Wait a minute…what is this talk about another HR something floating in ‘the usual place’ aimed at, yet again, on tightening the grip on Ethiopia’s throat? Sad! Once again it seems that when the name Ethiopia comes it’s business as usual in some circles; business being somehow trying to chop down the very pillars which hold up this ancient country; business being to ram so-called ‘conditions’ down our throat even at the danger of choking us! “Go home draft one ‘punishing’ bill or another, toss it towards some committee and voila! Mission accomplished.” Look, I’m just another ‘guy in the street;’ but when it comes to trying to put some reasonable logic behind efforts being made to once again wield the sledgehammer, two plus two just doesn’t add up as it should for me. Questions, more questions! “Where is the logic in all this?” isn’t that what many of us are saying.
When it seems there are things being rolled out to seek peaceful solution, you just don’t come out with guns blazing! (Like the group designated as a terrorist one by the House of Peoples’ Representatives is doing now in the Afar region!) The idea of ‘forcing’ peace on one side or another is the crudest sort of politics which wouldn’t take any one across bridges.
The HR thing isn’t only untimely but also forces into asking, “What do those behind the bill want from us?” “What are they REALLY trying to do to us?” These days with so many channels of information available connecting the dots might not always be quantum-something these days.
Peace! Come on! No one, absolutely no one, craves for peace more than Ethiopians do; No one! So it pains us to hear others trying to lecture us about so-called ‘moral high grounds.’ Any bill, if it honestly is meant to address the situation in the right way it should be and bring to an end the suffering of hundreds of thousands impartiality should be its DNA.
It cannot put the blame where it shouldn’t be while no mention of the real culprits is made. Any bill should have focused more on the reconstruction and about how to try to support the country’s economy and infrastructure which have been dealt heavy blows. That, ladies and gentlemen isn’t about political camaraderie or anything like that.
It’s about humanity. Period! It should have been how to rehabilitate the hundreds of thousands innocents who have been displaced from their homes. “Cut them to their sizes!” That seems to be the rallying call.
I personally couldn’t help thinking whether part of the reason is that Ethiopian Americans used their ballots to express their dissatisfaction of how the ‘democrats’ were treating the Ethiopian situation. It’s said they’re determined to continue doing so in the midterm elections.
Are the authors of the hill maybe trying to send the message “See, who calls the shots here! Behave, or else!” ‘Behave’ meaning give us your votes lest we bring much more suffering to your land and your people. So, what’s next? When, oh when, will the thirst of some souls for causing suffering to people who have done them absolutely no harm, be quenched? If we had the chance we’d have asked, “How does it feel sitting for a sumptuous dinner at home when you know your acts have wiped clean the dinner tables of hundreds of thousands and even millions?” “How does it feel that due to your irresponsible, ill-informed and, don’t pardon me for saying this, inhumane actions, a mother is unable to feed her kids, kids who already are as badly malnourished as bad could be?” The strange thing is while they lack the basic tenets of humanity of not thinking ill of your fellow man; they try to lecture you of moral standards.
Moral standards? What kind of moral standards! You can’t help torturing your mind with questions like, “What have we really done to them for them to be so determined to throw to the alligators which comes in the form of sanctions or whatever?” But these things aren’t about rights and wrongs.
Maybe some prophet might have told them “Your only way to salvation is by imposing the strictest sanctions on the weak.” By throwing such ‘bills’ at us they might not fully cut the ground from under our feet.
They might not be able to leave us suspended in the thin air with hurricane something just around the corner; but they sure might shake the ground! “If lies are repeated often enough, they become part of the common parlance.” That’s what the Gobbles model is.
Gobbles might be material ‘to be excavated’ in the next life time or another. But his ‘model’ sure is alive and kicking. Just look at the months of barrage from the so-called international media against us. I mean, come on even the sci-fi authors couldn’t have managed such brazen ‘creativity!’” Many Ethiopians at home and abroad were somewhat taken aback at hearing someone has written another bill filled with another round of uninformed, unanalyzed, and sorry for saying this but, inhumane conditions.
It might be good for those who base their actions to bring the smiles to the faces of those so-called lobbyists who thrive on destruction and not construction of the weak. There is no confusion as to on which side their bread is buttered; and the bills seem be meant to keep that side of the bread always buttered. Look, it might not be next month, next year or anytime soon.
But when truth comes knocking and starts flexing its muscles, it is astounding to even imagine how many of us would be dragged screaming and kicking all the way to the deepest well of shame; shame at causing suffering to those whose only crime, as there are those who take being poor as yet ‘uncategorized’ crime.
Though they aren’t put in as many words the verdict, according to the actions being taken, is, “You’re poor: therefore you don’t deserve equal treatment or sympathy Wading into tricky, and probably treacherous, waters, wouldn’t you say? As of recent times, as arrogance and greed-driven prejudice break open camouflaged intentions and the world comes to see the real unadulterated picture there are powerful forces who want, and are determined, to keep us poor; to make sure the begging bowl will always be in our hands; to make sure that what we these days call, ‘wheat politics’ stays the rule and not the exception. That’s pretty much the picture.
Ephrem Endale
Contributer
The Ethiopian Herald 20 February 2022