PART ONE
H.E. Olusegun Obasanjo, AU High Commissioner for Horn of Africa
On 9/11/2014, Feltman met with Afghanistan’s two presidential candidates Abdullah Abdullah and Ashraf Ghani and said:
I was here to reinforce the message to the two candidates, on behalf of the Secretary-General, to please move forward… And if there are things we can do to help them, we’re willing to do it; but this, obviously, is an Afghanistan decision about Afghanistan’s future.
What is good for Afghanistan ought to be good for Ethiopia but not so.
Feltman never said, ‘I am in Ethiopia to reinforce President Biden’s message. If there are things we can do to help the Ethiopians, we’re willing to do it; but this, obviously, is an Ethiopian decision about Ethiopia’s future.’
Read more below.
Ethiopian solutions to Ethiopia’s problems
No more White Man’s Burden in Ethiopia.
No more bleeding heart, two-faced, double-dealing hypocritical liberals pontificating human rights and shedding crocodile tears for the wretched of the earth in Ethiopia!
On April 23, 2021, President Joe Biden announced he is going to appoint a “Special Envoy for the Horn of Africa”, in so many words to save the “half devil, half child” Ethiopians from themselves, to borrow a phrase from Rudyard Kipling, the unabashed apologist of European and American colonialism.
The fact of the matter is that Biden just signed Feltman’s commission.
The whole “special envoy for the Horn of Africa” idea was the brainchild of the GRAND DUCHESS OF DARKNESS SUSAN ELIZABETH RICE.
Rice sought to achieve three clear strategic objectives with Feltman’s appointment:
1) Use Feltman’s appointment as a publicity stunt to give high global relations profile and legitimacy to the terrorist Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) with whom she has been in bed for decades.
2) Use the might, prestige and power of the Office of the President of the United States to arm-twist the Ethiopian Government to negotiate with the terrorist TPLF and swiftly restore them to power, and
3) If all else fails, use Feltman, who is a behind-the-scenes specialist in breaking up countries and plunging them into chaos, to blow up Ethiopia into smithereens.
Jeffrey Feltman is nothing more than Susan Rice’s handmaiden and a TPLF hitman sent with the mission of taking out Ethiopia’s leaders with diplomatic, economic and political sanctions like the world has never seen and render Ethiopia a pariah nation in the world.
Since his appointment of April 23, 2021, Feltman has turned up in Ethiopia like the proverbial bad penny– unwelcome, uninvited, unwanted, unnoticed and unheralded.
I have followed Feltman’s diplomatic capers with amusement and have relished exposing his treacherous mission.
Who is more qualified to lead a peace initiative in the Horn of Africa?
On August 26, 2021, Moussa Faki Mahamat, the Chairperson of the AU Commission appointed former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo as High Representative for the Horn of Africa Region.
Why would the AU appoint a distinguished African elder statesman to do the job of Jefferey Feltman appointed by the President of the U.S. to do the same job?
It is true that Feltman has been chasing his tail for four months around the Horn with nothing to show for it.
It is manifest to the reasonable observer that the AU chair had concluded Feltman’s appointment is an exercise in presidential futility as he has evidently no credibility with the Ethiopian Government and his unabashed partiality to the TPLF is evident in his condemnation of Ethiopia’s sovereignty and depraved indifference to the crimes, domestic terrorism, and insurrection of the TPLF.
The appointment of ex-President Obasanjo as High Commissioner in my view sends a polite but clear message to the Biden administration to butt out of Ethiopia.
Obasanjo’s appointment is the clearest affirmation of basic principles to the U.S., the European Union, and the U.N.:
Enough is enough, Uncle Sam! We got this! Butt out of Ethiopia. Ethiopians with their millennia-long history know how to solve their own problems in their own way. If they need help, their African brothers and sisters are there to help out. Africans can solve their own problems by themselves without the aid of the former colonial masters or others trying to play a dehumanizing game of sanctions-based neocolonialism.
Feltman was appointed by President Biden to save the Horn of Africa from the horns of a dilemma.
Obasanjo is appointed by the African Union to “engage with all relevant political actors and stakeholders in the region towards entrenching durable peace and stability within the Horn of Africa.” Obasanjo was selected for his “deep knowledge of the current situation in the Horn of Africa.”
Feltman’s singular declared mission is to force Ethiopia to “commit to an inclusive dialogue”. That is code for arm-twisting Ethiopia to negotiate and restore the terrorist TPLF to power as the U.S. did in 1991 with Herman Cohen, then Assistant Secretary of State for Africa.
Can Feltman cut the mustard in the Horn of Africa?
The answer is a resounding, “Hell, No!”
Feltman is basically an apparatchik who asks, “How high?” when he is told to jump. Feltman spent his professional life as a pencil pusher and gofer running errands and doing his bosses’ dirty work.
What experience or knowledge does Feltman bring to address the complex issues of the Horn or the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam?
What does Feltman know about Ethiopia, its glorious history, the pride and dignity of the Ethiopian people, their defiance against colonialism and white supremacy?
He does not know diddly squat!
Feltman’s own resume shows the following: Master’s in law and diplomacy and a bachelor’s degree in history and art; visiting Fellow in International Diplomacy in the Foreign Policy program at the Brookings Institution; Under-secretary-general for political affairs at the United Nations in New York (“frequently briefed the Security Council in both public and closed-door sessions on a wide variety of peace and security issues such as terrorism and nuclear proliferation”); Chairperson of the U.N.’s Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force and executive director of the U.N. Counter-Terrorism Center; U.S. foreign service officer for over 26 years, “focusing largely on the Middle East and North Africa”. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs; U.S. ambassador to Lebanon, also served in other diplomatic roles in Erbil and Baghdad, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Tunis, Amman, Budapest, and Port-au-Prince.
What has Feltman done in Sub-Saharan Africa that he is proud of to include in his resume? Nothing!
What are the credentials and experience of former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo’s justifying his appointment as AU High Representative for the Horn of Africa Region?
Obasanjo’s resume shows the following: One of Africa’s distinguished elder statesmen and living legend; 21-year military career including serving in the UN peacekeeping mission in the former Zaire and commanding the 3rd Marine Commando Division during Nigeria’s 30-month Biafran civil war (1967-70); Nigeria’s military ruler following the assassination of General Murtala Muhammad; Presided over democratic elections in Nigeria won by civilian Shehu Shagari; Nigeria’s first military ruler to hand over power to a democratically elected civilian government.
Following Shagari’s ouster from power in a military coup Obasanjo became critical of subsequent military regimes; founded the African Leadership Forum; sought to become UN Secretary-General and came in third.
Political prisoner for allegedly plotting coup against General Sani Abacha and released after Abacha’s death and returned to politics; Won presidential elections with 62 percent of the valid votes cast in 1999; Gained international respect for his efforts to end white minority rule in South Africa and Zimbabwe.; Highly respected for his mediation efforts in Angola, Burundi, Mozambique, Namibia, and South Africa; Appointed in 2008 by the UN Secretary-General to serve as Special Envoy on the Great Lakes region; Led African Union election observer team to Ethiopia in June 2021.
After retirement, he has authored some dozen books on various issues relevant to Nigeria and Africa in general; so, we have two individuals tasked with the same exact mission.
To paraphrase the old western movies, “The Horn ain’t big enough for Obasanjo and Feltman. Mission failed. Feltman gotta hit the road!”
BY ALMARIAM
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SEPTEMBER 7/ 2021
