Yara Foundation Can Do the Right Thing to Restore the Good Name of Norway
By Dr. Michael Fessehaye
Sep 5, 2005, 17:07



Allow me to express my heartfelt dismay after I read Yara Foundation of Norway is to award the African Green Revolution Award to the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi; as if Meles Zenawi is a leader who has tried, let alone he to have succeeded, to save Ethiopia from hunger and from being the perpetual beggar nation.

For all to read, this is what Yara Foundation has to say why they selected Meles Zenawi, the 21st Century "racist" Ethiopian leader, to receive this award, and I quote (emphasis mine):

1. "The Yara Foundation Board recognizes Prime Minister Meles' decisive steps towards increasing food production and reducing poverty in one of the poorest countries of the developing world. He has brought about political change in Ethiopia, and placing the rural poor first in the country's development strategies."

2. "It also involves providing an enabling policy environment, securing ownership rights, improving child nutrition, making markets work for the poor and doing all this in ways that protects and enhances the rural environment. It is a revolution to end hunger that also empowers people with a voice, and the opportunity to create their own future."

Please read the above paragraphs over and over again and see if the Meles Zenawi that being talked about is the Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia.

The Meles Zenawi to have taken "decisive steps towards increasing food production" to "reducing poverty" and to have "brought about political change in Ethiopia" by "placing the rural poor first in the country's development strategies"?...!...? Claiming all these and much more Meles Zenawi to have done by "enabling policy environment, securing ownership rights, improving child nutrition, making markets work for the poor" "in ways that protects and enhances the rural environment"?...!...? The Meles Zenawi presented as a revolutionary to have led a "revolution to end hunger that also empowers people with a voice, and the opportunity to create their own future."?...!...? No; something must have gone terribly and horribly wrong within the chambers of Yara Foundation to say these words and to award the Meles Zenawi, the Prime Minster of the apartheid regime of Ethiopia, the Weyane.

Defining Meles Zenawi Vis-a-vis The Country We Call Ethiopia.

What kind of Ethiopia do we have at this very moment for Yara Foundation to justify their decision? Here is Ethiopia, which is the NO. 3 from the bottom in all indices of development. Here is a country where 65% of her yearly operating budget (just to pay civil servant salaries) comes in the form of loans, alms, and handouts. In Meles Zenawi's Ethiopia: If it is not hunger, it is HIV; if it is not HIV, it is malaria; if it is not malaria, it is Meles killing the Ethiopians in cold blood; if it is not Meles killing the Ethiopians, it is making the Ethiopians kill each other on ethnic lines; if it is not making the Ethiopians kill each other, it is war and incursion against all sovereign neighboring countries including Eritrea; and if it is not war and incursion against sovereign nations, it is back to square one-to hunger and human misery of biblical proportion. And what a historic blunder for Yara Foundation to award Meles Zenawi while the Meles Zenawi is the one who reduced Ethiopia to be synonym to hunger and human misery.

Here is the Ethiopian Prime Minister who graduated from a school of deception, lies, TILMET (betrayal), and ALU (denial) with flying colors. The hallmark or the trademark of Meles Zenawi and his Chifra (regime): TILMET and perfecting the art of beggary to the highest level of sophistication. Here is Meles Zenawi, a leader of a nation, who goes begging for alms and handout year in and year out with no end on sight. It is documented fact that the country we call Ethiopia is now a country that has relinquished her soveignty to more than 250 Western NGOs. In short, here is a man who bled Ethiopia to death economically, politically, and socially during the last 14 years and he is still at it in grandiose scale. Here is the architect of a none-existing and a none-functioning "ethnic-based federal" state out of Ethiopia. As some experts are putting it, to undo the damage done so far by Meles Zenawi, just to bring Ethiopia back to the pre-1991 economic and social status, as if there was a pre-1991 status to begin with, Ethiopia is to need half a century! And here comes Yara Foundation to award the Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia as if he is a leader who took "decisive steps" "to end hunger that also empowers people with a voice, and the opportunity to create their own future."!

That is not all. Here is country we call Ethiopia that is already Balkanized for all practical purposes. With the exception of a handful loyal footsoldiers of Meles Zenawi, who can go anywhere and who can do whatever and whenever they wanted to blood-suck the resources of Ethiopia; here is a country where her citizens are not allowed to travel from one ethnic-based federal zone to another to make a living or to seek residency. The ugly and the scary about Meles Zenawi and his regime is here is Meles Zenawi setting up the country we call Ethiopia for balkanization, if not for genocide, and Yara are giving him High-Five for a job well done!

What else is there about Meles Zenawi in which Yara Foundation has decided to hide or to overlook? Any other skeleton hidden in the closet of Meles Zenawi? There is more from just yesterday. The most shameful aspects of this whole episode is for Yara Foundation to have awarded Meles Zenawi at the very moment when Meles Zenawi was mowing Ethiopians in the streets of Addis in cold blood. At a time when Meles Zenawi was spilling Ethiopian blood in the streets of Addis; some one within the chambers of Yara Foundation was pouring wine celebrating Meles Zenawi for a job well done! What would the Ethiopian mother who lost a son or a husband or the Ethiopian child who lost a father in the May 2005 killing spree say to Yara Foundation when they are told the murderer of their loved one is being celebrated by Yara? What a contradiction and what an anomaly of life to see these diagonally opposed faces of Meles Zenawi to surface at the same moment! Meles shooting his victims by one hand and receiving a check for $200,000 on the other for a job well done; all at the same time! How could that be?...!...?

This is the Meles Zenawi of Ethiopian and if Yara Foundation wants to know more about Meles Zenawi, they do not have to take the words of the Eritreans or the Ethiopians for it; but to ask the EU Election Observers who were there when Meles Zenawi was mowing 72 Ethiopians on the streets of Addis Ababa in May 2005. This is what the EU Chief Election Observers, Ana Gomes, has to say about Meles and his law of jangle, and I quote,

"In several important aspects, international standards for genuine democratic elections were not met. Unrest over alleged vote-rigging led to the police shooting dead at least 36 protesters and arresting thousands more in June.... The climate of threats and intimidation was maintained throughout the complaints investigation process."

It defies logic and human decency to see that was what Meles Zenawi was doing at the very hour when Yara Foundation was showering him with praises and award. Then again, it is easy to conclude what is Ethiopia and its people to Yara Foundation as long as there is a potential fertilizer market in Ethiopia to be shared or monopolized. According to Weyane propaganda machine, the Walta Info, Ethiopia has imported over 420,000 metric tons of fertilizers in the year 2004-2005. If Yara could grab half of this market, then the $200,000 award money Meles Zenawi is to receive compared to the tens of millions Yara could potentially have in the sale of their fertilizers in the years to come is just a change that could end up thrown under the seat of Yara CEO Volvo.

And another question that begs an answer is how can Yara, the exporter of fertilizers to African countries, is that eager and that hasty to award the very same leader who is leaving the Ethiopian poor farmers out in the cold? Simply the Ethiopian farmers are unable to pay the credit they secured to buy the fertilizer from Weyane merchants and peddlers; they are being thrown out in the cold. Yara Foundation should know the very people who receive and peddle fertilizers to the poor Ethiopian farmers are Meles' people-only to come back after one season demanding payment in full from these farmers-if not these farmers are to be evicted from their centuries old farms and homes. Yara should know or they should have known they are being played into this cruel fertilizer credit-evict evil scheme of Meles and Co.

This being the truth about Meles and his regime, can Yara Foundation afford to be part of this evil scheme-a scheme that ends in evicting the poor Ethiopian farmers from the land of their forefathers? At this hour it is the poor Ethiopian farmers, including those from Tigrai (Meles' tribe), that are being evicted from the land of their forefathers. Knowingly or unknowingly, the message that being sent by Yara to Meles and Co is business is good and continue. What a shame, wittingly and unwitting here is Yara to end up to be the right hand man of a man who is taking Ethiopia down the drain.

The Law of The Jungle And The Racism of Meles Zenawi Vis-a-vis The Rule of Law.

In addition, does Yara Foundation know Meles Zenawi is not only known for his crimes from within Ethiopia but also for his crimes against humanity? Here is the Ethiopian Prime Minister who deported over 70,000 innocent Eritreans from Ethiopia, with the only shirt on their backs, simple Meles Zenawi did not like "the color of their eyes"! Here is a man who imprisoned a 70-years old Eritrean grandmother, on a wheelchair for more than 18 months in Billatien Concentration Camp, for no apparent reason but for being an Eritrean grandmother!

To know the evil and sadistic nature of Meles Zenawi and his CHIFRA; what you have to do is to read his lips and listen Meles Zenawi defining Meles Zenawi. When asked by international journalists as to why Meles Zenawi has to deport the Eritreans and the Ethiopians of Eritrean origin with the only shirt in their back; boisterously, with his blood-flooded bulging eyes looking straight into the TV cameras, this is what he has to say for the world to hear and to heed. The racist and sadistic words of Meles Zenawi went like this: "Be it Japanese or Eritreans, they are only in Ethiopia due to the goodwill of Ethiopia. If Ethiopia says get out of Ethiopia because Ethiopia does not like the color of their eyes; they have to get out."

These are the very words of Meles Zenawi and these words are recorded in living and breathing pictures for generation to come! If Yara Foundation would like to oblige reading and viewing these infamous racist words of Meles Zenawi; what they have to do is push the button and let the living and breathing pictures do the telling and the talking.

Going back in time to review history from the recent past; the above words of Meles Zenawi are the very exact words and phrases Adolph Hitler used when he sent 7,000,000 Jews to the gas chambers for no other reason. Adolph Hitler did not like their color of their eyes, the color of their hair, and their race and so he did commit this heinous crime. And here is the 21st Century African Hitler who used the same racist criteria to commit crime against humanity. The question is how quick they forget. Especially Norway, more than any one else, could not have forgotten the ugliness of race-driven crimes. Thus, to bestow an award to Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia could only mean to awarding and celebrating Adolph Hitler for his crimes against humanity.

Any thing else about Meles Zenawi! Here is an Ethiopian leader who does not abide by the rule of law but by the rule of the jungle. It is documented fact that under the pretext of Badme, which was and will be a sovereign Eritrean land for generations to come, Meles Zenawi has to declare war against Eritrea. After squandering 36,000,000,000 Birr (count the number of zeros please) in arms and armament, after hiring 259 "soldiers of fortune" from Eastern European countries and another 79 from North Korea to win him the war against Eritrean; and after leaving 153,000 dead Ethiopian "Fengiregach" (live human mine sweepers) behind to litter the Eritrean landscape; Meles was made to drink the bitter truth in June 2000. The bitter truth: Defeated and humiliated militarily, legally, and diplomatically; Badme was declared to be all Eritrean by the Eritrean-Ethiopian Boundary Commission (EEBC) at The Hague. Despite the "final and binding verdict" of EEBC, whom he signed to abide by and to live with, here is man who is telling the UNSC, EU, AU, the US, and the International Community as a whole to go to hell. Thus, wittingly or unwittingly, Yara Foundation is now giving Meles Zenawi a helping hand to continue practicing his law of the jungle.

In conclusion; this is the Meles Zenawi of Ethiopia. Then some thing must have gone terribly and horribly wrong within the chambers of Yara Foundation to award the Meles Zenawi, the Prime Minster of the apartheid regime of Ethiopia, the Weyane. Statements such as to "to end hunger that also empowers people with a voice" from Yara can only be an insult to the Africans in general and a slap on the face to the Ethiopians in particular.

"What is the most shameful aspect of this Meles-Yara fiasco?"; some one should ask. As such statements can only be a frantic and desperate move to afloat the already sunken-ship of Meles Zenawi. As such, it is not the $200,000 award Meles Zenawi is to receive from Yara Foundation but it is how the regime of Meles Zenawi is to be propped up for business as usual. As such statements can only be to whitewash the bloodstained hands of Meles Zenawi! If you add this award with the desperate dealing of the Prime Minister of UK, the objective can only be to raise the diminutives stature of Meles Zenawi by one notch in the diplomatic arena. But the truth but nothing but the truth: Meles Zenawi's ship has sunk already and to try afloat the sunken ship by anyone is an exercise in futility. The facts nothing but the facts: Meles Zenawi is the rotten apple of Africa; even if Yara Foundation and others are to try to market him, repackaged as a revolutionary, leading "a revolution to end hunger that also empowers people with a voice, and the opportunity to create their own future." Rotten apple no matter how hard they try to package or repackage it; it can only be a rotten apple with no market value. Yara Foundation might not know it or they might not want to accept it but Meles and Co are goners. It is not a question of when but how soon before Meles and Co skip town or jump ship like Mengistu Hailemariam, the Butcher of Addis Ababa. In short, if elements like Yara and others are genuinely interested in the well being of Ethiopia and its people; at this juncture, what they can only hope and pray is for Meles Zenawi and his CHIFRA to skip town without leaving the Ethiopians behind killing each other and/or balkanized.

This is what 65,000,000 Ethiopians and 5,000,000 Eritreans know about Meles Zenawi. Can 70,000,000 people go wrong whereas a handful of Yara Foundation board members, relying on information supplied by Meles paid lobbyists (soldiers of fortune), are right about Meles? This is where Yara Foundation and Norway stands on this issue and this is the Meles Zenawi on the flesh. Yara Foundation should have known Meles Zenawi is neither good to Ethiopia, nor to Yara, and nor to Norway. To be honest, we do expect such a behavior and such an attitude towards Africa in general and Ethiopia in particular from the ex-colonizers who are still hovering like a vultures over the blue African skies to blood-suck the rich natural resources of African but not from Norway. We know, historically the Nordic states in general and Norway in particular were the last countries to play the unscrupulous and evil games of "the exploiter and the exploited". No; this has never been the practice of the Norway we know. But if this is how Yara and the others are to continue to conduct business as usual in Africa; then Africa can only pray, "May God save and protect Africa from those who claim they are there to save her from hunger and disease"!!!!!

These being the facts on the ground, there is still time for Yara Foundation and the Norwegian Government to bring back the good name of Norway by doing the right thing. By rescinding the award of Meles Zenawi and by apologizing to the people of Ethiopia, the honorable reputation and the noble name of Norway can be reclaimed or restored. May God give the Norwegian Government and Yara Foundation the wisdom to do the right thing!

Wetru Awet N'Hafash!
Hiji Win Hade Hizbi Hade Libi!
Eternal Glory to the Dead and the Living Heroes/Heroines
It is a Must "Wefri Warsai-YekeAlo" Should Succeed!

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The views expressed in the commentary section of Shabait.com do not necessarily reflect those of the Ministry of Information of the State of Eritrea. The writer contributed this article and bears sole responsibility for its contents.



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