Watching American Diplocrisy at the African
Union
I enjoy watching American diplomats
chilling out and kicking it with African dictators. I like seeing them
kumbaya-ing, back-patting and carrying on. Their body language, more than
their forked diplomatic tongue, speaks more honestly and eloquently. I
have learned to take their words with a grain of salt and a dash of pepper.
(Is it true that a diplomat is an honest gentleman (woman) sent to lie
abroad for the good of their country?)
Not to be misunderstood, I get a kick listening to
American diplocrats (practitioners of human rights diplomacy by hypocrisy)
pontificating about human rights. I enjoy listening to them talk as much as I
like reading Lewis Carroll’s poem “The Jabberwocky”. The diplocrats say,
“We will work diligently with Ethiopia to ensure that strengthened democratic
institutions and open political dialogue become a reality for the Ethiopian
people… We will work for the release of jailed scholars, activists, and
opposition party leaders… History is on the side of brave Africans...” These
words, like “The Jabberwocky”, are nonsense; but I enjoy fairy tales, like
Alice in Wonderland. (If history is on the side of a few brave Africans, what
is on the side of the millions of frightened Africans? Just curious.)
After
listening to U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry at a press conference during
the Golden Jubilee of the Organization of African Unity/African Union (OAU/AU)
Summit (a/k/a “African Dictators’ Club”) in Addis Ababa last week, I have concluded it is preferable to watch American
diplocrats than listening to them. Kerry made a number of statements at that
press conference which were not only disconcerting but also appalling. (I was
tempted to plug my ears, but didn't have the darn things handy.) Kerry
glibly remarked,
With respect to
the economic growth, we [U.S.] would love to have Ethiopia’s economic growth.
Ethiopia’s one of the ten fastest growing countries in the world. It’s up
in the double digits in growth. It’s really quite an extraordinary story.
To paraphrase William F. Buckley, I
do not want to insult Kerry’s intelligence by suggesting that he really
believes what he said about Ethiopia’s economic growth
and "extraordinary story". I am just not sure he
meant what he said. Actually, I am totally confused. Was he being artfully
glib, patronizingly humorous, graciously disingenuous or congenially
accommodating in his hyperbole? Could he be so woefully uninformed or willfully
ignorant about Ethiopia? Could he
be engaging in barefaced diplomatic mendacity?
If he really believes the canard, it is shocking because it
shows a reckless disregard for elementary facts bordering on
gullibility. If it is an attempt at humor, it is pretty
lame. If he is being disingenuous, no one is amused. If he said it
to patronize his hosts, he does great disservice to U.S. foreign policy by
lending the credibility of his high office to legitimize a manifest and
notorious fraud.
A fact
check by the Associated Press reporter Bradley Klapper following Kerry’s press
conference showed a disturbing pattern of
loosey-gooseyness with the facts. Kerry seemed to be sleepwalking facts.
Klapper cites numerous instances of factual lapses at the press conference in
which “Kerry exaggerated the U.S. record on climate change, appeared to
conflate past U.S. policy on drones with President Barack Obama's new policy
and gave an incomplete account of how he opposed the Iraq war (and how) he
struggled with economic data as well as the contents of his own department's terrorism
blacklist.” Klapper gave a big smack down to Kerry’s assertion that
“Ethiopia is up in the double digits in growth.” According to Klapper: “THE
FACTS: Ethiopia's economic growth was 7 percent last year, following several
other years of growth in the mid to high single digits.”
American Diplocrisy by Kerry-speak?
Let me say at the outset that I have no intention of “swiftboating” Kerry. I am not criticizing him
because he was waltzing with the dictators in Ethiopia on the marbled floors of
the African Union Hall. I appreciate the need for diplomatic decorum.
Diplomatic language must be used with delicacy. I also bear no malice towards
Kerry. I supported and voted for him in the 2004 presidential election. Though
I fiercely opposed Susan Rice's potential nomination to become Secretary
of State earlier this year (soon to be National Security Advisor), I
raised no objection when Kerry’s name was submitted for Senate confirmation. I
was not overly concerned about his foreign policy credentials since he was
chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. I followed his confirmation
hearing closely.
I am, however, concerned about Kerry’s “factamnesia” (to
coin a new word to describe the selective recollection of fantasy facts
intentionally or to unwittingly paint a rosy picture of thorny policy issues
and problems), loosey-gooseyness with facts in general and a penchant for
“doublethink” and “doublespeak” (kerryspeak) on important issues. Kerry has a
history of fudging facts which troubles me in light of his statements at the AU
press conference. For instance, in October 2002, Senator Kerry said he voted to
give President Bush authority to use force against Saddam Hussein because he
“believed that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is
a real and grave threat to our security.” In February 2003, he said, “If
you don’t believe...Saddam Hussein is a threat with nuclear weapons, then you
shouldn’t vote for me.” (I did not believe Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass
destruction but voted for Kerry anyway.) In March 2004, Kerry said “I
actually did vote for the $87 billion [for Iraq war] before I voted against it.
…” (Should I say I actually did vote for Kerry before experiencing pangs of
remorse for voting for him?) In September 2004, Kerry branded the Iraq war,
“the wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time”.
What
really concerns me about Kerry as America’s diplomat-in-chief particularly in
the human rights area is the same concern many of those closest to him
had during the 2004 presidential election. Kerry has a penchant for
being namby pamby on critical policy issues. During
the second presidential debate in 2004, Kerry was asked by ABC news moderator Charles
Gibson, “Senator Kerry, after talking with
several co-workers and family and friends, I asked the ones who said they were
not voting for you, “Why?” They said that you were too
wishy-washy. Do you have a reply for them?” (I voted for Kerry despite
the same misgivings.) Now that Kerry is America’s chief diplomat, I am worried
about what a “wishy washy” Secretary of State could mean for African human
rights.
Kerry-talking the myth of double-digit growth in Ethiopia
Benjamin
Disraeli, the Nineteenth Century British politician, is reputed to have said,
“There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” The late
Meles Zenawi said it even better. In
March 2010, Meles condemned and ridiculed the U.S. State Department’s “Reports
on Human Rights Practices” on Ethiopia as “lies, lies and implausible lies.” He said the U.S. State
Department could not tell a crooked lie straight: “The least one could expect
from this report, even if there are lies is that they would be plausible ones,”
snarled Zenawi. “But that is not the case. It is very easy to ridicule it [human
rights report], because it is so full of loopholes. They could very easily have
closed the loopholes and still continued to lie.”
I am not suggesting that Kerry follow Meles' prescription to
“easily close the loopholes and continue to lie” about Ethiopia's “extraordinary
story”. (It is a boldfaced lie to say the Reports on Human Rights Practices in
Ethiopia are “lies, lies and implausible lies”.) Kerry is an honorable man and incapable of
such chicanery.
Meles was a master of mendacity. He had perfected the art of
lying. He had incomparable skills in creating “loopholes” in the truth and
transforming lies into half- truths. Double-digit growth is the greatest “lie,
lie and implausible lie” ever created by Meles while he remained in the saddle
of power for over two decades. In a
spectacular public relations coup, Meles managed to insert a bogus narrative of
Ethiopia’s stratospheric economic growth in the international media and
policy circles which continues to be repeated ad nauseam
today by some of the most respectable news organizations and magazines in
the world, and top policy makers like Kerry who should know better. I realize
that talk of double-digit economic growth statistics for Africa in general is
part of the “Afro-optimism” (a/k/a African Renaissance) Western media, donor
and loaner communities are trying to push to influence Africans and world
opinion. By reporting double-digit growth
rates, they hope to mask the cataclysmic income inequalities and poverty in
Africa. They are trying to make dictatorial rule acceptable and chic in Africa
in the name of economic growth and development. (Remember the hype about the
“new breed of African leaders”? Or was it “new breed of African dictators”?)
The
fact of the matter is that many in the Western media, donors, loaners and
diplomats know that the self-serving inflated double-digit statistics of
economic growth in Ethiopia are pure fabrications generated from cooked books.
For instance, in 2010, Meles
Zenawi forecasted an 11 percent growth in 2011 and sanguinely opined that a
14.9 percent economic growth for Ethiopia over the next five years is “not
unimaginable”. In 2011, the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) artfully disagreed concluding, “Strong growth [in
Ethiopia] has continued in 2010/11 that the mission estimates at 7.5 percent
(compared to an official estimate of 11.4 percent)…. The mission sees
lower growth for 2011/12, at about 6 percent, on account of high inflation,
restrictions on private bank lending, and a more difficult business environment
(parentheses original).” The World Bank similarly concluded that year “Ethiopia’s
dependence on foreign capital to finance budget deficits and a five-year
investment plan is unsustainable…” On
June 9, 2011, deputy prime minister Hailemariam Desalegn, offered firm assurances that “economic expansion won’t
drop below 9 percent in the fiscal year to July 7, 2012, from 11.4 percent this
year.” For 2012, the IMF registered economic growth for
Ethiopia at 5.0 percent, and for 2013 its projection is 5.5 percent. For 2017,
the IMF estimates 6.5 percent economic growth for Ethiopia (see p. 197 at this
link). Simply
stated, the claim about double-digit economic growth in Ethiopia is not only
preposterous and a colossal insult to our intelligence, it is also a BIG BIG
LIE!
Repeating
BIG LIES
Joseph Goebbels taught, “If you tell a lie big enough and
keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be
maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the
political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes
vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent,
for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth
is the greatest enemy of the State.” The BIG LIE about Ethiopia’s
stratospheric economic growth continues to be repeated through a silent
conspiracy of mendacity and/or the willful ignorance of high level policy
makers in the donor and loaner communities and in the Western media. (I
wish they would stop insulting our intelligence and treating us as “fools and
idiots.)
Despite
the irrefutable facts, the BIG LIE about Ethiopia's “extraordinary story” has
taken on a life of its own. It continues to be repeated mindlessly in the media
and policy circles like some mystical mantra: “Ethiopia’s one of the ten fastest growing countries in the
world… double digits in growth….” Meles managed to hoodwink
everybody, almost. Even the mighty Economist Magazine fell for Meles’ elaborate
hoax. In its November 7, 2006 editorial, The
Economist minced no words in describing the Meles regime. Editorializing in the
context of the Starbucks coffee row, The Economist bluntly stated: “The Ethiopian government, one of the most economically
illiterate in the modern world, would do well to take Starbucks’s
advice.” In
May 2012, The Economist wrote, “Long
benighted, Ethiopia is attracting attention for a better reason. It has become
Africa's fastest-growing non-energy economy (see chart).” The “chart”
drawn up by the Economist attributes its data source to the “IMF” which gets
its data from the regime in Ethiopia! In its ebullient
appraisal, the Economist fails to explain how the regime it described in 2006
as “the most economically illiterate regime in the modern world” was able
to create “Africa’s fastest non-energy economy” in just six years! (Do they really think we are so dumb that we could not
figure this out?!)
The
“economic illiteracy” of the Ethiopian regime was also the talk of diplomats
behind closed doors in 2009. At a high level meeting of Western donor policy
makers in Berlin, there was debate about Meles’ economic knowledge and
competence. According to a Wikileaks cablegram, a German diplomat suggested
that Ethiopia’s economic woes could be traced to “Meles’
poor understanding of economics”.
How such an “economically illiterate” regime
pulled off the economic miracle of Africa is a mystery worthy of a Dan Brown
novel. (How about the title, “Economic Illiterates and the Mystery of
Double-Digit Growth”?)
I
have made several attempts over the past few years to expose, debunk,
deconstruct and unpack this pack of “lies, lie and implausible lies” about “Ethiopia's
extraordinary story”. In my commentary “The Voodoo Economics of
Meles Zenawi”, I exposed the double-digit canard
and demonstrated how Meles exquisitely finessed it:
In March 2009, for instance, Zenawi bragged that he expected
the Ethiopian economy to grow by 12.8 per cent. The International Monetary Fund
(IMF) disagreed in the same month, stating that given the global economic
crisis Ethiopia could expect only about 6 per cent economic growth. Zenawi
dismissively countered those who pointed out the discrepancies: ‘We have
differences with the international financial institutions when we predict our
economic growth, but we usually agree on the economic
growth statistics at the end of each year.’ In March 2010, Paul Mathieu, the
IMF team leader for Ethiopia, diplomatically told the regime in Ethiopia to
stop cooking the books on economic growth. He said, ‘Statistics collection of
the country requires transformations, and we advised the government to do
that.’
In
my commentary, “The
Fakeonomics of Meles Zenawi”, I demonstrated that Meles’
economic planning (“Growth and Transformation Plan”) was based on juggled
figures, massaged statistics and irrational exuberance about overrated and
illusory economic development. Systematic
falsification of economic data, fraudulent statistics and creative accounting
in economic reports by the Meles regime have largely gone unchallenged by
Ethiopia’s learned economists. (I still lament the fact that there has been
little systematic analysis and critique done by Diaspora Ethiopian economists
to entomb this cock and bull economic narrative and discredit the
regime's theatrical swagger and wind-bagging about stratospheric economic
growth and development.)
Meles cunningly orchestrated his message of Ethiopia's economic
prowess and unrivalled economic success under his personal leadership to the
world using the International Monetary Fund as a mule. For instance, the
IMF’s
Country Report (Ethiopia) No. 08/264 (July 2008) states: “Growth has averaged 11 percent since 2003/04, far
exceeding the minimum target of 7 percent in the Program for Accelerated and
Sustainable Development (PASDEP), that is estimated to be consistent with
keeping the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) within reach.” On pp.
20–24 of this report, the source of the data for an 11 per cent growth is not
some independent data collection and analysis agency or organization but Meles'
own Central Statistics Office. The footnotes in the above-referenced
pages state: “Sources: Ethiopian authorities; and IMF staff estimates and
projections.” Similarly, the data source for “Financial Soundness
Indicators for Banking” is identified as the “National Bank of Ethiopia; and
IMF calculations.”
Does
Kerry care about facts?
I
am really perplexed. When Kerry talks about Ethiopia
as “one of the ten fastest growing countries in the world” with “double digit
growth” and swoons at its “extraordinary story”, is he also aware of the dark
side of that “extraordinary story”? For instance, is Kerry aware that in 2010,
the Oxford
Human Development Index ranked Ethiopia as second poorest country on the
planet? Is
he aware that in 2011, Global
Financial Integrity reported,“
Ethiopia lost $11.7 billion to outflows of ill-gotten gains between 2000 and
2009” and “in 2009, illicit money leaving the country totaled $3.26
billion.” Is Kerry aware Ethiopia
is Africa’s largest recipient of foreign aid?
A report issued by the Ethiopian “Ministry of Finance and Economic Development”
in January 2012 showed the country shouldered crushing foreign debt in excess
of USD$ 16 billion. Is he aware of this fact in his role as the raconteur of
Ethiopia’s “extraordinary story”? Is Kerry aware every single year tens of
millions of Ethiopians receive emergency food aid or face starvation and
famine? Is Kerry aware that the Inspector General
of his State Department concluded in 2010 that there is no way to determine the scope of fraud,
waste and abuse of American aid tax dollars in Ethiopia? Is Kerry aware
that in 2013, the World Bank released its 448-page report entitled “Diagnosing
Corruption in Ethiopia” documenting
corruption of epic proportions?
It is true that “everyone is entitled to his/her own
opinion, but not to his/her own facts.” A high level policy maker like
Kerry is entitled to his opinion but he is not entitled to cherry pick facts
and embellish them with hyperbole in making official statements that are
reasonably likely to mislead the American people. He is not entitled to distort
facts to present only one side of a foreign policy issue or paint a rosy
picture for Africa's most corrupt leaders without talking about the thorns on
that rosy story. Kerry is not entitled to put out to the American people
half-truths, discredited hyperboles and tall tales to defend a collaborating
dictatorship. Kerry is not entitled to propagate and perpetuate a BIG LIE, a
manifest hoax, misinformation and disinformation to humanize the inhuman face
of a bloodthirsty regime in Ethiopia from his exalted bully pulpit.
Does Kerry really care about U.S. human rights in Ethiopia,
Africa?
I am also bewildered by Kerry’s exuberance and morbid
fascination with Ethiopia’s “extraordinary story”. He says the U.S. “would love
to have Ethiopia’s economic growth.” Really?
Ethiopia
“achieved” its stratospheric economic growth following the
"China Model", NOT the “Washington Consensus [neoliberal] Model”
(which demands fiscal discipline (limiting budget deficits), increasing foreign
direct investments, privatization, deregulation, diminished role for the
state”). If the “China Model” produced an “extraordinary story” in
Ethiopia, it is because that story was written by a brutal one-party system
that has a chokehold on all state institutions including the civil service and
the armed and security forces and rules by instituting a vast system of
controls and censorship. Meles, the arch foe of “neoliberalism” in Africa
said "neoliberalism" is a death trap for Ethiopia and the continent.
In a 2012 article, Meles declared “the
neo-liberal paradigm is a dead end incapable of bringing about the African
renaissance, and that a fundamental shift in paradigm is required to effect a
revival.” In a 51-page
monograph, he expounded on his argument for
the consignment of the “neoliberal paradigm” to the dustbin of history
and its replacement by the economics of the “developmental state” (“China
Model”).
When Kerry wistfully yearns for Ethiopia’s double-digit
growth, is he openly advocating the importation of the “China Model” into
America?
Given Ethiopia’s “extraordinary story”, is Kerry
openly endorsing the “China Model” for Ethiopia and the rest of Africa to
produce even more “extraordinary stories”?
The fact of the matter is that the “China Model” in Africa
is a demonstration not of the success of African economies but China’s economic
conquest of Africa and the triumph of praetorian klepto-capitalism -- a
form of militarized capitalism in which African dictators and their cronies
maintain a stranglehold on the state apparatus and have privatized the economy
for their personal use. The dictators in Ethiopia, Uganda, Rwanda, Zimbabwe,
Equatorial Guinea, etc. rule by coercion and their coercive power derives
almost exclusively from their control and manipulation of the military, police
and security forces, party apparatuses and bloated bureaucracies which they use
for political patronage. They have successfully eliminated rival political
parties, civil society institutions and the independent press.
The “China Model” or the “developmental state” has become
the ultimate smokescreen for African Dictators, Inc. It has provided a
plausible justification for circumventing transparent and accountable
governance, competitive, free and fair elections and suppression of free speech
and the press. Simply stated, the “China Model” in Africa is a huge hoax perpetrated
on the people with the aim of imposing absolute control and exacting total
political obedience while justifying brutal suppression of all dissent and
maximizing the ruling class' kleptocratic monopoly over the economy.
In my opinion, it is downright unpatriotic for Kerry to confer any
legitimacy on a watered-down, kinder and gentler reinvention of
klepto-communism in Ethiopia.
There is another issue Kerry seems to have intentionally or
unwittingly overlooked. The “China Model’s” viability is currently undergoing
an acid test. The heavy infrastructure investment and export-led
growth model at the heart of China’s “economic miracle” is now showing serious
cracks as that sector suffers from chronic overcapacity. This is particularly evident
in the housing boom which has contributed significantly to China’s high GDP
statistics. Soaring housing prices and high vacancy rates have created multiple
massive ghost towns. Ordos, China is one such model city built under the “China
Model”. Ordos was designed to house,
support and entertain 1 million people, yet five years later hardly anyone
lives there. China’s “first quarter 7.7 percent rise (for
2013) in gross domestic product is even lower than the 7.8 percent rate for all
of last year (which in turn, was China’s slowest growth in 13 years.)” China's economy keeps on chugging “because of
huge increases in lending by state-controlled banks and a surge in off-balance
sheet lending.”
Ethiopia is touting stratospheric economic growth driven by
exports (including land giveaways to multinational agro-businesses) and
sustained by handouts and crushing debt loans to finance infrastructure
projects and build shiny buildings in urban areas that lack the most basic
sewage facilities. Does Kerry really believe Ethiopia could continue with
its “extraordinary story” by having state-controlled banks printing money? Not
long ago, in Zimbabwe, China’s “biggest and arguably most important trade and
diplomatic partner in Africa”, a USD$5 bill was worth a 100 trillion Zimbabwean dollars. Does Kerry
believe such reckless economic planning is sustainable for Ethiopia which
is expected to treble its population to 278 million in less than 40 years
according to U.S. Census estimates?
Whatever happened to President Obama’s “New Alliance”?
In
May 2012, President Obama invited the leaders of Ghana, Tanzania, Benin to a
Summit for a New
Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition to spark a Green Revolution and achieve “sustained and
inclusive agricultural growth and raise 50 million people out of poverty over
the next 10 years by aligning the commitments of Africa’s leadership to drive
effective country plans and policies for food security.” American
multinational giants including Cargill, Dupont, Monsanto, Kraft, and
others signed a “Private Sector Declaration of Support for African Agricultural
Development”. Kerry did not even mention a word about it. Is the “New
Alliance” dead like “neoliberalism”?
I
agree with President Obama that what Africans need are policies that balance
economic growth with human needs including food security and nutrition,
reasonable access to health care and education and employment opportunities.
But Africans can’t eat policies on paper nor could they have a Green Revolution
when their most fertile lands are being sold and leased to multinational
corporations who will commercially farm millions of hectares only to export the
harvest. Africans will starve as their land is used to produce food for the
rest of the world and the U.S. continues to provide food aid to Africans
year after year. When will Africa ever become self-sufficient in food
production? (When America stops feeding them?) Just a historical footnote: Africans
fed themselves on their own and without handouts during the worst days of
colonialism. (Ummm!)
I do not think President Obama and Secretary of State
Kerry are on the same page on African issues. President Obama said Green
Revolution first. Kerry said in his press conference that “our private sector
businesses need to focus on Ethiopia and recognize the opportunities that are
here.” Is it going to be a Green Revolution or a Trade Revolution? I believe
expecting to “strengthen the trade and investment relationships between the
U.S. and Ethiopia” under the “China Model” is like trying to fit a square peg
in a round hole.
Skerry U.S. human rights policy in Africa
The next four years for human rights in Africa under Kerry
look pretty scary to me. At the AU Summit, I hoped to hear an announcement or a
statement from Kerry that points to some meaningful shift in U.S. human rights
policy in Ethiopia. I expected to hear a little bit of the usual babble about
“history is on the side of brave Africans.” Nothing doing. Under Kerry, it
seems human rights in Ethiopia and Africa have been sacrificed at the altar of
political convenience and the “global war on terror.” That is why Kerry is
downplaying and soft-pedaling human rights in Ethiopia. It is
manifest to me that the U.S. is willing to turn a blind eye, deaf ears and
muted lips to restrictions on civil society, theft of elections, repression of
dissent and opposition politics, suppression of free expression, press and the
Internet and the blossoming of corruption in Ethiopia.
To borrow a line from Alexander Pope’s verse, “Hope springs
eternal in the human breast”. I hoped Kerry would make a strong case for the
immediate and unconditional release of all wrongfully imprisoned human rights
defenders, journalists, political opponents in Ethiopia. I hoped Kerry would
demand an end to ill-treatment and abuse of dissidents, opposition leaders and
journalists. I hoped Kerry would plead for an end to the crackdown on civil
society organizations and press for the free functioning of domestic and
international human rights organizations to operate in the country without
undue official interference. I hoped Kerry would insist on an end to
suppression of media, harassment of journalists and strongly argue in favor of allowing
publication of opposition newspapers in Ethiopia. (Oh, yes! I had faint hope
Kerry would call attention to the need for the arrest and prosecution of
the police and security officers who massacred 193 unarmed demonstrators and
wounded 763 others in 2005.)
I
am not just hoping naively or pipe dreaming. I am just taking Kerry and
President Obama at their words. In September 2008, candidates Obama and Joe
Biden promised to “work for the release of
jailed scholars, activists, and opposition party leaders such as Ayman Nour in
Egypt.” On
January 24, 2013 during his confirmation hearing Kerry said,
… I've occasionally wrestled with that when I made a visit
to one country or another and we have a primary objective and we're trying to
get it done, but I've never hesitated in any visit to raise human
rights concerns, usually in the context of particular individuals
where we are trying to get them out of a jail or trying to get them, you know,
out of the country. And I obviously will continue to do that, as I
know Secretary Clinton has. And she's been diligent about it. And I intend to
continue…
Secretary Kerry, I ask you a simple question:
When you visited
Ethiopia last week, did you “work for the release of jailed scholars,
activists, and opposition party leaders such as” Eskinder Nega, Reeyot Alemu,
Woubshet Taye, Aragie, Olbana Lelisa, Bekele Gerba, Abubekar Ahmed,
Ahmedin Jebel, Ahmed Mustafa, Kamil Shemsu and so many others?
Professor Alemayehu G. Mariam teaches political science at
California State University, San Bernardino and is a practicing defense
lawyer.
Previous commentaries by the author are available at:
http://open.salon.com/blog/almariam/
www.huffingtonpost.com/alemayehu-g-mariam/
Amharic translations of recent commentaries by the author
may be found at:
http://www.ecadforum.com/Amharic/archives/category/al-mariam-amharic
http://ethioforum.org/?cat=24
