Posts filed under ‘Who is Who’
Should You Be Running Barefoot like Ethiopian Abebe Bikila?
WE LOVE YOU ABEBE BIKILA
By Amby Burfoot
As a teenager, I loved to run barefoot on the Connecticut beaches, splashing through the waves. A few years later, I often ran without shoes while training for the college cross-country season, completing workouts that were the hardest, fastest, most puke-able, and yet most enjoyable of my life.
Those are strange bedfellows: extreme effort and high pleasure. I have wondered if someone was spiking my Kool-Aid, a popular sports drink of the time. Then I close my eyes and recall how my friends and I snuck onto Shennecossett Golf Course as dusk descended. How we giddily removed our shoes, and felt the fairway underfoot. How we ran an undulating six-mile fartlek loop, sprinting and jogging, sprinting and jogging, the summer sweat cascading off our bodies. How we finished, not another gasp of oxygen in our lungs, and flopped onto the 14th green. The kinesthetic memories are fullblown, from the slight chill of the grass on my feet to the heaving chest and the light-headed dizziness of the effort. Was it the barefoot running that made the memory so vivid?
Famous runners had gone barefoot before us, of course. In 1960 Ethiopia’s Abebe Bikila, the greatest Olympic marathoner of all time, won the first of his consecutive gold medals sans shoes in a world record 2:15:17. My high school coach, “Young John” J. Kelley, was the leading American finisher (19th, 2:24:58) in that 1960 Rome Olympic Marathon, and his descriptions of the torchlit race have always entranced me. Except the part about the stones.
“On the ancient Appian Way, we had to run on huge, rounded cobblestones that were completely unyielding,” Kelley says. “They had no ‘give’ at all. I remember that I was afraid of slamming down too hard on them, and I still can’t imagine how Bikila did it.”
While Bikila was making Olympic history, England’s Bruce Tulloh was running European record times from 1955 to 1967, almost always in bare feet. He ran 13:12 for three miles on grass, and 27:23 for six miles on cinders. Later, Tulloh taught in Africa, coached, wrote books, and ran solo across America (2,876 miles, albeit in shoes). At 68, his mind is as sharp as ever, and he is ever eager for a good barefoot jaunt. “I’ll be running on the beach at Devon this weekend,” he said in early summer. “The only reason that more people don’t run barefoot is that they’re afraid to be unconventional.”
That wouldn’t apply to either Charlie “Doc” Robbins or Zola Budd, both important contributors to barefoot running. Robbins, winner of two USA National Marathon Championships in the late 1940s, completed 50 straight Thanksgiving Day Road Races in Manchester, Connecticut, before calling it quits two years ago. Most Thanksgivings, Robbins went shoeless, though he would resort to a pair of socks if the temperature dipped below 20 degrees.
Budd set a track world record in January 1984 when, just 16, she ran 5000 meters in South Africa in 15:01.83, more than six seconds under Mary Decker’s existing record. (Too bad Budd is better known for her fateful collision with Decker in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic 3000 race. Decker was thrown horribly off-balance, and twisted and fell to the infield grass.)
Interest in barefoot running seemed to wane until 2001, when Michael Warburton, an Aussie physical therapist and 2:42 marathoner, published an online paper titled, simply, “Barefoot Running.” (You can view the paper at the sports science web site sportsci.org.) In his section on running economy, Warburton points out that the extra weight of shoes on your feet is much worse than a pound or two around your middle. Weight on your feet is subject to constant acceleration and deceleration (runners call these movements “strides”), which have a high energy cost. According to Warburton, research has shown that 100 grams of extra weight on your feet decreases your running economy by one percent. Simple math says that two 10-ounce shoes will make you more than five percent less efficient. That’s a big deal. When you add five percent to Paul Tergat’s marathon world record 2:04:55, he’s a 2:11 guy, which doesn’t net him enough for a warm bowl of ugali in the Kenyan highlands.
But we don’t think much about running economy when we buy a pair of new running shoes. First we want protection from harmful objects. And then we expect cushioning and/or motion control–the stuff of injury prevention. But this is where things get strange, because scientific studies have had a hard time proving that shoes represent a big step forward from the naked foot.
To learn what’s going on inside the body, which, after all, is where we runners develop all our stress fractures, Achilles strains, and so forth, a medical team needs to take measurements from–ouch!–inside the body. I’ve actually seen this take place in a biomechanics lab, and it’s a blood sport. The combatants typically include a mad Ph.D. scientist and several grad students (a.k.a. the “volunteers”) desperate to finish their degree work. (“Sure, I’ll be happy to let you drill a metal accelerometer into my shin bone before my next treadmill run,” says a grad student.) The results of several of these intrusive experiments have shown little change in shock absorption or motion-control in shod versus unclad feet. This apparent difference seems hard to believe. All that foam padding and all those posts, bridges, and dual-density midsoles have to be doing something, right?
Of course they are; they’re deceiving the body. Here’s an explanation, based on your body’s proprioceptive abilities–that is, the way it can communicate up and down all pathways. When you run barefoot, your body precisely engages your vision, your brain, the soles of your feet, and all the muscles, bones, tendons, and supporting structures of your feet and legs. They leap to red alert, and give you a high degree of protection from the varied pressures and forces of running.
On the other hand, when you run in socks, shoes, inserts, midsoles and outsoles, your body’s proprioceptive system loses a lot of input. “This has been called ‘the perceptual illusion’ of running shoes,” says Warburton. “With shoes, your body switches off to a degree, and your reaction time decreases.” The way I see it, there’s a simple explanation for the high IQ of barefoot running: We descended from the trees to walk and run this planet’s surfaces six million years ago, and we’ve had time to get really, really good at it, from the soles of the feet to the top of the brain.
By now, you might be worried about your Reebok stock or your friends who work at the local running store. I wouldn’t sweat it too much, at least not to judge from the number of bare feet I saw at my last big road race (zero). Even though a guy named Ken Saxton is running a marathon a month this year (barefootrunning.org), I doubt his preference will take off the way instant messaging, low-carb diets, and The Apprentice have.
Besides, many podiatrists think it’s dangerous. “Most of my patients aren’t worldclass runners,” says foot doctor Stephen Pribut, DPM. “It wouldn’t make sense for them to risk getting twigs and glass in their feet. And I think some soft surfaces increase plantar fascia and Achilles problems. Of course, what doesn’t kill you might make you stronger.”
This a-little-medicine-is-good-for-you perspective is shared by a number of other podiatrists, physical therapists, and coaches. Their theory: Modern man does spend too much time in shoes, and this weakens many of the foot and leg structures. To correct this, you can walk barefoot around the house, do simple foot strengthening exercises, or run a few barefoot miles a week on safe, secure surfaces.
And then put your shoes back on before you hit the pavement. Even Abebe Bikila gave up his barefoot ways. Four years after winning in Rome, he wore Pumas in the Tokyo Olympic Marathon. He won again, despite having had an appendectomy 40 days earlier, and set a new world record, 2:12:11.2. Apparently, the shoes didn’t bother him at all.
Like this:
Bring the last Fugitive to justice-A Call to Human rights now
by Getachew Teklu
Mengistu Haile Mariam is (as in still alive) a politician who presided over Ethiopia from 1974 to 1991. The way he got into power was by smothering the previous president Haile Selassie although he has denied those rumors. His biggest claim to fame is the Ethiopian Red Terror which was a campaign of repression led by the Derg (communist militia in Ethiopia). In his introductory speech Mengitsu yelled, “Death to counter revolutionaries! Death to the EPRP!” Then he took three bottles filled with blood and threw them to the ground. It was an auspicious beginning to say the least. Thousands were killed and found dead on the streets in the years that followed. Much of the murdering can be attributed to the friendly neighborhood watch their known as “Kebeles”. As if killing innocents wasn’t enough they would then charge the family a tax to return the dead body to them. The tax was aptly named “the wasted bullet”! Are you serious Mengitsu? However there was an even more gruesome fate of being left on the street where wild hyenas would fight over the dead. The campaign has been described as one of the worst mass murders ever in Africa in the 21st century.
Mengistu Haile Mariam, a former Lieutenant Colonel in the Ethiopian Army, led a coup which ousted Emperor Haile Selassie from power in 1974. Mengistu took control of the government and served as its Communist head of state in Ethiopia from 1977 to 1991. He formally assumed power as chair of the Worker’s Party, head of state and Derg (military junta) chairman in 1977. In fact Mengistu had wielded behind-the-scenes power since the coup of 1974.
Opposition against Mengistu’s regime emerged with a rebellion against the new government between 1977 and 1978. The government suppressed the rebellion and in the process generated thousands of casualties, estimated at 100,000 killed or disappeared. In response the anti-Mengistu Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party (EPRP) launched a guerilla struggle that would last until the overthrow of Mengistu’s regime in 1991.
On September 10, 1987, Mengistu became a civilian president under a new constitution, and the country was renamed the People’s Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Mengistu’s government was faced with enormous difficulties throughout the 1980s in the form of droughts, widespread famine (notably the Ethiopian famine of 1984-1985), and insurrections, particularly in the northern regions of Tigre and Eritrea. In 1989, the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front merged with other ethnically based opposition movements to form the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). In May 1991, EPRDF forces advanced on Addis Ababa. The EPRDF forces successful toppling of the Mengistu government coincided with the fall of Communism in the Soviet Union. The new Russian government ended aid to Ethiopia.
Mengistu fled the country with 50 family and Derg members and was granted asylum in Zimbabwe as an official “guest” of Robert Mugabe, the president of that country. Mengistu left behind almost the entire membership of the original Derg and the Workers Party of Ethiopia (WPE) leadership, which was promptly arrested and put on trial upon the assumption of power by the EPRDF. Mengistu still
resides in Zimbabwe, despite attempts by Ethiopia to extradite him to face trial. Several former members of the Derg have been sentenced to death in absentia by the new regime. The trial against Mengistu started in 1994, and in January 2007 he was sentenced to life imprisonment for genocide. He remains in exile in Zimbabwe. This war criminal military junta killed more than half a million Ethiopians. Bring him to justice to close this case. Here is a partial list of Ethiopians who sacrifices their life, and murdered by this criminal military junta: http://www.dergu.shutterfly.com/
Teza (Morning Dew)-Ethiopian Film Director Haile Gerima
Director: Haile Gerima
Minneapolis Exclusive Engagement
Teza is set in Germany and Ethiopia, and examines the displacement of African intellectuals, both at home and abroad, through the story of a young, idealistic Ethiopian doctor – Anberber. The film chronicles Anberber’s internal struggle to stay true, both to himself and to his homeland, but above all, Teza explores the possession of memory – a right humanity mandates that each of us have – the right to own our pasts.
After studying medicine abroad in Germany for several years, Anberber returns home to Ethiopia only to find his beloved Ethiopia, and soon the quiet of his dreams, stifled and disarrayed by the country’s political turmoil.
Seeking escape from the center of violence, Anberber turns to the solace of his countryside childhood home, but quickly realizes that there is no shelter there. The competing forces of the military and opposition factions usurp the comfort he thought the memories of his youth would invoke. Anberber must determine if he can bear the strain of his reality and piece together a life from the fragments of a complete existence that lie around him.
Teza documents Anberber’s recognition of his own displacement and powerlessness in the face of the dissolution of Ethiopian humanity and social values.
Click Here to watch TEZA trailer
ETHIOPIA, GERMANY, FRANCE · 2008 · 140 MIN · IN AMHARIC, ENGLISH & GERMAN WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES
TEZA Playing at St. Anthony Main Screen #3 – Fri. July 16 thru Thu. July 29 @ 4:15, 7:00 with Fri. thru Sun.
Purchase your tickets online or at the box office.
Ticket Prices:
Matinees before 5:00pm $5.50
General Admission: $8.50
Student/Senior: $6.00
MFA Members: $5.00
Here is a link to Saint Anthony Main Theater:
Meklit Hadero Performs at the “Center of Culture”
At the age of 12, the Ethiopian-born Meklit Hadero left Brooklyn and called several cities home before settling in San Francisco. Now, after the release of her debut album ‘On A Day Like This’ in April, Meklit will be taking center stage in New York for the first time.
This past Friday Meklit performed to a sold out crowd at Bernos’ 4th Anniversary Celebration in Washington D.C. and on Tuesday, June 1st, New Yorkers will get a chance to see what the buzz is all about. Meklit will be performing at (Le) Poisson Rouge, a state-of-the art performance venue located in Greenwich Village and she is “really, really excited” about the performance. She describes New York-one of her 12 hometowns-as the “Center of Culture.” In addition to touring the United States and Europe, for the remainder of the year, Meklit will also be performing in Ethiopia this December.
Live performances in one of Meklit’s hometowns are extra special for her because “it gives me an opportunity to meet up with old friends.”
Happy Mother’s Day, Birtukan (Invictus) Midekssa
By Alemayehu G. Mariam
As Mother’s Day is celebrated in Ethiopia on the second Sunday in May, I feel privileged to share with my readers a testimonial tribute honoring Birtukan Midekssa, the first female political party leader in Ethiopian history and the most famous political prisoner in that country. Let me say up front that Birtukan needs no tribute or praise from me or any other person. She has written her own heroic chapter in the modern history of Ethiopia for which she will be praised by future generations. Her suffering and sacrifices in the struggle for democracy, human rights and the rule of law are inscribed in the hearts and minds of her people in the indelible ink of courage and humility. But on this Mother’s Day, I have taken the liberty to say just a few words in tribute to Birtukan for her sacrifices as a mother.
Of course, I hold great admiration, respect, appreciation and gratitude for Birtukan not only on Mother’s Day, but every day. I am awed by her display of supreme grace in the face of withering oppression by one of the most barbarous dictatorships in the modern world. When democracy is trampled in Ethiopia, and “wrong forever sits on the throne”, to paraphrase James Russell Lowell, and the rule of law, human rights and truth dangle from the tyrant’s noose on the scaffold, Birtukan did what Nelson Mandela did. She stood up and shouted for the world to hear: Only right makes might!
For her selfless sacrifices in the service of her fellow citizens, we all owe her a heavy debt of gratitude. Birtukan has been to the mountain of temptation and offered the chance to live in the lap of luxury. She could have had everything that money can buy: a posh mansion away from all the poor people, the very best of amenities, the finest garments and jewelry, power and the invisible benefits of office that many have used to accumulate personal wealth. Birtukan refused outright the temptation to sell her soul for all the silver and gold in Ethiopia. She paid a heavy price to keep her soul intact and free: Life Imprisonment.
For showing courage and integrity facing the Beast, I have the highest admiration for Birtukan. As a judge she stood up for justice and the independence of the judiciary. She refused to bend justice to serve politics; and for her judicial integrity, she was booted off the bench. By refusing to betray her professional obligations and judicial oath, Birtukan has served not only the ends of justice in Ethiopia but also the cause of universal justice. She is to be honored for being a fair and impartial judge whose loyalty was always to the supreme law of the land and never to the supreme dictator.
I appreciate Birtukan for showing dignity even when she is the object of obscene mockery. When she stood up for her rights, the constitution of her country and the rule of law, she was mocked as a “silly chicken” that “hanged herself”. After she was forced to endure six months of harrowing solitary confinement under the most brutal conditions in violation of a court order, she was made the object of the proverbial “fat woman” joke. They said she sat around in solitary confinement eating all of the prison food, not exercising and putting on a “few kilos.” I know Birtukan would never stoop to the sewer to respond to such filth. She is just a class act!
I commend Birtukan for being a great Ethiopian. As Shakespeare wrote, “some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them.” In Birtukan’s case, she achieved greatness. Let me be clear. She did not achieve greatness through exploits in the battle field. She was never a general. She abhors violence, brutality and inhumanity. She did not achieve greatness by amassing great fortune. She comes from a humble background; and she would never steal from the people to enrich herself. She did not achieve greatness through extraordinary scientific, literary or artistic endeavors. She never had opportunities for such pursuits. She did not achieve greatness because of her long service to the state or extraordinary political experience and skills. She is too young for that.
She achieved greatness in her profound and absolute faith in what she likes to call “the future country of Ethiopia” and her willingness to pay for it with her life. She has a bottomless faith in the future of her generation to raise Ethiopia from the ashes of dictatorship and transform it into an impregnable fortress of democracy. The “future country of Ethiopia” is the country of Birtukan’s generation. They will inherit a land that has been scorched by dictatorship and oppression, racked by enforced ethnic division and ravaged by poverty, disease, corruption and ignorance; but Birtukan’s generation will be able to build on that arid landscape an oasis of democracy, human rights and the rule of law. Birtukan’s generation will be Ethiopia’s greatest generation. In her youthful idealism, Birtukan has overcome the cynicism, pessimism, negativism, defeatism, criticism, lack of enthusiasm, neuroticism, bitterness, doubt and distrust of the generations that have come before her own. I believe a person’s greatness should be measured not only by what they have done in the past, but more importantly by what they are prepared to do for the future and the sacrifices they make in the present for that future. By this measure, Birtukan is truly a great woman!
I have heard it said that Birtukan could walk out of prison at any time if she kissed the hands that keep her chained in the dungeons and licks the boots that press heavily against her neck. “She must beg for mercy and ask for a pardon,” they say. She won’t do it! Birtukan is the type of young person who personifies the principles spoken of by Winston Churchill when he urged the youth of England to “Never give in–never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force; never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.” She is also that ordinary person anywhere to whom President John Kennedy’s message could be addressed when he pleaded with his fellow citizens, “ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.” Birtukan refuses to yield to force and asks not for a pardon, but what she can do for her country.
I pay homage to Birtukan for being an inspirational role model to all young Ethiopians. Through personal example, she has taught young Ethiopians the values of honesty, courage, integrity, intelligence, fair-, open- and broad-mindedness and an unshakeable faith in the future of democracy in Ethiopia. In the final analysis, Birtukan is a symbol of the titanic struggle between those who cling to the impoverished and bankrupt politics of the past and the young people who are fighting for a future Ethiopia built on a vision of democracy, human rights and the rule of law. If the past wins, the nation will be lost; and if the future wins, the nation will have been reborn. I have no doubts whatsoever that those who fight for the “future country of Ethiopia” will win because history is on their side.
But on this Mother’s Day, I pay a special tribute to Birtukan for being a mother to her five-year-old daughter, undoubtedly someone she values more than her own life. I can not even begin to imagine what thoughts may have rushed through her mind when she resolved to leave her then three-year-old daughter and serve out a life sentence. The psychological pain and anguish must have been more painful than the prospect of serving out a life sentence. Though her daughter will grow knowing her mother is in prison for life, I can imagine the enduring pride she will have knowing deep in her heart that her mother is very, very special.
I possess neither the poetic imagination nor the ability to write the silky prose that Birtukan deserves in praise for her sacrifices as a mother. So I shall borrow verse from William Ross Wallace, whom Edgar Allan Poe called “one of the very noblest of American poets”, to pay my tribute to her.
“The Hand That Rocks The Cradle Is The Hand That Rules The World”
…
Blessings on the hand of women!
Angels guard its strength and grace,
In the palace, cottage, hovel, (prison)
Oh, no matter where the place;
Would that never storms assailed it,
Rainbows ever gently curled;
For the hand that rocks the cradle
Is the hand that rules the world.
…
Happy Mother’s Day, Birtukan Invictus (Unconquered)!
Free Birtukan and all political prisoners in Ethiopia.
souce: The Huffington Post, May 9th, 2010
Abebe Bikila: Barefoot runner-Ethiopia
Bikila’s triumph was all the more stunning because it happened in the capital of Ethiopia’s former military occupier. Legend has it that he made his decisive move in the race just as he passed the Axum Obelisk, a towering stela that Mussolini had brought back from Ethiopia as war loot. Four years later in Tokyo, Bikila won gold again, the first man to defend his Olympic marathon title. This time he wore shoes.
For such a pivotal figure in sports history, not much is known about Bikila. Perhaps there is little to know. A poor villager who faithfully served the Emperor and was coached by a charismatic Swede named Onni Niskanen, Bikila left neither piles of letters nor much insight into his own dreams and beliefs. After his twin marathon wins, filled with hubris and alcohol, his body betrayed him. He failed in Mexico in ’68, was paralyzed in a car accident and died a few years later at the age of 41.
Two new books about the runner tackle in very different ways the paucity of behind-the-scenes substance and the absence of telling interviews with the man himself. In Barefoot Runner: The Life of Marathon Champion Abebe Bikila, former rock journalist Paul Rambali weaves a powerful narrative through a series
Source: Time
In 1960, Ethiopian athlete Abebe Bikila shocked the whole world and became an overnight sporting legend when he ran barefoot through Rome to win the Olympic marathon gold medal.
Virtually unknown in the world of sport, and joining the team only at the last minute, Bikila was the first African to win the top Olympic honor. He repeated the feat at the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, this time wearing shoes and socks and, despite an operation for appendicitis six weeks prior, set a new world record and became the first consecutive marathon gold medal winner.
Now widely acknowledged as the greatest long-distance runner the world has ever known, Bikila returned to Ethiopia as an international sporting hero, before his life took a harrowing turn. This intriguing and elegant hybrid of biopic and documentary follows Bikila from his early days as a shepherd and soldier in Ethiopia, through his triumphant wins in Rome and Tokyo, to the aftermath of the car accident in Addis Ababa that left him paralyzed from the waist down.
His phenomenal journey is described here in loving detail, the intimate screenplay displaying a keen understanding of this incredible man and his defiant spirit. Rasselas Lakew, who also directed, co-wrote and co-produced, shines in the central role, bringing a quiet determination and an impressive depth to his portrayal of this extraordinary sportsman.
Co-director Lakew at onetime an athlete in Ethiopia, studied cinema at the University of Montana. Filmmaker Frankel is an audiovisual artist based in New York and Berlin.
THE ATHLETE
http://www.arrow-entertainment.com/html/The_Athlete/The_Athlete.html
British oil worker shot dead in Ethiopia
A Briton working for an oil company has been shot dead in Ethiopia, the Foreign Office has confirmed. The 39-year-old geologist was killed on Monday near Danot, a town in the Warder zone of Ethiopia, in the conflict-stricken Ogaden region. He worked for IMC Geophysics International – which was subcontracted to Malaysian oil giant Petronas. It is believed he was attacked while driving alone in what officials have called an “act of banditry”. Full inquiry A Foreign Office spokeswoman said: “We can confirm the death of a British national on 5 April near Danot town in the Warder zone of Ethiopia. “Next of kin have been informed and we have offered the family full consular assistance. “The Ethiopian authorities are carrying out a full inquiry and we are liaising closely with them.” Bereket Simon, Ethiopia’s communications minister, said the man had not taken the appropriate “security measures” and was driving alone. He said: “We have reports that the incident has occurred and is an act of banditry. “Following the act the local militia had confronted the perpetrators and had taken measures on them. “We understand that the act was not politically motivated.” Barbaric attack Although Ethiopia does not currently produce oil, Chinese companies and Petronas have signed deals to explore the area. The area has seen a great deal of bloodshed as the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), formed in 1984, has fought for the independence of ethnic Somalis in the oil-rich region for some time. It says the Somali-speaking population has been marginalised by the capital Addis Ababa. The fighting has escalated over the past two years following an ONLF attack on a Chinese-run oil exploration field. More than 70 people died in the attack, including Ethiopian guards and Chinese workers. Addis Ababa calls the rebels “terrorists” and has cut off all access to the region. But Abdirahman Mahdi, spokesman for the Ogadeni rebels, told the Associated Press news agency that as far as they were aware, “our fighters are not involved in such barbaric attacks”. “Our troops do not have permission to target foreign civilians. But we will investigate the circumstances that led to the man’s death.” Source: BBC |
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The BBC’s allegations over Ethiopian aid: what is the truth?
by Nicholas Winer
Aid workers must be pragmatic – if food was getting to people, then the money was doing its job.
The food shortage in Ethiopia is still on-going. Photograph: AFP/Getty ImagesI have followed, with a certain incredulity, the recent story put out by the BBC that 95 per cent of the aid to the Tigrayean rebels was diverted. I mean, 95 per cent is a vast amount of money, and why, I ask myself, would any group of self respecting conmen steal it all? Surely they would need to show that enough good was being done, so that the cash cow would come back again and again and again. The cross-border aid process ran from 1984 to the fall of Mengistu’s regime in Addis. This was no one-off smash and grab.
Initially, the TPLF simply sent people from Tigray to Sudan to be fed and housed by the UN and the international NGO community. It seemed a cheap and efficient way to manage a famine in Tigray. But the horrific sight of 300,000 people arriving en masse was overwhelming. The Sudanese camps suddenly turned into a second Korem, until enough aid could be delivered to reduce the death toll. The TPLF consistently deny that this was what they had done. I, and others, couldn’t conceive how such a vast sea of people could have moved through such tightly controlled rebel territory without the active guidance of the TPLF.
What happened next is the crux of the BBC’s story and of Paul Vallely’s refutation in the Independent. There had been a good harvest in western Tigray, but the poor had no money to buy it. The TPLF, through their civilian wing REST, determined sensibly that buying from the producers to feed the consumers was better for all than dumping food aid into the market. Why, they argued, suppress the price of food for the few who had managed to grow enough to sell? This impeccable free trade logic from hardline Marxists won immediate sympathy. And so began the process of meeting merchants, handing out cash, and checking on both food distribution and nutritional levels.
Khartoum, before Sharia law and the “Courts of prompt and Instant Justice”, was a vibrant, dusty and chaotic city. TPLF soldiers swaggered around with gold cigarette lighters, and Johnnie Walker Black Label was their favourite tipple. REST had a large house in an expensive suburb, where rents were too high for us Oxfam types. It was a friendly house, with an endless flow of people coming and going. As foreigners, we never knew who was who, but no one was turned away, and the atmosphere was beguilingly appropriate for beginning a relationship of trust.
The recent angry response to the BBC by aging colleagues that every effort was made to build checks and balances into the purchase and distribution process speaks volumes about their real anxiety that many things could’ve gone wrong. They wanted to be sure that if food or money did go astray, it wouldn’t be because they’d been negligent. On that basis — and the detailed explanations of Paul Vallely — the more extreme claims made by the BBC must be discounted. But for the very same reason, so too must any outright denial that anything did go astray.
The truth, I think, lies somewhere between the two positions. The proud young TPLF fighters in Khartoum and the earnest workers of REST intermingled, working for the same cause, under the same authority. There was much we were never privy to as aid workers (and the same applied to journalists), and so it would be foolish to state anything too categorically. It was in the interests of both REST and the TPLF to ensure a continued supply of resources to them and their people. This they did by providing a satisfactory level of access. That was smart and logical thinking.
Had they not been of a Marxist orientation they would have had an easier time of it from the USA, and perhaps would not have needed to be so accommodating: they could have done with their own Charlie Wilson. As it was, the best they could have hoped for was to be considered the good ‘commies’, as opposed to the bad ones of Mengistu’s regime. The verdict too has to be out on what the CIA in Sudan did and didn’t know. At the time it seemed not enough, given their boringly incessant attempts to question aid workers coming out of Tigray, and yet rather a lot, given their involvement in the highly complex evacuation of Ethiopian Jewry to Israel.
The people they seemed most interested in were often the health workers who travelled widely, witnessed bombing raids by the Ethiopians, and saw where TPLF fighters were based. This was precisely what the spooks wanted to know about. The health workers, on the other hand, weren’t too pleased with these extra attentions, but they were the ones who knew whether the process was working or not. If the people weren’t hungry, then that was what counted. That was, after all, what the grain buying programme was for. That was what determined whether the money was well spent. Counting bags of grain was never going to be a fool-proof process, nor could it have been a guarantee of success. The process did work. The flood of refugees into the border camps slowed to a trickle, and health levels improved in Tigray. That’s what people gave Sir Bob their money for and, by and large, it did what was expected of it.
It was always evident that greater access, and thus greater accountability, was mroe possible with the structures established by the Tigrayeans than with those of the Eritreans. That this was so is still reflected in the different political realities of the two countries. So, I ask myself if the story even has the right focus. What happened to aid to the Eritrean rebels, where accountability was much harder to establish? What of the tales of an underground TPLF political prison in Gondar, to which no aid worker was ever granted access? No surprise there. This wasn’t just famine, but a nasty and brutal war zone. To suggest that the TPLF never pulled a fast one and took their share would be a very foolish and naive assertion.
Today the TPLF — sorry, government of Ethiopia — own vast tracks of sorghum-growing estates on the Sudan border, right next to Western Tigray where this all began. In a land where private property is illegal, these (ad)venture capitalists are a real success story. As ever, someone else is paying the price.
Nicholas Winer is the former director of Oxfam in Sudan and Ethiopia. He is also the author of “The Tethered Goat” a political thriller set in Mengistu’s Ethiopia.
The World’s Billionaires
| Net Worth: | $10.0 bil |
| Fortune: | Self Made |
| Source: | oil |
| Age: | 65 |
| Country Of Citizenship: | Saudi Arabia |
| Residence: | Jeddah, Ethiopia |
| Education: | NA |
| Marital Status: | Married, 8 children |
Mohammed Al Amoudi
Born in Ethiopia to Saudi father and Ethiopian mother, Al-Amoudi claims to be investing more than $3 billion into Ethiopian agriculture and industry with the aim of modernizing farming and eventually exporting much of the output to Saudi Arabia. Also owns mine in Ethiopia that puts out 5 tons of gold a year. Started investing in Sweden in 1974; stakes there now comprise half his fortune: Preem operates two refineries; Svenska Petroleum produces crude oil in the North Sea and west Africa. Construction company Midroc operates in Europe, Africa and Middle East. In recent years completed estimated $30 billion contract with Saudi Arabia to build vast underground oil storage caverns.
Edited by Luisa Kroll, Matthew Miller and Tatiana Serafin
Source: Forbes.com
On the trail of Ethiopia aid and guns
Images of the famine in Ethiopia moved millions of people around the world to reach in to their pockets and donate to international aid efforts. But as Martin Plaut has been discovering, there is a disturbing allegation few would choose to confront.
It was the early 1980s. The famine, which would soon devastate much of northern Ethiopia, was already evident. I had gone on the long, difficult journey through Sudan and into Eritrea with rebels who had been fighting the government for more than 20 years. My wife, Gill, had come with me. As a nurse she was fascinated by the way the rebels were treating their injured, carrying out difficult operations in makeshift wards dug into the mountains. But now it was time for me to go up to the frontline and for her to go home. It was late at night, and I remember wondering to myself what I would say to her mother if anything went wrong as Gill got into one of the aid lorries rumbling their way back to Sudan. Sitting in a bunker, I had no idea where we were in this vast, arid landscape. I was entirely reliant on the rebels who had brought us in. Live Aid
For years the rains had failed and by 1984 millions were starving. Thanks in no small part to the help of Bob Geldof and Live Aid, people responded as never before. Millions of dollars were raised. Food was brought in. Many died, but the worst was averted – or so I thought. But a year ago, I began hearing a different take. I was contacted by Ethiopians who said we had all missed the real story of how money given with such worthy objectives had ended up being used to buy weapons. I began making enquiries. Gun money Aregawi Berhe is the former army commander of the rebel movement that operated in the Ethiopian province of Tigray. He now lives in a modest flat in the back streets of a Dutch town. He insisted on making me coffee. Then he told me his version of what took place all those years ago – how the lightly-armed rebels he led took on the mighty Ethiopian army which had all the latest Soviet weaponry. He told me that as the money began flowing in to feed the starving, a bitter debate had taken place inside the rebel movement. There were divisions over how the cash should be spent.
He also explained how the aid money was diverted not just to buy weapons his troops needed, but also to build a hardline, Stalinist party – the Marxist Leninist League of Tigray. This initiative, he said, was led by a young ideologue, Meles Zenawi. In the bitter infighting, Aregawi and his allies lost out. Money that was being channelled through the rebel side went to the party and to buy guns. In 1985, Aregawi told me, just 5% of $100m (£65m) they received went to the starving. It was an extraordinary tale, but perhaps Aregawi and his associates were just embittered men, trying to blacken the names of their former comrades? After all, Meles Zenawi went on to become Ethiopia’s prime minister and served with distinction on the Commission for Africa set up by former British prime minister Tony Blair.
Secret CIA reports So over the next months I spoke to people from Alaska to Australia, from Scandinavia to Palestine. I accumulated evidence from secret CIA reports. Former ambassadors supported the story Aregawi had told me. Facts were found in the dusty back issues of obscure newsletters. Even former Ethiopian government officials, who had been on the government side of the conflict said they believed it was true. Was it significant that so many people refused to speak about these events, including civil servants, academics and politicians like Meles Zenawi? Even Bob Geldof, who is not usually reluctant to talk, turned me down. It became clear that 25 years on, this was still a subject too sensitive to be discussed openly. Money trail One person who did talk to me was Max Peberdy. He is an aid consultant, who had carried nearly $500,000 (£331,00) worth in local currency into Tigray to buy surplus grain to feed the starving. Despite telling him the evidence I had collected, he insists the money did not go astray. I pointed out that he had been entirely reliant on the rebels to take him in, and that their Marxist-Leninist ideology ran counter to every notion of an independent aid operation.
I also explained that he had been unable to monitor the distribution of aid in the Ethiopian highlands that were the scenes of the most intense fighting. As I left his London home I thought back to when I waved goodbye to Gill with an Eritrean fighter by my side. I thought about just how isolated I had been – entirely dependent on the rebels who had taken me in. And how I had failed to ask the right questions at the time. Although I was now finally following the trail of the money and the rebel guns, I am only too aware that I was making these enquiries 20 years too late. The aid workers who did so much to help those suffering back then had not asked those questions either. But perhaps they would not have saved so many lives if they had. Source BBC |
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Money that was being channelled through the rebel side went to the party and to buy guns 
