The Battle of Adwa
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| Emperor Menelik II |
The
Battle of Adwa and the Victory of Adwa Centenary Medal The Battle of Adwa, in
which Ethiopian forces under Emperor Menelik II united to defeat an invading
force of Italian troops, was one of the most significant turning points in the
history of modern Africa. It occurred, in 1896, when the “colonial era” was
well advanced on the African continent, and it served notice that Africa was
not just there “for the taking” by European powers. More than this, it marked
the entry of Ethiopia into the modern community of nations: Menelik’s victory
over the Italians caused the other major European states, and Italy itself, to
recognise Ethiopia as a sovereign, independent state in the context of modern
statecraft. The actual battle which took place on March 1 and 2, 1896, at Adwa,
the principal market town of the North of Ethiopia, had been precipitated by
the great rush of the European powers to colonise Africa. Italy and Germany had
lagged behind other European powers — most notably France and Britain — in
seizing large parcels of the Continent to colonise. Thus, the Conference of
Berlin was convened in 1884-85 to “divide up” the remainder of Africa among the
other European powers, anxious to obtain their own African colonies to satisfy
the urge for imperial expansion and economic gain.
Italy
was “awarded” Ethiopia; all that remained was for Italian troops to take
possession. Significantly, until this time, Ethiopia had been left alone by the
European powers. Its coastal littoral was well-known to traders, but the
heartland in the highlands was peopled by nations notoriously unwilling to
accept and embrace external contact and influence. But the Ethiopian nations
had been known in the past to be fractious and divided, and from all accounts,
Italy’s leaders expected a rapid conquest of the individual national leaders.
Britain had, in 1868, waged a successful war against Emperor Téwodros II
(Theodore), leading to his death. The Italians, however, failed to recognise
that Emperor Menelik II had re-shaped Ethiopia since he came to power in 1889,
uniting its various kings and leaders, and creating in the process a
substantial army, outnumbering and outperforming the invading Italian
professional army of 17,000 to 20,000 men. The modern parallel to the situation
came with the Israeli-Egyptian confrontations of 1967 and 1973. The Israeli
victory in 1967 (the Six-Day War) left Israel complacent and confident in the
superiority of its forces over those of the Egyptians.
Apart
from this, the Israelis had put in place the Bar-Lev Line of fortifications,
which were expected to hold against any conceivable Egyptian attack. But the
Israeli leadership and intelligence services failed to note that the crushing
defeat inflicted on Egypt so quickly in 1967 had brought about a dramatic
transformation in the psyche of the Egyptian leadership. President Anwar
as-Sadat totally transformed the education, training, equipment and doctrine of
the Egyptian Armed Forces, without Soviet help (Soviet advisors had been
expelled in 1972), within six years of the defeat. When Egypt initiated the
October 1973 war, the transformed situation took Israel by complete surprise. Despite
the massive logistical re-supply of Israel by the US — which effectively saved
Israel from complete humiliation — and the recovery of initiative by Israeli
commanders, Egypt achieved its strategic objectives. The Suez Canal was
re-opened, the Sinai returned to Egypt, and peace achieved. That the Battle of
Adwa is still fresh in the minds of Ethiopians became apparent when, on July 5,
1998, Ethiopian volunteers were cheered off to battle against invading Eritrean
forces.
As
a Reuters report noted: “Residents from the city’s [Addis Ababa’s] 265
neighbourhood associations danced and sang songs recalling the Battle of Adwa
where Ethiopia defeated the invading Italian army in 1896.” With even less
intelligence on which to base its actions, Italy could only draw on the British
victory at Magdàla and the commonly held European belief that no African forces
were a match for disciplined and well-equipped European military formations.
But much had happened since Magdàla, and Emperor Téwodros’ defeat. Indeed, the
British victory had even at that time obscured from General Robert Napier and
his officers the sophistication of the system which they had just defeated.
Victory often breeds contempt in the victors against the vanquished; at best it
breeds an unwillingness to learn from the enemy so recently crushed. Apart from
the overall political and social aspects of Ethiopia in 1868, Emperor Téwodros
had based his defence against the British on the Rist-Gult system of
recruitment, military structure and logistical support.
This
logistical structure was entrenched in what was commonly called Mesfint Hagr:
namely, the present day highlands of Eritrea, the region of Tigré, Gonder,
Gojjam, and Wello. The rest of Ethiopia was under a second type of resource
system known as the Geber Madriya system, which formed the basis of the fiscal
and military organisation of Emperor Menelik’s Government. The Rist-Gult system
was used not only at Magdàla, but also against Egypt at Gundet (1875), Gura
(1876), Italy at Dogali (1887), and against the Mahdist Sudan at Metemma
(1889). [It was in this battle, at Metemma, that Emperor Yohannes IV had died.]
The Battle of Adwa was based mostly on the Geber Madriya system. Ethiopian
historian Tsegaye Tegenu noted that in all of these large battles, the
background composition of the troops were similar. “All were drawn from the
various ethnic groups and constituted the class of military nobility, regional
aristocracy and peasantry.
However,
there was a difference in the manner of administration and the use of human and
material resources [at Adwa]. The troops of Adwa were recruited basically
through the Geber Madriya system, which had qualitatively different methods of
remuneration, revenue administration and provisioning, which was in harmony
with the form of economy.” One of the major failings of the Italian planners of
Savoyard Italy was that they failed to notice the fundamental change in
Ethiopia under Menelik. Emperor Menelik II had transformed the administration
of the economy and had greatly improved the tax base of the country. This in
turn improved dramatically his capability to raise armies and to equip them.
The complex tax base meant that the battles fought during the era of the
Rist-Gult system were precariously-managed affairs. As Tsegaye Tegenu noted:
“It is not difficult to see the desperate effort of the kings to overcome the
fiscal limits of the system to fight against external aggression.” And Menelik
managed this transformation to a new economic base in such a way as to prepare
Ethiopia for the most decisive battle. Emperor Menelik took immediate steps
upon hearing of Italy’s plans to annexe Ethiopia.
He
called, on September 17, 1895, for national mobilisation, and within two months
more than 100,000 troops were assembled in the specified areas: Addis Ababa,
Were Illu, Ashenge, and Mekele. About two-thirds of these troops were raised
through the Geber Madriya system. The Emperor himself mobilised some 35,000
troops, commanded by his court officials. His Queen — Empress Taitu — also
mobilised her own force of some 6,000 men. The Imperial Army also included
troops raised by governors-general, such as Ras Makonnen (the father of Ras
Tafari Makonnen, later Emperor Haile Selassie I) who commanded some 12,000
troops. Dejazmatch Tesema commanded some 5,000 soldiers; Ras Welde Giorgis
about 5,000; Ras Bitwoded Mengesha Atakim, about 6,000; and so on. Troops of
the regional princes numbered about 35,000, and of these, Ras Mengesha of Tigré
commanded about 8,000; King (Negus) Tekle Haimanot of Gojjam about 6,000; Ras
Welle of Begémder another 6,000; Wagshum Guangul of Wag a further 5,000. In
all, Menelik (shown at left) was able to mobilise some 70,000 to 100,000 modern
rifles for Adwa.
By
1895, he had obtained at least 5,000,000 cartridges. He had spent more than
$1-million (in 1895 currency), a sum which would have been unthinkable to
Emperor Téwodros, or even Emperor Yohannes IV. And this sum did not even
include the artillery which Emperor Menelik had secured. This component of the
force — the Corps of Gunpowder and Shell — was commanded by a Bejirond: a
treasurer in charge of finance and the storehouse of the Palace, and by the Lij
Mekuas, who was also commander of the Royal cavalry. The logistical tail of the
Adwa campaign, from the Ethiopian side, was no less impressive than the
logistical effort put forth to carry and support the invading force of some
17,000 Italian troops from Europe, supplemented by local recruits. Italy had
already occupied the highlands of Eritrea, and therefore was well-placed with
forward support for the battle. Moreover, it was aware of the problems which
had been challenging Ethiopia and Menelik. Famine and internecine squabbling
were preoccupying the country, and Menelik was initially unable to mobilise
forces to resist Italy’s occupation of Eritrea and its expansion into the
hinterland.
An
emboldened Italy pushed further into Ethiopia, crossing the Mereb River and
chasing out Ras Mengesha, the ruler of Tigré; full control of the region seemed
at hand, and Italian forces settled in for a permanent occupation. Italian
General Baraterie, commander of the occupation force and governor of the
Eritrean colony, sought and obtained an additional budget of four-million lira
and 10,000 more trained troops. But Gen. Baraterie seemed unaware of Menelik’s
main strategic imperative, which was to wait for the opportunity to confront —
with infantry and artillery — the main Italian force and its supplies, rather
than engage in piecemeal battles at the enemy’s choosing. To this end, Menelik
focused his efforts on building a large coalition force, capable of the
mission. This entailed a process of diplomacy with the regional princes and
rulers, not only to secure the participation of their individual armies, but
also to be able to access their logistical support base. The strategy and
tactics employed by Menelik were not only due to the Emperor’s diplomatic and
military skills, but also to the unique doctrines developed by Ethiopia
literally over several millennia.
These
doctrines were also created in virtual isolation from the military lessons
learned by the rest of the world, and reflected Ethiopia’s own history and
topography. In this sense, then, the Ethiopian forces under Menelik did not
conform to the expectations of the Italians. As a result, the Battle of Adwa
was to become a significant case study for military schools for the next
century, and almost certainly well into the future. It would not be fair to say
that the Italians had failed to study Ethiopian military history. But by basing
their perspectives on the very different strategies of the Rist-Gult system
used by Téwodros and Yohannes, they could not comprehend the vastly superior
mobilisation capabilities of Menelik’s Geber Madriya system. Thus, when the
Italians expected to meet a force of about 30,000 Ethiopians, they met instead
some 100,000. Having said that, the Geber Madriya system was based on a form of
recompense to the soldiers which involved grants of land and the payment of
food, drink and honey, etc., to the soldiers from tenants working the land.
In
other words, it was a non-monetarised system which provided for the welfare of
the troops. As a result, it was not a system which could be projected far
beyond the supporting geography. The Battle of Adwa came in such a way that —
because Emperor Menelik had lured the Italian main force into his own territory
— it fitted perfectly the criteria of the Geber Madriya system. But Menelik,
after the stupendous victory at Adwa, could not use the same structure to
pursue the Italians into Eritrea and throw them entirely into the Red Sea. The result
was that, although Ethiopia was, as an Empire, saved by the Battle of Adwa, the
Italians remained lodged on the periphery. More importantly, the concept of
seizing Ethiopia remained in the Italian psyche, so that when fascist Italy
once more dreamed of empire in the 1930s, it again embarked upon an attempt to
conquer Ethiopia. And, in that campaign, even though they met with initial
success, it was once again an overreaching of Italian resources and Italy was
thrown not only out of the Ethiopian heartland but also out of Eritrea. Thus,
less than 50 years after Adwa, Eritrea, too, was restored to Ethiopia.
TIMKAT 2011
Posted By Meosha Eaton
Timkat (which means "baptism" in Amharic) is the most important festival in the Ethiopian calendar.
It is the Ethiopian Orthodox celebration of Epiphany celebrated on January 19 (or 20 on Leap Year), corresponding to the 10th day of Terr following the Ethiopian calendar. Timket celebrates the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. This festival is best known for its ritual reenactment of baptism (similar to such reenactments performed by numerous Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land when they visit the Jordan).
During the ceremonies of Timkat, the Tabot, a model of the Ark of the Covenant, which is present on every Ethiopian altar (somewhat like the Western altar stone), is reverently wrapped in rich cloth and born in procession on the head of the priest. The Tabot, which is otherwise rarely seen by the laity, represents the manifestation of Jesus as the Messiah when he came to the Jordan for baptism. The Divine Liturgy is celebrated near a stream or pool early in the morning (around 2 a.m.). Then the nearby body of water is blessed towards dawn and sprinkled on the participants, some of whom enter the water and immerse themselves, symbolically renewing their baptismal vows.
It is the Ethiopian Orthodox celebration of Epiphany celebrated on January 19 (or 20 on Leap Year), corresponding to the 10th day of Terr following the Ethiopian calendar. Timket celebrates the Baptism of Jesus in the Jordan River. This festival is best known for its ritual reenactment of baptism (similar to such reenactments performed by numerous Christian pilgrims to the Holy Land when they visit the Jordan).
During the ceremonies of Timkat, the Tabot, a model of the Ark of the Covenant, which is present on every Ethiopian altar (somewhat like the Western altar stone), is reverently wrapped in rich cloth and born in procession on the head of the priest. The Tabot, which is otherwise rarely seen by the laity, represents the manifestation of Jesus as the Messiah when he came to the Jordan for baptism. The Divine Liturgy is celebrated near a stream or pool early in the morning (around 2 a.m.). Then the nearby body of water is blessed towards dawn and sprinkled on the participants, some of whom enter the water and immerse themselves, symbolically renewing their baptismal vows.
Responsibility for a healthy market
Reported by Wahde Belay
Prime Minister Meles and other senior government officials held a meeting with hundreds of the business community. The meeting was to discuss implementation of newly launched trade regulations and to introduce a commodities price index.
The government believes that recent commodity price rises have not been related to any economic factors, and that there is no economic explanation for these price increases. It believes the increases were mainly the result of a lack of transparency in business activities, unscrupulous speculators, an inefficient regulatory system and a distorted picture of the free market system held by some in the business community.
The government, therefore, took the step of introducing regulations to control the basic consumer products traded across the nation. These short term measures were in effect taken to curb the increasing inflation that the nation has been experiencing recently in the price of food and other basic commodities. The increases have in effect been the result of man-made activity and have had no economic justification.
Prosperity and rapid growth have long been the priorities on the agenda of the government in order to reduce poverty and improve people's livelihood. This is why the government has put in place a whole series of different development plans and strategies aimed at realizing the country's desired development goals. Indeed, the government has clearly demonstrated its commitment to transforming the economy and achieving its development objectives through creating an enabling institutional environment. Its reform programs have been largely aimed at creating a legal, institutional and conducive policy environment to enhance private sector development in the economy.
This is why the government has introduced a free market economy over the last twenty years, releasing the private sector from the constraints of the previous military regime, and providing considerable contributions to the country's development. These policy measures, augmented by various additional monetary and fiscal policies, have produced encouraging dividends: the national economy has, of course, registered double digit growth rates over some seven years. Equally, registering rapid economic growth doesn't come about without challenge.
Ethiopia has, of course, been affected by inflationary pressures. As prices of basic food items and other commodities have been steadily increasing without any sign of abatement, consumers have become alarmed. The price rises have been putting enormous pressure on communities, especially on the poor and those with fixed or minimal sources of income. Consumers have been expressing concern over soaring prices; the government has now taken measures to stabilize prices of basic food items and commodities in the market.
The government has now taken the necessary steps to fix the prices of a number of essential commodities to contain inflation. It believes that the continuation of an unregulated free market will cause public suffering, and be an obstacle to the achievement of the new five year national Growth and Transformation Plan, intended to bring about radical change in improving socio-economic developments and eradicating poverty. Equally, the government is also aware that it is neither possible nor desirable to ensure development or conduct economic diplomacy in an effective manner without the active participation of the private sector. This does after all represent a major segment of the economy.
In the context of the growing importance of trade as an engine of economic growth in particular, the promotion of private sector interests are vital to the promotion of the national interest. This is why the government held its consultative meeting with the business community, aiming to create a common understanding of the problems, and to encourage the establishment of a healthy trade and free market system.
The government fully recognizes the important role the business community can play in the country's development programs. It has given a lot of consideration to the concerns of the private sector in its various policy measures and during the meetings that have taken place with higher government officials. Now it is time for the business community, for importers, wholesalers, distributors and retailers, to show their sense of duty and their responsibility, to respond positively to the government's call, and join hands to implement a healthy, fair and balanced market system throughout the country.
Expired food sickens 100 in S.Africa squatter camp
By THANDISIZWE MGUDLWA
Associated Press
CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) - The cookies, candies, jams and juice were destined for a dump when Themba Mgodla took them as payment for loading a truck. Only some of the goods he planned to sell in his squatter camp turned out to be a decade old, sickening more than 100 people.
"We only saw that the food was spoiled hours later, when people came to us and said their children were sick," said Mgodla, who was among those treated for food poisoning over the weekend.
Desperate for work, Mgodla said he had gone to a factory food shop seeking employment. A driver there was supposed to take the food items to a dump, but offered to let Mgodla have the load in exchange for helping put it on a truck.
He planned to sell the food, not knowing that some of the expiration dates went as far back as 2000. Once he got to his squatter camp, some of his hungry neighbors snatched goods from him.
Wilfred Solomons-Johannes of the city's emergency response department said all those sickened had recovered by Monday. Authorities are trying to determine how to proceed with charges under the city's health regulations, Solomons-Johannes said.
Polile Park, where the food poisoning struck, is near one of Cape Town's most popular beaches. Upscale houses are nearby, but the 1,000 or so squatter camp residents live in zinc-roofed shacks without electricity, and rely on communal water supplies and toilets.
Zithobile Maqamunca, a community leader in the camp, said he was working with police and city officials to collect the tainted food Monday. But poverty was making that difficult, he said.
"Some of the people don't want to give it up."
(Copyright 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)
Buzz up!
Ethiopian Jews Seek Refuge in Israel
By Aaron Maasho
Reuters - In a run-down synagogue built from corrugated iron sheets in the north east of the Ethiopian capital, preacher Wagaw Moges addresses a crowd of dozens gathered for weekday prayers. The participants are all members of a 2,000-strong community in Addis Ababa who claim Jewish lineage, but their very origins are doubted by authorities in Israel who believe they are imposters seeking entry under the guise of religion. "Be strong my colleagues, there will be a lot of discomfort," Wagaw tells his audience, some of whom wore skullcaps while others brandished photographs of family members they say live in Israel. "We're ready to die until we get an answer," he says, hoping that a "long hunger strike" would draw attention to their poor living conditions and pave the way for "aliyah", the right to return to the Promised Land.
Over 100,000 Ethiopian Jews already live in Israel and Jerusalem recently granted entry to 7,800 Falash Mura more from only the northern town of Gonder, where many Ethiopian Jews originate from. The Falash Mura see themselves as Jews, and say they were forced to convert to Christianity in Ethiopia and Israel has not accepted that all of them are Jewish.
Those in the Ethiopian capital say they were unfairly left out, dashing their hopes of reuniting with family members.
"All we want is to reunite with our families. Both my father and mother are in Israel along with my two sisters," said Fikirte Delele, a 33-year-old mother of two. The group says its members moved from Gonder in the mid-1990s hoping to fast-track their aliyah after Israel resettled thousands of Ethiopian Jews in the 1980s. But the dream of quick resettlement soon turned faded, and the new arrivals -- mostly poor farmers and manual laborers -- soon found themselves struggling to survive in Addis Ababa having sold all their meager belongings in rural Ethiopia.
ISRAEL SCEPTICAL
Israeli officials, long skeptical about whether all Falash Mura are actually Jewish, have confirmed that those Falash Mura in Addis Ababa will not be part of the 7,800.
"Last month, the government of Israel decided to bring the last group of Falash Mura waiting in Gonder," Alon Unfus-Asif, spokesman at the Israeli embassy in Addis Ababa, told Reuters.
"This decision aims to be the last chapter of organized immigration from Ethiopia to Israel," Alon said. Israel grants automatic citizenship to Jews who immigrate. Most Falash Mura must undergo a conversion ritual before receiving citizenship papers.
Since the 1990s, Ethiopia's tiny Jewish community has been supported by a handful of Western-based advocacy groups, mainly by providing Jewish education, organizing religious services, and food projects, but finances for some of them are running dry. "We came to Addis after our parents, siblings, uncles, aunts and others left for Israel. We are suffering a lot as we have no one here to help us," Sisay Berhan, head of the Association of Ethiopian Jews in Addis Ababa, said.
Today, the Ethiopian community in Israel has grown to more than 100,000. The Jewish state airlifted its first Ethiopian Jews in the 1980s and 1990s following a rabbinical creed that ruled they were descendents of the biblical Dan tribe.
ISOLATED GROUP
The Falash Mura has been an isolated group ever since they emerged in the region in pre-Christian times. Ancient records showed they were barred from owning land and hardly ever married outside the community. In modern times the legal constraints disappeared, but the separation persisted. Even after they go to Israel however, the Falash Mura often face difficulties, including enrolling their children in schools. Others take long to fit into the Israeli society.
On Aug. 30 last year, three private ultra-Orthodox institutions refused to admit Ethiopian students saying they needed to raise their academic standards, drawing the ire of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But members of the Falash Mura would rather settle in Israel at all costs, to flee life on the margins of Ethiopian society, and plan a string of measures to highlight their plight, including demonstrations in the capital.
"We have already been here for 13 or 14 years, and we will continue to make voices and fight until we are listened to. We want to go home," said unemployed 30-year-old Sintayehu Sidistu.
30 African Countries to Hold Elections in 2011
By Williams Ekanem
At least thirty elections are taking place on the African continent this year.
My Africa Channel Television findings show that of all of them the ones that are generating global are those of Nigeria and Zimbabwe. Investigations show that the elections in Nigeria are of great interest to all and sundry because it constitutes the single most significant event in the country this year and rightly so. There are many reasons why this is the case. First, there is the recognition that past elections, except that of 1993, have been woeful and did not represent the wishes of the Nigerian people, simply put, the elections were not free and fair. Second, there is the recognition that leadership is a critical issue in Nigeria. Because of the lack of genuine and progressive leadership, all forms of progress a modern country should make are stalled. It is expected that free and fair elections in April would propel the country, the most populous black nation on earth towards a measure of progress.
In addition, the insistence of Robert Mugabe to again stand for reelections after decades in power and growing call for him to step aside makes the forth coming elections in Zimbabwe very interesting to observers. This is largely because Zimbabwe faces renewed political and economic turmoil as President Robert Mugabe is pushing for reelection in polls next year and has threatened to kick out Western firms. The veteran leader, who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980, was over the weekend endorsed by his Zimbabwe’s African National Union-Patriotic Front ( ZANU-PF) party to contest a likely fierce election battle against the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Mugabe who at 86 is Africa's oldest leader, and could stay in power until well into his nineties if he wins another presidential term, is expected to face MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, the current prime minister and his long-time foe, in a presidential vote, after he said an almost two-year power-sharing arrangement between their parties would end in February.
Nonetheless, analysts say Mugabe's quest for polls and bombastic, hard-faced rhetoric that he could nationalize British and American company’s risks unraveling progress made since 2009 that saw hyperinflation ended and a sense of normality return. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama is reported to be quietly but strategically stepping up his outreach to Africa, using this year to increase his engagement with a continent that is personally meaningful to him and important to U.S. interests. The White House says Obama will travel to Africa again and the political calendar means the trip will almost certainly happen this year, before Obama has to spend more time on his re-election bid. No decision has been made on which countries Obama will visit, but deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said the stops will reflect positive democratic models.
Expectations in Africa spiked after the election of an American president with a Kenyan father. But midway through his term, Obama's agenda for Africa has taken a backseat to other foreign policy goals, such as winding down the Iraq war, fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and resetting relations with Russia. White House officials believe the postelection standoff in Ivory Coast could be the model for Obama's stepped-up engagement in Africa.
Obama aides believe those issues are now on more solid footing, allowing the president to expand his international agenda. He will focus in Africa on good governance and supporting nations with strong democratic institutions.
Obama delivered that message on his only trip to Africa since taking office, an overnight stop in Ghana in 2009, where he was mobbed by cheering crowds. In a blunt speech before the Ghanaian parliament, Obama said democracy is the key to Africa's long-term development.
"That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long," Obama said. "That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans." The White House can send that message right now as it deals with the disputed election in Ivory Coast and an upcoming independence referendum in Sudan, which could split Africa's largest country in two.
Rhodes said the president has invested significant "diplomatic capital" on Sudan, mentioning the referendum in nearly all of his conversations with the presidents of Russia and China, two countries which could wield influence over that of Sudan's government. When Obama stopped in at a White House meeting last month of his national security advisers and United Nations ambassadors, the first topic he broached was Sudan, not Iran or North Korea. And as lawmakers on Capitol Hill neared the December vote on a new nuclear treaty with Russia, Obama called southern Sudan leader Salva Kiir by telephone to offer support for the referendum.
The president tried to call incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo twice last month, from Air Force One as Obama returned from Afghanistan and then a week later.
Neither call reached Gbagbo; administration officials believe the Ivorian leader sought to avoid contact. So Obama wrote Gbagbo a letter, offering him an international role if he stopped clinging to power and stepped down. But Obama also made clear that the longer Gbagbo holds on, and the more complicit he becomes in violence across the country, the more limited his options become, said a senior administration official.
SUDAN-REFERENDUM/FACTBOX
Ethiopian Jews Seek Refuge in Israel
By Aaron Maasho
Reuters - In a run-down synagogue built from corrugated iron sheets in the north east of the Ethiopian capital, preacher Wagaw Moges addresses a crowd of dozens gathered for weekday prayers. The participants are all members of a 2,000-strong community in Addis Ababa who claim Jewish lineage, but their very origins are doubted by authorities in Israel who believe they are imposters seeking entry under the guise of religion. "Be strong my colleagues, there will be a lot of discomfort," Wagaw tells his audience, some of whom wore skullcaps while others brandished photographs of family members they say live in Israel. "We're ready to die until we get an answer," he says, hoping that a "long hunger strike" would draw attention to their poor living conditions and pave the way for "aliyah", the right to return to the Promised Land.
Over 100,000 Ethiopian Jews already live in Israel and Jerusalem recently granted entry to 7,800 Falash Mura more from only the northern town of Gonder, where many Ethiopian Jews originate from. The Falash Mura see themselves as Jews, and say they were forced to convert to Christianity in Ethiopia and Israel has not accepted that all of them are Jewish.
Those in the Ethiopian capital say they were unfairly left out, dashing their hopes of reuniting with family members.
"All we want is to reunite with our families. Both my father and mother are in Israel along with my two sisters," said Fikirte Delele, a 33-year-old mother of two. The group says its members moved from Gonder in the mid-1990s hoping to fast-track their aliyah after Israel resettled thousands of Ethiopian Jews in the 1980s. But the dream of quick resettlement soon turned faded, and the new arrivals -- mostly poor farmers and manual laborers -- soon found themselves struggling to survive in Addis Ababa having sold all their meager belongings in rural Ethiopia.
ISRAEL SCEPTICAL
Israeli officials, long skeptical about whether all Falash Mura are actually Jewish, have confirmed that those Falash Mura in Addis Ababa will not be part of the 7,800.
"Last month, the government of Israel decided to bring the last group of Falash Mura waiting in Gonder," Alon Unfus-Asif, spokesman at the Israeli embassy in Addis Ababa, told Reuters.
"This decision aims to be the last chapter of organized immigration from Ethiopia to Israel," Alon said. Israel grants automatic citizenship to Jews who immigrate. Most Falash Mura must undergo a conversion ritual before receiving citizenship papers.
Since the 1990s, Ethiopia's tiny Jewish community has been supported by a handful of Western-based advocacy groups, mainly by providing Jewish education, organizing religious services, and food projects, but finances for some of them are running dry. "We came to Addis after our parents, siblings, uncles, aunts and others left for Israel. We are suffering a lot as we have no one here to help us," Sisay Berhan, head of the Association of Ethiopian Jews in Addis Ababa, said.
Today, the Ethiopian community in Israel has grown to more than 100,000. The Jewish state airlifted its first Ethiopian Jews in the 1980s and 1990s following a rabbinical creed that ruled they were descendents of the biblical Dan tribe.
ISOLATED GROUP
The Falash Mura has been an isolated group ever since they emerged in the region in pre-Christian times. Ancient records showed they were barred from owning land and hardly ever married outside the community. In modern times the legal constraints disappeared, but the separation persisted. Even after they go to Israel however, the Falash Mura often face difficulties, including enrolling their children in schools. Others take long to fit into the Israeli society.
On Aug. 30 last year, three private ultra-Orthodox institutions refused to admit Ethiopian students saying they needed to raise their academic standards, drawing the ire of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But members of the Falash Mura would rather settle in Israel at all costs, to flee life on the margins of Ethiopian society, and plan a string of measures to highlight their plight, including demonstrations in the capital.
"We have already been here for 13 or 14 years, and we will continue to make voices and fight until we are listened to. We want to go home," said unemployed 30-year-old Sintayehu Sidistu.
30 African Countries to Hold Elections in 2011
By Williams Ekanem
At least thirty elections are taking place on the African continent this year.
My Africa Channel Television findings show that of all of them the ones that are generating global are those of Nigeria and Zimbabwe. Investigations show that the elections in Nigeria are of great interest to all and sundry because it constitutes the single most significant event in the country this year and rightly so. There are many reasons why this is the case. First, there is the recognition that past elections, except that of 1993, have been woeful and did not represent the wishes of the Nigerian people, simply put, the elections were not free and fair. Second, there is the recognition that leadership is a critical issue in Nigeria. Because of the lack of genuine and progressive leadership, all forms of progress a modern country should make are stalled. It is expected that free and fair elections in April would propel the country, the most populous black nation on earth towards a measure of progress.
In addition, the insistence of Robert Mugabe to again stand for reelections after decades in power and growing call for him to step aside makes the forth coming elections in Zimbabwe very interesting to observers. This is largely because Zimbabwe faces renewed political and economic turmoil as President Robert Mugabe is pushing for reelection in polls next year and has threatened to kick out Western firms. The veteran leader, who has been in power since independence from Britain in 1980, was over the weekend endorsed by his Zimbabwe’s African National Union-Patriotic Front ( ZANU-PF) party to contest a likely fierce election battle against the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Mugabe who at 86 is Africa's oldest leader, and could stay in power until well into his nineties if he wins another presidential term, is expected to face MDC leader Morgan Tsvangirai, the current prime minister and his long-time foe, in a presidential vote, after he said an almost two-year power-sharing arrangement between their parties would end in February.
Nonetheless, analysts say Mugabe's quest for polls and bombastic, hard-faced rhetoric that he could nationalize British and American company’s risks unraveling progress made since 2009 that saw hyperinflation ended and a sense of normality return. Meanwhile, President Barack Obama is reported to be quietly but strategically stepping up his outreach to Africa, using this year to increase his engagement with a continent that is personally meaningful to him and important to U.S. interests. The White House says Obama will travel to Africa again and the political calendar means the trip will almost certainly happen this year, before Obama has to spend more time on his re-election bid. No decision has been made on which countries Obama will visit, but deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes said the stops will reflect positive democratic models.
Expectations in Africa spiked after the election of an American president with a Kenyan father. But midway through his term, Obama's agenda for Africa has taken a backseat to other foreign policy goals, such as winding down the Iraq war, fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan and resetting relations with Russia. White House officials believe the postelection standoff in Ivory Coast could be the model for Obama's stepped-up engagement in Africa.
Obama aides believe those issues are now on more solid footing, allowing the president to expand his international agenda. He will focus in Africa on good governance and supporting nations with strong democratic institutions.
Obama delivered that message on his only trip to Africa since taking office, an overnight stop in Ghana in 2009, where he was mobbed by cheering crowds. In a blunt speech before the Ghanaian parliament, Obama said democracy is the key to Africa's long-term development.
"That is the ingredient which has been missing in far too many places, for far too long," Obama said. "That is the change that can unlock Africa's potential. And that is a responsibility that can only be met by Africans." The White House can send that message right now as it deals with the disputed election in Ivory Coast and an upcoming independence referendum in Sudan, which could split Africa's largest country in two.
Rhodes said the president has invested significant "diplomatic capital" on Sudan, mentioning the referendum in nearly all of his conversations with the presidents of Russia and China, two countries which could wield influence over that of Sudan's government. When Obama stopped in at a White House meeting last month of his national security advisers and United Nations ambassadors, the first topic he broached was Sudan, not Iran or North Korea. And as lawmakers on Capitol Hill neared the December vote on a new nuclear treaty with Russia, Obama called southern Sudan leader Salva Kiir by telephone to offer support for the referendum.
The president tried to call incumbent President Laurent Gbagbo twice last month, from Air Force One as Obama returned from Afghanistan and then a week later.
Neither call reached Gbagbo; administration officials believe the Ivorian leader sought to avoid contact. So Obama wrote Gbagbo a letter, offering him an international role if he stopped clinging to power and stepped down. But Obama also made clear that the longer Gbagbo holds on, and the more complicit he becomes in violence across the country, the more limited his options become, said a senior administration official.
SUDAN-REFERENDUM/FACTBOX
Source News Feed: Reuters World Service
Jan 9 (Reuters) - Millions of southern Sudanese begin voting on Sunday in a referendum on whether Africa's largest country will split in two. Here are some facts about the vote.
WHY A REFERENDUM?
Sudan's north-south civil war was Africa's longest-running civil conflict, flaring in 1955. A 2005 peace deal ended the latest phase and promised southerners self-determination through a referendum on independence from the north.
Since then, the northern ruling National Congress Party and the former southern rebel Sudan People's Liberation Movement (SPLM) have bickered over implementing almost every detail of the 2005 accord and mutual distrust has deepened. Few believe a majority of southerners will vote for unity.
Many southerners believe they are ethnically or religiously distinct from the mostly Arab and Muslim north, and a history of war and slave trading has haunted north-south relations since before independence. Southerners say an economic boom and development has been concentrated in the hands of the northern tribes surrounding Khartoum, while they have been neglected.
WHO CAN VOTE?
According to the referendum commission, anyone who has a parent or ancestor from a southern tribe indigenous to the south can vote. Also anyone who has been permanently resident, or whose parents or grandparents have been in the south since independence on Jan. 1, 1956, can vote.
Southerners whose families left before independence must return south to register and vote. Southerners in the north of Sudan and in Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Australia, Britain, the United States, Canada and Egypt can also vote. However, the vague guidelines and decades of inter-marriage and movement of tribes means it may be difficult to verify who is a southerner.
Almost 4 million southerners have registered to vote inside and outside Sudan, organisers said, about 75 percent of those eligible.
HOW WILL IT WORK?
The referendum law states that of those registered, 60 percent need to turn out for the vote to be valid. About 10,800 staff will work in almost 3,000 referendum centres and more than 14,000 police will secure the process in the south. The north has deployed 17,500 police. Voting is due to begin on Jan. 9 and last one week. The 10,000-strong United Nations peacekeeping force in Sudan, separate from a much bigger U.N.-African Union force in the Darfur region, will also help to maintain security. Some 3,000 observers have been accredited to monitor the process in the north and south.
TIMING
The referendum law should have been passed three years ago and the commission formed immediately after, but commission members took their oath in July 2010, giving them just six months to arrange the vote.
The commission, helped by the international community, has managed to arrange the vote on time in the face of mounting logistical obstacles. However, the schedule laid out by the Referendum Law has been forsaken, leaving the vote vulnerable to legal challenges. Parliament has yet to amend the law. The result should be announced by Feb. 15, 2011, although preliminary results for the south -- the majority of voters -- will be announced on Jan. 31.
VIOLENCE
The disputed oil-producing Abyei region is supposed to hold a simultaneous plebiscite on whether to join the south or the north. But deep north-south divisions over who will vote and who will plan it mean this referendum may not happen at all.
Most analysts believe Abyei, the site of north-south clashes since 2005, could provoke a more general war if left to fester.
Other areas could include oil fields close to the still disputed border such as Heglig and Unity. Border states Southern Kordofan and Blue Nile could also be flashpoints of violence and both north and south armies have traded accusations of troop build ups along the unmarked border.
WHY IS IT IMPORTANT?
Many African nations favour Sudan's unity because they fear the split could fuel secessionist tensions in their own countries. Sudan also marks the continent's Arab north-African and black sub-Saharan divide. Many will see a split as a wider failure to overcome those differences.
Some worry secession could lead to demands for autonomy in Sudan's other regions, including Darfur or the east which have also rebelled against Khartoum, and the country could disintegrate. Others fear if southerners are not given the chance to vote on whether to rule themselves, the north-south civil war, which destabilised much of east Africa, could reignite. (Reporting by Opheera McDoom; Editing by Janet Lawrence)
