When the Ethiopian People's
Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) took control of the capital, Addis Ababa
on 28 May 1991, Amnesty International hailed the day as a “…break with the
past” and an opportunity to put human rights protection at the top of the
agenda for the future.
However, as Ethiopians celebrate 25
years of EPRDF rule, they have suffered persistent and pervasive violations, in
particular, of civil and political rights that has become a hallmark of the
EPRDF government.
Use of legislation to stifle
dissent
The EPRDF government has used
legislation to stifle dissent since the early days after it came into power.
More than 200 independent publications, including over 60 newspapers, were
registered by the then Ministry of Information under the 1992 Press Law, 2
which criminalised defamation, and established a number of other crimes, for
instance the “instigation of one nationality against another”3 . These crimes
attracted stiff penalties and up to three years imprisonment. By 1998, the
application of the press law had significantly reduced the number of
independent media publications in Ethiopia to less than 20
Ethiopian civil society’s engagement
with human rights is shackled by the Charities and Societies Proclamation
621/09, which violates Ethiopia’s Constitution and the country’s international
human rights obligations and commitments. The law places funding and other
restrictions on human rights organizations, and to violate it is a criminal
offense. Since 2011, the law has been used to freeze assets of more than one
million US dollars belonging to the country’s two leading human rights
organizations: the Human Rights Council5 and the Ethiopian Women Lawyers
Association
Amnesty International’s study on the
impact of the Charities and Societies Proclamation found: “This law has also
had a devastating impact on the staff of human rights organizations, the human
rights defenders themselves. For many years human rights defenders have
operated in a climate of fear in Ethiopia, subjected to regular harassment, arrest,
detention and even violent attack. The underlying impact of the Charities and
Societies Proclamation has been to entrench still further, and even to
institutionalise, this fear pervading the work of human rights defenders”. 6 25
years since the EPRDF took power, only one independent human rights monitoring
organisation-the Human Rights Council -remains operational in the country.
The Anti-Terrorism Proclamation
(ATP), which came into force in 2009, has also been used to silence political
opposition and voices critical of government policy and practice. The
Proclamation’s provisions defining ‘terrorist acts’, ‘moral support to
terrorism and terrorist organizations’, and ‘search, seizure, detention and
arrest’ are vulnerable to abuse especially in a country not well known for
judicial integrity. The Government of Ethiopia denies that the law was aimed at
political opposition parties or journalists. Yet, journalists, political
opposition leaders and dissidents, have been arrested, and convicted for alleged
involvement and links to the three domestic organizations that the government
considers to be terrorist groups - the Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF),
the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), and Ginbot-7
The ATP has been used against
members and leaders of opposition political parties, journalists and human
rights defenders since its enactment in 2009. Political opposition figures such
as Andualem Arage, Nathanial Mekonnen and Asaminew Berhanu (all senior
officials of the Unity for Democracy and Justice Party), Zemene Molla, (General
Secretary of the Ethiopian National Democratic Party), Olbana Lelise, and
Andargachew Tsige are among political opposition leaders charged and convicted
under the ATP. In 2014, Omot Agwa Okwoy, Ashinie Astin Titoyk, Jemal Oumar
Hojele, land rights activists from Gambella Region, were arrested while
travelling to Nairobi, Kenya, to attend a workshop on land rights and charged
under the ATP.
Bekele Gerba (Deputy Chairman, Oromo
Federalist Congress), Getachew Shiferaw (Editor-in-Chief of the online
newspaper Negere Ethiopia), Yonathan Tesfaye (an online activist), Dejene Tafa
and Fikadu Mirkana (Oromia Radio and TV) are among those who were arrested
following the Oromo protests which started in November 2015.
On 22 April 2016, the public
prosecutor charged Bekele Gerba and 21 other co-defendants, in Federal
Prosecutor Vs Gurmessa Ayano et al, under the ATP. The defendants are accused
of masterminding the latest Oromia protests. On April 26 2016, the court
adjourned the hearing of the case until 11 May 2016 so that the defendants
could submit their preliminary objections. However, prison administration
officials did not bring the defendants to Lideta Federal High Court on 11 May
2016 for their court hearing. A lawyer representing some of the defendants in
Gurmessa Ayano et al told Amnesty International that the prison administration
officials declined to bring the defendants to court because they were dressed
in black suits, in expression of their mourning for the people killed during
the latest Oromia protests.
In addition to the trial of Gurmessa
Ayano et al, the Federal Prosecutor has charged more than fifty people under
the ATP in connection with the 2015/16 Oromia protests. Yonatan Tesfaye, former
Spokesperson of the Blue (Semayawi) party, was arrested in December 2015 and
held without charge until 4 May 2016. He was then charged with “incitement,
planning, preparation, conspiracy and attempt” to commit a terrorist act in
alleged pursuit of the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF)’s objectives. The charge
failed, however, to specify evidence linking Yonatan Tesfaye with the OLF
The government also used the ATP to
quash political opposition members and media outlets before the 2015 election.
Abraha Desta of the Arena Tigray party, also a lecturer at Mekele University,
Habtamu Ayalew and Daniel Shebeshi, both members of the Unity for Democracy and
Justice (UDJ) party and Yeshewas Asefa of the Blue (Semayawi) Party were
arrested on 8 July 2014. In April 2014, the government arrested six members of
the Zone-9 bloggers and three journalists. The Prosecutor withdrew the charges
against five of the bloggers and journalists in July 2015. The remaining four
were acquitted by the Federal High Court in October 2015. The court however
ruled that Befeqadu Hailu should be prosecuted for incitement to violence.
Despite the release of the Zone-9 bloggers in July and October 2015, the
government has filed an appeal against their acquittal.
Freedom of expression
Journalists with dissenting
views are often silenced, or face arbitrary arrest and detention, torture and
other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment. Since the EPRDF came into power,
the government has arrested people for criticizing or opposing government
policies and practice. In 1994, Professor Asrat Woldeyes, Chairperson of All
Amhara People’s Organization (AAPO), Sileshi Mulatu, AAPO's Office Manager,
Teshome Bimerew, an Addis Ababa University student, former army lieutenant
Chane Alamrew and Ambelu Mekonnen, a farmer from Gojjam, were found guilty of
incitement to violence and sentenced to two years imprisonment. At the time,
Amnesty International raised concerns that their rights to fair trial had been
violated. In the years following, Professor Asrat was arrested several times for
his political activism, and was adopted by Amnesty International as a prisoner
of conscience, incarcerated solely for his peaceful political opposition to the
government.
Amnesty International has documented
numerous cases of journalists who have been arrested for criticizing government
policies and actions since 1993. Several editors and journalists, have been
arrested and questioned by the police and security authorities; some of them
like Eskinder Nega have been arrested multiple times. 9 Reporting on armed
conflict has been particularly risky. For example, Tesfaye Deressa and Bekele
Mekonnen of Urji were charged in December 1995 with "publishing false
information and disseminating it internationally" in connection with their
report of on the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) that casted a doubt on a
government statement about the conflict. The charge was that they
"described the situation as if there was no peace but active war and by
doing so they encouraged violence and instigated war in the country".
In January 2014, the
state-controlled Ethiopian Press Agency and Ethiopian News Agency published a
report claiming that the Addis Guday, Fact and Lomi magazines were promoting
terrorism and damaging the economy. These media houses were subsequently shut down
by the government. Likely facing imprisonment, journalists working with these
media houses fled the country.
More than ten journalists are
currently on trial, or serving jail terms in Ethiopia, and some of them are
detained in inhumane conditions. An example would be the case of Temesgen
Desalegn. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ):
“…prison authorities denied Temesgen
prison visits from friends and family for more than a month, according to a
public letter by Temesghen's mother, Fanaye Irdachew. Authorities did not
provide an explanation, but local journalists told CPJ they suspected Temesgen
had been denied prison visits after an article he wrote from prison was
published on several Ethiopia news websites. The articles detailed the
mistreatment of prisoners at Ziway Prison”
The continued use of the law to
silence journalists such as Reeyot Alemu, Eskinder Nega and Zelalem
Worq-Agenyehu places Ethiopia amongst the ten most censored countries in the
world, according to CPJ’s 2015 report
Freedom of Assembly
Amnesty International’s
documentation over the last 25 years indicates that assemblies criticizing the
government are not tolerated. In November 1991, Amnesty International reported
the killing of at least 20 demonstrators who were protesting against the new
EPRDF government.
Over the years, Oromo protests have
been broken up multiple times by the police and the military. On 4 January 2004
for instance, dozens of protesting Oromo students were arrested and transferred
from Addis Ababa University to an undisclosed place of detention. 14 They were
participating in a peaceful demonstration by members of the Oromo ethnic group.
In another incident, scores of people were arrested near Jimma in the Oromia
region, over 300 kilometres southwest of the capital Addis Ababa, on 26 August
2004. They were detained at Agaro Prison without access to a lawyer or their
families and without charge or trial. The students were not brought to court
within the 48 hour period required by law.
During the Oromia protests against
the Addis Ababa Master Plan in April-May 2014, Amnesty International documented
the use of excessive force by police and security officials. During and after
the protests, police and security officials beat hundreds of people, including
protesters, bystanders and parents of protesters for ”failing to control” their
children, resulting in hundreds of deaths and injuries in locations including
Ambo, Jimma, Nekemte, Wallega, Dembi Dollo, Robe town, Madawalabu and Haromaya.
A woman who attended a protest in Guder town told Amnesty International: “On
the third day of protests, the military came to the street and were waiting for
them. When the kids came to protest again, the military just started shooting
at them.”
Oromo protests against the Addis
Ababa Master Plan erupted again in late 2015. The government labelled the
protesters as “terrorists” and escalated its response against them, resulting
in deaths, injuries and the mass arrest of protesters, opposition party leaders
and journalists. The ATP permits up to four months of pre-trial detention,
which contravenes international human rights standards. Amnesty International
has documented the widespread use of torture and other ill-treatment of
protesters during this lengthy pre-trial detention period. The Federal police,
regional police and the military killed children as young as twelve years of
age during the protests. The security forces and the military have discharged
live ammunition, and beaten up protestors, wounding hundreds of people. They
have also conducted mass arrests during the protests as well as its aftermath.
In May 2005, widespread protests
broke out in Addis Ababa and other towns over contested results of the Federal
and Regional Parliament election. Police and other security service agents
conducted mass arrests of political opposition party activists and supporters,
leaders of the political opposition party, Coalition for Unity and Democracy
(CUD), as well as journalists and civil society activists. Thousands of people
were detained and many were beaten, tortured or otherwise ill-treated, and
detained without charge or trial for significant periods of time.
In December 2005, 131 opposition
leaders, journalists and civil society activists were charged with a range of
capital offences, including treason, incitement to armed uprising and genocide
against an ethnic group and members of the ruling party. The group included
Berhanu Nega, the newly elected Mayor of Addis Ababa; Birtukan Mideksa, a
former judge; Professor Mesfin Woldemariam, founder and former president of the
Ethiopian Human Rights Council; journalists Serkalem Fasil and Eskinder Nega;
and civil society activists Daniel Bekele and Netsanet Demissie.
Regional and Federal Police also
conducted pre-emptive arrests following the ‘Arab Spring’ in North African and
Middle Eastern countries. Amnesty International observed:
“In early 2011, the
authorities made large-scale arrests which appeared to be pre-emptive – to
prevent demonstrations from taking place. Hundreds of students and opposition
political party members were arrested across Oromia, apparently in relation to
the ‘Arab Spring’ uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa of that period.
[…] large numbers of opposition political party members, students and other
dissenters, including independent journalists and advocates of reform,
were arrested.”
Members of Oromo political
opposition parties were arrested by security forces in August and September
2011, as well as a number of students in August 2011. More than 75 students
from Wallega and Adama universities and Gimbi town were arrested that following
December.
In 2012-2013, Muslims in Ethiopia
staged a protest against alleged government interference- the government
sponsored teaching of ‘al habash’ interpretations of Quran- in Islamic affairs.
Amnesty International received reports of several incidents in which security
services used excessive force against peaceful protestors, including firing
live ammunition on unarmed protestors, beating up protestors and in some cases,
bystanders resulting in deaths and injuries. 19 After security forces forcibly
dispersed the protesters, perceived leaders of the protests were subsequently
arrested and prosecuted.
Restrictions on the right to
peaceful assembly of political opposition parties intensified during campaigns
in the run-up to the May 2015 general elections, in which the EPRDF won 100
percent of the votes. For instance, on 12 May 2015 security officers arrested
two campaigners and three supporters of the Blue (Semayawi) Party who were putting
up campaign posters in Addis Ababa. On 19 May 2015, Bekele Gerba and other
members of the Oromo Federalist Congress were campaigning in Oromia when police
and local security officers beat, arrested and detained them for a couple of
hours. More than 500 members of Medrek, an umbrella group of political
opposition parties, were arrested at various polling stations in the Oromia
region on 24 and 25 May 2015.
Security officers beat and injured
46 people during the elections; six people sustained gunshot wounds and two
were killed.
Recommendations
Ethiopia’s Silver Jubilee is an
important opportunity for the government to respect, protect and fulfil its
human rights obligations. Specifically, Amnesty International calls on the
Ethiopian authorities to:
- Immediately and
unconditionally release all prisoners of conscience;
- Ensure effective judicial
oversight of arrests and conditions of detention as required under Article
19 of the Ethiopian Constitution and Article 9 of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights;
- Ensure prompt, thorough,
impartial, independent and transparent investigation of allegations of
excessive use of force including beatings and summary killings against
protesters; publicize the findings of any such investigations and bring anyone
suspected to be responsible to justice in fair trials without recourse to
the death penalty;
- Amend the ATP and the
Charities and Societies Proclamation to conform with Ethiopia’s
international and regional human rights obligations and commitments pertaining
to the rights to freedom of expression, peaceful assembly and
association.
By Amnesty International
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