Week of 09/21/2008: Renaissance or Deja Vu? - Pictures: On the left is the newly Woyane-built Blue Nile Gorge bridge called "Renaissance Bridge"; on the right is the original Blue Nile Gorge bridge built by the Italians during their brief occupation of the Ethiopian empire in the 1930's.

What's similar about these two bridges is not only their locations, but also their intentions. The Italians occupied the Ethiopian empire for 5 years starting in 1936. Immediately after they had seized this Horn of African country, they started an infrastructure-building frenzy. Almost all of the current roads and buildings of the Ethiopian empire were built by the Italians during that 5-year occupation. Their intention was not to help the peoples of Ethiopia, but to facilitate routes for their colonial loots.

About 70 years later, the Woyane colonialists now ruling over the Ethiopian empire have built yet another route for their loots. The Woyane ruling elites are selling their colonial scheme as "renaissance", but it should have been a "Deja Vu" moment as the peoples of Ethiopia had been there; the colonialists were never successful then, and they will not be successful this time around. Building bridges and roads is not a sign of democracy; come on, the British had the grand plan of building a railroad from Cape Town to Cairo, and democratizing the regions from Cape Town to Cairo was never what they had on their minds.

Instead of building escape routes for colonial loots, the government should have first provided basic needs to the peoples of Ethiopia. A fair government committed to human rights does not let its citizens starve until they surrender to its demands; a fair government committed to human rights does not pull out the plug on the only television station in Afaan Oromoo (by the way, the Woyane government took away Oromo's right to broadcast TV in Afaan Oromoo; the Italians were the ones who allowed the first radio broadcast in Afaan Oromoo during their occupation --- you be the judge), a fair government committed to human rights does not imprison its citizens because of their political views, and building a bridge to facilitate colonial repression does not make a government fair. The new bridge does not change the relationship between the oppressed and the oppressor.

Woyane Built Bridge (Blue Nile Gorge)	Italian Built Bridge (Blue Nile Gorge)