President dishes out new districts as polls near
Daily Nation, Kenya - Dec 15, 2007

President Mwai Kibaki’s intensified campaigns in the last one month have increased the number of districts to 145.

The Head of State has nearly tripled the 57 districts he found in 2003 as he responds to public demand for closer administration.

A list from the Office of the President however still shows 137 Districts and four sub-districts.

President Kibaki, once a critic of the creation of districts and divisions by Former President Moi, directives which Internal Security minister John Michuki unsuccessfully challenged in court, has now come full circle.

In the two weeks the President has been in Western and Eastern provinces, eight districts have been born.

The newest districts are Chuka, Mara, Shinyalu, Kilome, Navakholo, Bura, Lafey and Siakago.

President Kibaki had also carved Laisamis, Chalbi, Garbatula, Tigania, Igembe, Imenti North, Imenti South, Mutomo, Kyuso, Mwala, Yatta, Kangundo, Mbooni, Kibwezi and Nzaui districts in Eastern Province.

Western Province earlier got Hamisi, Emuhaya, Mumias, Bungoma North, Bungoma East, Bungoma West, Samia, Bunyala and Teso South districts.

In Nairobi Province, the new districts are Nairobi West, Nairobi East and Nairobi North.

Had its share

Coast Province bagged Kilindini, Msambweni, Kinango, Kaloleni, Tana Delta and Taveta districts.

In North Eastern Province, Fafi, Wajir North, Wajir South, Wajir West, Mandera West, and Mandera Central are the new districts.

Central province got Nyandarua North, Nyeri North, Murang’a South, Kiambu West and Gatundu.

Rift Valley received Turkana Central, North Pokot, Samburu East , Samburu North, Trans Nzoia East, East Pokot, Uasin Gishu South, Wareng, Laikipia West, Laikipia North, Molo, Naivasha, Nakuru North, Narok South, Loitoktok, Kipkelion and Sotik districts.

Nyanza had its share in Rarieda, Kisumu East, Rongo, South Kisii, Borabu and Masaba districts.

OLF urges unity of Ethiopian opposition
Sudan Tribune, Sudan - Dec 3, 2007

The Executive Committee of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) held its regular session from November 25- December 1, 2007. In its deliberations the Committee noted that:

1. The political crisis in Ethiopia is deepening. In a futile bid to stamp out the Oromo Liberation Army and the Ogaden National Liberation Army, the regime in Addis is conducting a brutal crackdown in Oromia and Ogaden. The indiscriminate targeting of the civilian populations is causing a humanitarian crisis at par with Darfur. Political repression is also rampant through the width and length of the country. To make matters worse by severely restricting political freedom, even to the opposition in the parliament, the regime has emasculated the political process and made open resistance the only route left to seek redress for political grievances.

2. The specter of war, chaos and humanitarian disasters looms over the Horn of Africa. When the Ethiopian regime made an adventure into Somalia last year against clear warnings, it boasted that it would accomplish its stated goals and withdraw within weeks. A year later it finds itself in a quagmire. To cope with a determined resistance, the Ethiopian army is taking its wrath on the civilian population, as it has been doing in Oromia and Ogaden, unleashing a horrendous humanitarian crisis. The saber-rattling by the Ethiopian Prime Minister against domestic and foreign enemies in a recent speech to the Parliament does not bode well for a peaceful resolution. Now that the Border Commission has expired without completing its mission, the resumption of another disastrous war appears an ominous possibility ...

The Oromia Support Group in Australia voices concern over the mistreatment of Oromo refugees in Sudan [pdf file 77KB]
OLF - Dec 3, 2007
The Oromia Support Group in Australia and, in fact, Oromos everywhere, are alarmed by the report we received on the handing over of 15 Ethiopian refugees, the majority, if not all of them, were Oromo by the Sudanese authorities against their will to the Ethiopian regime. Most of these refugees were legal residents in Sudan for a number of years, and some carried UNCHR IDs. In July this year several Oromo refugees living in Khartoum and El Damazin were arrested and detained in Kobor prison in Khartoum. When Kobor prison became overcrowded, they were transferred to destination unknown to friends, most probably to the prison around Shendi. Around September 25, 2007, they were taken from their prison cells and transported to the border town of Metama and handed over in shackles to Ethiopian security and military forces on September 26, 2007 ...

Oromo Opposition Calls Current Assab Status “Most Unjust”
Jimma Times, Ethiopia - Dec 2, 2007
The Chairman of the Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement (OFDM) opposition party said the present condition of Assab port is unreasonable.
Bulcha Demeksa of the OFDM stated these comments about Assab to Jimma Times after indicating that he doesn’t expect the upcoming elections in Ethiopia to be any fairer than the previous ones. Last week, Dr. Yacob Hailemariam of the CUD opposition party made similar statements about Assab port’s importance to Ethiopia, as the deadline for the EEBC then approached, today leaving the Ethio-Eritrean border without being physically demarcated ...

Ethiopia-Eritrea commission ends, border unresolved
Reuters South Africa, South Africa - December 1, 2007

An international commission charged with setting the border between Ethiopia and Eritrea dissolved itself on Friday, leaving the two states who fought a border war that killed some 70,000 people to work it out alone.

Thousands died in World War One-style trench warfare in the 1998-2000 clash between the Horn of Africa neighbours and, according to the United Nations, the two sides have again amassed thousands of troops and artillery at the frontier.

The Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, part of Permanent Court of Arbitration, fulfilled its mandate of determining the border in 2002. But a deadline for the two states to demarcate the boundary expired on Friday, with neither complying.

"Until such time as the boundary is finally demarcated, the delimitation decision of 13 April 2002 continues as the only valid legal description of the boundary," the commission said in a statement on Friday.

Tensions between the countries have ratcheted up in recent weeks with the approach of the deadline to physically mark the 1,000-km (620-mile) frontier ...

Kenya arrests 12 suspected Ethiopian rebels
Kenya Broadcasting Corporation, Kenya - November 30, 2007
Kenyan police said on Friday they had arrested 12 suspected Ethiopian rebels and nine locals accused of helping them in a remote region on the border with Ethiopia.
Two of the suspected members of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) rounded up this week have already been deported while the others are still being interrogated, said Rono Bunei, district police commander in the Kenyan border town of Moyale.
"The operation is still going on and we shall not allow any group to use our soil to fight a friendly government," he said. The rest will be deported if confirmed as OLF members.
One of several insurgent groups fighting Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's government, the OLF seeks greater autonomy for ethnically Oromo areas of south Ethiopia.
The nine Kenyans were arrested for offering shelter to the 12, police said.
Some locals said innocent youths had been arrested ...

China in Africa: Developing ties
BBC - November 27, 2007

An artist's impression of the new conference centre China is to build for the African Union at its Addis Ababa headquarters, at a cost of $150m (£75m).

In almost every corner of Africa there is something that interests China.

The continent is rich in natural resources that promise to keep China's booming, fuel-hungry economy on the road.

There is copper to mine in Zambia, iron ore to extract in Gabon and oil to refine in Angola.

In other countries less blessed by natural resources, Chinese companies have spied trading and investment opportunities.

Africa's need for new and better roads, school buildings, computer networks, telecoms systems and power generation has opened a lucrative window of opportunity for Chinese firms.

The new Sino-African dynamic can leave the West ill at ease, reviving memories of Europe's colonial domination in Africa and drawing complaints that low Chinese bids are freezing out Western companies ...

Related News:

China in Africa: Rebuilding

China in Africa: Mineral Trade

UN to visit Ethiopia trouble spot
BBC - November 27, 2007

The UN's Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs, John Holmes, is set to visit the troubled Somali region - the Ogaden - in south-east Ethiopia. Large parts of Somali region were off-limits to all outside humanitarian agencies for several months this year.

Meanwhile the Ethiopian army conducted counter-insurgency operations against rebels operating in the area.

The UN managed to negotiate access to the area. Mr Holmes will be meeting UN staff and local government officials.

Painstaking process

The situation in central Somali region - known as the Ogaden - has been extremely difficult for most of this year.

Residents have been caught between actions by Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) rebels and army reprisals ...

December 1st 2007 - World AIDS Day

Image Source: AbdiBorii.org

FACTS about AIDS in Oromia

- While the Ethiopian national HIV prevalence rate is estimated to be as high as 3.5% (UNAIDS 2007), a recent government source has put the HIV prevalence rate in Oromia at about 1.5%.

- Lack of government-supported aggressive preventive campaigns against HIV/AIDS in Oromia has been widely reported by many sources, including OLF, and the HIV/AIDS Prevention and Control Office of Oromia has frankly admitted that the lack of "adequate coverage & good quality data" had caused the disease to spread in Oromia.

YouTubeLink

U.S. Secretary of State, Dr. Condoleezza Rice, on the Horn of African current political problems & solutions:

MC Lil' M.Z. & His Stooges (Deputy PM Addisu & Pres. Girma) LOL - No Worries These Days

With a loan of $640 million on its way from India (Yes, India), a divided opposition in & outside the Empire, and the illegal investment schemes (the encroachment of Oromo farmland by the so-called diaspora investors) in Oromia at all-time high profit levels, the trio has nothing to worry about, but laugh out loud (LOL) unrestrainedly. Do not mention the major humanitarian crisis looming over Ogadenia, the illegal war in Somalia, and the HR 2003 bill, you will spoil this precious moment of the trio.

Athletics stars Gay and Defar take top IAAF awards
AFP - November 25, 2007

Tyson Gay and Meseret Defar

World champion sprinter Tyson Gay of the United States and Ethiopian middle-distance starlet Meseret Defar were on Sunday named by athletics' world governing body, the IAAF, as the top athletes of 2007 ...

Defar, the 23-year-old reigning Olympic champion over 5,000 metres, has been in startling form on the track, winning all her races this season and setting two world records and a world best.

She set world records of 14:16.63 for the 5000m at the Bislett Games in Oslo in June, and 8:23.72 for the indoor 3000m in Stuttgart in February.

In May, she also ran two miles, a distance not recognised by the International Olympic Committee, at Carson in a world record time of 9:10.47.

Defar, who won 5000m gold at the Osaka World Championships, said: "This is very special for me. This is very special for Ethiopian women.

"Those who struggle very hard and who don't have very many opportunities to achieve the highest levels of athletics. So I dedicate this award to them" ...

Sidama struggle veteran dies
The Sidama Concern - November 25, 2007

Woldeamanuel Dubale Hankarso died on Tuesday, 20 November 2007. Mr Hankarso was active in the struggle for the rights of Sidama people for self-determination, and he led the movement for liberation in the early 1980s. He lived in exile for decades, first in Somalia and later, during the TPLF regime, in the UK where he died.

Just before the May 2005 election, he went back to Sidama for reasons unknown to many people. He became ill just after the Ethiopian millennium and remained ill until his death. His body is flown to Sidama today for burial. We extend our condolences to his family members and friends ...

Some OLF Suspects Released, But Replaced by New Comers – Bulcha
Jimma Times, Ethiopia - November 22, 2007

Qallitti Concentration Camp, where thousands of Oromo prisoners of conscience languish.

The Chairman of the OFDM opposition party told Jimma Times that many Oromo Ethiopians suspected of being OLF members were released recently. However, “just as many” new OLF suspects have been detained.

Bulcha Demeksa, leader of the Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement, has been outspoken in parliament condemning the widespread imprisonment of Oromos by government forces. In response, Bulcha says a number of them were released but “many have been imprisoned during the same period.”

He said the OLF suspects suffer without a trial and despite the widespread detainment "no one has been convicted of being an OLF member or supporter.” Bulcha has been disclosing similar problems, particularly in August, and other activists complained the imprisonment of Ethiopian Human Rights Council (EHRCO) workers in its Nekemte town branch in Oromia ...

Ethiopia: What Lays Beneath “A child that is born in prison fears the free world”
Ayyaantuu - November 20, 2007
Ebissa Ragassa, Freelance WriterThus far the appearance of Ethiopia has been perpetuated rather than the nature of Ethiopia as it really is. Each successive government continues to affix its own veil rather than shade some light on the causes of Ethiopia’s dysfunction. Massive energy and vital resources are spent by ruling groups in indoctrinating, creating a hypnotic state among its very citizens and imposing flawed model of thinking, rather than encouraging mutual reality. All different Ethiopian citizens or peoples of that land are contending based on their own individual or group’s appearance of what the state of Ethiopia is, or what it should be. Henceforth, the fundamental nature of Ethiopia has not changed since its inception. For some, Ethiopia is a step-mother; for other, it is their biological parent. For some, it is source of empowerment; for other, it is a cause of agony. For some, Ethiopia is an ancient country; for others, it is a two-century-old in the process of becoming. The clash of these competing ideas is the present day drama of Ethiopia. Whether the drama will unfold in tragic end or in a new beginning remains in our determination to look beyond the appearance, unwrapping the veil of Ethiopia, hopping over the propaganda and the our biases, and entering the domain of the truth.
We must recognize that Ethiopia is just an idea that exists in our mind; it is not a natural phenomenal like the sunset and sunrise that continue to exist independent of our thought. Ethiopia is not a fixed entity despite the common perceptions. Although some group do entertain that Ethiopia is a natural phenomena that can only be transformed by divine intervention, I contend that Ethiopia is a thought that can be altered to transcend us, elastic enough to stretch us. Since Ethiopia is an idea, it does not belong to no one, no ethic group has patent over Ethiopia, while Ethiopia’s past history is contrary to this idea ...

Ethiopians Dominate Beirut Marathon
International Association of Athletics Foundation, Monaco - November 18, 2007
The Ethiopian pair of Tamrat Elanso and Adaneche Beyene Jemilu proved to be easy winners of the BLOM Beirut International Marathon on Sunday.
But pride of place was acknowledged to belong to the meeting organisers who ensured the race went ahead without a hitch despite Lebanon's present political situation ...

Ethiopia: Bekele announces marriage
AfricaNews, Netherlands - Nov 17, 2007

Ethiopia' s triple World and 2004 Olympic 10,000m champion Kenenisa Bekele has announced he will marry film actress Danawit Gebregziabher at a wedding ceremony on Sunday 18 November 2007.

Today’s announcement of the marriage plans of the 25-year-old Bekele, will cause an equal stir of excitement in the Ethiopian capital. It was only in January 2005 that the World and Olympic champion suffered the tragic loss of his then-fiancée Alem Techale, the 2003 World Youth 1500m champion, who collapsed and died while on a training run with him in the outskirts of Addis Ababa. His new fiancée Gebregziabher was an actress in Ethiopian hit-movie “The 11th Hour”.

The wedding will take place at the Sheraton Addis, one of only two five-star luxury hotels in the country.

Bekele’s training and competition plans remain unknown for the remainder of 2007, but in January 2008 he is scheduled to compete in Edinburgh against Zersenay Tadese of Eritrea, the World XC and Road Running champion ...

Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement ready to participate in upcoming election
OromoIndex - Nov 17, 2007
The Oromo Federalist Democratic Movement (OFDM) disclosed that it will participate in the upcoming local election.
OFDM Chairperson, Bulcha Demeksa, told WIC that the movement will participate in the election for woreda and kebele councils as well as in filling vacated seats in the House of Peoples Representatives in all woredas of Oromia State and some woredas of SNNP State.
The party has been making preparation to field competent candidates as it believes that woredas and kebeles are the can help alleviate the economic and social problems of the public and become closer to the community, he said.
The Chairperson further indicated that the newly organized National Electoral Board has been consulting state governments and political parties to respond to the questions it raised in connection with the election.
A transparent system should first be put in place in order to carry out free and fair election, Bulcha said, adding that the media should also pave the way for the opposition parties to express their views on the election ...

Police harassment rampant at border
Daily Nation, Kenya - Nov 15, 2007
My recent trip to the Moyale border town from Marsabit by a lorry exposed me to police misconduct and lack of professionalism.
The trip took me through four police checks that operated like toll stations.
Vehicles and passengers were searched for reasons other than security concerns or roadworthiness.
Of the four check points, Wolda, Turbi, and Marsabit Town KBC transmission station were the worst.
Drivers and their passengers were not allowed to go past the metallic barriers before paying bribes.
I and a local councillor aboard the same lorry had rough time trying to speak for the innocent passengers harassed by the police.
The officers have apparently introduced a new system to identify travellers. Proficiency in Kiswahili language and vaccination marks have apparently become the basis for identification, instead of national identity cards.
At Marsabit KBC station, a woman with a baby strapped to her chest was ordered to alight from the lorry for not being fluent in Kiswahili.
The civic leader and I, had to intervene and save the woman from being taken to an extortion corner to negotiate for her freedom ...

Eritrea, Ethiopia urged to settle their border dispute peacefully
AFP - November 14, 2007
The UN Security Council on Tuesday urged arch-rivals Eritrea and Ethiopia to settle their border dispute peacefully and to take "concrete steps" to demarcate their frontier.
A non-binding statement read out by Indonesia's UN envoy Marty Natalegawa, the council chair this month, pressed the two Horn of Africa neighbors "to take concrete steps to implement immediately and without preconditions the delimitation decision" made by a UN-appointed boundary panel.
It also appealed to the two sides to "refrain from using force and settle their disagreements by peaceful means, to normalize their relations, to promote stability between them and to lay the foundations for sustainable peace in the region" ...