100 flowers of repression bloom as Ethiopia moves to gag press ahead of elections

The Ethiopian Human Rights Council, one of the most effective and professional human-rights groups in Africa, tried to operate under the new law.

But after the government unlawfully froze its bank accounts and threatened its staff, it closed all but three of its offices and half its investigators fled the country.

Under an anti-terrorism law passed last year, legitimate peaceful protest and dissent can be considered terrorism and critical reporting by the media can easily get labelled as “encouraging terrorism.”

The editors of Ethiopia’s leading independent newspaper, Addis Neger, closed the paper and fled the country after repeated threats that they would be prosecuted under this law.

The Ethiopian government tried last year to impose its awkward definition of terrorism across the border after a Kenyan television station broadcast a programme on the rebel Oromo Liberation Front.

Fortunately, the Nation Media Group in Kenya refused Ethiopia’s demands to stop the broadcast.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the only African country with more journalists behind bars than Ethiopia is its archrival, Eritrea.

The Ethiopian journalists languish in jail along with at least nine opposition leaders detained following the crackdown after the 2005 elections.

The most prominent among them is Birtukan Midekssa, the young, charismatic leader of the Unity for Democracy and Justice Party, pardoned in 2007 but re-arrested and returned to jail in 2008. She is fast becoming one of Africa’s most celebrated political prisoners.

Keeping Birtukan behind bars, tightening the screws on non-governmental organisations and jamming VOA are just some of the “100 ways” in which the government is putting pressure on the opposition and exacting a high price from those who dare to criticise the government.

Ethiopia’s influential foreign donors on the other hand have every opportunity to raise their voices against the Ethiopian government’s growing repression ahead of the parliamentary elections in May. They should do so loudly and clearly.

Ben Rawlence is a researcher with Human Rights Watch.