This week marks the start of a new term for President Barack Hussein Obama. Although I could not get close to the Capitol Hill where the president was publicly sworn in, I had the privilege of visiting Martin Luther King’s memorial to reflect on some of his marvelous speeches. It was exactly fifty years ago that the reverend marched on Washington to speak about his inspired dream of ending racial discrimination. The world witnessed that his vision became true as America showed that it has by and large put racism in history books; for otherwise 12% would not have had a shot at defeating 73% of the population. If Obama’s election in 2008 was wrongly judged as a mere vote against George W. Bush; Obama’s re-election demonstrated that this time men were truly judged by the content of their characters than the color of their skins. If colors mattered then it was blue versus red than black versus white.
Obama’s re-election did not create that much of a buzz around the world as it did when he first took office. This was more evident especially in the eyes of Africans who had seen him as a Messiah. Of course there were too many expectations and hence too much disappointment as he was never going be an African president leading the US but a US president of African origin. Still the disappointment is justified as demonstrated by his lack of attention to African affairs in his first term, and total omission in his debate. His inauguration speech was no different; as no assurances of support for democracy or pressure on dictators were made. This hurts many of us; particularly Oromos in East Africa who are in desperate need of justice and freedom from dictatorial regimes.
This week is also of significant importance for Oromo immigrants dwelling in and around Washington DC as we prepare to march on Washington to protest the inhumane conditions our compatriots are faced with in Ethiopia. We march on Washington to ask that the US puts pressure on Ethiopia to release Oromo political prisoners including an inspiring leader Bekele Gerba, so that he too can speak of his dream to his people in his capital.
As I glance around the room where we spend nights writing slogans and preparing for the rally, I see young Oromo immigrants working with enthusiasm. One cannot easily read the stories behind each face as they sing to songs of freedom and of justice. You’d have to dig deep to find out a woman in her late twenties, whose mother was slain by government militia, a young man who was put in jail three times while he was a student at a university and delayed by several years to graduate and another young man forced to exile after being tortured repeatedly in notorious prison cells of Ethiopia. It goes on. And then I remember my own friend, Gaddisa Hirphasa and another student of same age Alemayehu Gerba who were slain while in prison. It becomes vivid that each young man/woman is motivated not only because of the injustices on compatriots and inspiring leaders but also on close family members and relatives if not on themselves. One finds similar stories if they go to Oromia/Ethiopia and inquires about their sufferings in the hands of brutal cadres. A tale of students expelled from schools, farmers evicted from their land and government workers detained from their work places. We live in a country that discriminates its citizens based on their ethnicity.
The Oromo and other marginalized society of Ethiopia have long been in need of global attention as successive governments have never been kind to them, to put it mildly. When a potential leader emerged then they would be mercilessly executed or put to jail. History repeats itself today as two leaders of Oromo political leaders, Bekele Gerba and Olbana Lelissa, are sentenced to a decade of jail time along with seven others, joining the tens of thousands of Oromo political prisoners.
One would have thought that the greatest democracy on earth should protect democratic rights of millions of people, especially when those people practiced similar democratic governance for centuries albeit of little growth in the last couple of centuries. It had been to the contrary; however, as Ethiopia’s dictatorial regime remained USA’s close ally not only during the war on terror, a term the Ethiopian government conveniently uses to terrorize its own people, but also during Obama’s first term. As we prepare to march on Washington we ask ourselves if Obama’s government is going to keep silent about the injustices in the Eastern African country or stand in the right side of history, as the otherwise inspiring president likes to say. But then we can only hope as did our parents and those who came before them in search of friends to listen to our voices.
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Girma Tadesse, a native of Addis Ababa/Finfinne, is an engineer based in the United States of America and can be reached at girma.tadesse@gmail.com for comments.