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Month: November 2020

In the Scramble for Vaccines, the Have-nots Lose Out

Posted on by Web Master

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to rage in many parts of the world, the African region is somehow spared the wrath of the virus. While it remains a source of great relief that we have been spared the severe suffering and death that is ravaging the rest of the world, we can only be cautiously optimistic that the tables will not turn at a later stage.

This cautious optimism is grounded in the fact that while a combination of efforts may have contributed for better control and that there are speculations and theories as to why the region seems to fare better than the rest of the world, we still do not know why the pandemic took a lighter course in Africa. A great deal remains to be understood. There is no scientific evidence that suggests that we are in a “post-pandemic” stage.

In the meanwhile, there have been positive reports and news regarding effective vaccines, which the rich world is queuing to buy to save and protect their citizens from the virus and open their economies to ameliorate loss of income.

It is important to remember that the world has been in these types of situations in the past, and it overcame them each time at a cost. Our most recent memory of a pandemic of Biblical proportion is the HIV-AIDS pandemic, which killed millions before the world got together to institute a programme of prevention, care and treatment that tamed and eventually put it under control.

Before this though, the poor of the world, specifically those in Sub-Saharan Africa, paid in millions with their lives to such an extent that most people at some point lost or knew someone affected by the HIV pandemic. The region still caters to millions of people with the disease as well as orphans who were left without parents to raise them. The economic cost associated with the loss of the labour force also left the entire continent to be in a state of catch up.

With the way the current pandemic is playing out at the global stage, one cannot help but wonder what will happen to the African region if the rest of the world manages to put it under control with the provision of vaccines and potentially even treatment, leaving the continent behind.

It is fair to say that, in the past, the African region has suffered multiple traumatic experiences in its relationship with the rest of the world. The HIV pandemic again serves a good example of how the region was left or remained behind the rest of the world to have a programme of prevention, care and treatment for the virus. The delay in accessing life-saving antiretroviral medications was the cause for the many deaths that could have been avoided. In hindsight, it can be argued that the people of Africa were left and abandoned by both their governments and the rest of the world.

The governments of the day committed a historic mistake by not acting fast enough to intervene on behalf of their citizens. While some were caught up with their own illusion that HIV was not an African problem and deluded themselves by promoting unfounded local remedies as treatment, others were paralyzed by rigid policies and procedures that stifled attempts of support from the rest of the world.

Non-African governments were no more helpful. They left the region to its own devices until a time when the raging pandemic in Africa was on the verge of becoming a threat to the entire globe. To this end, the US remains the single most important actor in saving millions of lives through the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPfAR) programme that saved and continues to save millions of lives. Africa is indebted to the US for its generosity for bringing the region back from the edge of collapse.

At the height of the HIV pandemic, despite differences, the world was a more-united entity than it is now. The global institutions we know had a much better standing and leverage on countries and governments. The people of the world were much more tolerant of difference and diversity than they are now.

With such a different global orientation now, with the scramble for vaccines and treatment for COVID-19, what is the fate of the African region? Will it wait to see how the rest of the world would do to support it? Will it step up and join the scramble to get a portion of the pie? Does it have the resources to compete? Is there a global platform where equity would be a founding principle?

There is a potential that the African region could be left behind. The relatively milder trajectory the pandemic is taking in the region may create a pseudo sense of safety and protection by both the populace and African governments that may delay engagement and cost valuable time.

Just as worrying is the severity and the damage the pandemic is causing to the richest countries of the world. Even if these countries have the willingness to help out, they may be overstretched for both resources and time to pay attention to what is going on in other parts of the world until a time when the pandemic in other places becomes a local threat.

The ideological divide that is prevailing in the world now has weakened global institutions. It is rendering them into becoming weaker mediators for global action, which is crucial in ensuring a coordinated programme of action on matters such as vaccine access and distribution.

All of this sounds familiar, in a strange way, it feels like we have been here before. Déjà vu! The fact that we find ourselves in the same predicaments of the past triggers us to re-experience our historical trauma.

A better and equitable world is an ideal which all of us, as citizens of the world, should aspire to reach. But it is just that: an ideal. While we continue to aspire toward it, we have to continue to live in the real one, which remains as divided as it has always been between the haves and the have-nots.

Ethiopia, and Africa, belongs to the have-not category, almost always dependent on the generosity, charity and at times mercy of the haves of the world. There is very little that suggests that it will be different this time but with the added challenge that even the haves of the world are facing their own unprecedented odds.

We have to continue hoping that the whole world gets better and gets better fast and that the pandemic continues to be kind to the African region and all the regions of the world where it has been mild. Should the trajectory take a turn for the worst, there is a need that we have to be ready and cannot be complacent in doing what is possible with the means that we have at hand.

Hearing German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s concern about not leaving developing countries behind, after the recent G20 meeting which tangentially promised equitable access and distribution of vaccines to emerging countries, should put things in perspective for us. The world seems to be willing, but the means may not be there yet.

What governments and citizens of developing countries could and should do now is to focus on hammering on the good public health prevention methods that are tested and proven. It is cheap and is as good as a vaccine!

Gov’t Outreach to International Media Necessary for Whole Picture

Posted on by Web Master

It has been a few weeks now since the forces of the federal and Tigray Regional governments began their military engagement. As is mostly the case, armed conflict can be fought in different fields using guns and tanks, but there is the propaganda front as well.

In this day and age, where globalisation is central, and information can be accessed and found easily, there are different avenues to gain supporters. Even though the federal government was able to use the local media and provide its perspective about what it refers to as a law enforcement operation, when it comes to the international media, the government has been lacking in the messaging of its actions. Whether the conflict was justifiable or not could be argued, but the failure in public relations on the international stage is emblematic of what has long been a problem.

Perhaps a more persuasive example of this failure to engage the international community and win the narrative is the whole issue over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). Despite the fact that it is a Dam built entirely within the country’s borders and plans to generate electricity using its own water resources, it has been a showcase of the inability to message properly when Egypt succeeded in gaining sympathy from the international community.

The conflict occurring in the Tigray Regional State is also one that requires the utmost responsibility in messaging. It is compounded all the more by social media, which has intensified disinformation, as the BBCreported early this month in an article headlined “Ethiopia’s Tigray conflict sparks spread of misinformation.”

The Washington Post,in an article headlined “Ethiopia’s cracking down in Tigray. But activists are spreading the news,” has a more damning account of the possibility of wide-scale misinformation.

“Twitter data collected from November 1 to 10 showed that 30pc of tweets about Tigray and [Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD)] were from accounts created this year,” states the piece. “Nearly half (47pc) of these tweets were from accounts created in late October and early November. After November 4, the number of new accounts created per day grew from an average of 21 to 245.”

This shows us how the information void in the Tigray region, except by state media, is being filled. What the federal government should do is provide accurate and correct information using all the media opportunities it gets. The most significant of these is likely to be international media.

Since the start of the conflict, understandably, there is increased attention on Ethiopia by different media houses worldwide. Mainstream media institutions from CNNand BBCto Al Jazeerahave weighed in. But in their coverage there was a substantial information gap, and in some instances they were decisively one-sided.

In these news coverage and discussions, we rarely see federal government officials clearing up the government’s positions and making the point for what they justify as a law enforcement operation. The office that should take point on this matter is supposed to be the Foreign Affairs Ministry and by delegation the Ethiopian ambassadors for different countries. Save for some ambassadors such as Henok Teferra, who was featured on France 24and tried to explain the federal government’s position, most of the country’s foreign diplomats are not seizing the opportunity.

One may argue that an ambassador’s responsibility is to create and maintain a diplomatic relationship with the country they represent and their host country. This is true, but they also have a duty to inform the international community with facts on the ground and clarify the government’s position to the public using the media as a tool. While the inclusion of activists and outside observers should be encouraged, there could only be a well-rounded picture of the happenings in the country when government voices are represented.

The irony is that this harkens back to the appointment process and culture of diplomats and ambassadors. Ambassadors’ responsibilities are numerous, complex and sometimes critical. As with any top management position, they cannot be effectively carried out by anyone. In addition to leadership skills, an ambassador should have excellent communication, public speaking, interpersonal and problem-solving skills.

Contrary to this, the appointment of diplomats in Ethiopia is not merit-based. When one needs to hit the ground running then, there seems to have been a vacuum in the representation of one side of the argument in international media outlets.

Making a political appointment to an ambassador’s position is by no means a problem that exists only in Ethiopia. But for a country with a multiplicity of problems that desperately wants to develop, it needs to work with other countries. We need to gain foreign investment to realise the development of our foreign direct investment (FDI), and we are still not self-sufficient when it comes to feeding our people, which means that we have to rely on aid. To all of these, Ethiopia’s diplomats play a critical role. That is why the government has to think twice about how we appoint ambassadors and why we have to focus on career professionals rather than political appointees.

Career ambassadors know the business, have been tested and proven, and are deserving of increased responsibility. There may be several commendable abilities of politicians, but that of an ambassador is specialised work, whether in managing the embassy or doing outreach in the host country.

Make the Centre Great Again

Posted on by Web Master

Once in a while, Ethiopians are flung into a moment where socio-political circumstances are upended. It is as if a new spirit descends on the land, and all we have come to understand about our condition is suddenly upended.

It is not just Ethiopians. It has been just about three decades since the fall of the Soviet Union, around the time Francis Fukuyama boldly declared the end of humankind’s “ideological evolution.” For the uninitiated, the certainty of a lasting liberal utopia was rudely interrupted in 2016, when the custodians of this tradition, the United States and Britain, themselves rejected liberalism.

For the acutely observant, the writing on the wall was evident in the same decade that Fukuyama penned “The End of History and the Last Man.” With an equal measure of certainty, Huntington argued that this could not be further from the truth. If the major fault lines of the Cold War were ideologies, the near future would be demarcated along the greatest expressions of religio-cultural groupings: “Civilisations.”

With populism on the rise and pushback against migration to the Global North, the growing assertiveness of nationalisms and religious radicalism means that we are unlucky. We are not in Fukuyama’s liberal utopia. We are caught in Huntington’s purgatory of the “clash of civilisations.” If we slip a little too far, we will find ourselves in the Nietzschean hell of nihilism.

Fortunately, there are many, on the right and on the left, that are trying to deliver us to a more certain world. Unfortunately, their ideas are often conceited, impractical, exclusionary or downright destructive.

On the right, they think our predicaments could be addressed if we live “freely,” without the imposition of taxes or government control. On the left, it must be a strong centralised government that thrusts among citizens strict political correctness and redistributes wealth at once.

Not every political difference is formed along such fault lines, but the gist is there. More worrying is that these groups take themselves seriously enough, as all movements do in their prime, that they believe that violence is a legitimate way of bringing about a political end.

In the same instance, the centre is on retreat. It is no longer fashionable to attempt to find a middle ground. It shows uncertainty, an unwillingness to move quickly and vanquish the enemy at once. The centre is what both the left and the right – here in Ethiopia as elsewhere – agree is bad for business. It is the side that advocates stability to unpredictability, political evolution to revolution and socioeconomic improvements to political overhaul.

For the left, the centre is a vestige of the patriarchy, justifying its continued existence. For the right, it is a weak link likely to be used as an instrument of a power grab by the radical left. This essentially was the argument by the two extremes of American politics against President-elect Joe Biden.

It is also true of the view attached to the centre in Ethiopia. For the “federalist” forces, those rejecting revolutions are stuck up on the old forces of feudalism, at least sympathisers of the status quo. For the “Ethiopianist” legions, a person advocating incremental change must be disloyal to the founders and the state, a suspect of indoctrination by the Left’s unceasing attack on tradition.

There is no winning here, although the opposite seems to be evident. Both tradition and change are what sustain human existence. Both are necessary to function as a society.

Tradition is what we know and how we do things. There is accumulated knowledge there. It cannot be gotten rid of at a moment’s notice when we know society is conditioned to it. The change, when it comes, should be grassroots and very well understood. It is only ironic that the left – much enamoured by the post-modernist view that nearly every sort of knowledge is a byproduct of social and historical realities – would be the one that believes something that makes up our very reality can be torn down and rebuilt rapidly.

Change too is crucial, if for no other reason than the fact that the physical world we live in is changing – climate change, technological advancement, demographic changes and depletion of resources. We are not in Kansas anymore. Here the call of the likes of Greta Thunberg, Swedish activist superstar, to take immediate action against climate change is duly admirable. The science backs her claims; the change can be implemented without creating many negative externalities and, crucially, she is not calling for a violent overthrow of governments that do not toe her politics. We can take some lessons from her activism.

The centre has become unpopular precisely because it refuses to accept the status quo but at the same time cautions against demolishing structures without a clear plan to replace them. This has become a political sin today to the unfortunate circumstance of our being.

With Science, to Books, Cinema and Beyond

Posted on by Web Master

It was in my early teen years, a Saturday. The sun was setting, and our new neighbours had finished moving in. A short, wiry boy came to introduce himself, showing off his gymnastic ability and boasting about how he was two grades higher than me.

He was usually found twiddling a green coloured maize-shaped harmonica, or else head-over-heels, walking on his hands. He started to tell me soon enough about how close their house used to be to the national library and the movie theatres, in present-day Arada District. Noting my keen interest, he promised to show me where the library was. The movie was out of the question, as it involved money.

Being downbeat, I thought of showing off myself. I took out my collection of bubble gum stickers full of famous actors. He went through them, acting not that much surprised. Then he went to their house and brought his set.

His were few, yet action-packed, unlike mine which are of portraits. He had watched most of the movies the pictures were taken from. He knew who was who. I just thought mine was a pile of rubbish, as I could not relate them to anything. I asked him if he would swap some with mine.

He counteroffered a game, with the stickers as prizes. By the time it was over, the whole of my cards had ended up in his hands. I started to cry. He said he would rescind his pledge, as I was behaving in a way unbecoming of an ‘Arada,’ an Amaric word close in meaning to ”sleek.”

But all was forgotten when the long-awaited day came. I was taken to a place where everything was big, beautiful and numerous – the National Archives & Library of Ethiopia. The trees, the gardens, buildings and finally the books, with their typical bookish smells, were a dream.

Hats off to my friend, I got one of the few most coveted reads. I dove into the deepest ocean, in a disquieting reflective life one can imagine a new world. A quantum literature travel to a future with an otherwordly technology; the story of a scientist giving his son through a transplant a set of shark gills.

It took quite long to take me out of the ocean of Alexander Belayev’s ”The Amphibious Man,” in an Amharic translation. Yet there was no other book to set alight my or my friend’s kindled science passion. It was the tragedy of having too few places for reading.

Instead, I continued reading mostly the penny dreadful books, melodramatic, often lurid adventures, as I usually sat close to the librarians and started to probe through the pile of books high in demand.

Not my friend. He completely stopped coming to the library, as his reading passion was completely gone as my movie watching was. It was revived for me only when the film adaptation of the Amphibious Man, a 1961 Russian flick, came to town.

It is with great appreciation then that the news of the construction of a grand library came in Addis Abeba. To the teetering book industry, the weak reading culture and the lack of incentives, such initiatives by the City Administration are admirable. The new city library is currently under construction in Arat Kilo and was commenced last year.

But it is not just the reading culture. There is a grave misconception about how children grow up to have an interest in science. It is not in classrooms and laboratories, at least not just there, that their passions are sparked but also in stories told in movies and books. With the spotlight we attach to science and technology in our education system, there is a need to encourage the publication of science fiction books in local languages to kindle the passion among children.

Comic superhero books by Ethiopians, such as “Jember,” published in two languages, is an excellent example of how to light children’s interest with the wonders of the natural world and what could be.

All forms of fictions are good to write and of course, to read, yet not everyone is fit to read every book. For children, what meets their immense imagination is the bold creativity of science fiction and fantasy, which go beyond the boundaries of today’s spacio-temporal limits.

The Political Economy of Nile, GERD

Posted on by Web Master

The advent of major climatic crisis across the vast Sahara region, about seven millennia ago, made the region inhospitable for humans and animals. The crisis triggered a phenomenon that made the Nile River the only lifeline on the eastern corner of the massive landmass. The river waters supported life, agricultural cultivation, fishing, transportation, trade, and eventually served as an anchor to Egyptian and Nubian civilisations.

While generations of Egyptians considered the Nile a gift from God and held that view in veneration, they could not trace the source of this generous river initially. As all things abstract, they cherished the blessings of nature to their gods and gave their offerings to favour them with the annual flows of riches from the upper streams. Despite the vulnerability of the economic foundation to the annual water flows of the Nile, this was a remarkable achievement of adaptation and resilience in the face of adversity.

But the Nile River was also transboundary water body and its basin extends across 11 central and northeast African countries. While repeated attempts and efforts to control the entire basin were unsuccessful, Egyptian rulers used all their leverage to secure uninterrupted and full control of the Nile waters. Protecting this exclusive right has been the most enduring theme of Egyptian politics.

While Egypt might have been successful thus far in pressuring and upholding their hegemonic power over the transboundary water resources, the status quo has become increasingly unsustainable. There is simply too much inequality and unfairness in the way the riches of the Nile waters are utilised among the riparian countries. The legitimate demands for economic development have necessitated the urgency of exploring all options and opportunities to pursue equitable use of water resources. While Egypt and Sudan have enjoyed the benefits of freshwater inflows, they were content to ignore the plights of the people in the upstream countries for development and a better standard of living.

The increasing demand for equitable utilisation of shared natural resources would pose immediate challenges of reform in Egypt and Sudan. While the resistance is understandable and expected, it is time to pursue a new framework for basin-wide development endeavours for inclusive and shared prosperity.

Making a case for this is the fact that the majority of the Ethiopians still live on subsistence agriculture and their life is excessively subject to the vagaries of nature. Despite its long history of civilisation and early initiation on the path to modernisation, Ethiopia remains economically underdeveloped, and its population is one of the poorest on earth. Moreover, misguided economic policies have resulted in long term stagnation and abuse of the natural and human resources of the country. This reality of abject poverty in a country that is blessed with relatively rich natural resource endowments is a brutal fact of life and a consequence of misguided political and economic policy choices.

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) is a vital infrastructural project with a primary objective to generate hydroelectric power. It has no significant adverse impact on the average annual water flow to downstream countries once the reservoir is filled. Apparently, what Ethiopia is currently attempting to build at the dawn of the 21st century is what Egypt successfully managed to accomplish a century ago in 1902 at Aswan!

While the intention to develop the Blue Nile basin has been actively pursued by generations of Ethiopians, due to lack of financing and quite sophisticated conspiracies against the planned project, it is only now that the country mustered the will to initiate the project by its financial initiative.

The GERD is quite a complicated and costly project relative to the capacity of the domestic economy to bear the necessary financial and technical resources to complete the Dam. The project has faced significant delays, cost overruns, and widespread embezzlement from the meagre funds Ethiopians contributed.

While such problems need timely and just remedial measures, the priority now has to be completing the project as soon as possible and integrating its electricity generation into the electrification effort both within Ethiopia and the regional economies. The GERD has considerable ripple effects and can initiate a sustained structural transformation of the economies in the riparian countries.

Ethiopia and Egypt have somewhat similar population size, and yet Egypt runs a GDP in excess of 250 billion dollars compared to the stunted size of the Ethiopian economy at a third of the scale.

The relative dependence of these economies on agriculture for output and employment is also starkly different. Agriculture, which employs about 24pc of the labour force, contributes about 11pc of Egypt’s total output. In Ethiopia, two-thirds of the total labour force is engaged in the agricultural sector and makes up over a third of GDP.

Extremely low labour productivity in agriculture leaves the Ethiopian economy literally trapped in subsistence with chronic food insecurity. These economic features provide unique contrasts and complementary opportunities for collaboration that could benefit both economies and beyond. The relative economic muscle provides Egypt, should it choose to use it wisely, the opportunity to create a conducive environment for promoting critical investment to the wider regional economies. The overall effect of such endeavours pays significant returns both in sustainable economic growth and economic integration within the region. This is the most promising path to pursue for all the partners within the Nile basin.

On its own merits, Ethiopia has a legitimate right to make full use of its natural resources for the benefit of its population. Moreover, a richer and more prosperous Ethiopia is good for Egypt and the world. Widespread destitution incubates only hopelessness, instability and conflict. Conflict, whatever form it takes, is destructive and hampers development efforts.

Egypt has a mightier economic and military power in the region. And yet it has even more positive power to play a constructive role in mobilising critical investment resources for Nile basin-wide development initiatives. What it can gain by cultivating development affinity is by far better and everlasting than what it hopes to accomplish with military force or violence.

Egypt has hard choices to make. First, it has to carefully reflect on the implications of initiating a conflict with Ethiopia and subsequently depriving itself completely of future opportunities to negotiation on the water resources of the Nile. Second, if Egypt indeed intends to promote the interest of its poor farmers, it should choose mutually beneficial negotiation with Ethiopia.

Egypt will never win an armed conflict with Ethiopia over the Nile River issue. Ethiopians are carefully watching the choices that Egyptians are making regarding the Blue Nile. Any hostile action on the GERD will surely trigger an avalanche of reaction with dire consequences. If the GERD is attacked in one way or another, Ethiopia has all legitimate rights and means to protect its vital national interest.

Should Egypt choose the way of violence, it is bound to pay a significant price. With its strategic location at the source of the mighty Blue Nile River, Ethiopia has natural and extremely powerful leverage. Ethiopia, if it chooses to, has what it takes to inflict significant and long-term damage to downstream countries.

Whatever the level of its economic and military handicap might be, it does not take much treasure and blood to inflict considerable damage against provocative violence. By their strategic geographical advantage, Ethiopians could at least make the fresh waters of the Nile unusable to regional bullies.

Ethiopians have always been patriotic and would defend their sovereignty at any cost. All the same, Ethiopia can win the war over the Nile waters without shooting a single bullet. Reason and justice should remain the guiding principle of settling the competing claims of the stakeholders in the region.

No doubt, the current generation of Egyptians would muster the wisdom of their ancestors and seek the ways of peace with their neighbours in Ethiopia. Recognising the legitimate aspirations of its fellow Africans and a modest token of solidarity would go a long way to create mutual trust and friendship among the peoples of the region who had a long history of peaceful coexistence.

Conflict jeopardises the very objective of securing the equitable and shared use of the waters of the Nile. It is prudent and more sustainable to shift the perspective from rivalry to collaborative engagement that optimises the contribution of the GERD to the regional demand for energy and creating ripple effects on the rest of the economic sectors.

Ethiopia should focus all its effort in completing the GERD and start in earnest to address the more pressing problems of chronic poverty, unemployment and bad governance. Provocations and threats against the dam may trigger popular demands for a strong reaction. Just as this may be, restraint is necessary and prudent. In that spirit, Ethiopia should continue its stance of magnanimity towards its neighbours and endeavour to explain its position clearly to the international community. There is still considerable scope for collective development and mutual progress in the Nile basin, and all opportunities should be used to realise such rich and deep potential.

Apparently, both the falcon and the lion have their unique natural and innate ways and characteristics that humans cherish and fear at the same time. Taming the natural urges of the falcon and the lion, though challenging and not politically instinctive, is critically important for the sake of peaceful coexistence and survival in such a challenged region of the world.

Keeping the Global Focus on Low-Income Countries

Posted on by Web Master

Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, the global economy is suffering its sharpest decline since the Great Depression. But while everybody is hurting, it is the world’s poorest countries that will pay the highest price unless they receive more help.

Some 1.5 billion people live in low-income developing countries, struggling to overcome weak public health systems, limited institutional capacity, and in many cases high debt levels. All these countries entered the crisis with a limited capability to fight it. They faced a dramatic increase in spending needs just when the pandemic caused a decline in revenues from tourism, remittances and commodity prices. While actions to protect advanced-economy businesses and workers amounted to some 20pc of GDP, this support in low-income countries was only about two percent.

With as many as 115 million additional people at risk of falling into extreme poverty this year, today’s deep economic decline is threatening to reverse two decades of gains in living standards. The current damage will last for many years to come, as children – especially girls – drop out of school, the quality of health services deteriorates, and employment levels remain depressed.

This matters for all of us. Insecurity in poor countries translates to instability for the rest of the world. And more importantly, the COVID-19 crisis will never truly be over until it is defeated everywhere.

To that end, international institutions and bilateral donors must help poor countries as they work to create the right economic conditions for recovery at home. The International Monetary Fund continues to provide hands-on technical assistance and training to its members, helping governments handle debt, raise revenues, and manage public finances to ensure effective delivery of vital services, including health. The Netherlands has supported these efforts by contributing to dedicated IMF thematic funds and the Fund’s network of regional capacity-development centres in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Middle East, and the Caribbean.

The critical task now is to help low-income developing countries overcome the current crisis and strengthen resilience for the future. Bilateral donors like the Netherlands supplemented IMF lending programme with targeted interventions for health, education, and job creation, as well as through programmes that address climate change and greening the economy.

We also need to do more to help countries with unsustainable debt burdens. Even before the pandemic, around half of low-income countries were in or at high risk of debt distress. Now that many countries have only limited, if any, access to new market financing, they are confronting a terrible trade-off between supporting their people during the pandemic and servicing their debt.

The international community has taken some important steps to address this problem. With the support of 13 bilateral donors, including the Netherlands, the IMF has provided one year of debt-service relief of about half a billion dollars to 29 of its poorest members and is now seeking additional resources to extend this relief beyond April 2022. We have welcomed the extension of the G20’s Debt Service Suspension Initiative, which has already provided the poorest countries with about five billion dollars in temporary debt-service relief. The IMF also supports the G20 and Paris Club’s establishment of an ambitious new Common Framework for debt resolution, which combines a standard approach to decision-making among creditors with a case-by-case approach to debt relief.

Beyond addressing debt, low-income developing countries need strong international financial support. Since the onset of the pandemic, the IMF has doubled access to emergency financing facilities and provided 11 billion dollars in emergency financing to 47 countries in this group. The IMF remains committed to ensuring sufficient access to such credit in the years to come.

To do so, the IMF counts on its wealthiest member countries to support this effort by providing new loan resources for financing concessional lending programmes. Since the beginning of the pandemic, the Fund has secured an additional 22 billion dollars and is now working to mobilise grants to ensure zero-interest lending at these levels, to which the Netherlands will be contributing as well. Many bilateral donors have also bolstered their own programmes to support low-income countries. The Netherlands, for example, recently pulled together 595 million dollars to keep existing development efforts afloat and to fund new ones to help poor countries fight the pandemic.

Finally, low-income countries need trade now more than ever. Over the past two decades, global poverty levels fell dramatically as these countries ramped up their participation in international markets. But the pandemic and ongoing trade tensions have jeopardised that progress. An open, stable and transparent rules-based trading system remains absolutely critical for ensuring global economic stability, inclusive of sustainable growth and long-term prosperity.

The IMF continues to promote the recovery of global trade by working to maintain open markets and advocating for further policy reform. Within the European Union, the Netherlands and France have pushed for trade policies that put more emphasis on sustainability and responsible business conduct.

Meeting the many unmet needs of low-income countries will require further joint efforts by bilateral donors, including national public development banks and multilateral institutions. Together, we can help the most vulnerable countries and communities recover from the pandemic. In doing so, we will build a more resilient, inclusive world for everyone.

 

TRIAL OF THE CHICAGO SEVEN

Posted on by Web Master

It is often in history that the story of the present could be told colourfully, and perhaps even meaningfully. There is nothing like seeing our present through the lens of yesterday. It makes us more modest, shows us that our societies have been through predicaments just as bad, or worse. It offers us hope that whatever the damage that may have been done, it is possible to heal once more.

Aaron Sorkin, ever the adept storyteller and now also directing, tells such a story in The Trial of the Chicago Seven. In 2020, when the United States was racked with the challenges of liberalism, populism, mistrust of institutions and social cleavages, he dives headfirst into what was perhaps an even more rocky time for the North American country: the 1960s.

In the popular imagination, the ‘60s was the Beatles, Woodstock, Free Love and the Civil Rights Movement. The young, women and minorities rose to attempt to redefine the Unites States. They declared that women were not sexually liberated enough, that their country was waging an unjust war in Vietnam, and that American history has been bleak for a section of the society. They grew their hair long, smoked pot and sang songs of peace, all the while staring the patriarchy dead in the eye.

Uncle Sam, unfortunately, still controlled the military-industrial complex, the financial capital and, perhaps most importantly, the institutional tools to bend the law to its favour. It has been the tragedy of the Left that it assumed that its understanding of history, its sudden awakening, is in any way a good defence against the sticks and stones the powers that be are willing to employ.

Sorkin focuses on the use of the judiciary as a means of waging war against the counterculture movement. In 1968, the Democratic National Convention was being held in Chicago, where a new presidential nominee would be elected. But with the Vietnam War and the high profile assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy, the atmosphere for political turbulence was set.

For the event, leaders of various left-leaning movements, organisations and personalities organised rallies to descend on the convention. They all hoped it would be peaceful. It was not, less as a result of the actions of the people attending the rallies but police that ended up inciting riots.

Richard Nixon would win the presidential election that year and appoint a William Barr-like character, John Mitchell, a close conspirator during the Watergate Scandal, as Attorney General. In characteristic Nixon fashion, he goes against the opposition, the counterculture in this case, with the charge of inciting riots during the Chicago rally.

Charges are filed against the who’s who of the American grassroots left political movement. These included celebrities such as Abbie Hoffman (Sacha Baron Cohen), Tom Hayden (Eddie Redmayne), Jerry Rubin (Jeremy Strong), Bobby Seale (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) and three more. It was originally the Chicago eight until Seale’s case was declared a mistrial.

They are brought before an uncompromising judge who is clearly conservative, Julius Hoffman, played majestically by the ever wonderful Frank Langella. A jury that is not necessarily of their peers is picked for them. They are to be judged by a system they are attempting to change, because they believe it is unfair and unjust, designed to perpetuate the privileges of a few.

Sorkin is a master of rapid and witty dialogue and the sustaining of suspense. The film is as absorbing, touching and not easily predictable. More importantly, it resists the temptation to be preachy, as most social commentaries are – a trap Sorkin avoids through the clever employment of humour.

It also has one truly shocking scene. Before Seale’s case was dropped, he had been making a ruckus in the courtroom, asserting that he was unjustly charged. The judge, having enough of his interruptions, orders the bailiffs to take him to another room, where he is beaten and then brought to the courtroom gagged and his hands bound.

I thought at the moment that this was Sorkin taking poetic license. It was not. In 1968, Seale, leader of the Black Panther Party, was beaten, gagged and chained on the orders of an American judge to sit in a courtroom on charges that were obviously trumped-up and politically motivated. This is recent history.

It is to the credit of the likes of Sorkin to bring this part of history to life, which threatens to disappear if left untold and is proof of the stubbornness and longevity of oppression over the human spirit.

Political Apology, the Act of Courage that Can Heal Society

Posted on by Web Master

When war and transgressions of a political nature are still ongoing, apologising often seems to be the hardest thing to do for leaders. Ethiopia is no exception. But it is a sign of maturity that our troubled political culture should develop to progress forward.

Undoubtedly, even for a public that wants to see redress for the past, acts of penance essentially seem insignificant compared to justice served at the courts. Partly, this is because punishment resonates louder and partially since political apologies are usually for victims long dead and damage already inflicted a while ago.

Important not to forget as well is that apology is heavily political, and every statement made matters. Many, including leaders, perceive apologising as an admittance of wrongdoing not by a ruling class of a particular time but an assertion of guilt for an entire group of people – making it a highly unpopular political move. Such a matter is all the more complicated in a country such as Ethiopia where strength is idolised in terms of aggressive behaviour.

Still, apologies, never a simple move, are critical to healing a society slighted by the many instances of hardship throughout its history. A political apology can turn enmity into a national triumph. It can speak to vast swaths of the public that have felt victimised and humanise and put into perspective those that are believed to have done wrong.

This does not entail that leaders should avoid responsibility for an apology. Leaders are accountable not only for their behaviour but also for an entire nation. It is their job to keep the country and the people from widespread and enduring harm. An apology should be a measure of last resort, for wrongs that have been committed without intention.

Thus, when leaders speak for themselves as well as for their supporters and the country, their contrition has broad implications. Leadership apology is not only personal but also political and institutional. It is an act in which every expression matters and every word becomes part of the public consciousness. Unlike what many locals might think, apologising helps leaders in other parts of the world to thrive and earn more public trust.

Take, for example, the two economic giants of Europe. From the 1960s onward, Germany apologised verbally, and in action, showing collective grief for the crimes that took place during its Nazi era in the 1930s and 1940s. Not long ago, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, David Cameron, apologised on behalf of the British government for the Bloody Sunday massacre that occurred in 1972 in Northern Ireland. It was an incident where soldiers shot at unarmed civilians during a rally.

Leaders’ public statements can make or tear the individual and institutional reputations of a nation. They can quickly gain lost public trust when they acknowledge the problem and accept responsibility. It also connects leaders with the public as they feel the pain of people and even apologises for it.

Take also former President Bill Clinton’s apology, admitting his extramarital relationship with Monica Lewinsky, a White House intern. At the end of his presidency, Clinton departed with one of the highest approval ratings for an outgoing president in history.

Remorse is an armour that Ethiopians can make use of in our political engagements. As humans, we are all hardwired to empathise with others when they apologise. Leaders need to set the example, show how to be more considerate of others to create a sense of justice and fairness. Leaders’ habits are contagious, placing extra responsibility on them to often act properly.

Having a political system that applies contrition rather than aggressive tactics will help us avoid ongoing devastation and better focus on the job of developing the nation. The nation as a whole needs to learn to apologise to connect and feel safer with others. Holding onto grudges never healed anyone but keeps us in a vicious circle of renewed     pain.

It is essential for our leaders to feel guilty and for them to change problematic behaviours. Neither they nor us should make the habit of apology a shameful act but a courageous deed that affirms dignity and human value.

Sudan Takes in 120 Ethiopian Refugees an Hour

Posted on by Web Master

An average of more than 120 Ethiopian refugees an hour have been crossing the border of Sudan, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UNOCHA). At the end of last week, there were well over 40,000 refugees, leaving services overwhelmed as the needs increase by the day.

Islamic Relief distributed emergency food packs and hygiene kits to around 4,000 people in Um Rakuba camp in eastern Sudan. It has distributed food packs to 784 households and distributed hygiene kits including soap and other sanitary items to 1,088 households. Saudi Arabia and Norway have pledged to aid the refugees in Sudan.

The UN has announced that around 200 million dollars is needed to accommodate the refugees streaming into Sudan from Ethiopia. Potentially, up to 200,000 Ethiopians could flee to Sudan over the next six months, according to the UN.

As of the beginning of this month, the federal government and Tigray Regional State administration are in a conflict after the Defence Forces responded to the latter allegedly attacking the Northern Command of the Defence Forces.

GERD to Start Early Generation in June

Posted on by Web Master

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) will start early generation next June, according to Seleshi Bekele (PhD), minister of Water, Irrigation & Energy.

Started a decade ago, the construction of the Dam has reached over 70pc of completion, and the first water filling was finalised in July of this year.

The Dam, which has a capacity of producing 5,150MW of energy, was scheduled to be completed in five phases: a contract signing that was meant to be finalised during the first quarter of 2011; impounding that should have been started in the second quarter of 2013; early generation, scheduled to have been launched in the third quarter of 2014; completion of civil work, which was planned to be concluded in 2016; while full completion was scheduled for mid-2017.

The latest round of tripartite negotiations between Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt was held two weeks ago. Ethiopia finalised the first water filling before the negotiations between the three countries concluded.

The Bitter Pill of Saving

Posted on by Web Master

There is a debilitating habit that most of us have and that is spending money. On multiple occasions, I have sworn I would start saving more and spending less. But every time I get some cash in my hand, I get amnesia. All of a sudden, I am at a boutique purchasing the first thing that comes to my mind.

The only consolation might be that I am not the only one with this affliction. Even people with severe financial problems have it, probably as a result.

Take this old friend of mine. She is raising two children, and her husband is currently unemployed. She supports her family selling spices she makes at home. Whenever some money comes in, nonetheless, they savour it until the last cent.

“It is when there is meat in the refrigerator for three consecutive days that you know there is money,” she says teasingly.

She spends almost all the money she gets on food and clothes for the whole family, and when the time comes to pay rent or school fees for the children, they are in dire financial straits. That is when she reaches out to family and friends for a loan. She somehow manages to get by, but each month she has to pay back her loan, and on and on it goes.

It is a problem many of us can relate to. Every time my bank account begins to run out and when I look back at the ridiculous stuff I spent my money on, I question my sanity.

It is a guilt that can, to a certain extent, be justified with the consumer culture of our time. We hear stories of people who saved all their lives and passed away before they could enjoy the wealth they accumulated. We are told in movies and in pop music to “live in the moment.”

Such a motto when it comes to our finances is a terrible idea, nonetheless. No doubt, we deserve to treat ourselves for our hard work and achievements, but we cannot go around buying everything we see and spending money every time we come across some cash. The stories about greed are true. Earning more money begets the temptation to want more money.

The more we have, the more we need; that is the paradox. The single-minded quest for money strips us of our content in life. I have met several people who have decent and chunky savings but who argue with a taxi assistant for a quarter of a Birr. It is true that four of those would make a Birr. But this will still not buy anything meaningful, even the lowest of taxi fares, these days. Sometimes, it is better to let go and relax.

The sweet spot seems to be striking a balance, and this has to do with the ability to delay gratification. Research shows people who tend to delay gratification become more successful in life than people who want the pleasure right then and there. Delaying gratification takes discipline, and without that, it is hard to be successful.

On the side, there are people like my housemaid who saved enough to own a house. She came to Addis Abeba eight years ago. She started selling coffee and made about 800 Br a day. She put away just less than half of her earnings into ikub, a traditional and informal saving and credit association, and took a loan later to buy a house. It was not fancy but rather a one-bedroom house that needed heavy renovation.

She also rented a ground floor on a condominium apartment and opened her own small eatery after that. But the Novel Coronavirus came, and business was bad. She figured she could make some money working in domestic service instead of “sitting at home all day.”

That is how she ended up working for me. She is humble and sweet. When she told me she owns a house, I felt delusional for paying a domestic servant when I still live in a rented house. It was supposed to be the other way around.