Ethiopia’s New Terror Is Manmade : What America Did for Famine Can Be Done for Liberty

Americans have been moved to great compassion and generosity by media reports from Ethiopia. But little reporting has been done on the root causes of Ethiopia’s suffering.

Devastating as the latest drought is, the country’s people have survived droughts before by stockpiling food in advance. This drought has been made virtually unbearable because of the policies of Soviet-style dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam and his military junta, the Dergue. Ever since he seized power in 1977, Mengistu has invoked a Stalin-like reign of terror on the Ethiopian people. His forced resettlement program, collectivization of agriculture and disregard for human rights have wreaked economic and social havoc throughout the country, resulting in the suffering of millions.

The sympathy of people who enjoy freedom should be stirred by the following facts:

Mengistu has stated publicly that he intends to move 1.5 million Ethiopians from their traditional lands; 600,000 have been forcibly resettled in the last 18 months. According to the U.S. Food and Agricultural Organization, the regime uses food as “bait” to lure peasants out of the famine-stricken northern provinces where two Marxist resistance groups are based.

A French medical aid group, Medecins sans Frontiers , which was expelled from Ethiopia last December for criticizing the regime, reports that more people are dying now from the effects of the resettlement program than from famine. The doctors estimate that at least 100,000 deaths can be attributed to conditions during transport, where many refugees suffocate in unpressurized planes or are crushed or trampled to death, and in the resettlement areas, where disease and pestilence are rampant and where captured escapees are shot.

The State Department’s 1985 Human Rights report describes the situation in Ethiopia as “deplorable,” noting that the most alarming abuse last year was the resettlement program, “which was carried out involuntarily with considerable loss in human lives.”

Although Mengistu recently announced a moratorium on forced resettlement, we should not expect this to last. Last May, when a sanctions bill was pending in Congress, the Ethiopian dictator temporarily halted the program, only to reinitiate it in September after the bill had been scuttled by the State Department.

Yonas Deressa, president of the Ethiopian Refugees Education and Relief Foundation, says that the Mengistu regime has “done absolutely nothing” to address the long-term effects of the drought in order to prevent its recurrence.

In fact, worse times may lie ahead, because Mengistu’s policy of nationalizing all land holdings has greatly disrupted Ethiopia’s agricultural production. A Congressional Research Service report notes that “Since the revolution, the government has increasingly intervened in marketing and price setting of agricultural products.”

After nearly 12 years of Mengistu’s rule, the Ethiopian economy is in a shambles. Unemployment in the cities is 50% and growing, according to Ethiopian sources.

Mengistu has never held a general election of any kind to legitimize himself or his communist Workers’ Party of Ethiopia. And Ethiopian citizens do not enjoy freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom of speech or independent labor unions.

In sum, the policies of Mengistu and his regime are overwhelmingly repressive and a colossal failure. What can the United States do to pressure the Ethiopian government into instituting reforms? Sanctions are one option. After passing both the House and Senate last year, legislation calling on the President to impose a trade embargo on Ethiopia was blocked by the State Department. A bill currently before the House Foreign Affairs Committee would place Ethiopia on the State Department’s list of communist countries, making it ineligible for loans from the Export-Import Bank. This measure, which has been put forward by Rep. Toby Roth (R-Wis.), deserves careful consideration.

At the same time, the United States should not overlook another way to pressure Mengistu: We should support a little-known democratic resistance group, the Ethiopian People’s Democratic Alliance, now based in neighboring Sudan. Its leader, Dereje Deressa, claims that with political and financial support from the United States, the group could mobilize 50,000 men in a matter of months. Providing such support would be a positive step toward encouraging the development of a democratic Ethiopia wherein human rights will be respected. It is time we sent Mengistu a strong message that his reign of terror must end.