Southland Ethiopians Revel in Dictator’s Ouster

Ahadu Sabure fumbled for the telephone in his Crenshaw district home at 5 a.m. Tuesday and heard a neighbor yelling frantically into the receiver, “The thief, the thief has gone!”

Groggy and confused, he responded, “Who? What are you talking about?”

This was no burglary in progress. The caller, a fellow Ethiopian refugee, finally explained that the longtime dictator of their homeland, Mengistu Haile Mariam, had fled the country to escape advancing rebel soldiers.

Sabure’s phone rang many more times that morning, with calls coming from other friends with shortwave radios in Berkeley, Atlanta and Washington.

Sabure, 66, who moved to Los Angeles in 1988 after spending 7 1/2 years as a political prisoner under Mengistu’s regime, had waited many years for such news. But his reaction to the early morning telephone calls--like that of many Ethiopians living in the Southland--was decidedly mixed.

The despised dictator, responsible for thousands of deaths during his 17-year reign, was finally deposed. But his former defense minister had taken over, armed rebels continued their struggle and Ethiopia’s problems with poverty and famine were as severe as ever.

“We expected the downfall of Mengistu,” said Sabure, speaking from the cramped offices of the Ethiopian Community Center on Crenshaw Boulevard. “It was not a total surprise for us. He is the most hated man in our history. I was happy--I spent all those years in jail--but scared at the same time.”

For months, Sabure and other local activists had been planning a demonstration to raise consciousness in this country about the plight of Ethiopians. The news of Mengistu’s departure increased the urgency, and now the group will hold its rally Sunday at 2 p.m. at the Federal Building in Westwood. That is the day before rebel leaders are scheduled to meet Ethiopian officials at U.S.-sponsored peace talks in London.

Assefa Deres, 40, an electrical engineer who emigrated from Ethiopia to Boston 19 years ago, said the rally’s organizers are attempting to raise the same level of consciousness that existed in the mid-1980s, when the world’s attention was focused on Ethiopia’s famine.

“If the United States can go and give freedom to Kuwait, it can stop the war in Ethiopia,” Deres said. “What is involved here is human life. There is no reason for the U.S. to give money to stop the hunger in Ethiopia if they are not going to stop the fighting, too. It does not make sense.”

Southern California’s Ethiopian community of about 20,000 is closely following the developments back home.

At the Messob restaurant on South Fairfax Avenue, located amid a concentration of Ethiopians, a television set is tuned to Cable News Network. Across the street at Rosalind’s, another Ethiopian eatery, owner Fikre Mariam said he has become addicted to the news.

“I buy the New York Times, the L.A. Times, and I watch CNN and listen to the BBC,” said Mariam, 37, who left Ethiopia in 1971. “It’s the talk of the town in the Ethiopian community. At every table you go to in here, they are talking politics. It’s now old news that Mengistu is gone. They’re talking about what’s going to happen next.”

Bogaletch Gebre, 37, who sends books to Ethiopia through her group, Parents International Ethiopia, said her telephone has been ringing constantly with calls from fellow Ethiopians seeking the latest news.

“Everybody is hoping there will not be a civil war,” she said.