Amnesty International Asks Ethiopia to Investigate Suspicious Murders and Human Rights Violations

The suspicious murder of opposition leaders and wide-spread human rights violations against opposition party members over the past few weeks raises questions about Ethiopia’s elections, said Amnesty International as the parliamentary poll results were announced yesterday.

The organization has also expressed concerns about the failure of the Africa Union Elections Observer Mission (AUEOM) and the National Elections Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) to properly monitor and report on allegations of widespread abuses before, during and after the election.

“Amnesty International has received a number of reports concerning the deaths of political opposition figures in suspicious circumstances, as well as of a pattern of human rights violations against political opposition parties throughout the election period. These reports must be investigated and perpetrators brought to justice,” said Michelle Kagari, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director for Eastern, Horn of Africa and the Great Lakes.

“It is unacceptable that these violations barely warranted a mention in reports released by official observers, including the Africa Union Elections Observer Mission and the National Elections Board of Ethiopia.”

In the run-up to the elections, more than 500 members of the Ethiopian Federal Democratic Unity Forum (EFDUF)/ Medrek - a coalition of opposition parties, including the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) were arrested at polling stations in Oromia region. Forty-six people were beaten and injured by security officers while six people sustained gunshot injuries and two were shot and killed. Gidila Chemeda of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC/Medrek) was shot and killed by police in Western Shewa zone, Dima Kege Woreda, Gelam Gunge Kebele of the Oromia region.

On June 15, 2015, the body of 27-year-old Samuel Aweke, a candidate with the Samayawi (Blue) party was found in one of the main streets of Dembre-Markos at around 7 p.m. Blue party officials believe his murder was politically motivated. A few days before his murder, Aweke published an article in his political party’s newspaper Negere Ethiopia criticizing the behavior of local authorities, the police and other security officials. His political party claims he received threats from security officers after the article was published. Witnesses at the scene where his body was found said his body had visible stab wounds and appeared to have been beaten with a blunt object.

A member of the Arena/Medrek political opposition party reported that its leader for Western Tigrai zone, Tadesse Abraha, 48, was accosted while on his way home on June 16, 2015 by three unknown people who attempted to strangle him. Abraha managed to escape, but collapsed and died shortly after reaching his home. According to his political party, Abraha had reported being threatened by local security officials shortly before his death.

On June 19, 2015, another member of Medrek was found dead 24 hours after he was arrested at his home by two police officers. Berhanu Erabu’s battered body was found near a river in Hadiya Zone, Soro Woreda (district) of Southern Ethiopia.

Amnesty International has documented these killings and is now calling on the Ethiopian Ministry of Justice, Federal Police Commission and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission to investigate these apparent targeted killings of opposition political party leaders and ensure those responsible are brought to justice

Background:

Amnesty International sent a letter with preliminary recommendations to the AUEOM on May 21, 2015.

Amnesty International expressed its concerns about the state of human rights in Ethiopia and the impact the human rights context was having on the ability of Ethiopians to participate in the electoral process. The organization urged the AUEOM to monitor and report on human rights violations throughout the election period in its assessment of the conduct of the elections.

The ruling political party, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) has been declared the winner of the elections.

=>amnesty

TPLF’s Sham, Fake and Scandalous Election Results

By Alemu Hurissa*

The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), led by the Tigrayan People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), has stolen democracy, money, votes and liberty from the Oromo people as they had done many times in the previous elections and they have done in the 2015 General Elections. As the Chairman of the Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC), Dr. Merera Gudina said, this “is not an election; it is an organized armed robbery.”

I also asked myself many times: why TPLF leaders, while they know 100% that there is no free and fair election, spend a huge sum of taxpayers’ money to hold fake and sham elections? Why not they give that taxpayers’ money back to the people who look for food at garbage dumps for daily subsistence? Or does their evil behavior not even allow this?!

Many people live by gathering food from garbage dumps while TPLF officials claim an economic growth of 11%

The Oromo people have been the most affected people by TPLF election results because they refuse to accept the fake results, and Oromo mothers have lost many brave and strong children. The Oromo youth refuses to accept the election results, not without reasons, because everything in connection with the electoral process – before, during and after the voting day – has been accompanied by fraud and violence. The Oromo people are thoroughly tired of getting their democracy, their money, their natural resources, their choices and their liberty stolen by a tyrannical government like EPRDF and its satellite party, OPDO.

The dictatorial regime of EPRDF has clearly and openly lied again for the fifth time as if they had carried out a free and fair election in Ethiopia on the 24th of May 2015, but everything that has happened in relation to the 2015 election is opposite to what EPRDF is claiming. This is not something new; it has been carried out many times before in order to use it as a means to beg money from Western countries – the money, which they usually use to crack down on the opposition’s members and supporters as well as to suppress other citizens. The ruling party lies again as if it has won the election in a democratic process while the fact is that it has snatched people’s votes by bullets. Harassment of the opposition’s observers, members and supporters before, during and after the election is evidence that the election has been accompanied by violence. Before, during and after the election, human rights activists, journalists, and the opposition’s members and supporters have been prosecuted. They have been subjected to raids, and they have been deprived of their properties, and eventually, arrested and imprisoned – and even some of them had been killed based on false accusations. They have been harassed, intimidated, imprisoned and killed for legally exercising their freedom of speech, and demanding for a free and fair election. The anti-terrorism law makes this easy. The authorities have used a variety of methods to intimidate activists and silence critics – from using fictional criminal charges to implementing repressive laws and bureaucratic rules in order to suppress the opposition’s members and supporters. Persecuting the opposition’s election observers, members and activists reinforces the impression that the government is prepared to ignore human rights and the opposition’s demand for a free and fair election to achieve its goals. The EPRDF government has severely curtailed Oromo activists’ freedom and freedom of expression, and its harassment and threats directed at civil societies stand as a grotesque contrast with the government’s claims that there is democracy in Ethiopia. TPLF has also continued killing and dismissing Oromo students from universities as a revenge after Oromo students had refused to vote for TPLF’s candidates in the fake and sham election in Ethiopia.

The EPRDF government, led by the minority group called TPLF, has been using coercive means and manipulations of election results to stay in power. Despite the killings of Oromo university students by TPLF security forces and the sufferings of Oromo farmers – who have been evicted from their indigenous land by the EPRDF regime, TPLF says the economy is growing faster than any other country in Africa. If the development that has been claimed by TPLF is sustainable, why is it then BBC’s Lerato Mbel recently reported about the economic status in Ethiopia – putting it in this way on April 16, 2015: “They show an economy growing in near double-digits, but about 40% live below the poverty line.”

In fact, expecting a free and fair election from the TPLF-led government is the same as expecting a hyena to lay an egg. As EU’s Member of Parliament Ana Gomes also concluded about the election in this way: “Ethiopian election cannot be free and fair under current regime,” I would also say that Ethiopia won’t develop and be stable as long as the repressive TPLF regime is in power, and the Western powers continue to support it.

Therefore, the time has come to support the Oromo national movement morally, financially and diplomatically, and to put a concerted and united front with all oppressed peoples to send back this evil group of TPLF to where it has come from before it is too late as TPLF and its partners have not stopped their intimidation, arrests and killings of unarmed Oromo people who have refused to elect them.

Oromia shall be free!

* Alemu Hurissa: ejeru412@hotmail.com

=>gadaa