EHRP-Oromoprotests-100-Days-Of
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#OromoProtests: 100 Days of Public Protests March 2016 1 Executive Summary Oromia, the largest regional State in the Ethiopian Federation, has been rocked by series of protests in the past 100 days since mid November 2015. The protests began with the aim of having the proposed Master Plan of the capital, Addis Ababa, officially referred as the ‘Addis Ababa–Finfinne1 Integrated Development Plan’ (‘Master Plan’) scrapped. The Master Plan was designed by Addis Ababa City Administration in collaboration with the government of Oromia Regional State and introduced early in 2014. The protestors opposed the Master Plan, which covers 1.1 million hectare of land (approximately twenty fold the current size of Addis Ababa), saying that its implementation will result in the eviction of millions of farmers and families from their land. The first protests against the Master Plan were held mainly by students of Oromia regional State in April/May/June 2014 which resulted in deaths, injuries and imprisonment of many people all over the state. The protests erupted again in November 2015 and continued up until now. The ‘second round protests’, as it is called by activists, took wider area and longer time than its antecedent. Police brutality have reached its climax and deaths, injuries, mass arrest, kidnapping have tragically been reported in the State. In only the first hundred days of these protests, hundreds of towns and villages have witnessed mass incidents. In addition, death tolls have reportedly reached more than four hundered, thousands of people were injured and tens of thousands people were briefly arrested. Even though the Master Plan has been officially been scrapped by OPDO, ruling party in the regional State, on 13 January, 2016, fifty four days after the second round of the protest erupted, the third round of the protests have continued with a new momentum; what has started as an opposition to the Master Plan seems to end up looking for answers of political questions that have grown in the past two decades. The Ethiopia Human Rights Project (EHRP) has actively followed the protests and summarized the issues, causes, and the human rights violations perpetrated by government security forces in response to the protests in Oromia region. 1 Finfinne is another name of Addis Ababa as the Oromos call it. 1 1. Introduction Many parts of the Oromia region have been rocked by an unprecedented wave of protests since November 2015. In the beginning, the protest mainly aimed to have Addis Ababa City’s newly proposed master plan scrapped. Protesters say the the Master Plan would push the city’s size about twenty fold and would evict farmers around Finfinee (of Oromia region). The latest protests are a follow up of the April/May/June 2014 protests which resulted in the death, injuries and mass arrest for many individuals as well as property damage. Residents in all 21 zones of the regional State and hundreds of towns and villages in them have joined the ‘second round protests’ since it began on November 12, 2015. The government’s response to the protests has been very brutal and it even ignited an unending series of protests all over the region. The ‘third round of protests’ that started on January 14, 2016 and still ongoing at the time of writing this report have been different from the two previous rounds in the sense that they involved more violence and the changes in the demands protestors have been making. Like the previous protests, the third round protests are spreading across the regional State that resulted in reported hundreds of deaths and injuries as well as detention of thousands of Oromos. 2. Methodology In the preparation of this report, we have primarily relied on second hand information. Incident reports, names of victims and other data incorporated in this report were gatherd from political parties’ activists and statements and press relases issued by the government. As much as possible, we have tried to compile all the death reports with identified names and place of incidents in its specificity. While there have been siginifcant challenges to document the exact extent of the widespread human rights violations perpetrated in connection with the protests the number of people killed and the geographic coverage of the protests could be much more than incorporated in this report. 2 Background of the Protests After a long history of oppression and centralized experience, Ethiopia declared Federalism as a system of government in 1995. The 1995 Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (FDRE) constitution establishes nine states mainly formed based on ethnic line and a central government with its seat in Addis Ababa. Article 47 of the Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic Of Ethiopia Member States of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia are the Following: 1) The State of Tigray 2) The State of Afar 3) The State of Amhara 4) The State of Oromia 5) The State of Somalia 6) The State of Benshangul/Gumuz 7) The State of the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples 8) The State of the Gambela Peoples 9) The State of the Harari People The constitution clearly provides the powers of the central/federal government and those of the states. Later, the boarders of each State as well as the capital city Addis Ababa were delimited. However, the non-demarcated but delimited borders became causes of some sporadic clashes and disagreements among different states at different times.2 To resolve these disagreements, the federal government mainly relied on political solutions.3 Besides border demarcation problems, even if the same constitution provides human and democratic rights and electoral democracy, the fact on the ground shows a major problem of constitutionalism. The representation of dissent in the political sphere has been shrinking from time to time and with the ruling EPRDF and its ‘affiliates’ taking all the 547 seats in the Federal 2 Cross border clashes between neighborly states is rampant in the present day Ethiopia. The House of Federation which is mandated as a House to deal with such cross border clashes is busy of arranging political solutions to solve political impasses. 3 International Crisis Group (ICG), Ethinic Federalism and Its Discontents, Africa Report No. 153 – 4 September 2009 3 parliament and all the 1989 seats in States parliaments4 in May 2015, it hits the bottom-Zero. Moreover, the ruling party made life harder to citizens of Ethiopia by promulgating new laws that stifle rights5 and now it developed itself to be a full-fledged authoritarian party6. Thus, the current wave of protests across Oromia region7 are the result of such discontents among the Oromo people. In other words, it is a question of constitutionalism, representation and human rights. 2.1. Addis Ababa verses Oromia The FDRE constitution that established nine states and a federal government. Designated Addis Ababa as the seat of the federal government. With regard to the capital city of the federal state, Article 49 of the constitution provides: 1. Addis Ababa shall be the capital city of the Federal State. 2. The residents of Addis Ababa shall have a full measure of self-government. Particulars shall be determined by law. 3. The Administration of Addis Ababa shall be responsible to the Federal Government. 4. Residents of Addis Ababa shall in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution, be represented in the House of Peoples’ Representatives. 5. The special interest of the State of Oromia in Addis Ababa, regarding the provision of social services or the utilization of natural resources and other similar matters, as well as joint administrative matters arising from the location of Addis Ababa within the State of Oromia, shall be respected. Particulars shall be determined by law. 4 National Electoral board of Ethiopia, www.electionethiopia.org (Last Acessed on February, 2016) 5 Anti-Terrorism Proclamation Ethiopia passed in 2009 is one of them. Many rights organizations critisized this law as it is used by Ethiopian government to silence dissent. Ethiopia’s Charities and Civil Socities laws and the Ethiopian Press Proclamations are also criticized as they are used as a means of stifling citizens’ rights. 6 Freddom House, Freedom in the World 2016, Anxious Dictators, Wavering Democracies:Global Freedom under Pressure, January, 2016, available at http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/freedom-world-2016 7 Oromia is the largest of all the states in the Ethiopian Federation both geographically and population wise. 4 While there is no qualm on the first four sub-articles, the fifth one is so contentious.8 The fact that Addis Ababa is in the middle of the largest State in the Federation, Oromia, raises the issue of special interest of the same against the city of Addis Ababa. However, after two decades, there is no public action or act that tells what that special interest entails and implies. On the other hand, the absence of a demarcated boarder between the city of Addis Ababa and Oromia State resulted in some practical problems over jurisdiction and the relation of the two entities.9 The 10th Addis Ababa-Finfinne surrounding Integrated Development Plan was introduced amid such legal vacuum. The Addis Ababa City Administration announced a new ‘development plan’ for the city and its surrounding in 2012. This ‘development plan’ unlike its predecessors was not limiting itself only to the city rather it proposed to integrate Addis Ababa with its surrounding towns in Oromia Regional State in the name of ‘Integrated Development’. The proposed plan covers an area of 1.1 Million hectare, which is almost twenty fold the current size of Addis Ababa, which stands at fifty four thousand hectare. Since the proposal was made public, different interest groups and political parties expressed their concerns about the motive of the plan in addition to questions of its legality.