"t'

Uhtch nay Ethtopla? Problcnr of tn Afrlcan cducatlonal ayetem. /

Pcro I p r e u d . J / / I n : l , ! a n r ft c l d Col legc Iagaz Lnc . - Oxford . no .
175. L972. - p.1-7.

Which way Ethiopia?

Problemsof an African Educational
System

The history of education in Ethiopia is the history of a struggle

betweenthe country's traditional values and those of the modern
world. Ethiopia's rôle in Africa as the ancientempire that retained
its integrity and resistedimperialismwhen the rest of the continent
was being carved up is no longer acceptedas an adequateimage by
many educated Ethiopians. The contempt for the rest of Africa
expressedin the Kebra N egast'sformula "The will of God decreed
sovereigntyfor the seedof Shem and slaveryfor the seedof Ham"
is no longerdefensiblein a country that is host to the Organisationof
African Unity and the UN's Economic Commission for Africa.
Gibbon'swords- "Encompassed on all sidesby the enemiesof their
religion, the Ethiopians slept near a thousandyears,forgetful of the
world by whom they were forgotteÍr"- are no longer applicablein
the century of the Global Village,-with Addis Ababa only some
twelvehoursfrom the major Europeancapitals.
The powerof tradition in Ethiopiais overwhelming. The Church,
the nobility, and the Emperor either own or control major interests
in land, education,industry,communications, and every other area
of endeavour.The initial irnpulse towards modernisationin the
'twentiescame from the Emperor, then still known
as Ras Tafari,
partly becauseof what has been termed his "radical paternalism",
and partly becausehe was the only possiblesourceof any kind of
major political initiative of that kind. Yet in the 1960sand 1970sthe
closepersonalcontrol of the Emperor, necessary in the feudal times
4
during which he grew up, is seenby many of his subjectsnot merely
as obsoletebut as positivelyreactionary.Without commentingon thê
justice of this attitude,the fact of its existencemust be recógnised,
and its influenceon the patternof educationacknowledged.
Ethiopia is a rich country populated by poor people. Over
seventyper cent of the populationlives more than a day's journey
from an all-weatherroad. Predominantlyagricultural, Ethiopia is ;
text'book example of a one-crop country at the mercy of the
rapaciousconsumernationswho control the market. The per capita
-figurei
income averagesarounri f2350 a year, one of the lowest in
Africa. Yet the traveller cn the road, say, from Addis Ababa to
Harrar will be impressedby the obviousfertility of the land as well
as.by- the primitive methodsused to farm it. There are only 2,013
schoolsin Ethiopia, just over half of which are Governmentiun, the
rest being Mission schools,private schools, or Orthodox Church
schools- about one schoolper 12,000people.Only about 14% of
the school-a89population in fact attendi, ind the ïast majoriiy of
theseare in the urban centres.
It is only against this background of potential wealth and
entrenchedtradition that the successes and failures of the educational
systemcan be understood.The traditional Churchsystemof education
was, and is, based on an accepüanceof authority, tradition and
discipline that is spartan in the extreme. Studentswere taught
self'relianceand denial as a matter of course- they would begin-by
learningby rote the fidel - the syllabaryof over ZiO lettersin íhicL
both Amharic and Ge'ezare written. They might end up as 35-year-
olds,at the highestlevelin the system,stili leainingby essentially the
samemethods.Knowledgewas handed down and accepted;it was
not for the studentto offer his ideas or criticisms.tn ìOOition, as
? Nigerian writer has stated of his own country, the "idea of the
book is also influencedfundamentallyby the religiouscircumstances
of its intioduction to the people.Thó Koran and the Bible were the
first books in masscirculation. . . and they were presentedin sucha
way that their contentswere not to be disputed.Books, therefore,
cameto be regardedas infallible . . .". This attitudeis fundamental
in Ethiopia even today. Even the most revolutionarystudentstend
to regardthe works of l.enin and Mao as bodiesof dógma,not to be
criticisedor _adapted,but merelyappliedwithout questiõn.As recently
as the mid-fiftiesthe Jesuitswho ran the then UniversityCollegeot
Addis Ababa could givg low gradesto thosepupils whó questúned
their theologicalor philosophicalassumptioni.Ìt is true that this
situation became a cquse célèbre and was corrected, but the
underlyingattitudeswereharder to eradicate,and have only changed
slowly.
"You are to teach three things. Discipline, discipline and
disciplin€," said the Emperor to the Presidentof the University
College around 1960,and the remark is squarelyin the Ethiopian
educational tradition. Historically, the first alternatives to the
Orthodox church schoolswere the missionaryschools,which in many
(s.
respects\ryerelittle better- . . their curriculum is suitableonly for
training youths to be interpreters. . .dogmatic religion rather than
;seful educationseemsto be the aim of at leastsomeof them . . .".
As early as 1908the Emperor Menelik II foundeda schoolin
Addis Ababa, and in 1922 the then Regent Tafari Makonnen
founded and paid for the Tafari Makonnen School,still one of the
major high schoolsin the capital. The state educationsystemwas
systematicallydestroyedby the Italian Fascistsduring the occupation
of 1935-1941, but by 1952over 540 schoolshad beenestablishedor
rebuilt. Lack of capital, of roads,and of trained teachershas meant,
however, that recent growth has been slolv, slower in fact at the
lower levelsthan in highereducation.
Some recent developments,however, may herald substantial
changes.The potentially most significant of these has been the
publication in October 1972 of the Education Sector Review,
sponsoredby the Imperial Ethiopian Governmentunder pressure
from the ïVorld Bank. The Review is not yet generallyavailable,
although an interestingsummaryof its main proposalsappearedin
the October1972issueof Alríca magazine.
The three basic theoreticalassumptionsof the Revíew, which
involved almost all of the big namesin educationin Ethiopia, are
equity,quality, and development. By equity is meantbasiceducation
for everybodyin the country in as short a time as possible;by
development is meanta structuralgrowth at all levelsto ensurethat
future manpowerneedscan be met; by quality is meanta refusalto
lower standardsin orderto achievetheseaims.
The Review commits Ethiopia strongly to the objective of
universal education,at least at the elementaryschool level. The
implicationsof this commitmentfor the high schoolsystemand for
the one national and one private universityare far-reaching.Haile
SellassieI University originally plannedto double its size,in terms
of studentenrolment,every ten years.In fact its rate of growth has
been nearly twice as fast- it has doubled student enrolrnent
approximatelyeveryfive years.The University'splan,A Bluepríntfor
6
Development,published in ln}, envisaged20,000studentsin three
or four regionalcampusesby 1990.Right no\ry,in 1972,the University
will be admitting 5,000 students for the second semester.The
mathematicsare obvious.
Unemployment among high-school graduates who have
completed lzth grade is a national problem. However, of the
university'sgraduatingclassof 1972at the time of writing only two
or three have not found employment.The incentiveto enrol in the
University, which provides free tuition and cheap accommodation,
is thus very powerful. It ip clear that adoption of the Education Sector
Review's recommendationsto increase the base in elementary
educationfrom 14% to 66% to 92.4% will not only createcontra-
dictions in the policiespresentlybeing followed in the aÍea of higher
education,but will strain the social and economicinfrastructureof
Ethiopia severely.
The dialectic of tradition and modernism is thus at work in
Ethiopian society in general as well as in the sphereof education.
The University is committed to a policy of the maintenanceof
standardsthrough (relatively)slow growth. It now appearsthat the
Governmentis committed to masseducationat lower levels as fast
as possible.Unless urban industrial developmentcan keep up the
pacethe consequences could be grim.
There is no doubt that the Emperor still, at 80 years old the
dominating political figure in Ethiopia, is personallydedicatedto
educationas a weaponin the strugglefor development.His speeches
over the last fifty years have consistentlyharped on this theme.
However,it remainsto be seenwhetherhis conceptof educationwill
emergeas the dominant one in Ethiopia, or whetherthe extremesof
reactionary and progressivethought will fight it out to the finish.
Whateverhappensit certainly seemsto be true that, in the words of
Af rica, ".,: . Ethiopian educationseemsripe for a revolution."
"PERO"