Ethiopia Issues

By Charlie Freund

Politics:

Ethiopia’s political state has become more peaceful and ordered by far than before. Now that the four years of brutal dictatorship of Mengistu Haile Mariam has been stopped, justice is being served and a democratic system is becoming settled in. Unfortunately, it appears the new government has it’s harsher sides as well. With the trial of 73 of the top ranking members of the old government, some are having concerns on underlying agendas in bringing more than justice on these militarian’s heads. These persecutions are being perceived more as a way to gain political favor of foreign countries and show off a bit. Also, these trials are diverting the attention from human rights abuses caused by the first president, Meles Zenawi. Even though it may seem like the right thing to do to punish these war criminals, but most other times this happened in other countries, the criminals got away easily. In Ethiopia however, even those that are absent from the court are still being charged. The question comes to is this justice, or possibly vengeance or a ploy?

With a new government, called the Transitional Government of Ethiopia or TGE, there came a time for elections. In 1994, the voters unanimously chose Meles Zenawi of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) over hundreds of other candidates. The EPRDF was a main group in the stopping of Mariam. Of course, this election result was pretty much expected because the EPRDF and Zenawi had pretty much been running the TGE up until then anyway. The EPRDF is basically a collection of ethnic organizations lead by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which joined the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front in 91 to overthrow Mengistu Mariam. The main political opponent to the EPRDF is the Amharas, who had ruled before Mengistu lost power. They had a tough time winning due to their boycotts on polls in June that they brought on because of a change in the constitution that upset them. This adjustment allowed parts of Ethiopia to secede at will. This put the Amharas behind the EPRDF.

Stability of the new political structure is far from easy in Ethiopia. The country is made of almost 80 different ethnic groups and the people speak over 300 different languages. The country is divided into 9 states that are each very ethnically distinct. And, with the freedom for any part of Ethiopia to secede, there can be a quick movement to split which could shatter the Transitional Government of Ethiopia. But, the people of Ethiopia are not as tense with different ethnic groups as other countries are, and they get along much better than other foreign countries too.

Since the end of Ethiopia’s civil war in 1991, violence has died down to a normal level. Most major occurrences over the past year have dealt with accidental mine explosions. In two recent cases, military troops had left the mines to prevent bandits from using a certain road. However, they forgot to pick up their toys when they were done, when it was “found” by a random person driving down that road. There were no deaths, only major injuries.

Economic:

Ethiopia’s economy, or what there is of it, profits mostly from agriculture. Coffee has always been the main and most profitable crop and the primary export. Problems arose when under Mariam’s dictatorship, coffee bean prices dropped, bringing more hardship on the troubled country.

Economic conditions in Ethiopia have become very poor. This is partially due to the civil war years ago. During this war, the government lead by Mariam resorted to using famine against his opponents. Crops were burned and destroyed. This lead to hundreds of thousands deaths and left many stricken and in a miserable situation economic-wise. Also, a awful drought in 1993 and 94 brought greater hardships. This drought was said to have been the worst since the 1984 drought. This also brought starvation and hardships to Ethiopians.

The economy deteriorated during the past 20 years. It has become almost non- existent. Since over 87% of Ethiopians were farmers, the work force was drastically injured during the warring. The war left the farmlands ruined and poor due to the lack of care when most Ethiopians fled. This results in the 30% unemployment rate in Ethiopia currently. Farmlands are still in the act of recovering, but it is still slow as the government is required to help many other aspects in Ethiopia too.

The currency and inflation rates are of little importance in Ethiopia. More often is the country drawing aid from other countries to help it’s starving and sick than it is dealing with currency problems.

The standard of living in Ethiopia is quite poor. With most of the people poor, the conditions are obviously far from good. The roads, fields, countryside, and cities are still war torn. The citizens suffer from lack of civilization. They have a shortage on hospital care, there being one doctor for every 33,000 people. There is also a lack of education, leaving only 5% of the population literate. Water isn’t always safe to drink, families go days with out food, and there is little hope because there are so few jobs for the poor to do. The hope for the future has been claimed to be solved in either two ways. Of course, there are numerous organizations which are funding for help in Ethiopia to improve the life for the Ethiopians. But then, others believe in letting Ethiopia prosper individually. What they need is technology to get things rolling. Some economists propose getting computers with Internet access spread throughout Ethiopia, basically forcing them to modern day. A country with global access and communication can get back on it’s feet quickly. No longer will people be required to only work in their hometown, maybe they can make money from a business in England or Australia. This is a very risky plan, but it does seem more interesting and worthy than pumping money into the government to help pick them up. Rather, they can pick themselves up.

The debt of Ethiopia is currently at 4.354 billion U.S. dollars. This number is always increasing because many countries such as America and Italy are giving their aid. The concern of the national debt isn’t important compared to the seriousness of living conditions, so this isn’t much of a concern to the Ethiopian government.

Foreign trade fairs badly. Imports from developed countries are exceeding the exports Ethiopia is putting out. Imports are mostly manufactured goods and refined fuel that the Ethiopians can’t do themselves. They export coffee mainly and a few hides and skins. One doesn’t need to be an economist to see this isn’t working well. The cost of imports is twice as much as the gain in exports. Basically, Ethiopia is very unbalanced in trade and is not getting a large enough Gross National Product to cover it’s many required expenses. Ethiopia is one of the poorest countries in the world and is still growing poorer, but it is getting better.

Social:

The most prominent religion throughout Ethiopia is Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity. The Amhara are the primary group associated with this Christianity, making up 40% of the population. With all other groups, Ethiopian Orthodox Christianity is believed in about 50% of the population. The other, not as popular, is Islamic. Under Islamic, followers believed in customary law. An example of this is that daughters are to inherit half as much property as the sons do from the parents. Also, they treat property of land as owned by the clan of family rather than one individual member, which leads to division of land among the heirs.

The new constitution of Ethiopia does grant freedom to it’s citizens. There is freedom from any discrimination, freedom of religion, speech, press, and censorship. Much like other constitutions it states, “No one shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property with out due process of the law.” There are also numerous rights to protect citizens when the law accuses them. This includes safety from unwarranted search, innocence until proven guilty, can’t be charged twice for one crime, and no cruel or unusual punishment. These strong rights have brought back freedom to a country that had been suffering from dictatorship for the past 20 years or so. They are very important to all citizens of Ethiopia and enjoyed.

Human rights is no longer a concern. The last worries of human rights occurred under the president Zenawi who may have mistreated war criminals. The facts of this case are very uncertain because at the time, visitors weren’t very welcome and it was difficult for any real investigating to get accomplished. But now, the people have their rights and the country has settled to a peaceful state.

There is no real minority status currently. The population consists of many different ethnic groups and none of them are truly a strong majority. Ethiopia is said to be very relaxed when it comes to racial tension. They have bigger problems than that to be handling.

Terrorism is also not a issue. Ethiopia is really in no position that it would be striking out against another country or be struck at against. The terrorism that does exist is not large scale at all and would only consist of typical violence.

Again, drugs hasn’t been a large concern in Ethiopian issues. Being one of the poorest countries in the world, there would probably be too little profit for sellers in Ethiopia. And, the public doesn’t have money to buy food, let alone drugs.