To celebrate the 71th Israel Independence Day, Fig Tree, drama film directed by Alamork Davidian was premiered in Addis Ababa at the Italian institute of Culture last Monday in the presence of ambassadors, artists and invited guests.
Hirut Kassaw Minister of Culture and Tourism who opened the show said that the movie is one of the testimony of the tight bond between Ethiopia and Israel.
(Photo: Anteneh Aklilu)
“We have a relationship in politics, economy and culture but more than that we have bond in blood and the making of this movie is one of the testimony of the closeness.”
“As many of us know fig tree fruits is falling down but it will not remain there, it will start growing and this is a lesson for us. Failure is not the last word there is always an option and another chance‘’ she said.
Israeli Ambassador to Ethiopia Raphael Morav said that the film production was made in Israel and Israel will continue to share its experience in the movie industry.
The movie is all about the 16 year old Jewish girl called Mina who is trying to navigate between a surreal routine dictated by the civil war in Ethiopia and her last days of youth with her boyfriend Eli. When she discovers that her family is planning to immigrate to Israel and escape the war, she weaves an alternate plan in order to save Eli. But in times of war, plans tend to go wrong.
(Photo: Anteneh Aklilu)
Alamork Davidian told Capital that the movie was a lesson to show the danger of war in interrupting children education, people lives and love relationship.
The film was screened at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival, where Davidian won the Eurimages Audentia Award for Best Female Director.
The story “Fake news killing turtles” is a very interesting one (Capital April 28/2019) not only for its newsworthiness but also for its timely appearance to nudge me in to thinking of writing this piece on the subject. Fake news is used to refer to fabricated news. Available source indicates that fake news is also known as ‘junk news’ or ‘pseudo-news’. It consists of deliberate disinformation or hoaxes spread via traditional news media (print and broadcast) or online social media. Fake news being circulated through social media in particularly has become a number one enemy to human beings. These days there are many innocent people who have been injured, lost their lives and properties because of fake news. A year ago, we heard about a news report released from India that two individuals were killed by a mob that was misled by fake news circulated in the area.
“On the evening of June 8, [2018] a 29-year old sound engineer and a 30-year-old businessman were on their way to a picnic in India’s north-eastern Assam State when they stopped at a village to ask for directions. The villagers had been told, in a video circulating on WhatsApp, that child kidnappers were roaming the country. Believing these strangers were the ones they’d been warned about, the villagers formed a large mob, and, before the men could convince them otherwise, beat them to death.” This was a very alarming report that shows how human beings turn in to beasts because of groundless news. The astounding thing is that the video the killers had seen was an instructional safety demonstration made in Pakistan. It has nothing to do with any incidents happened in India! It was however shared through social media with some text warning about kidnappers in India.
Similar incident happened in our country, Ethiopia. Two young medical practitioners, who were on research tour in a rural school around Gojam Zone of Amhara State, were clubbed to death by a mob that had been misled by fake news. The cause for the killing of the young medical practitioners was a rumour that was circulating across the entire state claiming the prevalence of a hidden agenda of sterilizing females. The people in the area mistakenly took the young researchers for implementers of the said agenda. The widespread rumour of giving medicine to young females through vaccination in a bid to stop them from bearing children caused fear and anger among the community. That’s why the mob perpetrated the pathetic killing.
Nigerian Minister of Information and Culture said in February 2016 that the deliberate publication of false information especially via social media poses a greater threat than insurgency and militancy. According to him, the fake news has the potency of setting people against one another based on religion and ethnicity.
On 23 of June 2018 a serious of horrifying images began to circulate on Facebook. This created aroused tension in one corner of Nigeria. “One showed a baby with open machete wounds across his head and jaw. Another – viewed more than 11,000 times – showed a man’s skull hacked open. There were pictures of homes burnt to the ground, bloodied corpses dumped in mass graves, and children murdered in their beds. The Facebook users who posted the images claimed they showed a massacre underway in the Gashish district of Plateau State, Nigeria. Fulani Muslims, they said, were killing Christians from the region’s Berom ethnic minority… But some of the most incendiary images circulating at the time had nothing to do with the violence in Gashish. The image of the baby, which was shared with a call for God to ‘wipe out the entire generation of the killers of this innocent child’, had first appeared on Facebook months earlier. The video in which the man’s head was cut open did not even come from Nigeria, it was recorded in Congo-Brazzaville nearly a thousand miles away, in 2012.”
What happened after the circulation of these horrifying images? Let’s read here only a story about an incident. He is named Ali Alhaji Muhammed. He was a potato seller. This man, a father of 15 children had to travel to a town to meet some customers. It was a journey he had made many times. After his business, he started going back home in a shared taxi. Minutes after, the taxi was made to stop at a spot blocked by a wall of burning tyres. A mob of Berom (ethnic group in Plateau State) men armed with knives and machetes were interrogating drivers, looking for Fulani Muslims. The day was not good for poor Ali who is a Fulani Muslim. He was drugged from the taxi along with another unfortunate male passenger… Ali’s charred remains were reportedly discovered three days after the incident happened… His body was so badly mutilated that his wife refused to see it…
Similarly, a few days back here in Ethiopia an individual happened to post on Facebook a photograph that shows plastic-shrouded corpses of human beings. The individual claimed that a killing was perpetrated by a certain ethnic group against innocent people from another ethnic minority in Benishangul Gumuz State. The amazing thing is that the photograph was taken from the internet. It shows the dead bodies of “African migrants shot dead by smugglers on Libyan coast”. It was stated on the original news document of March 10, 2017 that “police initially believed the migrants had been shot because they refused to board the human traffickers’ boat during bad weather”. The guy posted this photograph for his devilish purpose of causing conflicts and killings among innocent people. If it were not for some active individuals who exposed the fake news, unexpected massacre could have been flared up because of this baseless fake news.
These days politicians in many countries seem to engage themselves in establishing fake news industry. Director of Abuja-based Centre for Development, Idayat Hassan said that Nigerian politicians have been involved in creating ‘fake news factories’ where paid employees, both local and international, create content with the aim of bullying, intimidating and sometimes cajoling the public to accept it.
In the same way some untrustworthy political parties in Ethiopia have gone to the extent of organizing a group of Facebook warriors who are paid to disseminate false news and rumours that cause conflicts in areas where ethnicity is radicalized.
An online survey conducted in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa shows that those who are exposed to fake news can hardly trust the traditional news media. “African audiences have low levels of trust in the media, experience a high degree of exposure to misinformation, and contribute – often knowingly – to its spread”. The finding is that many people have been exposed to fake news. Therefore, rebuilding trust in the mainstream media can be taken as remedy. Educating people about the dangers of fake news is not enough. It has also been suggested that media organizations would have to work at rebuilding relationships with the audiences. Raising awareness among the society or providing training on media literacy should also be taken as a good approach. What Taiwan has done is a good example in this regard. A new curriculum was designed in that country beginning 2017 to teach critical readings of propaganda and the evaluation of sources. This is what we call media literacy. It is of paramount importance to provide training in journalism in the new information society.
Deceitful people who have been engaged in fabricating fake news are posing serious threat to us all. We all should act responsibly whenever we read news (that seem exaggerated) highly circulated by unknown sources or senders. Let’s consider the source of the fake news. Let’s read beyond the headlines… check the author and date… assess supporting sources of the fake news… I feel that we must be very suspicious of the photographs and video footage that show mass killings, conflicts and property damages. Watch out! The least you can do is that do not share or like such fabricated news. If you click ‘share’ or ‘like’, you may be a cause for unexpected killings of many innocent citizens and property loss…
You can reach the writer through gizaw.haile@yahoo.com
Capital sat down with Kebour Ghenna, former President of the Ethiopian and Addis Ababa Chambers of Commerce and current Executive Director of the Pan African Chamber of Commerce and Industry to discuss about his views on the current situation of the country. Excerpts:
Capital: What can you tell us about the future of democracy in Ethiopia, and the rise of ethnic nationalism? Kebour Ghenna: The race to nationalism seems to make headways. The problem however, is that Oromo nationalism or Amhara, or Tigray nationalism is not going to solve our unemployment problem, or the climate change crisis, or the housing shortages and we can add many other problems. To the contrary these problems are better addressed by working together. I repeat working together. And the federation system, if well structured, with democratically constructed agenda through a series of discussions and procedures, can bring us prosperity. I am against those who preach ethnic nationalism as a solution to our current economic, social and political problems that’s not going to take us anywhere. It’s not by putting ethnic barriers that we can become a great nation. In fact if not careful, we may end up breaking the country into pieces and remain poor and powerless for generation.
Capital: Can this government, can Abiy Ahmed’s government, fight and win against ethnic nationalism? Kebour: We all know Meles and his colleagues were the ones who introduced such territorially based autonomous regions, typically a community of language as ‘Regional Administration’, which are now conducting themselves as republics. Despite many voices of concern then, this ideology under the guise of history and pragmatism, was vigorously pursued. Abiy Ahmed is a member of this same party that legitimized this system, the party is still functioning, he very much relies on it for its day to day activities. Now we understand that he is taking the party in a different path; can he really convince his coalition members to change or transform his party’s orientations on this matter? I don’t know. But I worry that ethnic nationalism, which is becoming increasingly real in the past years in Ethiopia, may turn truly toxic, especially in these times of economic and financial turbulence within which Ethiopia’s highly indebted, unevenly developed autonomous regions find themselves.
(Photo: Anteneh Aklilu)
Capital: You mentioned that we are going through difficult economic times in Ethiopia today, can you elaborate more on the economic situation. Kebour: We need first to understand that PM Abiy or his advisors and ministers do not really have much power when it comes to making the economy perform, that is, creating employment, generating foreign currency, create profitable firms, or controlling real wages or prices or even equalizing incomes or helping the poor very much. What is more interesting today is that people of power are under huge pressure to deliver prosperity to people who want instant gratification and are impatient for change. The young men and women like the ‘Kero’s and Fano’s’ of our time see politics as irrelevant to achieving the ideals that matter to them. How to reconcile this contradiction which on the one side is constrained by the limitation of power of political leaders with the impatience of the people is the biggest challenge. And we see it in the challenges our leaders experience in re-launching the economy. Yes the economy is in difficulty, it’s not creating employment, it’s not creating growth, not attracting enough investment and so on. But I have faith in the new generation; the PM has brought many of those young men and women into his team. He is also crisscrossing the country and the world and talking to professionals in search of ideas for turning the crisis into an opportunity for a ‘rebirth’ of the country. I salute the effort. But I also worry that such actions may not be sufficient or effectively conducted. I think there should be more discussions with regional leaders to promote a strong and cooperative region-federal relationship, encourage regional leaders to develop their own revenue systems, strengthen their economies, in short let them lead their economies. One small detail while I am on it, I think the federal government should consider the establishment of an association of regional presidents to share best practices and speak with a collective voice on national policy.
Capital: How do you explain the absence of an economic road map from the government and will there be a backlash as a result? Kebour: I don’t know why this administration chose not to put up a road map for the economy or for its program in general. But I understand there are bits and pieces of this roadmap here and there. This is an issue that seems to bother many people, notably the elites and I suppose many business people. Somehow this administration’s response on this issue remains rather vague. Frankly, I am not sure if Ethiopians want a program, even less an ambitious program. I don’t see people eagerly awaiting the specifics of Abiy Ahmed’s EPRDF policies. Today such policies or programs are almost beside the point. Most voters will cast their vote for leaders representing their identity. The traditional ideological divides of Left and Right have collapsed. The tendencies toward ethnic politics we’ve witnessed in these past years will very well intensify.
Capital: Are you optimistic about the future of Ethiopia? Kebour: Let me first say that I, as an ordinary citizen, am engaged in civic activities, recognizing of course that my individual contribution can only be quite modest. Still I see myself as a player, I don’t want to sit around, as a spectator, and say I am an optimist or pessimist. I am, and want to be engaged, I want to be an active citizen and help make the community a better place. I want ultimately to see a prosperous and fair Ethiopia. I think as a player you can’t be an optimist or pessimist, you just play to succeed.
Capital: What about the opposition parties, are you expecting them to form a reasonably broad alliance ahead of the next election? Kebour: Despite the number of opposition parties, almost 120 in the country and growing, I argue that our democracy is being crippled by a lack of true ideology. We have been paralyzed by having too few constructive policy arguments. Not only there is very little exchange of ideas in recent years, but we have also seen on a whole host of critical issues that the government is being run by a party largely interested in money and power. This has been the root cause of our governmental dysfunction in recent years. In fact opposition parties in Ethiopia have hardly presented their ideology, hardly shared a picture of the shape and content of the ideal society they advocate for Ethiopia. For me, the ‘ideology’ we seek should outline the strategies and tactics that will be used by the party to achieve the envisioned society. The ideology should describe the sort of people who will do the work – the party organization – that will take the larger society to the ultimate ideal. Today we have to be careful not to mistake the clamors of interested and factious men as ideology or some kind of patriotism, most are in fact meaningless noise. Citizens should begin demanding substantive policy debates that will ultimately drive our government’s decisions.
Capital: Many say that you are against privatization, can you tell us why? Kebour: May be you should ask me if privatization serve the public interest or not? For me, the issue is not simply whether ownership is private or public. Rather, the key question is under what conditions will companies or managers be more likely to act in the public’s interest. The debate over privatization needs to be viewed in a larger context. Privatization involves the displacement of one set of managers entrusted by the shareholders – the citizens – with another set of managers who may answer to a very different set of shareholders. By the way private ownership does not necessarily translate into improved efficiency. More importantly, private sector managers may have no guilt about adopting profit-making strategies or corporate practices that make essential services unaffordable or unavailable to large segments of the population. A profit-seeking operation may not, for example, choose to provide Internet services if it’s not profitable.
(Photo: Anteneh Aklilu)
Capital: So you are against privatization if I understand you well? Kebour: Let me take this question away from the ideological ground of private versus public to the more pragmatic ground of managerial behavior and accountability. Viewed in that context, the pros and cons of privatization can be measured against the standards of good management – regardless of ownership. Why? Because, first, neither public nor private managers will always act in the best interests of their shareholders. Privatization will be effective only if private managers have incentives to act in the public interest, which includes, but is not limited to, efficiency. Second, profits and the public interest overlap best when the privatized service or asset is in a competitive market in other words in a liberalized environment. It takes competition from other companies to discipline managerial behavior. If these conditions are not met, continued governmental involvement will be better. The simple transfer of ownership from public to private hands will not necessarily reduce the cost or enhance the quality of services. So yes I am against privatization if privatization decisions are not based primarily on pragmatic analyses of whether agreed-on ends can best be met by public or private providers. As I said the ends need not be limited to efficiency; they need only be clearly specified in advance.
One last point, private corporations are very good at writing contracts that shift all risk to citizens (the taxpayers) and keep any rewards for the company. Once a public service is outsourced or asset is privatized, taxpayers have little recourse if a contract was drawn up poorly or the drafters failed to anticipate all contingencies. Because some contracts are written for extended periods, the public can be locked into bad deals for generations
Capital: Regarding the overall economic direction, many say we are heading towards a crisis, what is your view? Kebour: As regards the economy, we may already be in crisis depending on whether you believe we’ve reached the tipping point. Let’s first recognize that the problem is not simple, and so the answer is not going to be simple either. The political picture remains muddy, it’s not clear that the federal government is strong enough to protect and maintain the rule of law. It’s not even clear to me that it can impose taxes or regulate commerce across the country. One fundamental question is whether our divided house remains one nation? How about the impact of climate change in our life and the economy? We have to tackle all these problems at the same time, they are interrelated, they require the participation of all of us: government, business, civil societies, faith organizations, academia and others. Regarding the economy the government has taken some steps here and there, and I don’t see any problem of reforming in bits and pieces, but then these bits and pieces should come one after the other in an ongoing effort to address the deep economic crisis the country is experiencing. I say, start by unchaining business growth, make sure business believes in the best future, find the right balance between liberalization and state-led development, encourage new entrants, new entrepreneurs unconnected with the state to reinvigorate the moribund economy, consider making Ethiopia not just a diplomatic city, but a commercial city with a very open economy, the easiest place in the world to register, and operate a company; abolish the Ministry of Trade’s business registration department, ensure the independence of the national bank (the one institution that is not ready to reform but is choking the economy), introduce a flat tax to ensure people pay proportionately more in income tax. Anyway, there is much to do in this area.
Capital: If you had one simple recommendation to the government – what will that be? Kebour: You mean in addition to what I just said earlier, I would say – and I have been saying this for quite some time – and it relates to the privatization of public assets, in particular the privatization of Ethiopian airlines; I want to say to the PM, to just drop the idea of selling the airlines! I want to say to the PM to just look south, look at Kenya Airways; it was privatized in 1995 with IFC as chief advisor, where is this airline today? Not everything is good with privatization, don’t destroy the Pride of Africa.
“…history is bound to judge us tomorrow by what we are doing today…” His Imperial Majesty Emperor Haile Selassie I
“It is normal for every individual, family or generation to give way to the new by adding something to the heritage bequeathed upon it… . It is thus our sacred duty and responsibility to be cognizant of the fact that because history is bound to judge us tomorrow by what we are doing today, we must do everything in our powers to leave behind us a lasting legacy of work,” declared HIM Emperor Haile Selassie I at the inauguration of the Addis Abeba School of Fine Art in 1958, renamed for founder Artist Alle Felege-Selam. The quotes of the art-loving Emperor never cease to amaze. Though HIM’s speeches are mostly grounded in the mid 20th century, they remain timeless prophetic prose, creating a road map for progress in myriad areas. Back to the point, it should go without saying that it is also the “sacred duty” of governments to enhance and promote cultural contributions beyond mercantile interests, through the strengthening of art institutions. After all, “A purely materialistic art would be like a tree which is expected to bear fruit without flowering and to sacrifice grace and beauty for mere utility,” states HIM.
Fast forward to the 21st century. It has been almost five decades since an Ethiopian Head of State visited their prestigious art institution. That speaks volumes. However, history was made on Sunday, May 12th as the Art Aficionado Prime Minister, Dr. Abiy Ahmed, ensured the “rubber meets the road” in a widely reported visit to the Art School. The PM was warmly received by three generations of art professionals, representing the historic and current pedigree and pedagogy of the institution. Art School Director, Agegnehu Adane led the visit and posted a synopsis that best captures the vibes, in two words, infectious exuberance. I paraphrase the Director’s FB post, translated from Amharic to English. “At 3 in the morning (9AM) we started the discussion with Dr. Abiy about the problems of the art school … he emphasized the need to give more attention to the art school and we were all happy about the discussions held with the art professionals… .”
It sounds like a pretty standard High Official visit. Right? But wait, remember I used the adage, “rubber meets the road” I meant it literally. Agenehu further explains, “Then during lunchtime, the PM returned a second time, driving his car on this round. He brought a civil engineer for roads and ‘infrastructure’; a professional gardener and designers affirming, ‘After this I will bring all leaders who come to visit Ethiopia here.’ When he said that to me, my heart and head said, the King who didn’t take his eyes off the art school the entire time, has come back again … therefore, when you have this kind of leader, he will leave a monumental cultural wealth.” Well said, Director.
So while this week’s discourse is not my usual “build the industry and they will come” rant, it is an important commentary emphasizing the need to promote the integrity, grace, beauty and creative processes and spaces, critical to the growth and development of contemporary fine art in Ethiopia. We can only pray and/or do our part to encourage the PM to remain on this trajectory of art appreciation, ensuring the bestowment of an enriched cultural heritage to the 22nd century generation of Ethiopians and beyond. However, we must also pay keen attention to consistency as a great legacy can be diminished in the blink of an eye if the sense of responsibility and connectivity to the arts wanes and waxes like the movement of the moon. Contemporary fine art should never be compromised and should always be protected and promoted, preciously. Art is indeed a true barometer of time, place and circumstance and an important indicator of our developed African civilizations. The materials, subject matter, technique and more mark history and reveal truths sometimes edited out of books to be revealed by subsequent generations.
If this proposed attention is paid to art, across the board, we should realize an enriched creative academic and intellectual environment for artists, boosting the confidence of the talented while diminishing the odds of otherwise gifted artists flagrantly copying for “mere utility.” Students of the Art School should now strive to distinguish themselves as increased global visibility is on the horizon. And as we ponder my discourse this week, filled with other important voices, we keep the Art School and its newly found Champion, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, in mind. Let us see and support the PM’s vision for “…how the school can be further set up to reflect the hopes of the country…” and let us embrace the notion of ‘normal’ duty of ‘every individual, family or generation” as stated earlier by HIM, to drive this new era for the Art School.
Dr. Desta Meghoo is a Jamaican born Creative Consultant, Curator and cultural promoter based in Ethiopia since 2005. She also serves as Liaison to the AU for the Ghana based, Diaspora African Forum.
