The Oromo Dialogue Forum (ODF), also known as Waltajii Marii Oromoo (WMO) in its Afan Oromo name, held a meeting in Footscray, near Melbourne, Australia, on February 3, 2013 with keynote speeches by ODF leadership.
The Footscray/Melbourne ODF meeting did not go as planned by the organizers as the following videos show (watch videos below). Heckling had interrupted the meeting several times. It is safuu (i.e. against the Oromo moral codes) to resolve political or other differences in the Oromo nation using heckling even though minor heckling is a form of protest protected by free speech in Western countries. The reason why the Oromo Gadaa system has no room for heckling is for the fact that the Gadaa parliamentary rules (Gumii Gaayoo rules) allow every opinion maker to have enough time to speak their mind.
Oromo liberation nationalists belonging to the Oromo Liberation Front’s camp accuse the Oromo Dialogue Forum (ODF/WMO) of advancing an unrealizable Ethiopianist agenda to democratize and federalize the Ethiopian empire at the expense of derailing the OLF’s national struggle to have an independent Oromo state to protect the interests of the Oromo nation in the conflict-ridden Horn of African region. ODF was initially set up to mediate among the OLF factions in 2012; however, it has shown its interest to undertake more than just mediating – in fact, it’s becoming a political movement in its own right, according media reports citing observers.
No comments:
Post a Comment