If a week is a long time in politics, then a year is an eternity. And in the case of Oromo politics, a lot has changed in the last year. By all accounts, Oromos had a good year.
First, Teddy Afro’s song praising Menilik II ignited the furry of Oromos resulting in numerous songs, poems, articles highlighting the savagery and barbarity of Menilik II during and after colonization. The memories of Walloo, Galaan, Gullellee, Azule and Calii-Calanqoo massacres (just to mention few) and the Harma fi Harka Muraa Aanoole where thousands of Oromo men, women and children breasts or arms were severed by the colonial army spearheaded by Menilik showed that the wounds have not healed and that Oromos would never forget.
Second, “I’m Oromo First” movement galvanized and energized the Diasporas Oromo communities. This movement and the positive response it received across the entire world have clearly shown that Oromos are ready for their Moses (Muusaa).
Third, the “Boycott Beddelle” produced a quick result as Heineken wisely decided to terminate Teddy Afro’s endorsement tour. This has thought us the effectiveness and importance of social media in
mobilizing the younger generation.
mobilizing the younger generation.
Fourth, the inauguration of the Oromia Media Network(OMN) launched a new era by establishing an independent and Oromo owned and Oromo centered mass media to counter the Oromo phobia advanced by the Habash groups. The OMN is the fruit of “I’m Oromo First” and the trailblazers deserve all the credit. Their commitment to excellence by demonstrating passionate personal commitment has inspired us all. This experience has clearly shown us that how the alchemic mix of leadership, vision, willpower, determination and commitment can produce a desired result. We can do more of this. We should and we must do more. We ought to do more. There is no other way.
Fifth, the Oromo students uprising, in every part of Oromia, in peaceful protest against the Integrated Master Plan for Shaggar (Finfinne), shocked the ruling junta and strengthened the Oromo resolve to fight for their survival. The ruling Junta killed close to 100 peaceful protestors. Many were wounded, thousands were arrested and hundreds of students expelled from higher education. Since then, the reprisal against Oromos students remains unabated.
Six, across the world, the diaspora Oromo communities carried out a well-orchestrated and coordinated protest in support of the Oromo students and in opposition to the Master Plan as well as in condemnation Ethiopian government’s brutality, savagery and inhumaneness against Oromo students. This successful protest and the support given to the OMN have proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Diasporas Oromos can after all rally for the just cause of their people.
In sharp contrast to Oromos, the Habash group, however, remained mute exposing the hollow of one Ethiopia they always espouse. Only on few occasions some of them briefly mentioned the students’ uprising. Tacitly, most of them support the ethnic cleansing of Oromos. Even their mass media totally ignored the massacre of Oromo students.
These events have clearly revealed the existence of two Ethiopia.
On one hand, Habash continue to believe that Menilik II was a nation builder just like Bismarck and a provider and a nurturer like a mother. So they call him immiyyee Menilik. As well, they have started to sanitize the life and times of Haile Selassie by portraying him as a Peter the Great of Ethiopia. Even, in their eyes Mengistu’s favourable rating is growing day by day. Further, the Habasha debteras continue to propagate self-mythologizing stories about themselves, while their spin doctors and their propaganda machine continue to run at maximum capacity to demonize anything and everything about Oromo. All the high school history books of my generation have now been sanitized to hide the savagery of the Abyssinians.
On the other hand, Oromos consider that Menilik II was a savage and ruthless colonizer who was responsible for genocide and ethnic cleansing. Menilik directed the colonization of Oromiya. In their own God given land, Oromos were reduced to the life of serfdom and slavery. The new Ethiopia turned into a prison, a colonial structure that brought despair and harm to all the colonized peoples.
What Menilik did to the Oromos was clearly genocide. The United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG) gives a very clear definition of what is and what is not genocide. So, nowadays social scientists have the necessary tools to determine if genocide has occurred. It should also be pointed out that under the CPPCG; the intention to commit genocide is itself a crime, and not just the act of genocide.
It’s clear that Menilik and his successors’ policies of ethnic cleansing in order to make way for the Amhara and Tigre colonial settlers meet the criteria of genocide under the CPPCG. Except ethnic cleaning how else can we explain what happened to Walloo, Galaan and Gullellee Oromos (just to mention few). How else can we define Harmaafi Haraka Muraa Aanolee and Calii Calanqoo massacre? Hence, under the CPPCG, the policies of the successive Ethiopian governments toward Oromos and other colonized peoples can be defined as genocide and ethnocide.
These two narratives could not be further apart.
Every day, I wonder how one can reconcile the two Ethiopia that feebly co-exist by sheer force, yet never seem to touch. If history teaches us anything it is that nothing lasts forever. So, the day will come when Oromos will achieve their freedom – we use the term “bilisummaa.”
Oromos are generally very patient. Given the many horrific experiences of colonization at the hands of the successive colonial governments from genocide, ethnocide, ethnic cleansing, servitude and slavery, economic exploitation, cultural subjugation and political domination, land grab, etc. — it is a testament to their peaceful nature that Oromos continue to sit at the table with Habashas in hopes of improving the relationship.
But the rising of Oromo phobia among the Habashas and certain groups coupled with Woyane’s master plan for Oromia in general and Shagar and the surrounding principalities in particular have set colonizer-colonized relations back over a century and a half. We are now back where colonization campaign started: the 19th century and the unfinished business of complete land grab and destruction of Oromummaa. As a result, the Integrated Master Plan has just experienced a head-on-collision with Oromo resistance due to their refusal to watch ethnic cleansing and their children’s futures assimilate into oblivion.
The scheme in the name of Integrated Master Plan is a misnomer and its real objective is the Habashization (Ethiopiawinet) of Oomiya through unlimited territorial expansion of all federal entities with the objective of asphyxiating or chocking Oromumma, thereby effectively diminishing the size of Oromiya, while expanding that of Ethiopiawinet. As you all know, Shaggar, for all intent and purposes, has already white-washed its Oromoness. The current plan is to export that cultural genocide or ethnocide to Oromo principalities around Shaggar and other federal entities. The annexed regions would be whitewashed of their Oromoness and then painted over with new Habasha identity / cultures thereby effectively rendering Oromos future into extinction.
For Oromos, such scheme is not something new. From Tewdros to Meles, there have been many such schemes where Oromos were evicted from their ancestral land – mutilation of Wollo Oromos by Tewodros, exile of Wallo Oromos under Yohannes, eviction for sugar cane plantation, villagization, resettlement, just to mention few. The Habash group claim that Aanolee mutilations did not happen. What they fail to understand is that Tweodros even did it to Shawa Amhara. Some of you may recall a passage from one of the high school’s history books, which reads:
Atse Tewodros mininyaa neddeduu
Ye Shewan mekuanint iji nestew heduu.
Ye Shewan mekuanint iji nestew heduu.
This is the case of “wax” and “gold”, where in terms of “wax” ijji nestew means greetings in the form of bowing down. On the other hand, the true hidden meaning is “left them without hands”.
What is new is that the Habasha, in general, and the TPLF, in particular, have realized that in spite of all economic exploitation, cultural domination and political subjugation as well as various schemes carried out since colonization, Oromummaa, our shared cultural traditions and collective memories remain a serious threat to their grand design. These collectivities connect us as a nation. They define us as one people. This has caused many headaches, sleepless nights, ulcer and psychotic problems for the Habasha groups. So, the mother of all schemes in the name of Integrated Master Plan was concocted to hoodwink Oromos and the world in order to implement the final plan.
So, if unity means anything, those in the Ethiopian camp should talk about decolonization. Decolonization for Habash is a paradigm shift. Decolonization has many definitions, but for Habash, it is the unlearning and then the relearning of Ethiopian history to include the narratives of the country’s history that exist and deserve equal airtime in our collective consciousness. Sometimes it makes us uncomfortable, and that’s okay because it means we are learning.
There are deep wounds that will take generations to heal. Leaving the reconciling to colonized peoples alone will not do. Colonized peoples recognize the need to heal from the past, but too often they are being pushed to forget before the historical injustice committed against them is acknowledged and fully addressed. Ethiopia needs to recognize its own wounds and the scars that have not healed. The continued failure by Ethiopia to address the just causes of the colonized peoples will ultimately lead to its disintegration.
So, what can the Habash do to help colonized peoples in Ethiopia? Listen (and don’t get defensive); identify what you don’t know (and then find out on your own; build relationships with colonized peoples, organizations and communities (and then use your strengths to work with them to support the ongoing work).
Then and only then we can talk about our common future together and then figure it out how to go about it in a manner that redresses the past, negotiates the present and plans for the future. As well, if common future together is not possible, we should still talk on how to go about our separate ways.
That is easier said than done.
Although I am an optimist by nature, the history and psychological make-up of the Habash begs for different outcome. OK, I’ll bite. How would you move forward in the definition of our “common future” with Habesh groups that never repented of Menelik’s genocides – crimes against humanity – and won’t play fair in democratic accommodations and would chew off their own legs before they held a free election? How can you sit at a table with the Habash, who by hook or crook would like to maintain their supremacy inherited from the colonial era? Moreover, the successive colonial governments, including the current government and the Amhara groups, have effectively maintained the colonizer-colonized relationship. Ethiopian unity for them is the supremacy of Habash over the colonized peoples.
So, the coming weeks, months and years will determine in what direction the relationship between Habashas and Oromos turns, but one thing is for certain: Oromos will never allow Habash to repeat the harms suffered by the naftanyaa policy again. Oromo students’ resistance to the Integrated Master Plan is testament to that.
Within the Oromo camp, we often ask each other as to why it is taking us so long. For me the answer and the solace too, can be found in the Holy Books. Reading Exodus one learns how Moses led his people out of Egyptian bondage, into desert, where they wondered for 40 years before reaching the Promised Land.
No one who began that odyssey made it, not even Moses, who only looked down from a mountain top to see that his people had arrived – even all those born and raised in captivity, and burdened with the doubting, fearful, and indecisive mentality of slaves – proved incapable of doing so.
I fear we (Oromos) will wander in an anarchical wilderness for years to come and even may be tested in the Holocaust of a difficult liberation struggle before we win our freedom. We will get there, eventually. Of that I have no doubt. But I do wish we (Oromos) had our own Moses, now.
Oromia shall be free!
Diida Borbor
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