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Already we have fallen under its dominion! The
Ethiopian Millennium should serve as a powerful
magnet on us, reaching down into the end of a
century and intensifying the decade.
It is amplifying emotions, accelerating change,
heightening awareness and compelling us to
re-examine ourselves, our values and our
institutions. Launching new approaches based on a
desire to increase understanding and respect and
diminish backwardness, ignorance and
misunderstanding within and between our diverse
cultures and traditions through communications and
future oriented thinking.
We are preparing to celebrate the Ethiopian
Millennium as a period of love, peace and hope, and
by promoting our unity in diversity. In the new
Millennium we should create an urge among our
children and the general public to recognise the
importance of peace by innovating new thinking
patterns suitable to each segment of the society
based on their needs and desires.
Using action orientated methods, we shall be
establishing platforms of communications and
understandings which would expand our knowledge of
each other's needs and respond to each other the
hopes and dreams we have for a future.
The ultimate aim of the Millennium celebration is to
positively engage people to love peace and justice,
esteem the value of individuals, respect labour,
have a deep sense of citizen responsibility and be
imbued with an independent spirit as builders of a
peaceful and highly developed society which would
contribute towards a culture of peace and harmony of
our beloved Ethiopia.
This century should be a century for an Ethiopian
renaissance!
When we talk of the Ethiopian renaissance, there are
those who doubt us. But how can we build the path to
a better life without some form of a dream, and
without some form of a vision?
It is those dreams that ignite a little spark within
us towards longing, and creativity, which opens the
whole universe as a theatre where nothing is
impossible. I believe the Ethiopian Millennium
celebration is one big spark, which springs from our
common aspiration as citizens for everything that is
good and life enhancing.
The ever-eroding image of our country has to be
restored, the degrading environment has to be
recovered and the trust for knowledge of our wider
population has to be quenched. We also need to
support our people in their quest for better health,
education and a suitable environment.
An integral element of our Millennium celebration is
that we should feel the greater need, now more than
before; to educate ourselves and the world about
what amalgam of historical events has given birth to
our collective Ethiopian experience.
It is only by understanding this that we can be
forewarned and forearmed for the challenges that lie
ahead in our effort to construct a better Ethiopia.
Only this experience can prepare us to be a country
of great artists, scientists, inventors,
philosophers, statesmen and women who can inspire
others and help solve problems besetting our nation,
our continent and by extension our world.
I have observed during my lifetime that it is
difficult to hold us Ethiopians together - or any
human group for that matter - for long if there is
no vision, an ideal, an objective or a dream.
To bind us as a big family together, foster our
further ascent, take us out of abject poverty,
disease and recurrent drought, to prevent us from
losing ground and falling into the abyss of despair,
we must have a constant and collective vision, a
dream as a nation. We will not swim forever in the
present sea of complexity if we are not shown a
shore.
The Ethiopian Millennium should thus serve us both
as a milestone and a threshold.
As a milestone, the new Millennium offers us a
unique opportunity to measure the road we covered
over the past millennia. It also offers us a chance
to take stock of how far we have come as a nation
and reflect on where we must go to achieve a lasting
peace and prosperity - a more developed and peaceful
country for all of us. Much like birthdays, wedding
anniversaries or national holidays, the year 2000 is
also a threshold to pass across.
If we were moving, we would probably spend some time
at the old house, sorting through what is of value
to take to the new home. In the same way, crossing
over the threshold into the Third Millennium offers
us an opportunity to repack our cultural and
historical baggage before we inhabit our new
psychological home.
The question can start with why we should celebrate
the Ethiopian Millennium, as a milestone or a
threshold, but it should soon graduate to a more
important one: How can these Millennium
commemorations truly leave a legacy for future
civilisation that will endure the test of time? What
are the legacies we are going to leave to the next
generation?
We talk about the Ethiopian Millennium because it
fills our soul with hope. Despite the anxieties of
our age, we believe that tomorrow can be a better
day for us and our children.
Whatever the setbacks of the moment, nothing can
slow us down now!
Whatever the difficulties, Ethiopia shall be at
peace! Ethiopia shall rise!!!
I wish you all a Happy Millennium!!!
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