Author’s Note: I have a tradition of reviewing the year in my last commentary of the year. It gives me an opportunity for a momentary reflection on some things that have happened and did not happen during the year. If I were to describe 2017 in a short sentence, it would be “The Year of…
Author’s Note: In this commentary, I offer a personal review of the Trump administration’s human rights record in Africa in 2017. On December 21, 2017, with little fanfare, President Donald Trump issued Executive Order 13818 of December 20, 2017 for targeted sanctions “declaring a national emergency with respect to the unusual and extraordinary threat to the national…
As long as people believed in ‘a bright future,’ they fought side by side irrespective of nationality – common questions first and foremost! But when doubt crept into people’s hearts, they began to depart, each to his own national tent – let every man count only upon himself! The ‘national question’ first and foremost! –…
Vindication of the rule of law In his closing argument defending a cabinet minister of a fictional African country called “Naranga”, John Mortimer’s equally fictional character Rumpole of the Bailey argued to the learned African judge: … When London is nothing more than a memory, and the Old Bailey has sunk back in the primeval mud, my…
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable…In the past, those who foolishly sought power by riding the back of the tiger ended up inside.” — John F. Kennedy The quiet riot of civil disobedience in Ethiopia over the past two years is slowly morphing into a creeping and enveloping civil war….
Introduction to the series I am developing this multipart series of what I call “Deconstructing Ethnic Federalism in Ethiopia” (along with many other topical series to come) for several reasons. The Thugtatorship of Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (T-TPLF) has used its phony ideology of “ethnic federalism” to hoodwink and bamboozle Ethiopians into believing its system…
Today, Africa is a Continent of COMPETING BEGGAR NATIONS. We vie with one another for favours from our former colonial masters; and we deliberately fall over one another to invite neocolonialists to come to our different territories to preside over our economic fortunes… … We may continue and indeed we will be right to continue…
Author’s Note: In the past few days, it has been widely reported that the fix is in to axe Rex Tillerson from the State Department and replace him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo by January 2018. There has been much talk about a “Rexit” since the summer when it was disclosed that Tillerson had described…
Ethiopiawinet in a nutshell… “Indeed, our diversity has been the amazingly distinctive feature of our Ethiopiawinet. The strong bond in the mosaic of our Ethiopiawinet is reflected in the diversity of our religions, traditions and cultural practices. The linkage of our unity over the ages has remained very strong. [Ethiopiawinet] is not something that dissipates…
Ethiopiawinet in a nutshell… “Indeed, our diversity has been the amazingly distinctive feature of our Ethiopiawinet. The strong bond in the mosaic of our Ethiopiawinet is reflected in the diversity of our religions, traditions and cultural practices. The linkage of our unity over the ages has remained very strong. [Ethiopiawinet] is not something that dissipates…
