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As I was sitting and
contemplating whether to have one more cup of tea to fend off the bitterness of
the chilly weather, a flash of grief ran down my spine while thinking about the
tragic accident encountered by Ethiopian Airlines Flight Number 409 that crashed
in the Mediterranean Sea carrying 90 people including passengers and flight crew
soon after takeoff from Beirut International Airport.
The fatal accident, tragic as it
was, is one of the rarest of its kind to have happened to the reputed carrier.
The prompt reactions of the international community and the government of
Ethiopia were laudable. The meticulous handling of press release principles,
under such circumstances, by the authorities of the corporation, was excellent,
as far as I am concerned. That was cause for some solace.
I came back to my senses when a
middle-aged woman begged her pardon and pulled up a chair by my side to share
the coffee table with me. She took off her heavy overcoat and hand gloves before
she sat down and signalled for the waitress. The sturdy woman engaged me in
weather gossip in French. But my French could not go beyond “Excusez moi,
mais je ne parle pas français.” She switched over to perfect BBC accent
English. She introduced herself as an Englishwoman. It was no wonder that she
talked about the weather with some air of authority and verse for quite a while.
I have always wondered why
Europeans start greetings with phrases related to weather conditions like “Good
morning” or “Good day.” In a society like Ethiopia, health matters are given the
top priority, for various reasons. Instead of “Good morning,” therefore, we tend
to inquire how he spent the night, “Indemin aderu?”
After the lady got over with
discussions on the weather, she asked me where I was from, guessing my alien
origins, judging from my complexion and perhaps by my accent, I suppose. The
word Ethiopia carried her back to the 1973 famine and the gruesome skeletal
pictures of dying children portrayed in the film entitled 'The Hidden Hunger'
filmed by Jonathan Dimbleby of the BBC.
She expressed her laments for
what had happened then. She blamed the Ethiopian government of the day, not so
much for its reluctance in taking action until the hunger crept to claim over
200,000 human lives, but for its ruthless silence and secrecy. If at all there
is some credit to be given to the military government that brought the downfall
of the imperial rule, it must be, inter alias, its discretion to publicise the
plight to the world by not censoring the film and succeeding to mobilise donors
and manage relief aid, she said.
Far fetched as it may sound, the
woman tried to draw some parallels between the recent earthquake crisis in Haiti
and the famine in Ethiopia of 1974. The height of the death toll in both cases
is about the same. The 1974 creeping death claimed the lives of over 200,000
Ethiopians. The number of victimised people in Haiti, so far, is close to that
number.
The Haitians do trace their
descent from Africa. But the difference between disasters caused by earthquakes
and those caused by droughts, she did not mention. Climate change and its
impacts on the environment were shunned away.
The lady did not worry about
treading on my nerves to tell me that both countries were among the poorest
nations in the world, the majority of their population earning less than a
dollar a day. I was offended. The offence, however, was out of sympathy if not
ignorance. I tried to explain that there were reasons for their poverty, chief
among them political. Some of the causes were beyond the control of the people.
Leaving politicking ordeals
aside, I tried to argue that there are positive sides to these countries that
the world should know. Ethiopians were among the first people on this planet to
live a settled life and start farming using the ox driven plough not to speak of
the ancient civilisation of Axum, the Lalibela Rock Hewn Churches and the
Castles of Gonder, I said.
But she would not budge. “Who
cares for the good stories?” she said. “They just do not pull a dime in the
media world like the BBC.”
For example the BBC reporter
would be more interested to tell the world that Haile Gebrselassie failed to
break his own marathon record in Dubai as he promised rather than reporting his
victory for the third consecutive time. They would rather tell us that Haiti is
the poorest nation in the western hemisphere than tell us the underlying cause
for the poverty of the country, the amount of loans they owe their debtors, the
very low wages Haitians are paid by western capitalists, or the corruption that
prevails there.
She told me about the huge
volume of food, water and medicine the international community was able to
secure in no time, the efforts made by international celebrities and world
figures to raise funds under the banner ¨Hope for Haiti.” Of course reporters
were quick to tell us that all these supplies were nowhere to be seen, due to
missing the most important principals of organisation and coordination. Every
institution and organisation was doing its own thing while many of them did not
know what to do, when and where, thus leaving loopholes for NGOs to come in and
even try to take over the mantle of power.
The woman told me that she has
made several visits to Ethiopia and that she has learnt that the emergency
relief management has evolved into one of the strongest relief and
rehabilitation institutions in Africa able to provide the necessary information
to the relevant bodies ahead of time.
Ethiopians are less corrupt,
more freedom loving people, and more generous, she said. I did not know whether
this statement was a compliment or condescension. Incidentally, I forgot to pay
her coffee bill.
I guess I am learning to be less generous. |
