EDITORIAL:

Response to the Press Release issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

On the Annexation of Ethiopian Territory by Sudan

By Tecola W. Hagos

My first impression of the vitriolic official statement of the Government of Ethiopia [Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Statement of Genbot 3, 2000 EC] is the striking guttural quality of the language used by that Ministry. Indeed, Ethiopia is in dire circumstance judging by the form of rhetoric and semantics the Ethiopian Government used to answer back the well founded accusations of several patriotic Ethiopians, individually and in committees, leveled against Meles Zenawi and his Government for their abrogation of the duty to preserve the territorial integrity of Ethiopia and for allowing the annexation of Ethiopian territory by the Sudan. Individuals, including me, could afford to be belligerent in the language being used against any government official; however, governments may not have that type of �symmetry� to use guttural language against any one. The language used in the Press Release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs under discussion is not in acceptable form. The official of a government must act under all circumstances with dignity and decorum. 

At any rate, a simple honest response would have gone a long way in solving the problem the Government of Meles Zenawi has with Patriotic Ethiopians, if only that Government is honest and transparent, and publish the agreement it signed with the Sudan as required by Article 12 (1) cum Article 55 (12) of the 1995 Constitution and submit the agreement to the People Representatives of the House. Rather than engage itself in mud-flinging competition with its critics, Meles�s Government ought to take steps to assure Ethiopian citizens that there is no underhandedness prevailing in this particular case. There is no substitute for transparency�the people of Ethiopia have the right to know what is being negotiated and agreed upon on behalf of all Ethiopians by Meles Zenawi and his Government. Publish! Publish!

There is nothing substantial in the Press Release that would dispel the well-founded accusations and distrust of Ethiopians of the activity of Meles Zenawi and his associates when it comes to the defense and preservation of the Sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ethiopia. Should it come as a surprise to any one that Ethiopians, in general, are suspicious of Meles Zsnawi�s patriotism or the commitment of his ruling party to preserve and safeguard the vital interest of Ethiopia? We need not travel to the edge of the universe in order to find examples or evidences of the treasonous activities of Meles Zenawi and his Government�the humiliating living examples being the independence of Eritrea and the land locking of Ethiopia, not to mention several other treasonous activities�from signing of the 2000 Algiers Agreement to the type of mediocrity in representing Ethiopia�s cause at the Hague in the sham border dispute hearings.  [�Treason,� �traitor,� �treasonous� are all legal terms of serious crimes provided for in the Penal Code of Ethiopia. These are not terms used for insult, but technical terms for identification of a crime or criminals.]

The Government of Meles Zenawi is alleging that it is in the nature of border demarcation negotiations to be discreet or secretive and thereby excusing itself not to publish any of its negotiations and agreements with the Sudan. This may be so in medieval times or in autocratic government structures, where the interest of a despot was perceived as the interest of the state. I challenge our learned officials to point to us a single border agreement in the World that was negotiated in secrecy without any oversight or involvement by parliamentarians or representatives and that has been suddenly sprung out on the people for implementation.  I will stop writing from this day onward criticizing Meles Zenawi or his Government, if there is to be found a single incident in the last fifty years, after the Second World War, where an independent state with a written constitution and separate branches of government had concluded a border demarcation agreement on the secret decision of the executive alone.

I have visited several Ethiopian controlled Websites critical of the Government of Meles Zenawi on the annexation of Ethiopian territory by Sudan. Not a single Website was belligerent in its approach in challenging Meles Zenawi and his Government officials to account for their activities that end up eroded the territorial integrity of Ethiopia. The demand for full disclosure of all negotiations and agreements with the Sudan about border demarcation and delimitations is legitimate and the language used to formulate such accusations acceptable. And Meles Zenawi and/or his associates are not going to wiggle out of their monumental error this time as they successfully did for years out of the Eritrean border debacle that left Ethiopia land locked.

The Press Release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs states that concerned Ethiopian local groups and individuals have been consulted in the Ethiopia-Sudan border areas, which assertion is a blatant lie for the correct procedure would have been to bring up the issue in the Amhara State Council (Article 50), but more so at the Federal House of People�s Representatives (Article 55) that has never been done. This Press Release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs tells us both in form and content more of the illness of the Government of Meles Zenawi than anything else. It illustrates to us the very reason why Ethiopia has the form of irresponsible and treasonous government and leaders pretending to be leaders of the whole of Ethiopia, who violate the constitutional provisions at every turn. They are either incompetent ignoramus thugs or deviously treacherous individuals who do know the treason they are committing in order to promote their own ambitious hunger for power at the cost of the vital interest of the nation as a whole.

Furthermore, the Press Release from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has alleged that the Government of Meles Zenawi is simply concluding what was laid out by previous Ethiopian leaders as part of a lengthy negotiation with the Government of the Sudan, especially pointing out the treaty of 1972 entered during the Government of Emperor Haile Selassie. This is an absolute lie, for Emperor Haile Selassie did not enter any such dishonorable and treasonous treaty to cede over thirty thousand square kilometers of fertile and productive Ethiopian territory to the Sudan. As far as I know, from my experience of 1975-76 as a junior level lawyer working at that Ministry in the Legal Department with responsibility for international treaties, there was no such draft or final treaty ceding of any sort of Ethiopian territory to the Sudan. Meles Zenawi and members of his Government are solely responsible for present illegal act of ceding Ethiopian territory to the Sudan, an illegal and treasonous criminal act for which they should be arrested.   

Let me point out the obvious acute need for a clear understanding of the magnitude of the harm that has been committed against Ethiopia by Meles Zenawi and associates due to the formation of the Federal State structure. I have stated in several articles that the Federal Structure of the State of Ethiopia under the 1995 Constitution is divisive, and would weaken and ultimately break up along ethnic lines the Ethiopian State. The ongoing crisis of annexation of Ethiopian territory of millions of acres of productive land is a good example of that phenomenon of loose relationship between the ethnic based several States and the whole of Ethiopia as a unite. Rather than considering the State of Ethiopia as a shared entity whereas its nationals have a sense of ownership of every inch of Ethiopia, Ethiopians are now pushed into a state of mind that have only a very limited attachment to Ethiopia as a whole, but only to ethnic regions or States.

Along with very many Ethiopians (I believe to be supported by many), I demand that all material pertaining to the negotiation and agreement with the Government of Sudan be officially submitted to the House of Representatives and be published in both Government and private media immediately without any delay. All copies of alleged agreements entered by the Ethiopian government at various times since the time of Emperor Menilik II (1902) to the last one of Emperor Haile Selassie I of 1972 with the various foreign Governments on the subject of the border between Ethiopia and the Sudan, be available for publication and distribution through Ethiopian Government controlled media and private publishers. I demand also that no annexation of territory under Ethiopian ownership be ceded to the Sudanese Government before a formal, open, and vigorously negotiated agreement is entered between the Ethiopian People and the People of the Sudan. God Bless Ethiopia!

Tecola W. Hagos

Washington DC

May 14, 2008