Right in Prison, Wrong on the Throne
by Alemayehu G. Mariam
Last April, I wrote a “Special Tribute to My Personal Hero Eskinder Nega”.
In that tribute, I groped for words as I tried to describe this common
Ethiopian man of uncommon valor, an ordinary journalist of
extraordinary integrity and audacity.
 |
| Eskinder Nega |
Frankly,
what could be said of a simple man of humility possessed of indomitable
dignity? Eskinder Nega is a man who stood up to brutality with his
gentle humanity. What could I really say of a gentleman of the utmost
civility, nobility and authenticity who was jailed 8 times for
loving liberty?
What could I say of a man and his wife who defiantly
defended press freedom in Ethiopia, even when they were both locked up
in Meles Zenawi Prison just outside of the capital in Kality for 17
months! What could anybody say of a man, a woman
and their child who sacrificed their liberties, their peace of mind,
their futures and earthly possessions so that their countrymen, women
and children could be free!?
Ethiopian journalist Eskinder Nega is
a special kind of hero who fights with nothing more than ideas and the
truth. He slays falsehoods with the sword of truth. He chases bad ideas
with good ones. Armed only with a pen, Eskinder fights despair with
hope; fear with courage; anger with reason; arrogance with humility;
ignorance with knowledge; intolerance with forbearance; oppression with
perseverance; doubt with trust and cruelty with compassion. Above all,
Eskinder speaks truth to power and to those who abuse, misuse, overuse
and are corrupted by power.
Now almost a year since I wrote my tribute, I remember my great friend
and brother Eskinder Nega as he languishes in Meles Zenawi Prison. But
I do not remember him in sadness or with heartache. No! No! I remember
Eskinder in the hopeful, faith-filled and resolute words of American
poet James Russell Lowell (“The Present Crisis”): “When a deed is done
for Freedom, through the broad earth’s aching breast…/ Once to every man
and nation comes the moment to decide…/ In the strife of Truth with
Falsehood, for the good or evil side… For Humanity sweeps onward: where
to-day the martyr stands…/ Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever
on the throne…/
Eskinder and his wife Serkalem did the right deed
to defend the right of press freedom in Ethiopia. They spoke truth to
falsehood in their newspapers and never backed down. They spoke right to
wrong in kangaroo court. The man who tried for 20 years to right the
wrongs of tyranny, today, like Lowell’s Truth, hangs on the scaffold in
the belly of Meles Zenawi Prison, a place of “wrath and tears where the
horror of the shade looms”, with his head bloodied but UNBOWED!
Last week, Birtukan Mideksa wrote an opinion piece for Al Jazeera urging
the release of Eskinder Nega and other journalists including Reeyot
Alemu (winner of the International Women’s Media Foundation 2012 Courage
in Journalism Award) and Woubshet Taye (2012 Hellman/Hammett Grant
Award) and all political prisoners in Ethiopia. Birtukan is the first
female political party (Unity for Democracy and Justice) leader in
Ethiopian history. Birtukan, like Eskinder, was the personal political prisoner of
the late dictator Meles Zenawi. Meles personally ordered Birtukan’s
arrest and on December 29, 2008, a year and half after he “pardoned” and
released her from prison, he threw her back in jail without even the
usual song and dance of kangaroo court.
On January 9, 2010, Meles sent
chills down the spines of reporters when he declared sadistically that
“there will never be an agreement with anybody to release Birtukan.
Ever. Full stop. That’s a dead issue.” On January 15, 2010, the United
Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention adopted an opinion finding that Birtukan Midekksa is a political prisoner.
It
is heartwarming to read Birtukan’s moving and robustly principled
defense of Eskinder Nega and the other Ethiopian journalists and
political prisoners. It is also ironic that Eskinder should replace
Birtukan as the foremost political prisoner in Ethiopia today.
Few
can speak more authoritatively on the plight of Eskinder and all
Ethiopian political prisoners than my great sister Birtukan who also
spent years in in the belly of Meles Zenawi Prison, a substantial part
of it in solitary confinement. In her Al Jazeera commentary she wrote:
My
journey to become a political prisoner in Ethiopia began as a federal
judge fighting to uphold the rule of law. Despite institutional
challenges and even death threats, I hoped to use constitutional
principles to ensure respect for basic rights… [Ethiopian] authorities
have detained my friend Eskinder Nega eight times over his 20-year career as a journalist and publisher. After
the 2005 elections, Eskinder and his wife – Serkalem Fasil – spent 17
months in prison. Pregnant at the time, Serkalem gave birth to a son
despite her confinement and almost no pre-natal care. Banned from
publishing after his release in 2007, Eskinder continued to write
online.
In early 2011, he began focusing particularly on the protest
movements then sweeping North Africa and the Middle East. Eskinder, who does not belong to any political party because of a commitment to maintain his independence,
offered a unique and incisive take on what those movements meant for
the future of Ethiopia. Committed to the principle of non-violence,
Eskinder repeatedly emphasised that any similar movements in Ethiopia
would have to remain peaceful. Despite this, police briefly detained him
and warned him that his writings had crossed the line and he could face
prosecution.
Then in September [14], 2011, the government made good on
that threat. Authorities arrested Eskinder just days after he publicly
criticised the use of anti-terror laws to stifle dissent. They held him without charge or access to an attorney for nearly two months. The government eventually charged Eskinder with terrorism and treason, sentencing him to 18 years in
prison after a political trial. Unfortunately, Eskinder is not alone;
independent journalists Woubshet Taye and Reeyot Alemu also face long
prison terms on terrorism charges.
Eskinder is a hero to the world but a villain to Meles Zenawi and his disciples
Who
really is Eskinder Nega? In Meles Zenawi’s kangaroo court, Eskinder has
been judged a “terrorist”, a “public enemy”. In the court of world
public opinion, Eskinder is celebrated as the undisputed champion and
defender of press freedom.
When speaking of my brother Eskinder, I
could be accused of exaggerating his virtues, hyperbolizing his
singular contributions to press freedom in Ethiopia and overstating his
importance to the cause of free expression throughout the world. Perhaps
I am biased because I hold this great man in such high respect, honor
and admiration. If I am guilty of bias, it is because seemingly in
Ethiopia they have stopped making genuine heroes like Eskinder Nega,
Woubeshet Taye, Anudalem Aragie, Temesgen Desalegn… and heroines like
Birtukan Midekssa, Serkalem Fasil, Reeyot Alemu….
Let others more
qualified and more eloquent than I speak of Eskinder Nega’s heroism,
courage, fortitude, audacity and tenacity in the defense of press
freedom.
On December 3, 2012, when Carl
Bernstein (one of the two investigative journalists who exposed the
Watergate scandal leading to the resignation of President Richard Nixon) read at a public forum Eskinder’s last blog before he was arrested, he said:
… No honor can be greater than to read Eskinder Nega’s words. He is more than a symbol. He is the embodiment of the greatness of truth, of writing and reporting real truth, of persisting in truth and resisting the oppression of untruth… So let us marvel at and celebrate Eskinder Nega. For
who among us could write what I am about to read [a blog of Eskinder’s]
spirit unbound, faith in freedom and the power of the word untrammeled…
When Eskinder was named as the recipient of the prestigious 2012 PEN/Barbara Goldsmith Freedom to Write Award, Peter Godwin, president of PEN American Center said, “The Ethiopian writer Eskinder Nega is that bravest and most admirable of writers, one who picked up his pen to write things that he knew would surely put him at grave risk…”
Larry Siems, director of PEN Freedom to Write Award,
at the award ceremonies groped for words trying to describe Eskinder
Nega. “…[This year] one [journalist] really stood out, and that is
Eskinder Nega. So tonight we recognize one of the world’s most
courageous, most intrepid, most creative advocates of press freedom that
I have ever seen…”
In awarding its prestigious Hellman/Hammett Award for 2012, Human
Rights Watch described Eskinder and the other journalists as
“exemplifying the courage and dire situation of independent journalism
in Ethiopia today. Their ordeals illustrate the price of speaking freely
in a country where free speech is no longer tolerated.”
The Committee to Protect Journalists declared,
“The charges against Eskinder are baseless and politically motivated in
reprisal for his writings. His conviction reiterates that Ethiopia will
not hesitate to punish a probing press by imprisoning journalists or
pushing them into exile in misusing the law to silence critical and
independent reporting.”
The
specific charge against Eskinder was that he conspired with a banned
opposition party called Ginbot 7 to overthrow the government. At his
trial, government prosecutors showed as evidence a fuzzy video,
available on YouTube, of Eskinder at a public town-hall meeting,
discussing the potential of an Arab Spring-type uprising in Ethiopia.
State television labeled Eskinder and the other journalists as “spies
for foreign forces.” There were also allegations that he had accepted a
terrorist mission—what the mission involved was never specified.
United States Senator Patrick Leahy read a lenghty statement into the Congressional Record informing
his colleagues that “7,000 miles from Washington, in Addis Ababa,
Ethiopia… a journalist named Eskinder Nega stands accused of supporting
terrorism simply for refusing to remain silent about the Ethiopian
government’s increasingly authoritarian drift…”
The
United States remains deeply concerned about the trial, conviction, and
sentencing of Ethiopian journalist Eskinder Nega, as well as seven
political opposition figures, under the country’s Anti-Terrorism
Proclamation. The sentences handed down today, including 18 years for
Eskinder and life imprisonment for the opposition leader Andualem Arage,
are extremely harsh and reinforce our serious questions about the
politicized use of Ethiopia’s anti-terrorism law in this and other
cases.
Eskinder is a hero to the heroes of international journalism. In April 2012, twenty
international journalists who have been recognised as “World Press
Freedom Heroes” by the Vienna-based International Press Institute (IPI)
stood by Eskinder’s side, condemned his unjust imprisonment on trumped
up terrorism charges and demanded his release and the release of other
journalists. These press freedom heroes minced no words in telling Meles
Zenawi of their “extremely strong condemnation of the Ethiopian
government’s decision to jail journalist Eskinder Nega on terrorism
charges.”
“The deprivation of liberty of Eskinder Nega is arbitrary in
violation of articles 9, 10, 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights and articles 9, 14, and 19 of the International Covenant on Civil
and Political Rights… The Working Group requests the Government to take
the necessary steps to remedy the situation, which include the
immediate release of Mr. Nega and adequate reparation to him.”
In December 2012, 16 member of the European parliament demanded the release of Eskinder Nega and journalists Reeyot Alemu and Woubshet Taye.
Who is (are) the real terrorist(s) in Ethiopia?
Meles
said Eskinder and all of the journalists he jailed are “terrorists”.
If Eskinder Nega is a terrorist, then speaking truth to power is an act
of terrorism. If Eskinder Nega is a terrorist, then advocacy of peaceful
change is terrorism; thinking is terrorism; dissent is terrorism;
having a conscience is terrorism; refusing to sell out one’s soul is
terrorism; standing up for democracy and human rights is terrorism;
defending the rule of law is terrorism and peaceful resistance of state
terrorism is terrorism. If Eskinder Nega is a terrorist today, then
Nelson Mandela was a terrorist then. The same goes for all of the other
jailed journalists and opposition leaders jailed by Meles Zenawi.
But
the real terrorists know who they are. When Meles and his horde of
guerilla fighters challenged military dictator Mengistu Hailemariam,
they were officially branded as terrorists, bandits, mercenaries,
criminals, thugs, murderers, marauders, public enemies, subversives,
rebels, assassins, malcontents, invaders, traitors, saboteurs and other
names. Were they?
Let the evidence speak for itself. In an interview Meles Zenawi gave to an Eritrean magazine called Hiwot (which was translated into Amharic and published by Etiop newspaper, (Vol. 5 Issue No. 52), he presented himself as the Willie Sutton of Tigray pulling bank jobs all over the palce. Meles spoke proudly of the banks he and his comrade-in-arms robbed or attempted to rob to finance their guerilla war. Meles boasted of his “victorious” robberies in Shire and Adwa while regretting botched jobs in Axum. Today they own the banks!
The current ruling party, “Tigrayan Peoples Liberation Movement” (TPLF), is listed today in the Global Terrorism Database as a terrorist organization. Documented
acts of terrorism by the TPLF include armed robberies, assaults,
hostage taking and kidnapping of foreign nationals and journalists and
local leaders, hijacking of truck convoys, extortion of business owners
and merchants, nongovernmental organizations, local leaders and private
citizens and intimidation of religious leaders and journalists.
An official Inquiry Commission established by Meles Zenawi to
investigate the deaths that occurred in the post-2005 election period
determined that security forces under the personal control and command
of Meles Zenawi massacred 193 unarmed protesters in the streets and
severely wounded another 763. The Commission concluded the “shots fired
by government forces were intended not to disperse the crowd of
protesters but to kill by targeting the head and chest of the
protesters.” On November 1, 2005, security forces in the Meles Zenawi
Prison in Kality gunned down 65 inmates while confined in their
cells. No one has ever been brought to justice for these crimes against
humanity.
In September 2011, the world learned that “Ethiopian security forces (had) planted 3 bombs that went off in the Ethiopian capital on September 16, 2006 and
then blamed Eritrea and the Oromo resistance for the blasts in a case
that raised serious questions about the claims made about the bombing
attempt against the African Union summit earlier this year in Addis
Ababa, Ethiopia.” Following its own investigation and “clandestine reporting”, the U.S. Embassy in Addis Ababa fingered “GoE (Government of Ethiopia) security forces” for
this criminal act. If all other acts of state terrorism committed
against Ethiopian civilians were to be included, the body count would be
in the hundreds of thousands.
Who are the real terrorists and criminals in Ethiopia today?
Tale of the Good Wolf and Evil Wolf
The
late Meles Zenawi and his apostles remind me of an old Cherokee (Native
American) tale of two wolves: A grandfather tells his young grandson
that everyone has a Good Wolf and an Evil Wolf inside of them fighting
with each other every day. The Good Wolf thrives on peace, love, truth,
generosity, humility and kindness. The Evil Wolf feeds on hatred, anger,
greed, lies and arrogance. “Which wolf will win, grandfather?” asked
the boy. “Whichever one you feed,” replied the grandfather.
Meles
and his disciples have been feeding the Evil Wolf for decades, and now
the Evil Wolf sits triumphantly crowned on the Throne of Hatred and
Falsehood. They have fattened the Evil Wolf with a lavish diet
of inhumanity, barbarity, brutality, ignobility, immorality, depravity,
duplicity, incivility, criminality, ethnocentricity, mediocrity,
corruptibility and pomposity.
Eskinder, Reeyot, Woubshet,
Andualem. Temesgen and the rest have managed to tame the Good Wolf and
have followed the path of peace, love and truth. Their wolf thrives on a
simple diet of humanity, unity, integrity, authenticity, civility,
morality, incorruptibility, dignity, affability, humility, nobility,
creativity, intellectuality and audacity.
It is hard for the
reasonable mind to fathom why Meles and his disciples chose to embrace
and follow the path of the Evil Wolf. Indeed, the Evil Wolf has been
very good to them. The Evil Wolf has made it possible for them to
accumulate great wealth and amass enormous power. They have unleashed
the Evil Wolf to divide and rule the country along ethnic, religious,
linguistic and regional lines. They have used the Evil Wolf to destroy
not only the lives and futures of young professionals like Eskinder,
Birtukan, Reeyot, Woubshet, Temesgen and Andualem but also the future
of the younger generation. They have used the Evil Wolf to sell off the
country’s most fertile lands for pennies and plunder its natural
resources. They have used the Evil Wolf to convict the innocent in
kangaroo courts. They have used the Evil Wolf to strike fear and
loathing in the hearts and minds or ordinary citizens.
They have given new meaning to the ancient Roman playwright Paluatus’ aphorism homo homini lupus est (“man
is a wolf to his fellow man”). They have used the Evil Wolf to create
war from peace; strife from harmony; wrong from right; vice from
virtue; division from unity; shame from honor; immorality from
decency; poverty from wealth; hatred from love; ignorance from
knowledge; corruption from blessing; bondage from freedom and
dictatorship from democracy. In 21 years, Meles and his disciples have
managed to jam a whole nation between the jaws of a snarling, gnarling
and howling Evil Wolf.
How long before the Good Wolf wins over the Evil Wolf?
The
great Nelson Mandela wondered when Apartheid would end. He told those
who had unleashed the Evil Wolf of Apartheid, “You may succeed in
delaying, but never in preventing the transition of South Africa to a
democracy.”
My friend Eskinder Nega warned the overlords of the
Evil Wolf in Ethiopia, “Freedom is partial to no race. Freedom has no
religion. Freedom favors no ethnicity. Freedom discriminates not between
rich and poor countries. Inevitably freedom will overwhelm Ethiopia.”
But
how long before freedom overwhelms Ethiopia? How long before Ethiopia
transitions to democracy? How long before “truth crushed to earth rises
again” in Ethiopia? How long before all Ethiopian political prisoners
are set free? Before Eskinder is released and joins his wife Sekalem and
their son Nafkot? How long before Reeyot, Woubshet, Andualem… rejoin
their families? How long before the Good Wolf wins over the Evil Wolf?
Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. agonized over similar questions during the
darkest days of the struggle for civil rights in America. His answer to
the question, “How long?” was “Not long!”.
I know you are asking today, “How long will it take?” Somebody’s asking, “How long will prejudice blind the visions of men…?”
Somebody’s
asking, “When will wounded justice, lying prostrate on the streets of
Selma and Birmingham… be lifted from this dust of shame…? … How long
will justice be crucified, and truth bear it?”
I come to say to you this afternoon, however difficult the moment, however frustrating the hour, it will not be long, because “truth crushed to earth will rise again.”
How long? Not long, because “no lie can live forever.”
How long? Not long, because “you shall reap what you sow.”
How
long before the Good Wolf wins over the Evil Wolf? Not long, because
“once to every man and nation comes the moment” to decide between Good
and Evil.
How long before wounded justice, lying prostrate on the
streets of Addis Ababa, Mekele, Adama, Gondar, Awassa, Jimma… is lifted
from the dust of shame? Not long, “because the arc of the moral universe
is long, but it bends toward justice.”
How long before truth and
right crushed to earth rise up again in Ethiopia? Not long, because
truth and right will not remain forever on the scaffold nor wrong and
falsehood nest forever on the throne!
I have no greater honor than
to stand up, speak up and defend my friends, brothers and sisters
Eskinder Nega, Serkalem Fasil, Reeyot Alemu, Woubshet Taye, Temesgen
Desalegn, Andualem Aragie and all political prisoners held in Meles
Zenawi Prison!
Professor Alemayehu G. Mariam teaches political
science at California State University, San Bernardino and is a
practicing defense lawyer.
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