Yonas Biru, PhD
In Summary
This is my third article on the topic of Oromummaa in four weeks. Some of my readers wonder why I am “so focused on Oromummaa.” We should focus on it because it is a metastasizing ነቀርሳ. It is led by tribal intellectuals who are guided by Hitler’s mass indoctrination and mobilization processes to create Oromo nationalism. Those who ignore Oromummaa do so at their peril like people who ignored the Nazi movement in its formative years.
What makes Oromummaa dangerous is that it is anti-Christianity and anti-Islam in a country where the two Abrahamic religions account for over 90 percent of the nation’s population. In recent days Oromummaa’s ethnic cleansing endeavor has been elevated to religion/religious cleansing crusade. A 398-page study from the University of South Africa notes Professor Asafa Jalata, the Godfather of Oromummaa, “is
hesitant to affirm Islam as having any rightful place within Oromo identity” and blames the processes of “Abyssinianization and Christianization” of Oromos as racist endeavors.
In an article titled “Promoting and Developing Oromummaa, professor Jalata characterizes Christians and Muslims as Ethiopian “Empire Builders” and describes Mosques and Churches as “Colonial Institutions.” At its core, Oromummaa is a national “political project” to liberate the Oromo identity from Christianity and Islam. In this regard, Professor Jalata’s position is that Christianity and Islam “need to adapt to national Oromummaa.” In this lies irreconcilable conflict between Oromummaa and the two Abrahamic religions.
In pursuit of adopting the Bible to the Oromo identity, Oromummaa scholars have published a new version of the Bible. For example, Psalms 68:31 read’s “Ethiopia is extending her hands to God.” The Oromummaa version reads: “Cush is extending her hands to God.”
In like manner, the famous statement of Prophet Mohammed “If you were to go to Abyssinia (it would be better for you), for the king will not tolerate injustice and it is a
friendly country, until such time as Allah shall relieve you from your distress” has been modified. The word Abyssinia is replaced by Oromia.
Professor Jalata condemns Oromos who embrace and venerate their Islamic or Christian religion as “assimilated former Oromos, [who] like their Habasha masters have been the defenders of the Habasha culture, religion, and the Amharic language and haters of the Oromo history, culture, institutions.” This is why Tulema Oromos are lumped up with Amharas, Gurages, Amaro’s, etc and targeted by Oromummaa mobsters.
The diabolical cruelty that the Oromo political class is unleashing on Christians and Muslims is the result of the evilgelization of Oromummaa. My first article on the topic was titled “The Oromummaa Politics: Weaponized with Lies and Soaked in Blood” and the second was headlined “Oromummaa is a Low Grade Nazification Movement.”
The two articles prompted three rebuttals on Addis Standard, the social media epicenter of the Oromummaa movement. The first rebuttal was penned by Professor Mirgissa Kaba and Girma Gutema. They started off their rejoinder with characterizing my article as a “hostile rhetoric” of a “disgruntled Amhara elite in the diaspora.”
Ironically, they said Oromummaa advocates “do not have traditions of engaging in hollow debates [because] such engagements are counterproductive.” Nonetheless, they felt obliged to respond to my article. They said they needed to set the record straight “as a reference to the future history.” The fact is that my articles unglued the Oromummaa narrative and left it naked. They are on the defensive.
I have four intertwined purposes in writing the present article. First and foremost, it is to show how the evangelization of Oromummaa has led to evilgelization signified by unprecedented inhuman cruelty against Muslims and Christians.
The second purpose is to expose Oromummaa’s futile effort to subjugate Islam and Orthodox Christianity with the aim of resurrecting and elevating Gadaa, Irrecha, and Waaqeffanna as unifying national identities of Oromo.
The third is to show how the rebuttals to my article fail to address the crux of the matter, choosing instead to engage in shameful lies.
The fourth purpose is to explain the reason behind the scaling and speeding up of the Oromummaa sadistic cruelty we have been witnessing lately.
I. The Essence of Oromummaa
Though my two earlier articles were entirely focused on political Oromummaa, all three rebuttals completely steered clear of it. Instead, they bent backward to convince us that Oromummaa is nothing more than an Oromo culture. Professor Mirgissa Kaba and Girma Gutema insist it is “a fundamental concept of being Oromo or Oromoness.” Professor Milkessa M. Gemechu describe it as a “broader concept that is explained by the totality of Oromo culture.”
Unlike his proteges, Professor Jalata is not afraid tells the truth. In an article titled Oromummaa as the master ideology of the Oromo national movement, he admits “Oromummaa goes beyond culture and history.” In a number of articles he admits Oromummaa is a “political project,” and characterizes it as “complex and dynamic” with national and global reach. He believes “global Oromummaa” is important in the “promotion of a global humanity that is free of all forms oppression and exploitation,” which he associates with Christian and Islamic colonial institutions.
As a political project, Oromummaa does not follow a peaceful path. It aims to achieve its goal by any means necessary, including violence. Professor Jalata is on the record, stating: “Oromummaa leadership can mobilize financial resources to support the OLA.”
The OLA is the Oromo Liberation Army that is involved in mass murder mass murder of women and children and kidnapping of Ethiopian and foreigners for ransom.
Here are some international headlines. “The horrific killings of 400 in Tole, allegedly at the hands of the OLA reveal its perpetrators’ utter disregard for human life” (Amnesty International, July 21, 2022). “OLA has been engaging in kidnapping activity, with 20 reported incidents claimed by the group in Oromia in 2022. Kidnap ransoms have helped to raise financial resources to fund the OLA.” (SRM, April 13, 2023). .” “As many as 320 dead in Ethiopia gun attack, witnesses say victims of massacre in country’s western Oromia region were ethnic Amharas” (The Guardian, June 20, 2022). “At least 54 killed [by OLA] in Ethiopia massacre” (Amnesty International, November 2, 2020).
What makes Oromummaa dangerous is that it aspires to change the cultural and social landscape to promote uniquely Oromo traditions and values where the diverse components of cultural, political, economic, and social aspects of life converge. There is nothing wrong with this, but for the fact that Oromummaa wants to achieve its goal by Nazifying its movement.
Just like the Third Reich for Nazi Germany was the restoration of the country to its former glory by purifying and unifying its racial identity, Oromummaa attempts to restore “the Gadaa glory days” by purifying and unifying the Oromo tribal identity.
I.1. The Effort to Crown Gadaa, Irrecha and Waaqeffanna as Unifying Cultures
As a tribal society, Oromo is culturally, religiously, and socially diversified and fragmented. The Oromo of Shewa has a lot more in common with the Amhara of Shewa than with the Oromo of Wellega. The same way, the Muslim Oromos of Arsi have little in common with the Oromo of Shewa or Wellega who are mostly Christians. There is no Oromo-centric culture that ties all Oromos together. The social engineers of Oromummaa saw this as a hurdle to build a unified national movement.
In “The Concept of Oromummaa and Identity Formation in Contemporary Oromo Society,” Professor Jalata states: “As the ideology of the Oromo national movement, national Oromummaa enables the Oromo to retrieve their cultural memories.”
The cultural memories they want to retrieve to make them suitable for Oromummaa as a national and global project are: Gadaa, Irrecha and Waaqeffanna. But this is not an easy task because all three of them are rituals and stand in conflict with the tenets and principles of Islam and Christianity that are followed by 90 percent of the population.
The Gadaa system that was practiced in limited areas of the Oromo tribal land has long been “reduced to a ritual system,” as documented by Professor Endalkachew Lelisa Duressa. Here is how he put it: “Due to the geographical expansion of the Oromo territory and an increasing population, the central Gadaa government declined beginning in the mid-17th century and autonomous regional and local republics took its place.”
This is echoed by Professor Jalata as follows: “The nonfederal nature of the Gadaa System, lack of Strong Central government, lack of regular meeting of Gadaa official and long distance of Gumii (assembly) from political center made Gadaa system less Competent”.
As a governance system Gadaa is a dead social artifact. Furthermore, it faces an insurmountable problem to serve as a unifying Oromo culture because it conflicts with Sharia that nearly 50 percent of the population of Oromo follows.
Similarly, both Muslims and Christians do not see Irrecha as a unifying Oromo culture because at its core it is Idolatry (a belief system that violates the core principles and tenets of the two Abrahamic religions).
This is how it is described in a Tourist website: “Oromo people travel to the shore of Lake Hora, near Debre Zeyit, to thank their god and to request good fortune, health, and fertility for the coming sowing season. Perfumes and butter are smeared on trunks of ancient fig trees.”
There is debate within the Oromo community whether Irrecha is religion or tradition. Dr. Gemechu Megersa, a leading Oromummaa intellectual insists it is religion and those who believe otherwise are “አቃጣሪ.” Listen to his two segment interview on the LTV Show here and here.
Waaqeffanna is an indigenous Oromo religion that is followed by 3.3 percent of the population in the Oromo tribal land. In general, very little is known about it. In the above referenced LTV Show interview, Dr. Megersa failed to give details about it. The interviewer asked him four times if Waaqeffanna has a Holy Book, institutional framework equivalent to Churches or Mosques, bishops and priests or religious practices such as lenting and fasting.
Dr. Megersa dodged the question four times. Finally, because of the persistence of the interviewer he acknowledged Waaqeffanna does not have institutions. He claimed this was because followers of the religion were not allowed to have religious institutions by successive Ethiopian governments. This is, of course, a shameful lie. Waaqeffanna was around for over 400 years before non-Oromo governments ruled the Oromo tribal land. This takes us to the second question. From whom is Oromummaa “retrieving Oromo’s cultural memories”? The answer to this question helps us understand Oromummaa’s similarity with Hitler’s Nazification process.
I.2. Unifying the Oromo Culture Requires Purifying It
In Nazi Germany, unifying Germans required purifying their thoughts and culture from negative influences. Oromummaa is following the same process. This necessitates actively promoting the Oromo culture as a superior culture and maligning and destroying other cultures.
The Oromummaa process includes purifying the social psychology of the Oromo by creating a high-level “Oromo consciousness” and “emancipating Oromo individuals and groups from inferiority complex.” Part of this drive includes introducing Gadaa as a “Classical African Civilization” and revising the Bible and Quran to Oromize them.
Political propaganda or psychological indoctrination is not sufficient to dust up Gadaa and Irrecha from the dead. Similarly, bolstering Waaqeffanna with political steroid is not enough to make it a unifying religion. Waaqeffanna cannot survive where there are competing religions. Therefore, maligning and suppressing or destroying other cultures and religions is a critical part of the Oromummaa purification process.
Professor Jalata’s voluminous writings revolve around one theme: “Externally imposed cultural and religious identities.” More specifically, he argues “Turks, Arabs, Habashas and the Europeans imposed both Islam and Christianity on Oromos.” He does not stop there. He characterizes Christians and Muslims as “empire builders” and sees churches and mosques as “colonialist institutions.”
The attempt to Oromize the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC) was the result of this. The conflict between Muslims that took regional dimension was Oromummaa driven. Recent demolitions of Mosques and Churches are not accidental incidents. They are an integral part of Oromummaa’s agenda to purify the Oromo tribal land from what “borrowed cultural and religious identities.”
I.3. Oromummaa is Sadist with a Mogassa Mindset
Over the centuries, the Oromos have assimilated others into their tribal communities and have been assimilated by others. On both sides brute forces, persuasions, and economic interests incentivized by fear and/or favor played significant part in the assimilation process.
Professor Mohammed Hassen (the most renowned Oromo historian and a member of the OLA delegation in international negotiations) acknowledges “Oromos assimilated more than they were assimilated by others.” He goes further to state that the Mogassa assimilation process was “inspired by political, military, and economic considerations on both sides.”
He acknowledges the Mogassa practice “included absorbing defeated tribes as clients or serfs into the [Oromo] tribal structure… The vanquished, still owners of their plots of land became the serfs or clients of the pastoral Oromo, who demanded service and tribute from them. The Oromo term for the conquered people was Gabbro.” Professor Mohammed is not shy to document the use of slaves as part of the Oromo expansion. Here is how he explained it.
While the Gadaa leaders marched with men and cattle from pasture to pasture as soon as the forage of a place was consumed, the wealthy individuals settled permanently on the lands. Their cattle were looked after by Oromo servants and non-Oromo slaves. By the beginning of the nineteenth century in the Gibe region of western Oromoland the term Borana had already acquired the meaning of noblemen, rich in cattle and slaves.
Yet, the Oromummaa mobsters led by Professor Jalata lament about the forced assimilation of Oromos into other societies while celebrating, glorifying, and canonizing the forced assimilation of other societies into the Oromo tribal structure that benefited from slavery.
Allow me to reintroduce you to Mogassa as seen in the eyes of foreign writers. Here is what C. F. Rey published in 1924 on Journal of the Royal African Society, Vol.23, No. 90. His article was titled “The Arussi and the Other [Oromo] of Abyssinia.” The term he used was the “G” word, which I replaced with Oromo.
“It must be borne in mind that they are and have been for nearly four hundred years, invaders on strange soil… Their methods of warfare were cruel even for that age, and it was they who introduced the horrible practice mutilating the dead, and even the wounded and prisoners.”
Pedro Paez added:
“The Oromo slaughtered many people and carried out extraordinary cruelties, because they cut to pieces the men and many of the boys and girls that they seized, and they opened up pregnant women with their spearheads and pulled the babies out of their wombs. The people of that land therefore came to fear them so much that nobody dared resist them.”
Despite providing other equally negative picture of the Oromo, C. F. Rey provided a boarder perspective, stating:
“I do not wish to suggest that the [Oromo] exhibit these [negative] traits generally, or even to any appreciable extent to-day… But I mention the facts in order that the lamb-like pictures which have been presented of Oromo folks since their subjection by the Abyssinians may be taken at the proper value, and that it may be understood why the Abyssinians have been somewhat harsh in dealing with their century old enemies when their turn came.”
II. The Evilgelization of Oromummaa
Oromummaa is the 21st century equivalent of the 16th century Mogassa empowered by the social psychology of Nazism. Hitler was highly successful in creating, nurturing and weaponizing the population’s anger and fear against designated enemies. They targeted the Jews as arch enemies.
Oromummaa uses the Amhara as well as Christians and Muslims as Oromo’s arch enemies to rile up their followers in anger. The root cause of the Oromo cruelty is the venomous political narrative and nazified political strategy of Oromummaa that claims
“The Ethiopian colonial terrorism and genocide that started during the last decades of the 19th century still continue in the 21st century.”
The Ethiopian empire that Muslims and Christians allegedly built is accused of “brutaliz[ing], murder[ing], terroriz[ing], and introducing an inferiority complex [on the Oromo by] attacking the Oromo culture.” In revenge and vengeance, Oromummaa foot soldiers are primed for retribution with unquenchable thirsty for blood.
Just like Hitler used hate and anger as social energy to create the Aryan race as an alpha race, Oromummaa intellectuals are doing the same. Just like Hitler was able to create followers with repulsively subhuman qualities, Professor Jalata and his Oromummaa mobster intellectuals have created a repulsively subhuman murderers with no moral fiber.
Please listen to helpless women in Hara crying.
“Who will stand up for Harar. They have chased us. It is Over. At this rate, we won’t find means to even be buried.” Click Here for a video clip.
You can also listen to the Amaro representative pleading to the Prime Minister at the 11th Ordinary session of the national Parliament:
“The people of Amaro are surrounded by Oromo on three directions. We are denied access to other regions. It is hard to explain our suffering in words. We are invaded and butchered, and our existence as an ethnic group is in peril.”
One can also see with horror a three minute video clip that shows the inhumanity that the Oromummaa culture manifests. Who would throw a nursing mother out in the cold, deny a Muslim father to collect his properties from his demolished house, and issue directives that anyone who rents a space to non-Oromos and “assimilated former Oromos” (aka Tulema Oromos) will be fined 15,000 Birr?
You may also look at the video clip showing Islamic leaders explaining the injustice they faced. They were not even allowed to collect their Holy Book, the Quran, before their mosque was demolished. Their mosque was legally built but that did not save it from demolition.
These are not isolated cases. According to the Ethiopian Human Rights Council, 111,118 families were forcefully displaced by the Oromo government. The Ethiopian Statistics Service suggests that one-quarter of households are headed by women and the average household size is 4.6 members. This means well over half a million people were forcefully displaced by the Oromo government in the last few months alone.
I highlighted such atrocities in my first two articles. The three rebuttals neither denied nor confirmed them. They ignored the people’s cry. Instead, they tried to paint the Oromo culture as saintly. The term shameful does not begin to explain them.
III. Three Coordinated Rebuttals to My Earlier Articles on Oromummaa
I believe the Oromummaa mobsters found my article damaging; hence their decision to break from tradition and organize multiple responses. Though my articles were entirely focused on political Oromummaa, the three rebuttals completely steered clear from it.
They were in a dilemma. Addressing my presentation of Political Oromummaa would require them to either support it in public or reject it. They could not support political Oromummaa in public because they know it is a Nazification movement. In the meantime, they could not reject it because they support (or are indifferent to) the annihilation and Oromoization of other tribal lands. Par for the course for cult intellectuals, lacking moral standing and bereft of principled guide – they tried to launder the evil political movement with the holy water of the Oromo culture.
The rejoinder to my second article on the Nazification of a tribal political doctrine was penned by a certain Professor Milkessa M. Gemechu. He started his rebuttal suggesting the intention of my articles was a “misinforming framing” of Oromummaa to:
“Advance the long-established hatred and phobia of the Oromo people (they had a derogatory name for the Oromo). They know that there is no Oromo without Oromummaa or Oromo identity.”
I do not know why he had to mention the derogatory name for Oromo. None of my articles has used such a name. His rebuttal was lacking intellectual integrity.
The “Oromo Haters” and “Oromo Phobia” Defense
Interestingly, in his rebuttal to my second article, Professor Gemechu accused me of having “Oromo Phobia.”
Let me introduce him to my heritage. Let us start with Weizero Senait. One of her daughters was Weizero Menen, who was the mother of Dejazmach Kasim, whose son was Dejazmach Biru, my father.
Who was this mysterious Weizero Senait? She was the sister of Negus (King) Michael who came from an Oromo heritage. He was married to one of the daughters of Emperor Menelik. My father’s body rests in Tenta Michael Church, where the King Michael’s body rests. Our Oromo ancestry is traced generations back.
Not to forget my mother’s side, let me introduce the Oromummaa community to her paternal heritage, starting with my grandfather Kegnazmach Habte-Michael Biru Mohammed TanTie (ጣንጤ). On his father’s side he was an Oromo ዘብሄረ ርቄ. His mother Weizero Likemyelesh was Emperor Haile Selassie’s first cousin. Her father Dejazmach Haile-Mariam was the son of Dejazmach Welde Michael Gudissa and the brother of Ras Mekonen, the father of Haile Selassie. My maternal grandmother was Desta Mekonnen Degfe Demo Bunie Buta. She was an Oromo through and through. I am married to a mixed Amhara and Oromo woman.
At times my Oromo ancestors whipped the asses of my Amhara ancestors and at other times their asses were whipped by my Amhara ancestors as it was par for the course of their time. During those days, tribes did not settle differences democratically or file complaints with international courts. They just brutalized each other. The Americans have done the same, just like European before them went through the same brutalization process. That is how states were formed.
The moral of this story is several. First, the Oromo and Amhara intermarriage is very common. Second, no Oromummaa intellectual can pull the “Oromo Phobia” crap on me. Third, Oromos were part of the Ethiopian dynasty. Ethiopian ruling class has always been of hybrid stock, never ethnically homogenic. Fourth, if the Oromummaa claim that Oromo was colonized by Amhara is true, that makes the Amhara the only colonizer in history that thrones members of its colony to rule it. The fifth and most
important message is that Oromummaa intellectuals are suffering from an incurable psychological trauma caused by their own lies.
My advice to the Oromummaa clan is to get their sorry ass out of grievance politics. If they wish to indulge themselves with grievance politics, they should remember Oromo was a victim as well as a victimizer. No amount of fiction they fabricate will launder the stained blood from the canvases of Oromo historical record.
IV. The Recent Speeding and Scaling Up of Ethnic and Religious Cleansing
Understanding the speeding and scaling up of Oromummaa’s religious cleaning and the heightening of its ruthless inhumanity requires understanding the political dynamics in the Oromo and Amhara tribal lands.
Let me start with some excerpts from an email message I sent to the leadership of the National Movement of Amhara (NAMA/አብን) on October 8, 2019. It read in part:
Currently, Ethiopia is at a crossroad. The conflict within the Oromo political parties seems to favor Abiy, i.e., pro-Ethiopian forces. Oromo hardliner activists such as Bekele Gerba, Ezekiel Gabissa and Tsegaye Arrarsa have lost all credibility and clout in the Oromo tribal land. This means the Oromo liberation theology has lost its spiritual muster at the national level. What happens next is determined by how the Amhara and Oromo political landscapes unfold.
In the current tribal system, there are two potential anchors that can hold the center for Ethiopia: (1) The group that is being led by Abiy, and (2) the Amhara.
We need to do whatever it takes to ensure Amhara tribal extremism does not take root. If Amhara ጎጠኝነት takes roots and grows, Oromo ጎጠኝነት will get oxygen. Such developments will force Abiy to retreat to his Oromo roots. If this happens, the center weakens, and tribalism will hold roots and rejuvenate.
In an article titled “Ethiopia in an Existential Crisis Without a Leader, But This, Too, Shall Pass.” I wrote:
The Amhara-Shene is an out-of-wedlock and bastardized product of the hermitized intellectual Amhara class. Unlike Oromo Shane that is well organized, Amhara-Shene is more of an off-grid and high-bandwidth network of activists. Its aim is to dial back to the time when the Amhara played a dominant role in state politics. The network’s ideological doctrine coalesces around Amhara nationalism at its nucleus from whence a unitary mindset radiates outward and expresses itself as a national identity. The network has neither a written manifesto nor an organizational platform. Instead, it pushes a passive-aggressive strategy to take the Ethiopian political center stage, using grievance politics both as the power cylinder and transmission belt of its political machinery.
The Amhara Morondum kingdom both at home and in the diaspora failed to differentiate between moderate and extremist Oromos. They attacked Lemma Megersa and Takele Uma with the same ferocity they attacked Ezekiel Gabissa and Tsegaye Arrarsa. I remember the vitriolic I was subjected to when I defended Lemma from false accusations and supported Takele Uma’s appointment. What we are witnessing now is the outcome of such a moronic politics.
Let us understand the Oromo political dynamics from 2018 to 2023. Up until mid 2022, there were three groups in the Oromo political landscape.
• Moderate Forces: Ethiopianist Oromos led by the Prime Minister. This was evident in 2018 when he dissolved OPDO and created ODP, purging all hardliner Oromos. In 2019 December, he dissolved ODP and Created Oromo-PP. This is when he brought pro-Ethiopianist forces and defeated Jawar and company.
In Foreign Policy magazine, Professor Milkessa M. Gemechu complained about it under the headline: “How Abiy Ahmed Betrayed Oromia and Endangered Ethiopia.” The Professor who is a former member of the Central Committee of the Oromo Democratic Party wrote: “Not even one year into his premiership, he was openly regarded as a traitor in Oromia.” Milkessa accused the PM of: (1) purging “hardcore Oromo
nationalists from any role in his government at federal, regional, and local government levels”; (2) demonizing the Qeerroo as an “ungovernable pestilence that must be dealt with”; and (3) shifting the Oromo Democratic Party “dramatically toward the public dominance of Ethiopian nationalists who are organized around Amharic language and culture…”
• Extremist Forces: Shene-Oromo and its Oromummaa intellectuals who dream of giving birth to an independent Greater Oromia by force or referendum.
• Opportunist Forces: A shadow government within Oromo-PP that wants to recreate an Ethiopia under an Oromo hegemonic rule. This groups tolerated and even supported Shene-Oromo as an insurance policy to thwart the Prime Minister’s pan Ethiopianist reform agenda. In the meantime, it tried to ensure Oromo-Shene would not be strong enough to topple Oromo-PP.
Sadly, Amhara extremists helped the Oromummaa community to weaken the Prime Minister. As I feared he retreated to his Oromo root. The Oromummaa camp is heightening its tribal and religious cleansing to push the country to a point of no return. The Prime Minister is now struggling to cling to power. He is rolling with the winning group.
Ethiopian intellectuals, particularly those from Oromo, Amhara and Tigray tribal lands are a curse to the nation. They each claim to be a source of civilization. Tigrayans cannot see their past, present, and future outside on the Axum obelisk. The Amhara are stuck with Lalibela and believe there is no civilization before or after. The Oromo is now jumping through a clown’s hoop to register Gadda (an obsolete Oromo ritual) as a great civilization. In the meantime, their people live a destitute life sharing drinking-water with wild animals.
With the grace of God, Tigray intellectuals have self-destructed beyond redemption and resuscitation. Ethiopia’s future depends largely by what happens in the Oromummaa and Amhara tribal lands.
Sometimes, I wonder if Oromo and Amhara intellectuals are even aware that two decades have gone by since the world welcomed the 21st century. By Amhara I am talking about a plethora of clowns running the gamut from Vision Ethiopia to Amhara Association of America and many in between.
In May of this month alone, two different groups invited Memhir Fantahun Wakie to give speeches. I summoned the courage to watch his speech for two minutes. In those two minutes he talked a tone of አቱቶ ቡቱቶ and some አያ ሰባት ቀንዶ stuff.
Ethiopians must fight the Oromummaa empire under construction, but they cannot do so without first (or at the very least simultaneously) addressing the አያ ሰባት ቀንዶ morondum kingdom.
Recently an all-day conference was organized to discuss the state of the nation and find a path forward. One of the main recent articles that has led to an international sanction campaign was a 20-page manifesto I authored with input from several prominent opposition groups. I was asked to present it at the conference. I agreed. My name was removed from the list of presenters because some members of the morondum community of #NoMore, Amhara-Shene and hermitized አያ ሰባት ቀንዶ intellectuals demanded I be removed.
If you want to see the reason why Ethiopia has failed to counter Oromummaa’s part primitive and part cult and unquestionably savage movement, look no further than the morondum kingdom. It gives me no pleasure to talk about it, but there is no way Ethiopia can get out of its existential threat until it deals with its intellectually stunted
and morally malnourished morondum kingdom.
To close it with a positive note, it must be noted that the #NoMore establishment has taken a turn for the better. One can only hope the hermitized አያ ሰባት ቀንዶ clan will come to realize it is unfit to function in the 21st century and follow Eskinder Nega to ገዳም.
ካጠፋሁ ይቅርታ
PS: Most of Asafa Jalata’s articles are published by University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The University must be held accountable for providing him with a venue to spread lies. I have sent a copy of this article to the provost (provost@utk.edu) to investigate if Jalata’s writings violate the University’s publication standard. For example, most of his articles are reruns using different titles. They contain easily verifiable lies and propagate anti Christianity and anti-Islam crimes. If you agree please send this article with a request to investigate him.
Editor’s note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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Why is that every time I read Dr.Biru I end up having this feeling like he is suffering from clinical boredom and that he is recklessly and irresponsibly self medicating? Perhaps almost, I mean nearly almost, like Major Dawit?
At the very bottom line is a simple good meaning naive question,Sir…Dear Dr.Biru, is this really about Ethiopia or is it all about keeping an otherwise proud retiree stay relevant at the expense of the uncut rough diamond, aka, the overwhelming reasonably angry Ethiopian youth?
Ato Samuel,
What is clinical boredom, what do you mean ” recklessly and irresponsibly self-medicating”?
Well, my friend, there are no such things, you made them up, I suggest you might be projecting your own stuff on to him.
Dr. Yonas wrote a well thought out article to warn Ethiopians on the danger of Oromuma, the cruelty and sadism of Abiy Ahmed and his Oromo thugs and the contributions of some badly educated phony intellectuals and more.
The least you could do is read it, and if you have objections, then articulate these objections in some reasonable way and say so, you owe him that. Instead, you pompously come up with some made up psychoanalytic terms, and call him names – have you no shame?
Well, my friend, I encourage you to go back and to read it, and come with something intelligent to say, instead of the nonsense you are going on about.
Trust me, you would do yourself proud, your country proud, you would feel better about yourself – I take it you are not Abiy Ahmed cadre, some kind of troll, are you?
It wasn’t clear from what you were writing . . .
my apologies…if I came across like some kinda uncouth brute, my choice of words was indeed regrettable…but still I will have to ask Dr.Biru- just what is wrong with Oromuma? is it any different from Amaruma? Ethiopuma? Eritruma? What I meant to say was-half Ethiopian opinion makers are Intellectually incapacitated by phobia- I can and I will pull that on him, no kidding…
10u!
Quite a mouthful, but hardly palatable.
1) first of all the so called pm, ጠ/ሚ ተብዬው was not “weakened by Oromo extremists who were helped by Amhara extremists”
2) the so called pm was weakened by his hidden extremist agenda against non Oromo Ethiopians
3) the so called pm lost credibility and an ounce of respect from many because of his five years of lies, mendacity and treacherous politics, and intrigues
4) the so called pm even from the very start was devoid of ethics, morality and basic decency (he just was capable of hiding these grave defects by constant, 24-7 sweet talk and his tear jerkingly boring trumpet blowing
5) the greatest character defects of the so called pm are his unfairness, lack of respect for the rule of law and due process.
6) ጠ/ሚ ተብዬው በተፈጥሮው ፍርደገምድል ነው: የፍርድ ሚዛን ላይ አንዲት ጣቱን ሳይሆን ከነመላው ሰውነቱ ተዘፍዝፎ ተወዝፎ በመጫን ይሄ ነው እውነተኛው ፍርድ: እውነተኛው ሚዛን በግድ ተቀበሉ ብሎ ፍርድ የሚያጣምም ነውር አራማጅ ነው::
The so called pm is 1) chairman of the pp, 2) he is pm of the country, 3) his pp controls 98 of the federal seats and nearly 100% of the regional seats,
The pm is 100% responsible for all the mumbo jumbo, the massacre of hundreds of thousands, and the displacement of tens of millions of Ethiopians that he has brought on Ethiopians.
The No More Movement, as articulated by its founders and followers, attempted to address one and only one issue: the sovereignty of a nation and its right (as enshrined in the UN charter) for no interference. It’s scope and limitations end right there. No More movement was not about a duplicitous pm, money driven political factions and advocacy groups- just sovereignty.
At this stage, it is almost impossible to see any way or path out of this conundrum for the pm and his group. If the rule of law is to be granted primacy, as it should, it must and it will, the pm and his gang will have to be taken to the gallows or life imprisonment or the Gulags or Ethiopian equivalent (በድንጋይ ሸክምና እና ሌት ተቀን ቁፋሮ ያሸበረቀች አለም በቃኝ).
The so called pm arrived at the political arena, he had unprecedented support and goodwill of tens of millions of Ethiopians at home and abroad, never seen in recent Ethiopian politics of the past 50 years. Any other politician in the world would have envied his position, luck and good fortune.
abiy ahmed blew all this political capital away. He managed to marginalize and elicit a sense of disenfranchisement in his core constituents.
The writer claims these are due to outside forces. That is just a hypothesis of one one man. The evidence on the ground shows something else. Early on Burayu massacre, the imprisonments of Eskinder Nega when the Balderas party was formed with abiy ‘s bloodshot eyes ወደግልፅ ጦርነት እንገባለን እያለ አይኖቹ እሳት ለብሰው ታይተዋል:: Several other anomalies occurred: the massacre in Bahir Dar, the death of Engineer Simegnew and on and on……
The pm was the sole beneficiary of the doubt from Ethiopians through all that saga.
The alternative hypothesis vis a vis Occam’s razor, points to a much simpler scenario. The pm from the beginning had a hidden agenda, he preached to the Ethiopian camp while advancing his secretive agenda. He got eventually exposed and since he cannot play the Ethiopianist fiddle anymore, he came out of his hidden closet and declared his true membership to the you know what club.
PM Abiy has been recently quoted for having said “I want everybody to become a billionaire”.
Taking the PM’s “Medemer” doctrine, let’s notch this up even further. Why not “ Mabazat” which mathematically is repeated “Medemer”.
Ethiopia : Thirteen Months of Shine With 100 Million Billionaires!!!!
100,000,000 people x 1,000,000,000 ( birr each)= 100,000,000,000,000,000 birr= 100 Quadrillion birr
Let’s say the PM uses 1 to 50 exchange rate for US dollar= 2 Quadrillion US dollars ( or 2,000 trillion dollars).
Here are some interesting numbers: total wealth of the entire world is about $500 trillion.
So effectively the pm is aspiring for Ethiopians to amass a wealth 4 times that of the entire world (Ethiopia included).
Hmmmmmm??????
How about just working for manageable and attainable goals. Here are some suggestions:
1) just one day in Ethiopia when nobody in Church or Mosque gets killed by your security apparatus
2)just one day in Ethiopia when nobody gets displaced by your gangs
3) just one day in Ethiopia when everybody can get at least one decent meal per day
4) just one day in Ethiopia when nobody gets terrorized and tortured in your prisons and torture chambers.
5) just one day in Addis people get uninterrupted electricity
6) just one day in Addis people get uninterrupted water supply.
Just start from these basics and work your way up to your dream of 2 quadrillion dollars economy.
Well, said.
I get nausea and embarrassment whenever I hear Abiy Ahmed speak.
Is he really a human being or some kind of animal?
Some people lie, and I have met some of these people, but I could not even imagine a man like Abiy Ahmed!!!
What did Ethiopians do to fall in the hands of such a criminal and his puppets?
Well, they would have to get him to eat earth, the process has now truly began, and he is terrified!!!
It really saddens me to see our intellectuals picking a fight against each other on issues that should have been relegated to the back burner a long time ago. For me the rancor among intellectuals we see now among our intellectuals strikes stark similarities to what I had witnessed in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s. Then preset theories took precedence over what should have been based on the realities on the ground. Then rightful priorities were shunned and missed. The driving priority should have been on how to drag that country out of abject poverty and put it on the right path to sustainable development. That was what Singapore, Taiwan, Malaysia, Douth Kores and Taiwan were doing. Our intellectuals chose to argue on what Karl Marx chicken scratched a century ago. There was a fierce and often verbally violent competition going on in Europe, USA and Middle East among our communities for who was the true commie among commies. Communities(student association) in these countries became dens of two commie groups with one committed to make a quick work of the other if the chance to do so presents itself. Then in 1975 and 7& went back still divided in two hostile camps. That country never seen bloodbath and destruction in its history until then. Those two hostile camps butchered each other to the last lucky survivors taking millions of innocent citing along with them. They did not just die and die out. They have left extremely toxic poison and descendants that continue to spew around picking new and different social issues. Their motto is the same. It is predicated on the working manual that ‘I have to kill you in order to reach my objectives’. ‘Workers of the world unite’ is somehow replaced by ‘People of the country disunite’. Talking about unity can get you killed these days. Being assertive and proud of your ethnicity can get you demonized and killed killed these days. This has been the lethal pandemic that has been endemic to that country and devouring at the heart and soul of that gem of the colored. It just aches my heart. It leaves me with utter sense of helplessness. May The Good Lord Our Creator Save That Country!!!
Such a disingenuous comment, so much dishonesty, so much diversion and misdirection in what you wrote, it is all mind boggling!!!
Let me tell you, my friend, by virtue of the choices you have made, including your comments here and all over the net, you have taken side, and you are on the side of the mass murders, the Oromo ethnic cleansers and thugs and criminals, those causing the mayhem, demolition houses on the head of the poor, women and children.
Those who are demolishing houses of worship, churches and mosques, indiscriminately kill unarmed civilians including the elderly, the children in these houses of worships – among numerous other things.
Ethiopians never had a day of peace since the psychopath, Abiy Ahmed, cheated his way came to power and decided to show himself for who he is, shameless criminal thug!!!
What you are writing is so much nonsense, and one would be wasting their time refuting each of them, showing how disingenuous you are and so forth.
It is very simple now, if you are against the criminally that is going on, a criminality led by Abiy Ahmed and the Oromo thugs, then go out denounce these things in clear statement, stating who is responsible by name!!!
Then and then we would take you seriously, otherwise, you are just an Abiy Ahmed cadre who is sent to diffuse things and confuse people with some phony intellectual musings and the like.
Thank you for your comment. I understand why.
Make that: Those two hostile camps butchered each other to the last very few lucky survivors taking millions of innocent citizens along with them.
It makes wonder where tall these inferiority complex of the mythical and fancy Oromumma originates from and how it become to be and where it woul lead eventually. Is ithis all about just out of bound projections and bluster in substitute for sense of reality and genuine history and place? I thought once that this excessive expectations of the nationalist ethnic groups were due to the lack of real experience in arts of politics, public policy and other power dispensation venues. I thought and hoped that , like many others, and they would curb their expectations overzealous group-think rhetoric and come to their sense once they ascended into corridors of power and sit in highest offices of the land. But such notion increasingly looks misplaced and dim in the face of unrelenting and ferocity of the public policy subversion and excesses of discriminatory power in public space and flagrant human rights violations, including
but not limited to, destruction of residential neighborhoods, desecration of holy sites and religois artifacts annd public warship places. This won’t end well for them and sooner they understand that fact, the better. As per the religious and racial incendiary rhetorics made made and spouted by so-,called learned like Mr. Jalaata. It looks all about projection and his own identity crisis at personal level. There was a public joke back then in the NAZi era about the obsession with the imaginary of Aryan race by its top leaders about a imaginary and typical Aryan race that went he should be as blond as Hitler, as tall as Godbells and as slender Goring . They fact that non of them remotely l possed and lived up in those ideal charrasterics they admired so much and fatally pursued was point. And so it goes they had their own serious personality complex problems about their looks , creation and what believes. Bottom line, if the likes of Assefa Jalaaa is confident enough about his heritage , name ,religion and he is genuinely trying to convince others to abandon and condem their identity and heritage in laiu of Oromomumma why he keeps Assafa namesake now, which is certainly not of one Waqafaa nomunacultre heritage.?
Typo correction
It makes wonder where alll these inferiority complex of the mythical and fancy Oromumma originates from and how it become to be and where it would lead eventually. Is ithis all about just an out of bound projections and bluster in substitute for sense of reality and genuine history and place? I thought once that this excessive expectations of the nationalist ethnic groups were due to the lack of real test or experience in arts of politics, public policy and other power dispensation venues with ruling elites. I thought and hoped that , like many others, and they would curb their expectations overzealous group-think rhetoric and come to their sense once they ascended into corridor of power and sit in highest offices of the land. But such notion increasingly looks misplaced and dim in the face of unrelenting and ferocity of the public policy subversion and excesses of discriminatory power in public space and flagrant human rights violations, including
but not limited to, destruction of residential neighborhoods, desecration of holy sites and religois artifacts annd public warship places. This won’t end well for them and sooner they understand that fact, the better. As per the religious and racial incendiary rhetorics made and spouted by so-,called learned man like Mr. Jalaata. It looks all about projection and his own identity crisis at personal level. There was a public joke back then in the NAZI era about the obsession with the imaginary of Aryan race by its top leaders about ab imaginary and typical Aryan race. And jjoke went as he should be as blond as Hitler, as tall as Godbells and as slender Goring . They fact that non of them remotely lpossed and lived upto ithose ideal charrasterics standard they admired so much and fatally pursued was point. And so it goes they had their own serious personality complex problems about their looks , creation and whatever they believed. Bottom line, if the likes of Assefa Jalaaa is confident enough about his heritage , name ,religion and he is genuinely trying to convince others to abandon in droves and condem their identity and heritage in laiu of Oromomumma cause why he keeps Assafa namesake now, which is certainly not one of the Oromumma’s Waqafaana nomunacultre heritage?
This an eye popping article. I jumped on the phone and called my friend who was born and raised in the countryside just a day’s mule ride from Bedesa. I was born in the same area of the country just outside Kuni Gabriel. My grandparents were from Menz who settled in Chercher back in the 1880’s. My parents were both Amharas from Shewa. Right after my grandparents settled in Kuni mountains they were voluntarily adopted into the clans of the surrounding Oromos. They had a working knowledge of the Oromo language before they migrated there. We can say the Oromo language was their everyday medium. I myself was more of an Oromo speaking child than my parent’s tongue until I began going to school there. My grandparents were voluntarily adopted into the two of the local Oromo clans in the tradition of what the author mentioned as Mogasa. They were accorded to be one of the Itu clan with my grandfather becoming an Itu Algae and grandma an Itu Babo. It was the Oromo tradition of accepting other ethnic ethnic groups into the society. My grandparents were not forced to abandon their ethnicity or religion. The Church they built, Kuni Gabriel, still stands to this day. I was baptized there. I am still fond of the idea of being a naturalized member of the Oromo clan as a mogasized Itu Algae. To my family Mogasa was absolutely 100% voluntary. They were offered and cordially accepted it. I am not alone in this tradition. There are tens of thousands whose families had to go through the voluntary ‘adoption’ into the Oromo. It was not a forceful process. I love it and present myself as an adopted Oromo Itu Algae(Alga) whenever I meet an Oromo. Some of them especially those from Shewa and Wellega become bewildered by my command of the Oromo language. One or two of them were rude in a way they reacted. Again, to my experience through two generations Mogasa was all voluntary and productive. I have a proof for you.
It happened during the Italian invasion in the 1930’s. One of my uncles had fought in the Ogaden theater and was gassed and injured. After the army there withdrew and disbanded he managed to make his way to the Doba area of the Chercher highland where he was nursing his wounds. He was a young man and not married yet. He was staying alone in his hastily built hut and one night someone fired a gun from outside killing him instantly. Our family was in shock and complained to their Itu clan. The murder had also angered the Itu clan of the area because they took it as a cruel crime committed against one of their own. Then they tracked down the murderer who fled to the Boke area and handed him over to the Italian officials in Chiro(Asbe Tafari). He was tried along with other murderers like him and executed by a firing squad in Chiro just outside the jailhouse. So the tradition of Mogasa was good to my families. If it is still honored these days is another story. Also to my knowledge Mogasa was for adults and they had another one for orphan kids they called Ilma Gosa. These traditions must be pacified and kept voluntary. We Amharas also similar tradition we call madago, don’t we? I still cherish myself as an Itu Algae and still madly proud of my Amhara heritage. Nothing is wrong with that. By the way, my auntie and her parents were mogasized as Itu Warra Babo and Warra Qalu. She rarely spoke in Amharic even though she was fluent in it.
I hear in this piece the voice of a person who profoundly cares about his country and her future, but who is also very frustrated by the apparent stupidity, shortsightedness, cynicism, and pettiness of most of the intellectuals in and out of Ethiopia. The PM, as well as all Ethiopians, must understand that ethno-fascism, i.e. promoting the hegemony of one ethnic group over all the others by any means necessary, will not only not get us anywhere but it is bound to destroy the very group that promotes it ( see now where the TPLF is). Ethiopia is not, was never, and will never be the playground of one ethnic group through the exclusion of all the others. Ethiopia has always been a composite reality that can only survive through cooperation and suppression of all hegemonic tendencies. The PM must understand this and not be played by factional politics, but offer a vision of Ethiopia that is all-inclusive.
I hear in this piece the voice of a person who profoundly cares about his country and her future, but who is also very frustrated by the apparent stupidity, shortsightedness, cynicism, and pettiness of most of the intellectuals in and out of Ethiopia. The PM, as well as all Ethiopians, must understand that ethno-fascism, i.e. promoting the hegemony of one ethnic group over all the others by any means necessary, will not only not get us anywhere but it is bound to destroy the very group that promotes it ( see now where the TPLF is). Ethiopia is not, was never, and will never be the playground of one ethnic group through the exclusion of all the others. Ethiopia has always been a composite reality that can only survive through cooperation and suppression of all hegemonic tendencies. The PM must understand this and not be played by factional politics, but offer a vision of Ethiopia that is all-inclusive.
My comment above was not meant to show that I agree with what is being done by the Abiy’s government. Far from it. It was meant to share my family’s history with everyone.
Article 12, subsections 1, 2 and 3 alone give Addis Ababans, a constitutionally protected right to RECALL AND REMOVE THE CORRUPT adanech abebe and her elk from Addis Ababa.
The blabber and empty talk about property tax increases on the residents and eviction or forced possessions by tithe criminal gang group occupying City Hall all are UNCONSTITUTIONAL AND ILLEGAL ACTS.
Residents must initiate the recall process and remove and kick out the embezzlers and looter. These are not public servants. The do not have, the education, training, skill, talent and temperament. to lead.
RECALL AND REMOVE!!!!!!
Cleaned up edition.
I gave Af-mishar a ring.
What’s up dude? It’s me, Ittu.
I know. I recognize your voice.
Last time you told me you had a meeting with a high level official from the State Department. Was that Special Envoy Mike Hammer?
Yes that was the one. Thank you for helping me remembering that name. He insisted we two meet before he meet other community groups. We had a lengthy discussion that lasted two hours on HOA affairs. I explained to him how US foreign policy toward that area was flawed since the 1970’s and pointed out how it can be fixed. He was amazed by my depth of policy knowledge and unmatched diplomatic skills. Simply he was awestricken. Then I gave him a 36-page guideline to follow. I have a picture of him and me alone to prove it.
Wow, I’m impressed now. You got a seasoned diplomat awestricken. What a story from La-la land!
So, what happened to your announcement?
Announcement for what?
To run for the presidency of USA?
O, that one? I had to make a few changes. I have changed my running mate. It will not be JJ anymore.
JJ, Janet Jackson?
No Jehadi Jane.
Why? You two seemed to be natural allies.
No I caught her meeting with Amharas, Tigres, Afars and Harari women last May.
What is wrong with that?
First, she did not ask for my permission and as Somali Abo she was not supposed to meet with such people. I have fired her.
Okay. Who is your new running mate now?
His name is Pants On Fire. He is on the other line. Can I put him on?
Yes you may. Go ahead, put him on.
Hello Ittu.
Hi there. What is your name again?
Pants On Fire.
Strange name. Can you tell me a few things about you?
I was born to a wealthy Oromo family. My father was an owner of a very large farmland. We had 60 servants at home. There were more than 6,000 farmers on my father’s land. So we were very rich. I never put on my shoes myself the whole time I was growing up. Our servants did that for me everyday. They were the ones who also took off my shoes and wash my feet before I went to bed every night. That was during the reign of the emperor. It was all peaceful time then. One day our traditional prophet(fortune teller) came to our house and told my father that a member of his family will be shot at with a bullet and survive but the bullet will go thru him. He was one of the most revered priests of our Oromo religion Waaqeffanna. You see Oromos have their own religion. They are not either Christians or Muslims. They are followers of our own religion, Waaqeffanna. Waaqa means God or Allah. We were forced to accept Christianity and Islam by colonizers.
So, Pants On Fire, you are telling me that I am not a Muslim?
Yes, that is what I am saying.
Did you tell any other Oromo about this?
Yes I did and 99.99% of them agreed with me and now they have gone back to worshipping the Waqaa.
Wow! That is a fantasy accomplishment by you. No wonder why they named you Pants On Fire. Then what happened after your father started fighting the government?
They came and took everything from our house, beat up my mother and sisters. They burned down every room except one. Then they took me to jail. They were killing everyone and showing the executions right live on TV. They shot 60 of former government officials who most of them were my father’s friends right on TV. We saw all that.
Then what did they do to you while you were in prison?
They tortured me. They pulled all my front teeth, fingernails and toes without any anesthetics. The gouged out my two eyes and put them back after two months. My teeth, fingernails and toes grew back after 6 months of agonizing pain. So they kept me in jail for 5 years torturing and poisoning me with potassium cyanide everyday.
Wow, you must be superhuman/supernatural to survive all that.
Yes I consider myself to be just that. So after 6 months I had a new cellmate who called himself a weasel. He could bore out an invisible hole and escape just like that. He asked me to join him in digging up a tunnel for our escape from our prison cell that stretched for hundreds of miles all the way to the Kenyan border. So after digging for days we thought were inside Kenya. But when we came out we were still inside Ethiopia. We were spotted by border guards and started running with soldiers hot in pursuit after us. They were shooting at us both from the ground and the sky. One of the bullets hit me on the left side of my temple. I survived. What that Oromo prophet/fortune teller told my father was fulfilled. That bullet is still lodged behind my left eye.
Wow, that is amazing. No wonder why they call you Pants On Fire. Then what did they do to you after you were caught?
They took me back to the prison in the capital and while in prison I discovered that I have the intelligence for numbers. I started my education inside the prison and one day they let me go home. I then finished my high school and college with honors in less than 4 years. Right after college I won scholarship and went to Latvia for my masters.
Wo, wo, wo! Hold it right there. Mengistu let you leave the country on scholarship after killing your father, jailing, poisoning and shooting you in prison? He must have received something from you to be so generous. Who believes you with such bold faced lies?
You are the only one that does not believe me. After I came here I told the same story to one of the local reporters and it was on his daily newspaper the next day. It is in the archive and I can send you the link if you want me to. Every one believed me except you, Ittu because you are one of those Amhara hugging Neo-Gobenas. I’m a local celebrity here where I call it home.
Okay, Pants On Fire. Now I suspect you must have been one of those Mengistu’s young red cubs who was his eyes and ears. How many of his opponents you led to their torture and execution? You had poor Oromos kept at your home as slaves and you are now a rabid advocate of an Oromian Republic? Who do you think we are? You may think of us as some kind of stupid people but we are not that dumb!!! We can tell a cross-eyed bee from among a swarm. The sad aspect of your story telling is there are so many gullible individuals among my noble Oromos who believe your bold faced lies.
Okay Ittu, mark down this. You will never set your feet on my Oromia when it becomes a separate republic in a few months.
Dream on knuckle head bigot!!!!
Please allow me to give you some history on the destructive disarray of our intellectuals. Please note that almost all of them were educated with taxes paid mostly by the poor peasants and urban dwellers that country of noble people. They went all the luxury/convenience of grow schools all the way to college. Many of them had the rare chance of advancing their education after being granted the much sought after scholarships to European countries and many universities here in the USA. That was all fine and dandy, right? That is what you may be naively think. Most of them did not take them too long to busy themselves into associating themselves with ultra leftist elements in their host countries. It did not also take too long for ‘beauty contests’ to begin among them for the ‘coveted’ title of who the best commie among them. It made you think that you are watching ‘Taming of The Shrew’ again and again. You could hear/listen the commotion ‘that one is the righteous commie; no he is not but this one is the one’. That split them into two groups in Europe with disgusting/rude name calling flying in all directions. That was when I decided to distance myself from those groupings. I thought those in USA were in better shape. That was what I naively thought. It did not take me too long to find out there was a low key silly argument was raging behind meeting doors on what applies to the old country: regionalism or nationalism. Later on the rancor was all about whether there was a two or three world. To be honest with you, to this day I never understood what the fuss was all about the ‘two or three world’ thing. Did the question about region or nation hold the keys for the solutions to the economic problems that country faced then or now? Two or three world? Forget about it! I still don’t get it and am not interested in it. Those intellectuals went back to the old country still blabbering with ‘Down with feudalism and imperialism’ huddling around two hostile groups. Some of them taught Mengistu how to talk and chicken scratch in their style. They butchered each other like savage rival pride of lionesses. Do you think the few survivors have learned any lesson from the mistakes of their role models of the 1960’s and 70’s? No!!! Ladies and gentlemen! They are now busy spew around divisive poison among the ordinary countrymen/women so as an Oromo I should always be at guard with every Amhara brother and sister; so every Amhara brother/sister should be on a ‘lookout’ for every Oromo like me. One has the ‘neftegna’ as an epithet to demonize every Amhara and the other one seems not to be able to make his/her mind which one of two, ‘Extremist or Orommumaa’ to criminalize the whole ethnic group and across the board. But that country which produced us all is still at a loss how to get rid of the scabby that has annoyingly kept its citizens scratching since antiquities. O you commies! You unrepentant possessed by demons commies! Do I have utter disdain for you or what!!!!!