There’s something truly ironic about attempts to rewrite history—how they often stumble on the very tools they try to wield. A case in point: a laughable “13th-century map of Abyssinia” now making the rounds. A single glance at its slick, pixel-perfect typography and digitally crisp outlines is enough to raise eyebrows. We are expected to…
Source: From a Presentation by Abiyu Geleta, Oromo Studies Association Conference of 2002 in Washington, DC. I. Introduction This is a brief account of major issues and outcomes of a decade of negotiations between the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) and the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) since 1991. In those negotiations, there were always third…
Date: 28/01/2021Author: Martin Plaut3 Comments The background to this story is told in a BBC report. A group of Ethiopian slaves were freed by a British warship in 1888 off the coast of Yemen, as they were being taken to the slave markets of Arabia. The freed slaves were then taken round the African coast…
By Leenjiso Horo December, 2020 A people without the knowledge of their past history, origin, and culture is like a tree without roots. Marcus Garvey This article is a general summary of the conquest, resistance, and failures, betrayals, and hopes for the future. Along with these, it also points out the lack of political homogeneity…
By Leenjiso Horo, April 2020 The great mass of the people are the foundation of the state. People are the basis of all legitimate political authority…..No sovereignty can come into existence, or continue to exist, unless the people consent to and authorize it. The inherent and inalienable sovereignty of the people is therefore assumed as…
Source: http://roape.net/2020/03/12/the-legacy-of-the-past-on-ethiopias-modern-political-life/ By John Markakis Ethiopian historiography has long featured a claim to exceptionalism based on the country’s many distinctive features: a state whose roots go back to antiquity, a literate culture, the only place in Africa where Christianity survived as a native faith and a surplus producing agricultural economy that sustained a sophisticated class…
Source: https://www.ethiopia-insight.com/2019/12/18/middleman/ Viewpoint Middleman December 18, 2019 by Mebratu Kelecha A prime minister torn between rival camps is increasingly acting in his own interests Viewpoint December 18, 2019 by Mebratu Kelecha On December 10, Ethiopians celebrated an extraordinary moment when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed received the Nobel Peace Prize. It occurred maybe only six months…
First published August 9, 2018 | by Assefa Tefera Dibaba In the past, on another platform (at OSA Conference, July 2016, Washington DC), I put forward three scenarios for the escalating Oromo civil resistance to bring about a systemic change, and not just a reform: a) If it obtains a degree of support from the…
By Adrian Blomfield, AFRICA CORRESPONDENT 30 JUNE 2019 • 7:00AM SOURCE: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/06/30/warnings-africas-yugoslavia-ethiopia-coup-attempt-heightens/ The meeting was meant to have been top-secret. The men gathered inside the room were the most powerful in northern Ethiopia’s Amhara region. The agenda before them was incendiary: the removal of Asamnew Tsige, the regional security chief whose shadowy ambitions had chilled…
June 12, 2019 By Sarah Hinlicky Wilson Source: https://www.sarahhinlickywilson.com/blog/2019/6/12/lutheran-saints-4-onesimos-nesib-and-aster-ganno?fbclid=IwAR3_N5X6tuT2YqO4Tmo_u4zsQt_7UH5ahGV5IyvWHNLbJcds76MCq-Hqsow If you attend a Lutheran church you may have noticed occasionally the unfamiliar name “Onesimos Nesib” among the commemorations of saints. Here’s his story—one that can’t be told without that of his friend and coworker, Aster Ganno. Go to an Ethiopian church in the U.S. today…
By Ibsaa Guutama 05/06/2019 At this point in history restoring the Ethiopian empire is out of question. Negotiation has to start for a New Union based on the will of all nations and nationalities. To decide on their destiny is exclusive right of each of them. Only their independence, federation or confederation could bring peace…
Source: https://oromiatimes.org/2014/01/04/evidence-meneliks-genocide-against-oromo-and-other-nations/ By Falmataa Oromo First Published on Oromia Times 4 Jan 2014 Frank Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn (1990: 24) wrote that ‘No fewer than 80 percent of the Herero and 50 percent of the Nama had… fallen victim to colonial rule’. They indicated that the Herero and Nama were exterminated for opposing German colonial…
By Professor Mohammed Hassen April 25, 2019 Georgia State University This paper attempts to briefly discuss the development of Oromo Nationalism and the continuous multi-faceted attack on Oromo cultural, civic and political organizations. The paper aims to show that the attack on Oromo political and cultural institutions which began during the imperial era, continued through…
By Ibsaa Guutama 10 April 2019 OLF is the first-born Oromo political organization. It was founded to free Oromia from Ethiopian colonialism and establish independent Democratic Republic Oromia. Since then, as Oromo struggle advanced with strength much change has taken place in the empire. Today except for colonial mentality colonial relations are no more what…
8 April 2019 By Leenjiso Horo* Let me begin with the oftentimes told old parable to illustrate the meaning of the Oromo consensus: unity makes strength. The parable runs like this. Once upon a time, there was an old man who was very ill and lay dying in his bed. He had four children who…
8 April 2019 By Ibsaa Guutama It seems we are now in a period like that of Ali Aluulaa, the last Oromo regent/guardian of the Ethiopian throne. He was true to his trusteeship and did not crown himself when Teedros came to disgracefully discarded him. But no one called Teedros “Zaranya” when he chased out…
