Addis Fortune (Addis Ababa)
August 23, 2005

Brehanu Nega, an enigmatic presence to some in the Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD), had his happiest moment on the day when Meskel Square and its entire surrounding were filled to capacity by hundreds of thousands - or millions by optimistic estimates - of residents of Addis Abeba and its environs. He keeps its memory alive with a giant photo hanging on the wall facing him in his office at Rainbow for Social Justice and Democracy.

He believed that the ruling Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) would let go easily and democratically if defeated in the elections. Reality dawned on him when armed forces of the government shot and killed 42 angry protestors, according to the latest report from the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission, on June 8, which followed the May 15th elections that granted the national capital to CUD.

He was deeply affected by what happened, according to those who knew him well. He still wonders why it had to happen.

"Maybe you can call that naiveté," he told Fortune two months after the elections where he said he had expected a peaceful discourse.

The "naive politician" had a more benign beginning in life with a lot of football, which he played well, and a lot of school work, according to his father, Nega Bonger, a prominent businessman in town.

Born in 1958 in Debre Zeit, Brehanu is one of the 14 children Nega had by his wife, Abebech Woldegiorgis. Now in his eighties and with failing eyesight, Nega is the usual Guraghe success story who built himself up from poverty to millionaire.

His success also shows itself in the academic achievement of his children, who have graduated in various fields; most going on to second and third degrees, and others advanced certification. The eldest, Teklu Nega, who passed away a few years ago, graduated in international finance; he joined Pepsi Cola immediately, to become one of the top managers in East Africa.

The teenage Brehanu was too good at football to finally end up leaving it, according to Samson, one of his younger brothers. Sport could have brought him close enough to people to see their misery and develop a desire to change it.

Brehanu was one of the multitudes of Ethiopia's revolutionary period youth who got swept into politics. In the 1970s, hardly was any student above high school left out of politics that was leftist in its infatuation. In his last year at Nefas Silk Senior Secondary School, Debrezeit Road, he represented his school in talks about the disputed Sector Review, the Emperor's education policy that threatened to curtail the educational future of low performing students.

By the time Brehanu joined the Addis Abeba University in 1976, when he had returned from the Edget Behbret (growth in unity) campaign, he had already become a member of the Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Party (EPRP). His father had no idea of his son's fascination to Marxism and activism in student politics.

It was the darkest years of Ethiopia's recent history.

In the early 1970s, Emperor Haile Selassie, more popular internationally with his image as a father of Africa, had to deal with domestic problems: the great inequality in the distribution of wealth, rural underdevelopment, corruption in government, rampant inflation, unemployment, and a severe drought in the north from 1972 to 1975.

In February 1974, students, workers, and soldiers began a series of strikes and demonstrations that culminated on September 12, 1974, with him being deposed by junior officers in the army named the Provisional Military Administrative Council Derg.

It subsequently issued a programme for the establishment of a state-controlled socialist economy. In early 1975, all agricultural land in Ethiopia was nationalised, with

much of it then parcelled out in small plots to individuals.

The overthrow of the monarchy had appeared to usher in a new era of political openness to Ethiopia. Rather than allow democratic elections, the military regime attempted to squash it. It was clear that Col. Mengistu H. Mariam intended to consolidate his hold on power.

This led to militant criticism from the already organized civilian left, particularly after several top leaders of the Derg were killed in early 1977, reportedly on Mengistu's orders. Chief among opponents was the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Party (EPRP), which by the beginning of 1977 had launched a systematic campaign to undermine the military regime.

The EPRP conducted urban guerrilla warfare against the regime, referred to as the "White Terror." The government responded with its own "Red Terror" campaign. The government provided peasants, workers, public officials, and students considered loyal to the government with arms to help government security forces root out those deemed anti-revolutionaries.

Between 1977 and 1978, hundreds of thousands of people, suspected of being enemies of the government, were killed or disappeared in the name of the Red Terror.

Askale Nega, a third year student at the Addis Abeba University at the time, was one of those who were killed by the military regime. She was his older sister, one of three. Brehanu fled with other fellow EPRP members to Asimba, a guerrilla base in northern Tigray.

Once out in the field, EPRP members, who once took for granted undemocratic procedures, because they understood that their party could not hold open meetings while underground, all of a sudden began demanding the commencement of such process. According to several accounts, the leaders responded by arresting 15, including Brehanu, for raising their voices against the powers that be. As fighting between EPRP and the Tigrean People's Liberation Front (TPLF) intensified and the latter approached the area where the 15 were arrested, EPRP decided to decamp from Asimba and move to a territory now found in Eritrea.

The prisoners were divided in two, according to Brehanu. The group he was in travelled along with the band. A little later, Brehanu remembers hearing gunshots. Then he saw others coming wearing the clothing of those who were arrested with him; clothing was a serious problem for those rebels. The killing of those people was a turning point in his political conviction. The trauma haunts him to date, and shaped the political outlook he maintains since then.

"If the organisation for which many gave up their lives kills people for demanding democracy, then there must be something wrong with socialism," he says speaking of his feelings then. "The death of those people used to bother me very much."

The EPRP court sat at Tsorena and dismissed three people from the party. Brehanu was spared on the merit of his young age; he was not even 20. He said he asked Commissar Tsegaye Gebremedhin to release him from his party membership, which he was granted.

Some months later, he made it to Sudan with about 70 other people, having survived malaria, the wilderness and the Eritrean Liberation Front, Jebeha, which had detained them for a couple of months.

There followed a spell of reading at the British Council and the Khartoum University Library. The lives of Trotsky, Bukarin and Liu Chaw Chee revealed a similar pattern of how socialism sacrificed those which were dismissed from their parties.

"In socialism, you are required to be a loyal servant of the party; not a free man who serves his party," he said.

His next destination, the United States, would not only give him academic maturity, but also a wife and a family. He would discover the ideology he is now passionate about: individual freedom combined with compassion to the underprivileged in society.

They call it Social Democracy; a political ideology incorporating a degree of socialism but including such values as private property and representative government. It has been long practised in European countries such as Denmark, Finland, Sweden and the former West German.

It was in the United States he had lost his other sister, Adanech, who fled the hard days here, in a car accident. Those periods were also trying for father Nega Bonger, who was affected by the loss of two of his 14 children.

Talking to Fortune, Nega said he started hugely investing in his children's education in the United States.

"I converted Ethiopian Birr into dollars," Nega said, "and spent 32,000 dollars for one, 12,000 for another."

For instance, he paid 60,000 dollars for the education of Hewete, who now practices accounting in the U.S. With the exception of Brehanu, who had a scholarship opportunity, and Samson who studied engineering at the Addis Abeba, Nega paid several thousand dollars to educate the others, who, today, are doctors, engineers, pharmacists and accountants.

He in fact attributes this success to the evil nature of the military regime, which convinced him that he had to send his children away to a better world.

Brehanu became a successful lecturer at the Bucknell University, after graduating from the State University of New York and the New School for Economic Research.

Home politics was in his blood, though. He was active in preparing the annual Horn of Africa conference with such people as Gennenew Assefa, a former EPRP member, and two other people. He used to produce Enbilta, a journal on Ethiopian issues, with people such as Dr Konjit Fekade, who is now teaching Materials Physics at Addis Abeba University.

The Horn of Africa conference was organised to demilitarise the military regime through dialogue, according to Genenew Assefa. The event, which drew up to 1,000 participants, with speakers attending from as far as Ethiopia, ended with the fall of the Derg; the desired dialogue vanquished by a win-lose situation.

The rebels who had fought for 17 years took control of the country in May 1991.

Whatever the feelings and reactions of the EPRDF, many who had made America their abode wanted to return. Brehanu, Genenew, Konjit and many others returned to lead their own separate lives.

Brehanu, the teenage exile who had been to college for only a few months before fleeing home, returned with a doctorate. He also had married a physician, Dr. Nardos Menasie, whom he met in 1988 at one of those events he hated to attend, a wedding. They now have two sons.

Dr. Nardos happens to be the only person serving in Ethiopia in optometry in her own clinic, Orbit.

Ever since Brehanu returned to Ethiopia, he has been making efforts to make a difference; where that has not been possible he has remained different, he says.

While nearly everyone interviewed for this piece agreed that he is "genuinely" a people's person, some wonder at the level of political sacrifices he has made to his current party. Others question if his judgment involved any astuteness. Or, as one of his whole hearted admirers put it, "he is too frank and honest to dabble in the local politics."

Many agree that he almost single-handedly transformed the cash strapped and weak Ethiopian Economics Association into the most important professional organisation in the country. EEA barely had 20,000 Br when he joined it eight years ago; today the association is undertaking the construction of a 20 million Br building to its headquarters.

The idea of adding a research wing to the association, which Dr. Wolday Amaha, the current president of EEA, brought from a trip to Tanzania, came into fruition through the arduous efforts of Brehanu; today it sports such ambitious visions as starting its own post graduate programme in the field of economics.

He was also the originator of the Vision 2020 series of public events.

He served as president of EEA for four years, then the Ethiopian Economic Policy Research Institute (EEPRI), made him its first director with a salary of 4,000 dollars a month, allowed him to be his true self. In the former, he was practically the only boss.

He managed his subordinates by making them set their own deadlines and demanded that they meet it. In the latter post, he was supposedly wielded less power because there were eight people who made up the executive body.

In the words of someone who worked with him in those days, the wonderful thing was that he could override those executive members whenever he felt like doing it.

Wolday, who was one of those people, says that Brehanu and he disagreed more than they agreed, although they would later go out together for some beer.

Whilst some see Brehanu Nega as someone who taught them to value work, and others as a dedicated person who could deliver even multiple assignments at the same time, one still needs to understand the man before being able to accept him.

"He is rough," said an anonymous colleague. "He speaks his mind, and he does it on the spot. He does this no matter who. Unless you know him well, you could be offended."

You do not want to be around him when he is angry, according to a woman who served under him at EEA.

"He says it all in your face and retains nothing in his heart," said Wolday. "He is not the kind of person who keeps his ill feelings and works to destroy you."

Hewet Kassa was just a teenage girl who was looking for any kind of work when Brehanu came back from the U.S. He gave her a job as a cleaner at Meseret Nega Stationery, owned by his sister. Then, he took her to the Ethiopian Agro-Maize, Inc, where he was a shareholder, with a better salary.

At a difficult moment in her life, which followed the failing health of her father, who would later die, she decided to go to the Arab world in search of work. Brehanu urged her to stay home telling her that there was so much to do in her own country. Then she got a job at EEA. When the association had its first car, through donation, he would not hire a driver but pushed Hewet to take driving lessons. After she got her license, he hired a driver to sit beside her in the cabin until she could comfortably drive around.

Today, she is happily married and has a child; she is also studying Supplies Management at Admas College. She says she owes it all to Brehanu Nega.

Despite the respect many bestow on him for his contributions, the difference he showed was not always appreciated, although natural to him. While a lecturer at the Addis Abeba University, colleagues did not appreciate his closeness to his students.

His dismissive and stubborn approach both at EEA and EEPRI was tolerated because of his remarkable success and because people learned that his behaviour had no malice in it.

His dominance of the EEPRI followed the failure to find an appropriate person for the position, and his departure, in favour of politics, was greeted with shock. He was good at fund raising and he had good contacts with various universities in the west. Wolday said he gave up trying to convince him to reverse his decision when he finally knew that he was going into politics.

"He has always been an enchanted person," says Genenew, with an emphasis on enchanted. "I am not surprised he joined politics. He started his adult life in politics and he has continued in it. He likes public role."

Some feel convinced that his intention in his days at EEA and EEPRI has always been paving the way for his entry into politics. Some people criticise him for taking advantage of these institutions to advance his ambition in politics.

EEA members began grumbling that the association was becoming a lobby group for the business community and later criticised the executives for politicising it; among the reasons for these accusations was the increased interaction with the business community and the commencement of Vision 2020. Suffice the quiet effort by EEA current leaders now to distance themselves from the leadership's past, where two of them, Brehanu and Dr. Befekadu Degfie, are top leaders of the main opposition, the CUD.

The creation of the elitist Rainbow by Professor Mesfin Woldemariam, Drs Berhanu Nega, Shimeles Tekletsadik and Befekadu Degefe, all share social democratic views, according to Brehanu, was an outcome of a concerned discussion about the way forward for Ethiopia. It serves as a stitch to keep the CUD as it is known today.

"Kestedamena is a late comer who has not passed through much of the political hardships," said Lidetu Ayalew, who is said to have regained his public relations role at the CUD through the intercession of Berhanu. "So it had a role of softening the differences between EDP/Medhin and AEUP, and strengthening the Coalition."

The CUD was created because the new party, Rainbow, formed less than a year before the May 15th Elections, felt that the field was already too crowded. Hence, it joined the All Ethiopia Unity Party, the Ethiopian Democratic Party/Medhin and the Ethiopian Democratic League, all without necessarily giving up their organisational independence. The CUD in turn started closely cooperating with the Union of Ethiopian Democratic Forces.

Most of the people Fortune interviewed for this piece, largely speaking on condition of anonymity for various reasons, questioned his judgement in the manner he chose his colleagues at the CUD, or the way he conducted himself during the entire on-going process. Even his decision to be part in the current election through Rainbow for Social Justice and Democracy was based on a naive acceptance of the ruling party's expression of a desire to see a good opposition around. Some, like Konjit, urged him on, while others, who felt he was too honest to fit in local politics, tried dissuading him, unsuccessfully.

Says Brehanu: "When I entered into this politics, it was in good faith that there would be a peaceful situation in which nobody would die."

Critics say that these sentiments ironically led to Berhanu's involvement with forces he had once been fighting, for the people belonging to the separate parties, both in the CUD and the UEDF, once belonged to the Derg, the All Ethiopia Socialist Movement (AESM) and the Ethiopian Democratic Union (EDU). His critics are blunt about it.

"I never expected him to go to this extent, creating an unholy alliance with people who do not believe in democracy," said an old friend from their days in the U.S.

Brehanu argues that personality was hardly the issue both in the formation of Rainbow and the CUD.

"The opposition had to win significant seats. That was more important than the personalities," he said. After all, "there was enough blame to share around." Besides, he mused, if any of the people he is involved with had done any crime, the EPRDF government itself would have put them behind bars long ago.

Genenew, who says that Brehanu himself would be surprised by his own latest political gamble, wonders how long he may stay with the group.

An old member of the EPRP said that Brehanu had done a lot of coordinating work in his present political role, but has hardly considered the force which he has coordinated, criticising the CUD as coalition of hate against the ruling party.

Critics say, the CUD's alliance is negative, the only thing holding the parties together being their mutual dislike of the EPRDF.

The CUD had been repeatedly causing itself problems because of the various leaders who speak at their own time, often conflicting. Hailu Shawel and Bedru Adem had made some acerbic comments, which rightly or wrongly, were interpreted to have implications on one ethnic group. Lidetu Ayalew was quick to take his difference to the media when he smelled trouble in the CUD. Mesfin Woldemariam also has given some of the strongest interviews, while Brehanu Nega sometimes draws attention to himself by getting involved in what some call vulgar politics and the slighting of journalists, especially those who reported in favour of the ruling party.

"I remember only two occasions," he says.

Both involved Radio Fana, which runs regular programmes against the opposition parties and the private press, and Eftin, a new private Amharic weekly that regularly publishes insider but so far accurate information on meetings of the CUD. Brehanu said he spoke harshly to those journalists to make them know that if they thought what they were doing was an honourable thing, then they were wrong.

There remains with him a conflict between a politician still haunted by a tragedy from a secretive operation of a political party he belonged to during his adolescence, and one who gets nervous when a newspaper reveals a closed door meetings of his party.

"I have a simple rule: I will not involve myself in politics that is done behind the scenes," he said.

It is one of the many personal conflicts he lives with, says those who see him with scepticism.

The opposition parties have not yet made themselves very clear about what they will do in the case of the election ending in ways they do not want. The CUD may not go to court, while the UEDF may. Mass protest may also be an option, but Brehanu dreads a violent response similar to what happened in June 8.

Now he is voted as mayor of Addis Abeba, his toughest challenge will come from dealing with an EPRDF-led government at the federal level. Besides, once the election confusion is over, "people in real times will begin to ask their real demands," according to an observer. That is going to be another challenge, both to the CUD and to Brehanu Nega.

Brehanu has proved himself among his friends as someone who continues working until the work is done; he also does not care much whether people came to work at eight in the morning so long as they deliver on time. He, with colleagues, has succeeded in setting EEPRI on its feet; he has managed to get the construction of the 20 million Br building off the ground.

"You cannot, however, say that you will reduce poverty by 50pc in five years," says Wolday Amha. "It is complex. But I believe he has the competence to be the City's mayor."

As a mayor, Brehanu is now to pass through a test of fire, especially as this mayor may not have the same support his predecessor, Arekebe Oqubay, did. Yet, he will be expected to solve the city's problems better than EPRDF did.

"If EPRDF is to be a government for the next five years," Lidetu Ayalew says in suspicion, "it will make sure that there will be a lot of problems in Addis Abeba."

He says the Mayor's job requires someone who is clever, strong, determined, dedicated and diligent.

The CUD says it is still determining how much the city will be affected by EPRDF's move in transferring some revenue sources to the federal government. But the problems are not only external: the Coalition for Unity and Democracy has yet to prove whether it is just a group hastily organised with the hate of the ruling party. It has yet to dissolve the doubt that it may be elitist, with everybody wanting to be the leader.

For years, the argument by ruling party opponents has been that even the gang of the EPRDF, who came from the wild, had been able to lead the country, so why not them, enlisting all the Ph.D. holders they have. This election has ensured that the claim will be tested for real, with all sort of social, economic and political challenges.

How will the CUD mayor cruise through those hardships?

Brehanu said that CUD's priorities would include "doing anything" to create more jobs, introducing a new way of mass transport, working in the areas of HIV/Aids, and improving education in the city's schools. Everything they say will be held against them, for the voters, unified by hate to the ruling party, will now expect the fruits of love.

An economist, who expressed concern that the politics would consummate Brehanu's intellectual energy, said that he would rather see him in a position such as Minister of Planning, where he would be able to achieve things. At the mention of this point, Brehanu's controlled excitement seemed to give away what was deep in his heart, and he admitted that he wanted to use politics only as a vehicle for what he wanted to achieve in terms of development of the country.

If things go absolutely wrong, Brehanu says, then he will announce his own personal decision when that happens. The worst things he has so far experienced in the election are the June 8 killings and the loss of his personal freedom, his ability to be where he wishes any time. He also misses his family, who are on vacation in the U.S.; he used to cook for the family, he read stories for his children before bed, and he drove them to school, all of which had made him closely attached.

His great satisfaction is his ability to participate in a situation where the people were free from fear and had a taste of freedom.

The man, whose teenage political infatuation ended in trauma, finds himself at the crossroads ones more. But he vows that he would not sacrifice his integrity by playing foul.

Great story, I wish him good luck.

City: Merkato