>artificial divisions within national communities along caste, religious and
>regional dimensions. In
>many rural areas, the forced sale of fertiliser to peasant farmers and the
>method of recouping the
>sales proceeds, the heavy tax exactions, and several forms of forced
>contributions to TPLF owned and
>controlled economic entities made people (rural and urban) exceedingly
>vulnerable to natural
>mishaps. Problems were observed in Hadiya, in Gambella and in Wolayta
>associated
>with the regime’s
>policies.
>
>On top of all these, the war with Eritrea which is in its third year is
>exacting
>massive burden on
>populations in Ethiopia. First came the requirement to safeguard
>‘territorial’
>sovereignty and
>integrity of the empire. This meant ‘Everything to the War Front’, a
>familiar
>tone from the derg
>era. The incident in Badme is blown out of proportion causing the massacre
>of
>thousands, if not
>hundreds of thousands, while the heavy fire in the south did force raise
the
>eyebrows of the
>officials of the regime. Next came the recruitment for war.
>
>This author anticipated in July 1998, only a few months into the beginning
>of
>the TPLF war venture
>with Eritrea, the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of the war. These
>meetings were conducted
>in Berlin, Germany, and soon in Stockholm, Sweden, and nearly no one in the
>international community
>heeded the voices of the oppressed people then. And now every one seems
>scrambling for what can be
>done to relieve the burden of destruction and death primarily imposed by a
>very
>bad government. The
>same war is not only depleting the natural resources but all kinds of
>resources
>that may be
>available in future.
>
>To informed audience, it came to no surprise when a minister of Ethiopia
>accused
>foreigners for not
>responding soon for a disaster his regime has a big hand facilitating the
>processes that lead up to
>this scenario. As if begging is a business of prudence and pride, it
>dictates
>which routes the aid
>should come and which should not. It refuses the offer of port services
from
>a
>warring neighbour for
>‘moral ' reasons or for reasons only devils understand.
>
>The difference of the TPLF regime of Ethiopia from the past ones is that
>this
>one uses all the
>pretexts and precedents to pre-empt and trample alternatives. The past
>rulers of
>the empire are too
>proud to tell the world that people under their, otherwise tragic, rule do
>starve in fact. Menelik
>had a pretext to hide the great famine behind the war with European
fascism.
>Haile Selassie had to
>hide fascistic famine with the connivance of the western powers. Mengsitu
>had a
>project to finish
>before accepting his policies were ruthless and contributed to famine.
>Today’s
>rulers are the first
>to tell all is well and sooner than later admit that all is worse. They
>cannot
>avoid today’s media
>exposure which contrasts with the deafening silence of the past. For this,
>they
>admit the inevitable
>and declare bankrupt when everything is out of their handling.
>
>Now the outside world faces a dilemma, as this author does. It is true that
>politics affects the
>economic and social conditions in any country. It is true that the buck
>stops at
>the benches of
>officials who impose destructive policies and their sponsors. But the
>humanitarian disaster does not
>give much time to spend on the luxury of disputing the rights and wrongs of
>the
>regime in power. In
>the short term, the international community has no alternative other than
>looking for ways of
>helping those people whose saddening images appear in the screens which
>disturbs
>people’s
>conscience. Such relief aid may help the dying, but the real help is
>commitment
>to humanitarian
>approach and to help people to help themselves. That is an issue to be
>addressed
>today. While relief
>work is as urgent as ever, the need to see long is by far beneficial to the
>people affected, to the
>region, and even to the world. It is only then that gods will have good
time
>free from blame.
>
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