Ethiopia conducted celebrations of two victories in the past week, the victory of Adwa and the Ogaden war which is known as the Karamara victory.
The Adwa victory was against the Italy colonizing powers, 124 years ago on the first day of March, the traditional warriors of Ethiopia defeated the Italian well armed and modernized army of the time. The war was the result of the article 17 of the “Wechale” treaty colonizing ambition of Italy. Farmers, pastoralist as well as women were included in the traditional army of Ethiopia, the war which took a day in the northern part of the country ‘Adwa’ ensures the only independence country in Africa consider and still stands as the symbol of freedom for black people.
Following the celebration of Adwa, the Karamara victory /the Somalia war/ took place on March 5. The Ogaden War, or the Ethio-Somali war was a Somali military offensive between July 1977 and March 1978 over the disputed Ethiopian region of Ogaden, which began with the Somali invasion of Ethiopia. The Ethiopians prevailed at Harar, Dire Dawa and Jijiga, and began to push the Somalis systematically out of the Ogaden. By March 1978, the Ethiopians had captured almost all of the Ogaden, prompting the defeated Somalis to give up their claim to the region. Ethiopia received support from the Soviet Union, Cuba, and south Yemen.
The U.S. Embassy launched nationwide media trainings to empower journalist for accurate reporting in connection to the upcoming elections scheduled for August 2020.
The initiative implemented by the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs (CCP) in partnership with Addis Ababa University School of Journalism and Communications and a support from the US embassy in Addis is launched on Wednesday March 4, 2020 at Sapphire Hotel.
The embassy earmarked 450,000 USD for the project which seeks to help the media provide accurate, balanced, and verified information to the public during the election process.
According to the organizers, a total of 25 training sessions are planned throughout the country in which 20 to 30 members of the media and social media influencers are expected to participate that ultimately reaching 625 Ethiopian media professionals.
“This project aims to enhance the skill sets of journalists and strengthen the institutional capacity of Ethiopian media organizations with the overarching goal of improving the quality of information available to the Ethiopian public in the lead up to the 2020 elections in Ethiopia” said Amanda Jacobsen, Public Affairs Officer of US Embassy.
“These media trainings are part of the U.S. Embassy’s efforts to improve media capacity as part of our seven pillars of engagement in support of the incredible reform effort underway here in Ethiopia,” she adds.
“The Media training helps journalist to inform the public by facilitating forums for open debate, and educate the public about the election process and discharge their responsibilities,” said Wondwossen Andualem Deputy Director of Ethiopian Broadcasting Authority.
The Training manual is prepared by the Addis Ababa School of journalism after a comprehensive needs assessment and findings was conducted.
A week-long intensive facilitators’ training was provided to 24 trainers who will be deployed nationwide for the trainings. As part of the overall media capacity initiative, up to six American media professionals will be embedded in Ethiopian newsrooms to reinforce best practices and conduct need assessments.
“The goal of the program is to enhance the skill sets of journalists and strengthen the institutional capacity of Ethiopian media organizations to produce objective, fact-based reporting on the elections process, which will in turn improve the quality of information available to the Ethiopian public in the lead up to the 2020 national elections.”
Ethiopia has said U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin’s advise to Ethiopia not to fill the dam before an agreement was “undiplomatic”.
Foreign Minister Gedu Andargachew made the remark in a press conference with Water Minister Seleshi Bekele at the Prime Minister’s office on Tuesday amid escalating tension between Ethiopia and Egypt since last Friday.
On Feb. 28, a week after the latest round of talks on Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), Mnuchin issued a statement that Ethiopia should not start filling its dam as planned in July before all three countries — Sudan, Egypt and Ethiopia — sign the agreement.
“Consistent with the principles set out in the DOP [Declaration of Principles], and in particular the principles of not causing significant harm to downstream countries, final testing and filling should not take place without an agreement,” the statement said.
A document by the U.S. during recent meetings in Washington, D.C. — which Ethiopia skipped — was initialed by Egypt, while Ethiopia and Sudan refrained from doing so.
“It is a big, big country in its diplomatic and other influence and we do not expect from them such an undiplomatic statement,” Gedu said, adding that it was “unacceptable”.
“We hope and expect that the U.S. would revise the statement,” he stressed.
Mnuchin’s statement was followed by a verbal tit-for-tat between Egypt and Ethiopia, with the former threatening to explore all necessary means to “safeguard the interests of Egypt.”
Gedu said the threat by Egypt to employ “all means necessary to safeguard Egyptian interests on the Nile” was not useful to all parties involved, including Egypt itself.
(Photo: Anteneh Aklilu)
Meanwhile, Seleshi said Ethiopia has not gone out of the talks.
“Ethiopia has called for a prolongation of time in the talks in view of unresolved issues in the talks. There are still numerous points of difference. And Ethiopia is developing a document based on the outcomes of negotiations so far,” Seleshi said.
“Ethiopia has never said it would go out of the U.S.-sponsored talks, and dialogue would continue,” he said, adding there were still sticking points in terms of the filling and operations of the dam with regards to extended drought periods.
“What Ethiopia opposes is the shifting roles of the U.S. as facilitator or mediator. We only agreed to the U.S. and World Bank to be observers, and we want them only stick to that,” he said.
“Ethiopia does not want the process of negotiation to be rushed in spite of the unresolved outstanding issues that are still on the table,” Seleshi said.
Seleshi also reaffirmed that Ethiopia would stick to its plan of starting to fill the dam as of July and testing the turbines sometime next year, and the first filling.
In related development, the government on Wednesday launched another round of fundraising to complete the construction of GERD, which has the capacity to generate 5,275 megawatts of electricity.
In her address at the fund raising launching ceremony, president of Ethiopia, Sahle-Work Zewde indicated that the water of the Nile should not be cause of conflict but should be used as tool of cooperation and development by Nile riparian countries.
When completed the about $5 billion Dam will be the biggest in Africa. So far all the money invested on the Dam, which is about 100 billion birr (close to $3.13 billion), is generated from domestic source.
The 5th Aviation Africa Summit & Exhibition 2020, an event organized by Times Aero space in association with Ethiopian Airlines and the Ministry of Transport attracted more than 600 participants from 75 countries and 32 representatives of Africa on the aerospace and defense industry.
The event was a two day summit and exhibition that include Speakers from African airlines leaders, civil aviation authorities, business aviation & support industries. It calls stake holders to cooperate on achieving a sustainable African aviation future and for more open Africa air transport market, and present debate on the current existing challenge Corona virus.
In December 2019, The international air lines associations forecasted 3.8% African RPK growth for 2020, but this has been narrowed to 3.4% following the outbreak and the travel limitation resulting from the corona virus threat.
“Previous disease outbreaks have peaked after one to three months and recovered to pre-outbreak levels in six to seven months,” said Raphael Kuuchi, special envoy to Africa at the IATA.
The outbreak of the virus demonstrates the resilience of the industry, and its members, in times of adversity. even if the air line did not stop its flight to china according to Tewolde GebreMariam, CEO of Ethiopian Airlines, the air line is seeing a 20% decline in demand “The corona virus is a huge challenge” however “we have certain other experiences helps us to minimize the outcome, it is temporary problem we have a capacity to recover”
Also the organizers share the challenge of the virus, “we were expecting more than 800 participants on the event, but because of the virus the number shows decrease” said Mark Brown managing director of the times aerospace.
The forum calls on governments to relax taxes and charges through this crisis and called for air traffic control slot retention rules to be moderated. Addressing the key theme of sustainability a panel of experts working across Africa’s aviation sector underlined the call for multilateral engagement to achieve the goal.
Abderahmane Berth Secretary General African Airlines Association stated that “The implementation of single Africa air transport market SAATM will result in enhanced connectivity and reduced journey times as well as lower airfares more efficient use of airspace.”
“African aviation has many opportunities, but also faces challenges that the sector must face together to ensure a sustainable aviation future,” said Tewolde. “Our main challenges include the attitude to aviation by African governments. We need support from governments, taxes need to be reduced and infrastructure needs to improve.”
Lack of human resources, the poor level of connectivity, low traffic demand and restrictive regulations, High fares and costs Heterogeneous levels of aviation safety and security Infrastructure capacity and operational limitations Limited access to finance are some ongoing challenges to the sector in the continent. Currently African aviations only command 20% of the global market share.
Different international organizations including Boeing and Airbus participated in the event and next year the 2021 African aviation will be held in Kigali, Rwanda.
A month ago African aviation host the 29th annual African aviation MRO Africa and the 8th African aviation training conference and exhibition in Addis Ababa, which gathered more than 40 African airlines.
