On the Death of Meles Zenawi: A Personal Reflection from a Disgruntled Citizen

By Urgessa Tura

August 21,2012

The death of a fellow human cannot be a cause for celebration for any sane-minded individual. Yet the announcement of Meles Zenawi’s death today by the Government of Ethiopia reminded me of a sad day in my life, which I have tried to forget over the years but in vain – May 20, 2005. On this very day, I was attacked ruthlessly by the evil security men under the direct command of Meles Zenawi with Tigrigna accent together with my other two friends. My crime that prompted them to beat me publicly was discussing with my friends about the flaws in the counting of votes in the 2005 election after Meles Zenawi appeared on ETV and declared a kind of emergency decree banning all demonstrations for a month unconstitutionally.

In his televised address to the nation on Sunday evening – May 15, 2005 – Meles Zenawi said, “[a]s of tomorrow, for the next one month no demonstrations of any sort will be allowed within the city and its environs. As peace should be respected within the city and its environs, the government has decided to bring all the security forces, the police and the local militias, under one command accountable to the prime minister” (source: Ethiopian Review available at http://www.ethiopianreview.com/content/2475)

It was five days after this announcement that I went through the ordeals I briefly mentioned above for chatting about the election process with my two other friends over a dinner table in a local restaurant in Finfinnee, Semien Hotel Sefer. I was racially profiled and beaten to ground at gunpoint despite showing my ID card that I work for the Supreme Court. Those Tigrean thugs, calling themselves ‘special security forces’, attempted to kidnap me and my friends after their brutal beatings. But we survived to tell this story because other people in the restaurant called the Addis Ababa City Administration Police over phone, which fortunately appeared on the spot to our rescue. I wasn’t surprised when those security thugs refused to surrender themselves to the police when they were asked to go to the nearby police station. Instead they claimed immunity as ‘special security forces’ under the command of Meles Zenawi in the town ordered to wipe out whomever they perceive to pose a threat to the TPLF oligarchy. Instead of subjecting themselves to law they lambasted the Addis Ababa City Police for lack of jurisdiction over security matters in the town since Zenawi’s emergency declaration I mentioned above.

Soaked with blood we were handcuffed and driven to a nearby police station. Four of the perpetrators, who attacked us with brutality, were let to go free with impunity while only two of them were taken with us to the local police station. The immediate boss of the so-called ‘special security forces’ in the Semien Addis Ababa region showed up at the station and tried to appease us so that we refrain from demanding their accountability for the grave assault they perpetrated on us publicly. When we insisted on their submission to the legal process the security chief warned me and my friends that he is prepared to throw us into Maikelawi, the notorious torture chamber of the Federal Police Commission, on the charge that we sympathize with the arch-enemy of the regime – the Oromo Liberation Front.

This is not an instance of an unfortunate and incidental attack against me and my friends. It is part of a widespread and systematic attack against thousands of other innocent citizens who are perceived to oppose the iron-fist rule of the regime. In most cases, people are racially profiled and subjected to harassment, beatings, torture, arrest and even extra judicial killings. There are suspect classes in Ethiopia targeted by the evil security machine put in place by Meles Zenawi. If you are an educated person from certain ethnic communities, such as the Oromo, Somali, Anuak, Sidama, and lately Amhara, you are in the suspect class that is eligible to illicit surveillance, harassment and attack by the security forces loyal to MZ.

I remember Meles Zenawi for assaulting thousands of Ethiopians like me and presiding over a brutal police state in the last two decades. Under his reign, security forces loyal to him are free to commit any crime against their own people and walk free on streets with impunity. Under his rule, some Ethiopians are viewed as disloyal only because they happen to belong to other ethnicity than that of the premier. Other Ethiopians are accorded special privileges and treated as first class citizens due to their ethnic origin.

Now upon the death of MZ and his temporary succession by Mr. Hailemariam Desalegn I am posing a challenge to EPRDFites whether these bad records of Meles Zenawi will be rectified sooner than later; whether I will be treated equally with members of the ‘special security forces’ as a citizen of that country; whether my physical integrity and liberty would be respected in post Zenawi Ethiopia; whether all exiled Ethiopians like me and those at home would be given assurances of safety and freedom; whether any Ethiopian’s door won’t be knocked by the security forces because he happened to hold different opinion than those who run the public affairs of the country; whether opportunity is going to be availed to all citizens irrespective of their ethnic background and ruling party affiliation; whether every Ethiopian is going to be allowed to speak and write his mind; and whether our country will choose the course of democracy, rule of law and economic development that benefits us all equally rather than the few. I pray that all Ethiopians rise to the occasion and put our homeland on the right course of history by using MZ’s death as an opportunity for making genuine reforms.

——————————————————————————————–

Urgessa G. Tura was formerly a judge with Oromia Supreme Court. He is currently pursuing an advanced degree at Harvard Law School. He can be reached via ugonu2008@gmail.com

                                                                                 Added by Tsegaye Hailu
                                                                                 August 23, 2012