“Musica Beyaynetu” a concert organized by the Italian Cultural Institute in cooperation with the Italian Embassy was held at the National Theater on Tuesday, December 10, 2019.
Two bands performed on stage, the Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio and the local Ethiocolor Band.
Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio performed its own unique songs for the first time in Ethiopia on the stage. The band represented their distinctive performance with textual and musical language, a mix of cultural dance, which attempted to keep different continents together with their culture sounds and history. Both bands performed together. 
“Musica Beyaynetu” is symbolic of the many wonderful tastes of the Ethiopian beyaynetu dish and the many musical styles and cultures represented in the event.
Orchestra di Piazza Vittorio is a well-known Italian multi-ethnic orchestra that was created in Rome in 2002 with the desire to enhance the namesake piazza of the Esquiline in Rome, the multi-ethnic district of the city par excellence. Over the past 17 years, the band produced five records and performed over 1400 concerts all over the world.
Musica Beyaynetu shows diversity
AGGA
A new comic book called “AGGA” based on true story was inaugurated on November 11, 2019 at the Embassy of The Republic of Serbia. The book by Minas (Sanim) Halefom is based on a true story and features of the second Italy-Ethiopia war hero Colonel Abdissa Agga. The new comic book is the first of its kind to be published in Ethiopia. The embassy helped the book to be published in limited edition to the international and local readers. The author is also known by other visual art works.
Colonel Abdissa Aga was born in Welega and joined the Ethiopian Army around the age of 14 and fought against Fascist Italy in 1936.
Reasons why I think Prime Minister Abiy deserves to receive the Nobel Peace Prize
By Hiwot Teferra
Once again, His Excellency Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed made us fall in love with our country, Ethiopia.
Ever since he took office, his actions have been remarkable, the type one can simply not ignore.
It started with his inaugural speech where he mentioned Ethiopia so many times, he evoked so much love for the country and showed so much respect to his predecessor, H.E. Hailemariam Dessalegn that right from the beginning, Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed touched our hearts.
It needs to be stated right away that Dr. Abiy’s speeches are generally mind-blowing and one has to have full control of his or her emotion while listening, in order not to cry. His words are moving and tend to bring people at the heart of the Ethiopian issue.
As far as prioritizing Peace in concerned, it was obvious since Dr. Abiy took office that he wanted to tighten and reinforce diplomatic ties with neighboring countries. In fact, within a few weeks of his premiership, Dr. Abiy started visiting each one of them.
This by itself was exceptional because customarily in Africa, premiers tend to spend more energy and time on domestic affairs rather than on international relations. This is of course not to say that Dr. Abiy did not focus on internal issues. He definitely did. In fact, he went to most regions to address the issues our people had. Yet, the fact that he gave equally an importance on foreign affairs was for me respectable and a clear indication that our Prime Minister came on board with a global vision.
In this initiative, what surprised me the most is when in June 2018, Dr. Abiy not only visited Egypt which is probably not the easiest country to tie diplomatic relations with due to the Nile issues, but after a successful meeting with President El-Sisi, Dr. Abiy got Ethiopian Prisoners in Egypt freed and brought them back to Ethiopia in the same flight he took to come back to Ethiopia. This was an unimaginable event, an action only a blessed person would take.
That same month, precisely on June 23, 2018, Dr. Abiy made a heart-touching speech in Meskel square, emphasizing on the concept of ‘Medemer’, the need for all of Ethiopians to work together for a better Ethiopia tomorrow. There again, he brought our emotions together, preaching love for our country and the possibility of building a better Ethiopia, in unity. When he finished his speech, he bowed down 90 degrees to the thousands of Ethiopians who were listening to his speech, showing a great length of respect for the people. This was never seen from a leader before and so, it was very much appreciated. Unfortunately, this same day, a bomb exploded at Meskel Square and sadly we had a few victims. The same day, not only Dr. Abiy went to the hospital to see the wounded, he also donated blood the very next day, thereby activating a blood donation program nationwide, on a voluntary basis.
Again in June 2019, Dr. Abiy initiated a peace deal with President Issayas Afeworki, restoring diplomatic ties with Eritrea after two decades. The rest is history, as the reunification of Ethiopia and Eritrea helped bring peace between the two nations, it reunited families who were separated for years yet had so much love for one another, and this saved thousands of dollars spent at the boarder for peacekeeping.
Dr. Abiy’s efforts to restore peace did not end there. In July 2018, he traveled to the USA and visited the most important cities where Ethiopians reside and addressed our people’s issues in North America. These people were to a great extent dissatisfied with the previous Ethiopian Government. It was therefore important to approach them and create peace. Hence, the largest halls were booked in various cities for this purpose. There, Dr. Abiy met most of the opposition leaders and started a peace and reconciliation process. He courageously apologized for all the wrong actions previously taken. He used this opportunity to invite Ethiopians to come and help build their country, which was well accepted. This proved to be very successful. A few days later, many opposition leaders who had not returned to Ethiopia for a long time came back and were received colorfully.
Over and above this matter, despite not being an Orthodox himself, Dr. Abiy took on the responsibility of bringing unity within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church which was divided into two between the USA and Ethiopia. Upon returning from the USA, the Prime Minister brought in his plane senior leaders of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church who were exiled in the USA for years. Within a couple of days in Aug 2018, a celebration at the millennium hall marked the Reconciliation, Peace and Unity of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.
October 2018 was a historic month for Ethiopia. First because that month, the ministerial cabinet saw for the first time, 50% of its ministers being women. Moreover, the country saw for the first time a Ministry of Peace with at its head, a woman, the remarkable He.E. Ms. Muferiat Kamil, the right person in my opinion to head this ministry.
On Oct 28, with the full support of PM Dr. Abiy, Ambassador Sahle-Work Zewde became the first female president of F.D.R. of Ethiopia. Again, this was the right choice because Ambassador Sahle-Work Zewde had been a diplomat for a very long time and she has a wide range of experience and exposure abroad including with the United Nations.
This move helped young girls and women, including me to unleash our potential and envision a bigger picture of ourselves, the sense that we too could reach the top if we work for it.
In November 2018, under PM Dr. Abiy’s leadership, Honorable Ms. Birtukan Mideksa who was imprisoned and tortured under the previous regime came back from the USA where she was exiled and became the Chairperson of the Ethiopian Electoral Board, a position never taken by a woman before.
In Feb 2019 at the opening of the yearly held AU Summit, the statue of the Emperor Haileselassie, one of the fore founders of OAU was inaugurated at the AU compound, whereas our previous government had obviously not lobbied for this to happen when the statue of Kwame Nkrumah had been there since 2012.
When is April 2019, a photo exhibition was organized at the Millennium Hall depicting H.E. Dr. Abiy Ahmed’s performance as Prime Minister of Ethiopia from April 2018 to April 2019, it was obvious that he had accomplished a number of things within one year and beyond anyone’s imagination.
The opening of the Unity Park in Sep. 2019 was another great achievement, for the outcome was outstanding. What made it even more unique is that when it was inaugurated, free access was given to elders, the physically challenged and the homeless before it was opened to the public…
Dr. Abiy’s achievements are many, way too many. Some of them are unique in nature and simple at the same time. I say simple because clearly some of them are based on his simple and uncomplicated core values which are LOVE for Ethiopia, PEACE for all & UNITY. His love for the non-privileged, his respect for the elders and religious leaders, his proven humility are the essence of his actions. Hence, the Nobel Peace Prize is a very well deserved award and a honor for Ethiopia.
Dear Nobel Laureate, Prime Minister Dr. Abiy Ahmed, Thank you! May you have a Long Life. May God Bless you and your family.
Hiwot Teferra can be reached at hiwotteferralobo@gmail.com
Free trade and developing countries
Cogent criticisms have been made about the ability of the doctrine of comparative advantage to deal with the obvious global disadvantage of developing countries. The concern here is that ‘in a world of uneven development free trade, or even trade per se, may be inherently unequalising. There is a range of economic arguments that explain why the doctrine of comparative advantage may be unable to deliver its promised welfare benefits to developing countries.
One of the important general arguments in this context is that comparative advantage is created and cumulative, rather than natural, being based on historical development processes, acquired skills, cultivated industry patterns or “first mover” benefits, so it can change over time, can be shaped by governments or industry leaders and can decay through neglect. If this is so, then the cumulative comparative advantage of developed countries will ensure either that inequalities remain or that they take an unacceptably long time to disappear.
Another important school of economic thought postulates perpetual inequalities as a consequence of free trade. According to this argument, where there is low elasticity in demand for the exports of a country but high elasticity in domestic demand for imports, then export prices relative to import prices will result in a continuous trade deficit. As this tends to describe the terms upon which at least some developing countries export their primary products and import manufactured products, it is argued that under free trade conditions these developing countries will remain trapped in a trade deficit preventing them from realising the welfare gains promised by free trade doctrine.
These are not, of course, the only explanations for the current trade deficit and retarded economic development suffered by developing countries. It is certainly the case that the adverse economic position of developing countries has been exacerbated by the fact that they have been denied comparative advantages that they might have otherwise enjoyed. In this respect two factors, in particular, are worthy of note.
The first is that the requirements for the global protection of intellectual property rights, the large scale benefits of which are overwhelmingly enjoyed by undertakings based in the developed world, deny to developing countries any comparative advantage that they may have accrued in the processes or imitation of certain manufactured goods and in incremental innovation. To place this in context, it is essential to understand that many of today’s developed countries once placed extensive economic reliance on the unfettered ability to copy manufactured goods emanating from other more developed economies.
Secondly, the trading position of many developing countries is adversely affected by the fact that developed countries have continued to protect their domestic markets for certain primary products and manufactured goods exported from developing countries. However, the extent to which the opening of developed country markets to such exports would alleviate the trade deficits of developing countries remains a matter of debate amongst economists.
The protectionism of developed countries is a response to what is perceived as a potential flood of ‘cheap imports’ from the developing world. It is not uncommon for industries in developed countries to argue that, in order to survive, they need protection from such imports, which are made on the back of low labour costs in developing countries. From the free trade point of view, this argument denies to developing countries their legitimate comparative advantage. In economic terms, some questions have been raised about the validity of this free trade argument given that many of the employers of low- cost labour in the developing world are multinational corporate interests, which marry high technology with low cost labour in order to achieve an advantage that gives little in the way of welfare benefits to the host developing country.
In addition to this, it is not clear that the developed world market for cheap manufactured imports from developing countries functions in quite the way that classical free trade economists postulate. Theoretically, the comparative advantage of the developing country will be realised when developed world consumers purchase the cheaper imports rather than more expensive domestic products.
However, increasing numbers of consumers in the developed world eschew the products of low-cost labour on ethical grounds. This not only shows the limits of economic theory but also indicates that the debate about free trade should transcend arguments about the validity in solely economic terms of the doctrine of comparative advantage.
Ethical concerns about the exploitation of labour, whether by multinational corporate interests or by domestically based interests, are one of a number of non- economic arguments that may be made about an unfettered free trade regime. What these arguments have in common is the rejection of wealth maximisation as the ultimate measure of human happiness and attainment.
As Keynes famously wrote: “If it were true that we should be a little richer, provided that the whole country and all the workers in it were to specialise on half- a dozen mass-produced products, each individual doing nothing and having no hopes of doing anything except one minute, unskilled repetitive act all his life long, should we all cry out for the immediate destruction of the endless variety of trades and crafts and employments which stand in the way of the glorious attainment of this maximum degree of specialised cheapness? Of course we should not – and that is enough to prove the case for free trade . . . has left something out. Our task is to redress the balance of the argument”.
The critique of free trade based upon the rejection of wealth maximization draws stark attention to the difficulty in attempting to divide the political and the economic. The decision to embrace a free trade regime is not, and can never be, a purely economic one. Rather, it is a political choice involving, amongst other things, economic considerations. Joseph Stiglitz underlines the significance of this point: “There are important disagreements about economic and social policy in our democracies. Some of these disagreements are about values, how concerned should we be about our environment (how much environmental degradation should we tolerate, if it allows us to have a higher GDP); how concerned should we be about the poor (how much sacrifice in our total income should we be willing to make, if it allows some of the poor to move out of poverty, or to be slightly better off ); or how concerned should we be about democracy”.
Overall, the debate on the non-economic merits and de-merits of the comparative advantage doctrine is one that even the most thoughtful modern proponents of free trade. In this, as in so much else, modern free trade theorists appear to be embracing a type of intellectual foreclosure that dates back to the work of Adam Smith. Adam Smith postulated non-economic effects of free trade, both positive and negative. On the positive side, both he and Ricardo cited cosmopolitanism and international harmony as a non- economic benefit of free trade. However, Smith saw that the pursuit of material wealth had less desirable effects.
