the campaign; background, Process and Success
Although the campaign seems single-issue centered, i.e. limited to Boycotting Bedele Brewery for sponsoring the immoral and ahistorical concert planned to be staged by artist Tewedros Kassahun (aka Teddy Afro); the underlying idea is much broader and goes deep into the socio-political wrongs done in the past and being rewind in the present. We have witnessed many people, organization and institutions roaring about a personality that has been dead long ago. Although this roaring and the sponsorship of the same group underpinned the campaign and series of integrated activities carried out in the process, the general objective of the campaign is more than just correcting personalities.
The purpose of the campaign was and still is to stop collaborative attempt to historical injustice done against nations, nationalities and peoples of the south by aggressor Emperor Menelik at the end of 19th and early 20th centuries imperial expansion. In order to prevent canonizing and glorifying evil deeds, dancing over the graves of the dead, mocking over the conscience of the alive and adoring the history of pillage, slavery and massacre; the campaign set forth series of activities. The first among these was organizing the activists core that provided leadership to the campaign. The second step was formulating the blue print of the campaign. The third was vigorous articulation of the message of the campaign that comprises hard facts on issue at hand. Further, the campaign set clear goals and devised appropriate strategies and tactics to realize success. Moreover, the campaign focused on gathering accurate information and tangible evidences, on the relevance or importance of the issue, on garnering and galvanizing supporters and allocating time, energy and resource.
I believe that most aforementioned elements and concerted efforts of this particular campaign can be a lesson for many social movements who need to reckon with the past injustice in that country or elsewhere. In line with this, the major phases that Boycott Bedele campaign passed through to realize its specified objective and to attain its goal can be analyzed with the help of various social movement theoretical frameworks. As social movement, the campaign can be discussed relying on the works of two American scholars Charles Tilly and Bill Moyers.
Charles Tilly is a sociologist, political scientist, and historian who described social movements as a series of contentious performances, displays and campaigns by which ordinary people make collective claims on others (1978). He identified three major elements of social movement (1) campaigns, a sustained and organized public effort making collective claims of target bodies; (2) repertoire, employment of combinations from creation of special-purpose associations and coalitions, public meetings, solemn processions, vigils, rallies, demonstrations, petition drives, statements to and in public media, and pamphleteering; and (3) WUNC displays, participants' concerted public representation of worthiness, unity, numbers, and commitments on the part of themselves and/or their constituencies.
There are several types of social movements identified by sociologists. Based on their scope, social movements can be reformative (advocate for changing some norms or laws) or radical (changing value systems in a fundamental way). On the bases of change they aim to bring social movements can be innovative (which aims to introduce or change particular norms and values) or conservative (which aims to preserve existing norms and values). Social movements can also be categorized based on their targets as group-focus (focused on affecting groups or society in general) and individual-focused (focused on affecting individuals). Method of their work divide social movements in to peaceful (use nonviolent means of protest as part of a campaign) or violent (which resort to violence; usually armed). Social movements can also be classified in to global and local based on their rages.
Boycott Bedele campaign is in harmony with these features and forms of social movement that made contentious performances, displayed and campaigned to renounce the sponsoring of Teddy Afro concert which obviously was upholding vocabulary of inhumanity and promote perpetrators. The movement employed effective and efficient method of campaigns, created many special-purpose networks and coalitions, held numerous meetings, dispatched petitions, issued statements in public and social media, and pamphleteering. Boycott Bedele has used at least two of the three elements of social movements successfully in accordance with Charles Tilly’s theory. In this context, Boycott Bedele is a reformative social movement that had aimed at changing the mindset of those who uphold Menelik’s expansionist war as “a holy war”. Moreover, the movement was innovative because it aimed at changing the attitudes and refusal to distance from war of aggression and its inevitable consequences of mass slaughter, large scale pillage and unparalleled human misery. From the outset, Boycott Bedele campaign looks individual focused movement, nevertheless, as evidenced by everyday rhetoric and practices, and more, by action and counter reaction, the campaign was actually about tackling widely held attitude by certain collectives that proudly associate themselves with objectionable historical deeds. In terms of its campaigning method, Boycott Bedele was a peaceful protest and its magnitude was global in nature. Therefore, Boycott Bedele campaign satisfies theoretical framework of social movements; that employed commonly identified social movement methodologies and successfully achieved its specified objective.
Next I will rely on the works of american journalist, public commentator and truth teller, Bill Moyers to discuss the pushing factors, processes and victory of Boycott Bedele Campaign. In his Movement Action Plan (MAP), Moyer argues social movements are not spontaneous events and successful ones follow series of stages. The detailed analysis of Mayor’s successful social movement has eight stages and Boycott Bedele successfully passed through seven of them. For the sake of simplicity, this article condense these stages into five broad phases and discusses the condensed stages one by one; namely, the hidden problem, increasing tensions, take-off, wagging the movement, and success/continuity.
Hidden Blooding Wounds of Oromo
Although Oromo society is having many hidden socio-political problems related to its mathematical majority-political minority position in the country, unrecognized historical injustices make hidden blooding wounds of the Oromo. What Oromo as ethnic group value are all dismantled and dismantling since Minilk`s war of conquest in 19th century. Although Oromo have got an exemplary social and political systems that can be used to solve many African political problem (Legesse, 1973) there are systematic efforts to date to hide them.
The level of insensitivity to this historical injustice in the country made the problem hidden blooding wound among the Oromo. The Oromo irrespective of its diversity recognizes these historical, social and political injustices and the insensitivity of far right wing political groups in the country. But very few individuals and groups of individuals react towards it due to the worst punishment for raising Oromo causes. Oromo lost many of its heroes so far as the result but the lessons drawn from this few individuals and groups kept the momentum of resistance current.
Insensitivity of Ethiopian regimes to Oromo questions drove the historical relationship between the regimes, the movements and the general Oromo public on the road of tension. It is possible to cite cases where authorities of different regimes express their hatred and fear for Oromo, the best example of which is Priemer Akilku Habtewold cited by General Tedesse Biru saying “Oromo is like an ocean, once they moved they will flood you, therefore educationally depriving them will ensure ruling them for another one century” (Zoga 1982).
The reaction of this authorities to oromo causes also kept the momentum of Oromo movement. Moreover, historical organization like Meca and Tullama association, Oromo student movements from time to time are all example of movement resulted from hidden problems. The current memory on Oromo movement goes to Oromo first community engagements and Afan publication. This events shacked the mind of insensitive (Oromo phobiatic) groups and boldly exposed hidden issues and ignited the spirit of building organizations, visioning Orommumaa again and developing strategies for networking among Oromo youth. The hostility of the right wing political group towards this last Oromo movements is also sever and raised the tension between Oromo youth (Qubee generation) and the right wingers.
Increasing Tension
This increasing tension between right wing political groups and Oromo youth led to increasing efforts to raise hidden problems and growing intolerance for issues related to historical injustices. These efforts were reflected through continuous writing of raising and clarifying historical failures of regimes and power holders with regard to Oromo at the same level receiving blatant resistance. It was at this pick time that the far right wingers roared to commemorate 100 death years of King Minlik II. The drama begins by Semayawi Party`s announcement of commemorating the controversial King. The same nostalgia was reflected by religious organizations, social groups and artists in and outside of the country. Although many Oromo and southern people found the act distasteful, the response was very calm and professional. Slowly but clearly and boldly people start to speak out the hidden problems. Church followers start to speak against the act of their church.
The specific event that put the tension high on agenda happen in the first weeks of December, when Teddy Afro, a top musical celebrity gave interview for ‘Enqu’ magazine’s in its special edition dedicated to 100 death years of the king and described Menelik’s unification war as a “holy war”. Many Oromo and none Oromo youth publically denounced this description of the unification war for it lost the memory of historical injustice among many ethnic groups in the country.
The far tensioning news heard on 20th of December, 2013 when Bedele Brewery, the subsidiary of Heineken NV, announced its sponsorship for a yearlong concert “Jorney of Love” of Teddy Afro, who a few years earlier served two years for a hit-and-run crime. A few hours later the social media was saturated by analysis of Teddy`s concert, location, timing and naming. It has been awhile now since Teddy Afro started to use the term “love” in a very controversial way. He said “love win” after he served two years for his criminal act, he called unification and bloody war “holly way ” and now his concert not far from singing loud about controversial personality is “love journey”. As to me it is easy to ignored Teddy as a person who came out with a mentality he was socialized in and discussing the idea of Ethiopian unification and its historical pains at Teddy`s level is very reductionist. The issue goes to many more academics of the right wing and also fits in to the existing ethnic political land escape. The whole idea is in line with the motto “what is nice for me by choice should be nice for you by force”.
The sponsorship happen to be the last act of adding flair to the drama decorated with ethnic tension and speed up take-off among Oromo youth to express their dismay through an organized campaign “Boycott Bedele” on facebook and twitter.
Take-off
Bedele is the only brewery in Ethiopia that sources its market/profit from Oromia; strategically located at the heart of the region. None of the brewery companies in the country even located in Oromia is strategically located in Oromia market as bedele and that add a flair to sponsorship controversy. Using this opportunity the campaigners decided to give a critical choice decision to Bedele (Heineken) to cancel the sponsorship before significantly losing its market.
And it was on this fertile ground that committee was established and discussions started shortly. The next day letters was dispatched to Heineken and Bedele brewery to reconsider sponsoring the concert considering the controversial speeches, songs and acts of the artist, fixing deadline for their response. The campaign was launched after four working days deadline as planned, 26 December, 2013. Flayers, cartoons, slogans, and songs were prepared and people start to denounce bedele`s sponsorship of the concert. Although, the campaign started online it shortly spread to people, organizations, student body, consumers of bedele beer, traders, hotel owners, workers and agents of the bedele and government representatives.
Waging the Movement
After a day or two the campaign won majority opinion and the movement both deepen and broaden. As a strategy to find ways to involve citizens and institutions from a broad perspective to address the problem, other ethnic groups were invited and prepared press release in line with the press releases already distributed to national and international media. Live radio transmissions about the campaign both from Oromia and internationally came out. Although there is no clear information for participation of the government body directly, there are rumors that the growing public opposition puts the problem in the minds of the political representatives at least individually.
The movement continued and aired massively, efforts were in place 24 hours to keep the issue on social media. The campaign attracted the attention of international and national media including Dutch media, VOA, Aljazeera and BBC, Awuramba times, Tigray online and Ethiotube. As other commentators argue the campaign crossed partisan borders and brought the cooperation of pundits and people from different ethnic groups in the country and Sidama, Kafchoo, Walayita and Tigray people were officially supporting boycott bedele and this accord campaign organizers the maximum confidence of reversing the sponsorship.
Oromo artists showed their support and prepared press releases and some arranged songs about the campaign; denouncing the sponsorship of holly war advocator. The concerts in Oromia has been used to strengthen Oromo artist group and further communication opportunities opened.
On Wednesday evening, after six days of intensive campaigning to boycott bedele, the team received informal calls from Bedele brewery that sponsorship of the concert has been reversed. Thursday morning news were published on the official website of Heineken that they canceled the sponsorship of Teddy Afro`s “Journey for Love” concert- disputed love journey suspended and boycott bedele become the first successful social media campaign in the history of Ethiopia.
Celebrating Success and Continuing the Struggle for Social Change
Although many faced a difficult to swallow the success of this movement, recognizing movement’s success and celebrating is ideal stage for the campaigners. Celebration is also one nice stage to draw lessons learnt. It is also one ideal stage for raising larger issues and proposing better alternatives in order to bring true paradigm shift in the country. This can be a point for recognizing the existence of true change people and can led to creating ongoing empowered activists and organizations to achieve other goals. The experience of the campaign can ignite sense of honor and continuing the struggle to achieve a more humane and democratic society in East Africa. This means defending the gains won as well as pursuing new ones. Moyer says the long-term impact of the movement surpasses the achievement of its specific demands and the public will adopt new consensus and status quo, new public beliefs and expectations are carried over to future situations. Therefore, the journey is now building on this success and to return to the first phase to struggle for the next change.
possible retort for the antagonist
Myself and many friends feel the time I spent on this part can be wasted time but wasting time to show that it is wastage is also success. I will still follow the affirmative side of the story and focus on what can be learned from the achievement of this campaign. The campaign has a lot to teach with strong implication for our future. Acknowledging and sharing historical pains is the best and commonest strategy to nurture peace and harmony in a country full of historical injustice. It serves as a reminder to prevent similar occurrence in the future and also speed up reconciliation. Reconciliation emanate from mutual understanding and acknowledgment of past suffering and changing negative attitudes into productive relationships between people. The act of commemorating past historical injustice and mass massacre as “holly” on the other hand is working against peace, harmony and democratization process in a country.
Based on this assumption it is appropriate to denounce mischaracterization of the campaign that aims to end tolerance for commemoration of historical injustice towards humanity. Although it is not uncommon for some Ethiopians, especially those on the far right of the political spectrum (ultra nationalists) to display insensitivity to ethnic pains when it is related to historical injustice, the step they took towards this campaign come closer to madness. They have been struggling to justify historical, social and political injustice towards different ethnics groups under the umbrella of unity; the strategy that served almost 100 years and not any more. The same group has now de-ethnicized itself willingly or systematically for the sake of unity. As anthropologists and sociologists argue de-ethnicization is a serious problem that leads to lose of one basic human identity and lack of belongingness. This group argue that Ethiopia is their first and last identity; the characterization that exposed many to hidden problems over a century. Now, Ethiopian is a national identity that every Ethiopians share with the other 90 million people. The intimacy of relationship between Ethiopian is obviously weak and the intensity of interaction is unimaginable. In this case smaller identity group are important and lack of it may lead to identity crises. The interaction of this self de-ethnicized group with others, especially those who have smaller identity group can be complicated and disturbing and that is already witnessed. My aim here is of course not to picture the danger of self de-ethnicization rather I am trying to use this analogy as the escaping goat and excuse those who were using groundless arguments to mischaracterize the campaign, with amazing success.
At the beginning, not few of the mischaracterizers started their analysis with seemingly balanced statements of manifest and latent results of the campaign. However, it took them very short to conclude that the campaign cannot achieve its objective of reversing the sponsorship of “journey of love” concert. Moreover, they predicted the potential impact the campaign on in-group solidarity (strengthen Oromummaa), and most importantly its potential to transform “Oromo first community engagement” in to a new Oromo political party. I could say this is not bad analysis for someone who don't have sufficient information about the campaign. Of course trying to make sense of what you don't know and what you don't want to understand right is the hardest job you can do and trying to think from what you know, if you can continue to gather information to ratify it is not the worst starting point. The worst comes out of it when you consider your initial points prophesy and that is what the antagonists did.
The campaign aftermath exposed them to the extent that help them to understand their mistakes. It is still possible to think that the campaign took different direction from what antagonist analysts thought but that doesn't mean it is necessarily hijacked or co-opted as they said. The major objective of movements/campaigns like this is after all to put pressure on responsible bodies that can do or undo the target decision. And failing to understand this theoretical position is standing on surely failure ground for assumptions. There could be many reason why the antagonists fail to predict the direction of the current campaign, lack of experience, new techniques used and so forth, the best of this reason for me, is however their poor understanding of what is social movement/campaigns and their targets.
Notwithstanding this lack of understanding they took another worst step of mischaracterization that possible misguide their future understanding of social moves. While learning from this process to inform their next journey is the natural step, they labeled the movement “hijacked” and “co-opted” which means a totally different thing from what happened theoretically. This is the other poor step to defend their prior poor understanding and analysis. Tautologically using another steps of mischaracterization based on groundless arguments serve nothing better than exposing poor analysis from the very outset.
8th February, 2014, Finfinnee
