It is not by dispersing apart like offspring of a snake do,
Instead, being united we build Oromoia even Ethiopia too,
These touching verses were recited in Afan Oromo (Oromifa language) by a young poet, Leta Qeneni, on the 4th International Oromo Studies Conference held at Jimma University, recently.
The conference was organized jointly By Institute of Oromo Studies (IOS), Jimma University and The Network of Oromo Studies (NOS), United Kingdom (UK) under the grand theme of “Oromia State Formation and Socio-Economic and Political Order in Ethiopia and the Horn.”
Regarding background of the conference, “Book of Abstracts” prepared for the conference, stated, “The great late 19th century carve-up of Africa that laid down the territorial grid that eventually resulted in today’s structure of African states likewise took place in the Horn, but characteristically did so in a way significantly different from that in the rest of the continent, and left behind it a pattern of state formation that differed not only in the internal character of the resulting political units, but in the dynamics of relations between them.
Calpham (2017) takes Ethiopia’s Menelik conquest and empire formation as example for this. He observes that “The result was to create an empire significantly different from the European empires being established in Africa at the same time. Nonetheless, an internal colonialism was in some ways more problematic than an external.”
Destabilized disposition symbolizes the Horn a conflict zone, in most cases internal political conflict. The failure of subsequent regimes of the Horn to halt these political conflicts prompted the subjects to seek self-determination, and a means to this end was the establishment of different liberation fronts and political organizations.
Research papers, which examine the impacts of prolonged political conflicts on social, economic, political and cultural development in the Horn of Africa in general, and Oromia in particular were selected for the conference.
The conference aimed at bringing together leading academics, researchers and other interested to exchange and share their research findings on all aspects of state formation in Oromia, Ethiopia and the Horn; Oromia nationalism, the world ideological and policy challenges and opportunities.
The objectives of the conference were: to examine the trajectories of state formation in the Horn and their impact on the current state of the art; to explore state formation in terms of socio-political conditions in Oromia, Ethiopia and implications for the Horn of Africa and to analyze the consequences of global and regional geopolitical and economic issues for peace and stability in the Horn of Africa among others.
The question prominently addressed along with related others is what initiated the founders of NOS and IOS. The Ethiopian Herald approached the directors of the institutions.
Dr. Gizaw Tasisa, director of Network of Oromo Studies (NOS) said that his organization is not the first one regarding Oromo Studies. There is an organization preceding this one known as Oromo Studies Association (OSA) which was the pioneering to take the initiation. But because of lack of resource and geographical barriers it could not reach the needs of Oromo scholars and people going from America to Europe and Scandinavian countries and coming even to Ethiopia.
Therefore, according to Dr. Gizaw, they are strengthening and augmenting the effort of OSA to cover the places where it could not reach.
The reason why they made their base in London UK was basically there was no conducive condition to establish such kinds of organizations in Ethiopia during the past years. Because of political conditions such institutions were not free. The other reason was that they themselves were in exile so that they tried to address the problems of their people from where they dwell, he said.
Regarding the preconditions to establish the institutions, he said, “The first one was to come together as a string committee or string group and before that we had different advocacy conferences and studies in advance to establishing the Network of Oromo Studies. And then we realized this should be legalized according to the legal conditions of UK. Based on the studies of the country’s legal conditions and the needs of Oromos, now we are legally registered according to the legal framework of the UK.”
They started to generate the idea of forming such institution being three including Dr. Gizaw, discussed on the issue and agreed to multiply their number so that they increased in number gradually and finally they convened a meeting that offered invitation to anyone who was interested to participate.
The Network of Oromo Studies, as to the director is striving to work with any institution wherever it is as they are acting globally. The Institute of Oromo Studies (IOS) which is based at Jimma University is the first institution to work with them. Therefore, they have signed memorandum of understanding last year with IOS on how to work together. As a result, they have conducted conferences jointly and this is not the end so that they are open to work with other institutions.
Oromos are benefited in many ways from the conferences. The first one, as far as his observation and information gathered from different participants is coming together. The other benefits are a sense of working together and the content of the presentations, the papers.
As the theme covers issues in Oromia, Ethiopia as well as the Horn, the papers focused on current issues of all these areas. The participants, thus, include presenters from Sudan, Khartoum University in line with the teams of friend. Therefore, the benefit is not limited to the Oromos.
Rather the people of the region whom the issues concern. Especially the junior students who study in Jimma University are benefited since they are allowed to participate on the conference without any restriction. They are initiated to do researches in the future in the way they are intended to do, he added.
The previous conferences have achieved some goals such as publishing journals and disseminating them and at the same time they have encouraged other Oromo scholars who reside in Scandinavian countries and Europe to make researches and present their findings. The director expects more achievements from the 4th conference too.
He said that this conference is inclusive means it is not only for scholars but political entities have also a chance to participate, to listen what the researchers and their scientific findings say and they can get some kind of knowledge how they can go about a nation building in Oromia, Ethiopia and across the Horn of Africa.
Dr. Teshome Egere, director of Institute of Oromo Studies which is based at Jimma University, for his part, said that the initiation to form the institute is the necessity of one center to gather dispersed Oromo studies from inland and abroad. In addition, to make researches on Oromo culture, philosophy and life style; to conduct conferences and seminars in line with encouraging creativity.
The objective of the 4th conference is to assess state formation processes in Oromia, Ethiopia and the Horn countries. In line with this, the past relations whether positive or negative and their impacts on the community are thoroughly examined to set directives of getting out for the future. In addition, it generates solutions for the formation of better Oromia, Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa states.
Unfortunately, as of the director, the former regimes in Ethiopia used their power politically, economically and socially imbalanced. They favored some groups in this regard and ignored others. Among the victims is largely the Oromo society. Though it owned wide infrastructure, resource and population, it was deprived the power of managing on and using from its resources.
These bad relations pushed some groups to be organized and fight for the benefit of their society. Therefore, the conferences paved way to change these ill mind driven scenarios from bad to good, he said.
Moreover, the conference enabled to bring Oromo scholars together in their country. Some professors who attended the conference have been out of their motherland for more than forty years. Thus, it created opportunities to share their life long experience, he noted.
The Ethiopian Herald August 6/2019
BY BACHA ZEWDIE
