ETHNIC CLEANSING AND INGTENSIFIED REPRESSION IN ETHIOPIA

SOCEPP (23 March 2019): There is a huge propaganda blitz by the powers who brought to power the Abiy Ahmed Lemma Megersa group to power to cover up the deplorable and even dangerous situation Ethiopia, which given time, may plunge Ethiopia into a disastrous and catastrophic ethnic war to destabilize further the whole Horn of Africa region. Not much has changed from the point of the violation of human rights in the country.

The claim that the regime has released poltical prisoners is totally false as three fourth of more than 45,000 political prisoners are still in dungeons and many more have joined them in the prison camps and hellholes. Dozens of the disappeared are still unaccounted for. The so called anti terror law, used to railroad and jail journalists and dissidents, is still in force along with other anti democratic proclamations. The new rulers need them as they have recently declared opposition as terrorism and vowed to close all social media and shut opposition media (there is only one actually called Finote Democracy radio which is being targeted).The rush towards the long existing dictatorial methods and rule is very much in evidence. There is only one independent news magazine whose publisher is now about to face charges in Addis Abeba and has been threatened publicly by the rulers.. The claim of change for the better has proved a wild fiction as the rulers are the same old members of the ruling EPRDF and have not attempted any meaningful change and have denied the popular demand for a peaceful all inclusive transition and declared that the election will be held, as for the last 27 years, by the rules of and under the ruling EPRDF (which includes the notoriously repressive Tigrean front–the TPLF).

If the Meles Zenawi TPLF has been marginalized their system is still alive and in place. The stove is sort of changed but the cooks are still the same. The ethnic Tigrean rule has been replaced in earnest by an ethnic Oromo rule. The rulers, who proclaim to stand for Ethiopia to dupe the people are actually rabid Oromo narrow nationalists out to wreak havoc and to commit crimes against the Ethiopian people. In short, the violation of the rights of the Ethiopian people has been intensified in a cruel way.

The deafening silence of the foreign media notwithstanding, a massive ethnic cleansing, cruel killings and huge displacement is taking place. In a year alone, more than two million people have been internally displaced, victims of Oromo gangs spurred and tolerated by the rulers, making Ethiopia the country with most displaced in the world. The rulers have invited and surrounded themselves by special guests they feted and let loose who are none other than ethnic cleansers and publicly declared violent hate mongers. A campaign is afoot to chase and occupy the land and property of non Oromos and to claim Addis Abeba ,in which Oromos are not even the majority ,as Oromo and to chase out that they call settlers meaning the majority ,the Ethiopians. Hundreds of thousands of the Gedeo people chased out by the regime’s young thugs are now helpless in the open and have started to die from starvation. Similar crimes have been committed against the Amharas,the people in Welyata, against Afars (who are being attacked by Djibouti forces too), against Somalis, against Oromos themselves in Shoa and other places, against Anuaks in Gambella, against most non Oromos all over the country. Ethnic discrimination has reached deplorable levels with appointments and employment denied to non Oromos. Burayu, Shashemene, Beni Shangul, Dire Dawa,Gedeo,Norhtern Shoa, etc –the list of places of ethnic cleansing and crime is long.

False propaganda aside, Ethiopians are suffering and the violations of their rights is limitless. Ethnic cleansing is pushing the victims to defend themselves by all means necessary. Ethiopia is on the edge of a catastrophe which is not of its own doing. We sound the alarm in time.

Stop ethnic cleansing and crimes against the people!
Respect the human rights of Ethiopians!
And end to discrimination of all sorts !!