|
The huge white elephant in the room that no one is
talking about is the upcoming Millennium
celebrations. There are three weeks or 21 days until
the celebrations are upon us, and I for one am
confused as to what exactly it is that is going to
be happening for the eve or day of the New Year.
The idea of having one's own Millennium after the
whole world went through the Y2K scare and it ended
up being a fluke, is well endearing in its own
right. I for one, and I am sure that I speak for
many Abeshas, would love to see a great big
and very well planned party that would allow the
world to see Ethiopia and Ethiopians for what we
really are.
As much as I would have liked to have seen this, the
way that things are going right now, it does not
sound like our planning is going well. I am sure had
it been handled in a better manner so far, we would
have all been able to enjoy something that modern
day Abeshas could call their own. And, had
everybody played their cards right then, it would
have indeed been a way to turn around the image of
the country; but I do not think that particular goal
is going to be achieved to its fullest.
The body that can of course be a scapegoat for what
I fear to be a looming disaster is the Millennium
Secretariat. It was the organ that was given the
full responsibility to make sure that the country
would be able to have the best possible celebrations
and to use the resources at its disposal in order to
make sure that happened. I have seen nothing
concrete come to fruition.
Upon inception it was full of ideas and grandiose
plans, it had options on what to do with Meskel
Square, it had something going in Jal Meda, there
were supposed to be community level endeavours that
would clean up the city and get its population to
have a participatory role in the whole thing. People
have not even been given an ear to their ideas, let
alone being given the reigns to their own fates.
I appreciate attempting to attract more tourists and
trying to make a maximum profit off this endeavour,
whether financial or geo-political, but the local
businesses, ideas, and plans that were thought up
specifically for this event by thousands of
wonderful Ethiopians, have been given no time of
day, and now we are three short weeks away of what I
fear is going to be a very messy holiday
celebration.
Changing the image of this country would have been
better done by the private sector. It has more
incentive to mobilise, it does not have to deal with
state issues such as security and infrastructure,
and it would have been able to give more
opportunities to a wider array of people. And it was
not for the lack of effort on the part of the sector
and its members. There were hundreds of good and
do-able ideas that were floating around and people
were willing to invest their time, energy and
finances into them, but of course, the powers that
be when it comes to the celebrations, would not
allow for that to happen.
The question to me is why?
Look at what is happening with the cleaning of the
city. The people that are going to come home to stay
with their families are not going to all end up in
the better parts of town where what little bit of
cleaning is going on is happening.
And even if they were, to be perfectly honest, they
are not going to live here. Should not the
government, whether city or federal, both equally
responsible for this city of ours, have begun the
cleaning campaign a year ago? There are fresh new
lawnmowers out there now but the people using them
are chopping off the flowers along with the grass,
so how exactly is that making the city clean?
Did not it occur to anybody that if maybe the more
populated areas in the city that are home to
majorities of its population were given the chance
to be cleaner and more attractive, if they had the
opportunity to be involved in the celebrations
instead of having to endure the negative effects
that it has brought into their daily lives; the
little comfort that the citizens get there may help
to make life a little bit more simple for everybody,
especially since we are all going to have to live
together when this is all over.
I for one say that this whole thing is going to take
a miracle to pull off, and I am not the person with
the strongest faith. I hope for all our sakes that
if nothing at least some sort of magic trick is
pulled off to at least give the semblance of
something successful having happened.
|
