Gondar’s Grief: People are “waiting for their turn to come to be killed”

A two-year-old is an amazing little creature. Your own child or maybe your niece or nephew, doesn’t matter — you can watch that happy cherub run along a hallway and just amuse herself sliding along the tiles. There she goes: Thump, thump, thump, thump…sliiiide, and back she comes to run along the hallway again, Thump, thump, thump, thump….sliiiide. And she smiles at you as if she’s just won the Olympics.

It’s a great age, two. Kids that old can say only a few words, but their eyes are big and full of questions. They are rubbery, loud, happy (for the most part) little beings who should cry when they fall splat on the ground but often don’t, they just get back up and giggle and run some more. And they hug you with an urgent candor that you will remember all your life because it’s pure. It’s love in its most honest form.

Nolawit Zegeye was two years old. She will never turn three. She will never get to ask questions like any other kid or learn to read or grow up and have a life. Because someone murdered her.

The information that’s coming out now — and there is no reason not to accept its outline of facts — is that government-backed thugs kidnapped this innocent child and at least one of her parents, and when the family couldn’t cough up the ransom demanded, the gangsters murdered the little girl. One report suggests the thugs were trying to pass themselves off as Fano, but no genuine Fano unit would do this; those fighting for the real deal want ordinary people on Fano’s side, and this certainly wouldn’t accomplish that.

And then, of course, there’s the response from the authorities that clinches who’s really responsible. A peaceful protest was organized, the body of little Nolawit carried in grieving arms to the administration office in town… and army soldiers opened fire. According to a posting on Facebook, one medical professional reported eight people were hit, while Amhara Association of America reports that at least three people were killed.

They died prisoners, each and every one of them, just as Nolawit died a prisoner. I don’t mean this in the sense of the barbarous kidnappings, I mean the Abiy regime is virtually holding every Ethiopian captive. Though the key target for the wrath of his Prosperity Party and its collaborators are the Amhara people, it is revolting acts of violence like this — yet another shooting on unarmed innocents — that is a reminder of an essential truth.

You as an Ethiopian are not free, whatever your ethnicity or faith. You are a hostage. That is the difference between a government that actually serves its people, and the kind in Iran or Myanmar or Putin’s Russia and yes, in Ethiopia, where if you dare write the wrong thing, say the wrong thing, live in the wrong place, or come from the wrong ethnicity, they can shoot you on the spot, no questions asked.

My friend who told me about Nolawit’s murder wrote in a DM that “instead of listening to the people, they shot them! What kind of horrible people are they?”

I regret to say that I know the answer: Those who feel no shame. For why else would you fire into a protesting crowd? Because you can. Because if you’re someone who’s lost your humanity, you over-value efficiency. And those who let that happen put a premium on their own time more than sparing a few minutes to go through the masquerade of pretended sympathy to the heartbroken family members and the demonstration’s organizers. They either know their act won’t fool anyone, or they genuinely believe they are better than these irritating folks out on those steps, demanding human rights.

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, I’ve had the macabre luck of having actually interviewed a couple of genuine sociopaths. And I am convinced that the mind of a deranged government official is not that much different than that of a street gang leader. They want to steal, they steal. They feel the need or urge to kill someone, don’t get in their way.

In late August, as the Amhara Association of America reported, regime forces kidnapped the partner and three-year-old child of a former police chief and member of Fano Nigussie Shitaw in North Shewa Zone. “Nigussie’s spouse, Memhir Mazengia Demeke, and toddler, Nigus Nigussie, are believed to be held hostage in a makeshift military camp (Arbegnoch School) in Alem Ketema town.”

There are those who will cold-bloodedly argue that in taking up arms against the government, these Fano members deserve what they get. (After all, how dare they attack the government trying to kill them?) But by any civilized measure, this response is state-organized terrorism. Oh, and in case anyone’s interested in the historical precedents, this is the kind of thing the British did to Kikuyu in Kenya — go round up scores of family members of your “enemy” and pen them up in camps.

You get the point. When your government acts like an occupation force, with you as its “colony,” no one is safe.

Which again, makes everyone a prisoner, a captive. My friend wrote these words, and I will not feel embarrassed to say that my eyes were wet as I read them: “People called me crying and telling me that they have nowhere to go and are just waiting for their turn to come to be killed.”

It’s a little more than ten years since I saw Ethiopia for the first time. I fell in love with Gondar at first sight. I liked the town. I liked the people. A family I know showed me more kindness and patience than I deserve, a debt of caring that I will never be able to pay back. When I covered the Hyena War with the TPLF, I returned at times to Gondar as if it were a spa, my place to relax and rejuvenate. And by that time, certain figures knew my name and gave me many courtesies, and I got to enjoy Timket as only Gondar can celebrate it. I will remember the best doro wat I’ve ever had in my life, I will remember beers and laughter and joy from 2013, and I will remember the happy, vibrant dancing near the roundabout, Tewodros with his tricolor sash…

This town, this region is special to me. Now it is a place where more than one friend or acquaintance has had to flee for their life, to go into exile and be a refugee. And my outrage is impotent, useless. My friend asked me to be a voice for them and others, but they put the truth of it more eloquently than I ever can: “I have never seen my city this sad and hopeless.”

I believe them. And if my memories are creased with the tragedies of what’s happening, imagine the lifelong Gondar resident and how they must look at what’s happening to their town, at what it’s becoming, and what’s being lost. Imagine the Gondar citizen who has to flee, who doesn’t know when he or she can return home — or if they ever can.

Okay, if you are not Ethiopian and are reading this, I will not abuse your curiosity by demanding, Where have you been? I will not rant and rage because it’s 4:00 in the morning Eastern Time in Toronto, and I don’t have it in me at the moment. Oh, yes, I want to scream at the world, Why? Why is it you have time and tears for Ukraine, and you’re ready to bleed and march for Gaza, but you can’t spare a moment for my friends?

For the people of Gondar. For Nolawit Zegeye.

I won’t have that big scene, that righteous tantrum, that angry call for change, because those in Gondar can’t have theirs. They had every right to hit the streets, to vent their frustration and rage, but even that could not be permitted. Because every resident of that town, every citizen in Ethiopia now, today and tomorrow and for the foreseeable near future, is a “Prosperity Prisoner,” a captive in Abiy Ahmed’s madness.

Recently, I put out a satirical news release from the Prime Minister’s Office about new currency notes, in the same way that I used to prank the TPLF with its letterhead (the TPLF was slightly more fun to screw over because gawd, they are pompous). And of course, there are always those who say how dare you? And some were even stupid enough to argue that I could have caused a financial panic… Yeah, sure, as if that were possible thanks to a joke news release. I will never apologize for that kind of stunt because let’s get real — weigh a piece of satire against a government that feels no shame in mowing down its own people. A regime that murdered a two-year-old girl.

Yes, I plan to go on making trouble. Being a pain in its ass. And so should you. So should all of us.

Gondar, I am with you. And so are many others. And they will turn their grief into art. They will turn heartache into poems. And songs. And paintings. And graffiti. All of these will have a chance to live longer than a protest for a day.

All such creations can light a spark in other towns, other regions. Make something that can spread the truth.

Yes, for now you must run when they raise their rifles. So, be creative to keep the fight going. Grieve but don’t let grief overwhelm you and lead you to despair.

Make something beautiful and true and lasting so that they hear a thunderstorm in Arat Kilo.

Because one day instead of feet running away from guns, you should hear children running to play, in a country that’s free of fear.