A Mogul Shuttering Lives

Nov 29 , 2025
By Kidist Yidnekachew

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In a truly heartbreaking admission, he revealed he had even sold his wife's wedding ring just to secure a small, temporary reprieve. He was calling the radio station as a last resort, saying he had exhausted every avenue, from talking to company representatives to filing complaints, all in vain.

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My commute has lately become a frustrating lesson in logistics. I've found a new, compelling reason to take the bus: it consistently drops me closer to my next shuttle by taxi. I once thought I enjoyed walking, but walking a mile just to reach a taxi stand has cured me of that notion.

On a recent bus ride, I tried and failed to shield my face from the morning sun's glare while working remotely on my phone. The bus's radio blasting in the background stirred me to listen to an utterly devastating piece on the public radio channel. The program features listeners calling in to voice their complaints and frustrations. That morning, one man's complaint turned into a public appeal.

He was a driver who made his living through ride-hailing services. He recounted how he sold his car and paid a staggering 950,000 birr, nearly a million in savings, to a company claiming to provide electric vehicles. His plan was to upgrade his business vehicle to an electric car, a cleaner, more efficient model that promised a better future.

However, almost a year later, 11 months, to be precise, he had received nothing.

The consequences were immediate and catastrophic. Without his car, his primary source of income, he could no longer support his family, pay rent or school fees and was at the mercy of his friends. In a truly heartbreaking admission, he revealed he had even sold his wife's wedding ring just to secure a small, temporary reprieve. He was calling the radio station as a last resort, saying he had exhausted every avenue, from talking to company representatives to filing complaints, all in vain.

His despair was evident. He confessed to having contemplated suicide, feeling completely hopeless and trapped by circumstances engineered by a corporate entity. The only thing preventing him from taking that final, irreversible step, he said, was the thought of abandoning his children.

Sitting there, fighting back the urge to cry on a public bus, the gravity of the situation hit me. It's a bitter irony that the only way to sustain the life we were given is through constant financial proceeds. It is an even darker reality when the very avenues meant to facilitate existence, honest work and responsible investment, are used by powerful players to engineer ruin.

Imagine the depth of that hopelessness, someone driven to the brink of self-harm, forced to choose between dignity and survival, all while a group of folks or perhaps one individual continues to enrich themselves by scamming the working class. These are people who, whether their wealth was acquired legally or illegally, will never understand the agonising decision to borrow a couple of hundred birr from friends or sell a wedding ring just to buy time.

What makes this situation particularly blatant is that this was not a covert, back-room deal. According to the victim on the radio, the company was openly and repeatedly advertised in the media. Numerous influential artists and celebrities were paid to vouch for this scheme, lending their immense credibility to an operation that has financially devastated the lives of numerous ordinary citizens.

This leads to the most pressing question: Why has the responsible regulatory body failed to take action?

If this were an unlicensed operation conducting shady business, the bureaucratic delays might be understandable. But this is a legal, registered company. It possesses a tax identification number (TIN) and, therefore, pays taxes to the government. It is operating in plain sight, yet it is allowed to continue its devastating scheme. I wonder why this systematic scamming of people is being overlooked? What exactly is this company doing behind the scenes to bury its wrongdoings and evade accountability?

If a company is legally registered, financially compliant, and endorsed by trusted public figures, who can a person trust with their money? The trust necessary for a functional market economy has been broken, and the cost of that breach is measured by the suffering of people like the driver on the radio.

My decision at that moment was clear: I had to be his voice. Someone has to step up to stand by him and many others like him. Bringing this issue to the attention of the wider media and the public sphere might be the only way to force a solution.

And even if we try to entertain the notion that the company did not intentionally set out to defraud people but encountered unforeseen delivery problems, the failure to communicate, apologise, and offer a concrete path to restitution or compensation is indefensible. They must come forward, clear their name, and immediately make amends to the drivers whose lives they have shattered. It is the absolute minimum standard of corporate behaviour.

The modern citizen is often on edge, fragile, and financially vulnerable. Any large-scale betrayal of trust can easily trigger emotional and financial catastrophe, leading some to despair or to retaliate. Businesses must operate with integrity. They should focus on generating profit through legal, ethical means that do not prey on or exploit others' hopes and dreams. I maintain a firm belief in the eventual consequence of actions, in a form of justice that ensures balance, both now and in the future. We must choose to act with integrity for our own sake, if not for those we affect. The continued authorisation of these 'legal' scams is a moral failure that society cannot afford.

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PUBLISHED ON Nov 29,2025 [ VOL 26 , NO 1335]

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