Dear DMV Oromo People, brothers and sisters and friends of Oromo people who are following the writer and journalist Tesfaye Gebreab situation. as you may all know, the Oromo community ofWashington DC is deeply heart broken by the sad news that is spreading across the social media for the past couple of weeks. It is very sad and heart breaking to know that one of our brother Tesfaye Gebreab has also become a victim of Oromophobia and lost the economic benefits that he should have gotten from his new book, "Ye Gazetangaw Mastawashya." He decided to share his Original copy of the book for free without any economic benefits after putting so many efforts and hard work; just to stick to his principles and to safeguard his moral integrity.
However, We the Qubee generation of Washington DC have managed to Organize a fundraising event at 811 Upshur St Nw, Washington, DC 20011, Oromo center on Friday October 18th 2013 at 7:00pm just to cover some of his losses. They offered him to publish his book excluding Chapter 7, and they agreed to pay him what they estimated around 35,000 to 40, 000 US dollars. However, Tesfaye refused to take the offer when they say he has to remove Chapter 7 of the book because it means bowing down to the immoral demands of the Oromophobians and advocates of practices of censorships. He could have agreed to publish the book without Chapter 7, collected his money and still released free copy of chapter 7 to his readers, but he did not want to do that because as a matter of principle it amounts to agree to the practice of censorship which is one of the oldest and ugliest means of hampering or obstructing the freedom of expression.
They did not want to publish the story because, after all, it is the story of Oromo people, the people they have been oppressing and disrespecting since the creation of Ethiopian State. I do not have words to express my admiration to this writer and journalist. Nevertheless, by now most of you readers have understood that chapter 7 was not written to achieve some kind of grandiose evil intention as some Amharic Speaking Elites wanted to convince us. That story was narrated by one of our brother. That story was real and it really happened to one of Oromo girl named Chaltu Midhaqsa. What Tesfaye did was just write it in readable and presentable Amharic language and nothing more. That is our story. Most probably the most mitigated story because of so many social and political reasons. Where is Tesfaye’s evil intention to create conflicts in their “EmiyeEthiopia” then? Why Tesfaye has to be blamed because he simply writes what lifes look like for our people in their own cities like Horra Finfinee. However, we are not writing this post to question who should be really blamed for what happened, but rather to say thank you to Tesfaye Gebreab for making our voice heard and to Organize a fundraising that will somehow cover his lost benefits. it is mind boggling for someone to write a masterpiece and suddenly his hard work is not rewarding or even pay back the amount of money he has spent writing the book , so it is up us to let him know that his works and contribution to the Oromo society isn't easily forgotten. For those of you who couldn't make it on the listed day fundraising events you can drop by Oromo center at any time between Friday and Saturday and leave your supports with your name on it. Tesfaye made Oromo peoples voice heard, and we as a community have to return the favor...For more info contact Jafar Abafogi
All Oromo form USA, Europe, Australia want to support Tefaye Gebreab.
No comments:
Post a Comment