The nanny of a nanny Opposition is heading to London

Mulugeta Aserate Kassa

8/05/2006.

As far as Ethiopia, and indeed the international community are concerned, Election 2005 is a done and dusted matter.   In the words of the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, “…but I think it is important to emphasise this is not a question of a government having lost an election and then trying to retain power, the government won the election….”(http://www.pm.gov.uk/output/Page 9045)   And on EU’s Final Report, the stance of the United States was made crystal clear by its Under-Secretary of State, Yamamato, when he testified before a United States Sub-Committee: “On the overall assessment of the elections, we agree with the final report, which noted that the elections had credibility and that the majority of the constituency results based on the May 15^th polling and tabulation are credible and reflect competitive conditions.   Our own assessments support this view.”

But for CUD Diaspora, the fact that the world has accepted the result of Election 2005 is a bitter pill to swallow, not to say the end of its day-dreaming exercise of pulling wool over the eyes of the international community.   The very fact that we are now made to witness mud-slinging amongst CUD, America, and the so-called Task-Force, over, what is by itself a non-issue matter of holding or not holding demonstrations against the election results, is farther proof of the fact that the recipe that was used to make the coalition, itself, was a ‘marriage of convenience’ and not principle/ideology.

It is against the back-drop of this kind of fractious CUD Diaspora that Ms Anna Gomes (popularly known to CUDists as “Hannah Gobeze” to denote that she is the comrade in arms of notorious Negede Gobeze) is heading to London in order to grace CUD’s Fund-Raising Rally, the entrance fee of which is a staggering £20.00.

Of the plethora of articles that questioned the neutrality of the EU Observer Mission to Ethiopia’s May 2005 Election, none obliterated Anna Gomes’ Interim Report into smithereens as did Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s Letter to the Editor of The Ethiopian Herald.   In his maiden article to a newspaper since he came to power in 1991, Meles described Anna’s behaviour as that of “a colonial viceroy.”   That observation was then; today, however, Anna has successfully morphed herself to become the nanny of a nanny CUD that tells its supporters, amongst other things, where to go and where not to go, who to meet and who not to meet, whose burial to attend and whose to avoid, which church to worship and which church to turn into a warship.

The European Parliament in Strasbourg had in recent months witnessed a spate of Ethiopian opposition supporters all seeking audience with their nanny to see if Anna did possess a magic wand that would turn the course of events in Ethiopia in their favour.   It was, indeed, in this Belgian city itself that Anna was alleged to have been seen dinning alfresco with a galaxy of CUDists, prompting critics to question as to whether or not Anna Gomes had registered her alleged earnings as a lobbyist to CUD with The Register of Interests of Members of European Parliament.

However, because nothing of significance by way of reversing the out-come of Election 2005 had flowed to the CUD from this much vaunted relationship with Anna Gomes, a growing number of Ethiopians have now started to openly question whether they are getting value-for-money.   A desperate CUD, London, and its tentacles, The Task Force and Ethiopians for Peace and Democracy, have, therefore, come-up with the novel idea of extending hospitality (at a great cost to the contributor) to Anna Gomes.   The aim could be nothing more than boosting the morale of its supporters who are said to have reached the end of their endurance with the treadmill of staging demonstrations of all kinds in London.   But CUD, London, has to realise that today’s public is not as gullible as it was in November 2005 when its gung-ho supporters of former henchmen of the Derg succeeded in hijacking demonstrations in order to advance their own agenda.    Today’s alert public would, therefore, not settle in for anything less than finding out from their Hannah Gobeze, if in her cherished wisdom she believes that Kinijit had won Election 2005?

It would be interesting to know, then, what Anna’s response would be; as she simply must not be allowed to be seesawed with our peace and unity.