We continue to suffer from deficiency of honest political discourse!

I happened to be present in a panel discussion held at Marriot Hotel, Washington DC on September,

26th, 2010 about ‘Land grabbing and delimitation of borders of Ethiopia’. The panellists were well
literate elites of Ethiopia who are currently residing in the United States and Europe. I have full
respect for all of these beautiful academics the service they are daily paying to Ethiopia.

All of them had given interesting analyses, commentaries and keynote address to basically try to
come up with possible explanations and, if possible, answers as to why and how the political
boarders of the country have been chipped away and people of other nationalities disguised as
investors are in haste of grabbing massive and fertile lands of the country. For that, Ethiopian history
has been quickly scanned in the light of defending sovereignty and political boundaries of Ethiopia.
What the emperors, kings and ‘rases’ of Ethiopian have done in the past when it comes to defending
the borders of Ethiopia against European colonisers and other resource-hungry intruders like the
Egyptians, Turkeys and Dervishes .

The talks were scholastic and heavy in terms of the many points they had carried and I just simply
could not rewrite some of them here as they were deep in their meanings for me to properly
retrieve them from my memory. I was very grateful every minute for the organisers of the discussion
as the panel go on and participants were discussing issues about the border delimitation, land
grabbing and later on general political order of the country of its past, present and future.

That being said, here is what actually prompted me to write this small commentary. After the first
round of panellists presented their presentations, I just stood up and asked the moderator to give
me a chance to make one comment and let the panellist run their thoughts over it. He allowed me
and I aired my comment. My comment was about the Ethiopian history and they way Dr Daniel, one
of the panellist, presented it. I also added that I seek their comments as to why thus far have failed
to actually come together as one people and form a one united, strong and democratic Ethiopia. As
my comment goes on, I said that we have failed because we never had an honest discussion about
our problems and that in itself had effectively impeded us from forming a strong and united
Ethiopia, and I also said that we have to really be wiling to walk what we are talking about unity by
showing our inclusiveness to the different ethino-linguistic and religious belief profiles of the county.
Some audience at the back of the hall booed me and tried to stop me from my talk. But I was at the
same time encouraged by other significant number of participants to finish what I had started to
talk. I finished my comment and sat down to listen the panellists for their reflections over my
comment.

Some might argue that my comment doesn’t directly relate with the topic of the day, but I strongly
believe that building our unity will answer not only these border delimitation and land grabbing
questions, but also many of our other socio-political concerns that we have in the country for long
time. It is a fact that significant part of the population has deliberately been left out from what has
been deemed as main-stream political discourse of the country. We also have to acknowledge, even
though we might fear that it will add a sour taste over our dishonest talk to building Unity in
Ethiopia, that we are different in ethino-liguistical profile, culture, and religious beliefs.

We have lived together for the last thousands and as some claim hundreds of years in the country
called Ethiopia, which, by the way, I love so much and proud to be one of her citizens. But our

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togetherness has never been a fair one for all blocks of the population of the country. Some had
reigned over the throne and tagged themselves as the official representative of the whole
population while they had in fact represented and benefited none except their own family and
relatives, cliques.

To size down long story short, what I have got from panellists as an answer or extension over my
comments, was satisfactory for me. Particularly, I was satisfied with the comments made by Obbo
Jawar Mohammed and Ato Fekade Shewakena. Both of them had really made very logical and civil
comments as to how we can move forward in forging peace and unity in Ethiopia amongst the
various blocks of Ethiopian population. Both of them believed that some segments of the
population of Ethiopia have continually being discriminated to meaningfully participate in the
politics and to be part of the governance in Ethiopia. This particular point really holds true to
Ethiopian Muslims. Both of them reflected that we, as Ethiopians of various ethnics and religious
beliefs never had honest discussion about the politics of Ethiopia and because of that Ethiopia
continue to be a very convenient land for dictators, autocrats and tyrants to rise up and step over
and reign on the throne in the palace and brutally repress the people.

In conclusion, it is my strong belief that we have to only fear the fear to discuss honestly about our
every aspect of societal matter if we are to be trustful to each other and allow to live together in
peace. We should have to allow honest discussion to underway and talk about our history in open
mind, reflect on our past togetherness and talk on present socio-political course and draw plans on
our way forward. We have to be brave to pay tributes and also sling blames to the many Ethiopians
who have written their names in the history book of that country. That has to be done in case-by-
case basis. For example, Atse Haileselasie have done a number of amazing things for Ethiopia and
Africa in general during his 40 years stay in power, but also he was a brutal dictator to most
Ethiopians who were under his repressive administration. While we talk honestly about the past, we
can build trust among ourselves today ; and we will use that public trust for many futures to come as
binding factor to continue to live together as beautiful peoples Ethiopia and will be able create a
durable and democratic government in Ethiopia. That is my thought for now. I am open for
discussion. Thanks.

Jemal Adem

jemalyasin@yahoo.com