Dangote Cement PLC should immediately correct itself or Leave Oromia for good!

The Oromo people are at the receiving end of all the ills of the economic gains in Ethiopia over the last 25 years. The Oromo people continue to be dispossessed of their lands, natural resources, social values and human capitals without gaining any economic benefits. The whole scheme of economic development in Ethiopia violates all the rule of free market and capitalist economic rules. Most of the economic gains are not the result of value creation as much as it the process of dispossession of land and natural resources, and wealth transfer from the poor to the politically connected and the rich.

The #OromoProtests is partially a protest against this scheme of dispossession and wealth transfer from the Oromo to other including foreign corporation. Unless this process immediately ends, its toxicity is bound to poison business and social harmony in Ethiopia in the long run. This is very risky venture that must end.

In this context, the Oromo people and the Oromia Regional Government should seriously consider policy changes on Dangote Cement PLC to make the following changes:

1) Dangote Cement PLC must agree to give shares to Oromo citizens who were displaced from their ancestral land in proportion to the value of their land and the natural resources on and within the land;

2) Dangote Cement PLC must agree to employ Oromos at the Executive positions including the CEO position (there are tens of thousands of qualified Oromos to run it). Now the company is employing imported Indians in these positions as opposed to Oromos;

3) Dangote Cement Plc must immediately start paying tax to the Oromia National Regional Government;

4) Dangote Cement PLC must make Afaan Oromo its working language immediately in line with the constitutions of Oromia and Ethiopia; and

5) Dangote Cement PLC must agree to rehabilitate the rivers, springs and streams and forests it destroyed and agree to follow the environmental standards and the culture and business values of Oromo people.

These are minimum policy practices companies in other countries, be it in China, India, France, Germany, United States or other European countries follow. A foreign company in China works in Chinese and employs Chinese. Foreign companies in the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Greece, Israel, and so on works with the working languages of those countries by employing the citizens of those countries. But, in Oromia and Ethiopia, a country with no owners, none of these standards are being followed. Not anymore. The Oromo people and all other Ethiopians should unconditionally reject and chase these colonialist companies out of Oromia and Ethiopia if they refuse to obey our languages, cultures and business etiquette and values.

Dangote Cement PLC is one of the foreign companies that are mercilessly displacing tens of thousands of Oromos from Mogor( English and Amharic speakers spell it as Muger) and dispossessed the land belonging to the Oromo people with zero benefits for the Oromo people.

This company’s CEO, an Indian filled with extreme hatred and disdain for the Oromo, was see on Oromia National Television ridiculing and insulting Oromo journalists who went to his office to interview him about this company. Neither Dangote Cement PLC owner, a Nigerian, nor other executives of Dangote Cement PLC apologized for the actions of the racist Indian CEO who runs it. Listen to the youtube video of this account. It is important to remind Dangote and the Indians who run it that Ethiopia is not their colony. Never will be.

Oromia National Regional government should immediately request Dangote for the removal of the Indian CEO who insulted the Oromo people and our journalists. If Dangote refuses to remove him, he should be permanently expelled from the country. This type of racist individual with colonial mindset should not be allowed to operate in Ethiopia. Our forefathers died to keep our independence to save us from this humiliation. And we will not relinquish our Independence and culture for godforsaken foreign direct investment and the lie of job creation when their practice is worse than slavery.

As it currently stands, Dangote Cement PLC has no value for the Oromo people except being exploited and our country and environment being destroyed by greedy foreigners. There is no value for the company to exist in Oromia if the Oromo people don’t have any ownership rights in the company and its executives are exclusively non-Oromos imported from other regions or from outside when there are competent and well-qualified Oromo’s to manage Dangote Cement PLC. Even regular employees are not Oromos including truck drivers. Afaan Oromo is not the working language of Dangote Cement PLC. Dangote Cement PLC is not paying tax to the Oromia Regional Government. Unless the company immediately corrects all these, it should immediately leave Oromia and the Oromo people should help it to leave!

The good news, Oromia can establish its own cement factory to meet its people’s need!

Changing Alphabetical Order is a Matter for the People

If the OPDO is working to change the order of the Oromo alphabet secretly, then it is probably jumping from the political cliff. (If what is being talked about is a method of teaching writing and reading skills, it is another matter, although even that is debatable among experts of language and pedagogy.)

The change of alphabets has a serious impact on the integrity of a particular language. To that extent, it leads to the violation of a community's right to language. As such, it can't be done without the participation of the entire population in the decision to change it.

Changing alphabets as a way of altering the integrity of language is a preeminently political act whose decision requires direct popular vote in a referendum. It is not something to be decided upon technically by a select few. It is not something to be decided on the basis of the whims and conjectures of a few politicians.

It is not even something to be decided through representatives in parliament (although the Parliament is at liberty to discuss, frame the agenda, debate, and resolve on the process and timeframe of the referendum).

This is because the right to language--apart from being the right of the individual to speak, to write, and to get social services in her/his language--is a collective right that is an aspect of (cultural) self-determination. It is no accident that the right to language (i.e., the right to speak, write, develop, and preserve one's language) is inscribed as part of the self-determination clause (Art 39(2)) in the FDRE Constitution (the constitution that never was).

This right to language includes the right to one's choice of script for one's language. The Latin script is the chosen script for Qubee Afaan Oromoo. The order of that script was not decided upon by the OPDO. The making of that choice antedates OPDO and/or its educational bureaucrats of today. That choice has never been questioned by any Oromo soul, past or present. No one ever saw it fit to rethink it thus far. That popular political decision can't be rethought in secret by a corp of experts even if there was a technical need for rethinking. They don't have the mandate nor the representation to do it. Only the people have mandate on such issues of crucial importance.

In multi-lingual societies, autonomy over decisions on language matters is of central significance as an aspect of linguistic justice (i.e., a just and fair distribution, among languages, of resources, power, and public spaces and amenities needed for the utilization, promotion, and development of languages).

This autonomy starts with the decision on scripts but it also includes the decision over the use of languages in the administration, in courts, in education, and in the media. It includes equality among languages in public spaces, institutions, and service-giving agencies. In particular, it is about equal and/or proportional distribution of financial resources for language education, language development in the media, in literature, and the wider cultural industry. In a genuinely multilingual polity, languages get recognized as co-equal working languages of the country's government thereby showing the deep diversity of voices, narratives, and writings that express and represent the peoples in the country.

The recent dabbling with the change of the alphabetical order of Qubee Afaan Oromo--if it is beyond methods of teaching--amounts to a tampering with the right of the Oromo people to theier choice of script. It is also tampering with the integrity of the language. As such, it should be denounced in the strongest of terms.

If this is, in deed, part of the bigger habesha supremacists' ploy to replace the Latin-Qubee script with the habesha/Geez script (as some of these thugs, aka homeless politicians, are dreaming of doing), they need to be told that they are not only playing an impossible game (a forbidden game, as it were) but they are playing with a dangerous political fire.

For whoever wants to do it should first go out to convince the people in a free and fair popular referendum. (No, it is not enough even to go to OPDO's Caffee! )

Anything less is an open declaration of war on the Oromo people, on their language, and on their identity. It shall only be met as such.

Jijjiira tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromoo illaalchisse ibsa ADO

Kufuu fi masheennuu sirna barnoota TPLF-EPRDFiif Qubeen Afaan Oromoo itti hin gaafatamu!
Jijjiira tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromoo illaalchisse ibsa ADO

Duulli dhoksaadhaan sirnaa fi tartiiba qubee afaan Oromoo walumaagalatti sabboonummaa Oromummaa kolaasuu fi suuta suuta Qubee Afaan Oromoo haqanii Qubee Sabaan (Ge’ez) bakka buusuuf godhamu dhiyeenya kana saaxilamuun ifaadha. Shiri «Ijoolleen Oromoo Qubee Afaan Oromootiin (Latin) baratan dubbisu waan dadhabaniif qorannoon godhamee maddi rakkoo kanaa tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromooti jedhamee ABCn gara LAGMtti jijjiiramuun isaa heddu waan nama gaddisiisuu fi nama qaanessuu jenna. Qorannoo godhame jedhamuu fi rakkoo dubbisuu dadhabuu barattoota Oromoo jidduu hariiroon bifa kamiiyyuu akka hinjirre qormaanni jeedhame kun wanni akeeku tokkolleen hin jiru.

Dadhabbiin jedhamu kun maddi isaa tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromooti jedhanii tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromoo jijjiiruuf yaaluun akeeka dhokataa fi shira golgame akka qabu ADOn hubatee jira. Erga Qubeen Afaan Oromoo ragga’ee maneen barmoota Oromiyaatti eegale irraa jalqabee sababii fi golgaa adda addaatiin Qubee kana balleessuuf duulli walirraa hincitne godhamaa turuun isaa dagatamuu hinqabu. Duulli amma bifa haarawaan jalqabe kun waan haarawa osoo hintayin itti-fufa duula baroota dheerraaf Aadaa, Afaan, Amantii, Duudhaa Oromoo fi walumaagalatti sabboonummaa Oromummaa dhabamsiisuuf godhamuun ta’uun isaa hubatamuu qaba.

Seenaa, adeemsaa fi dagaaginni Qubee Afaan Oromoo seenaa fi dagaagina Qubee Latin wajjiin walitti hidhataadha. Sirnaa fi tartiibni Qubee Latinii ammoo sirna idilee addunyaa guutuu ammatuu fi ittiin hijjatamu osoo ta’ee jiru, sirna kana Itoophiyaa-Oromiyaa qofaa keessatti tartiiba isaa jijjiiruuf yaaluun akeeka dhokataa qubee afaan Oromoo dhabamsiisanii Dubee warra Semetikiin bakka buusuuf godhamu ta’uu isaa qorannoo godhame jedhamu keessatti «Ijoolleen qubee Latinitiin yookin Qubee Ge’eziitiin yoo baratan daddafanii dubbisuu danda’u? gaafiin jedhu hundee qoraamata kanaa ta’uun isaa shira xaxamaa jiru caararreesa. Seenaa fi adeemsa Qubee Latinii keessatti tartiibni «LAGM» jedhamu kun tartiiba ABC wajjiin waldorgomee kufuu isaa seenaa ogummaa barnootaa afaanii(linguistics) ragaa baha.Tartiibni LAGM hundeen isaa afaan Semetika kaabaa (Northern Semetic order) biyya Syria duraanii) keessaa madduu isaa seenaan afaanota addunyaa ni mirkaneessa. Qormaata godhame jedhamu keessatti qubeen «L» barreeffama keessatti si’a heddu deddeebi’ee dhufa (frequency count) irraa caalaa qaba jedhamee dhiyaate Afaan Tigree fi Afaan Amaaraa keessatti yoo ta’ee malee afaan hundee Kushitika irraa maddan keessatti kan (freequency count) olaanaa qabu ABC akka ta’ee qorannoon waggoota kumootaaf godhamee ni mirkaneessa. Addunyaanis qorannoo kanarratti hundaayee tartiiba ABC fudhachuun ragaa gudaadha. ABCn afaan kamuu keessatti barachuu fi dubbisuuf salphaadha jedhame qorannoon ragga’ee ummanni addunyaa irra caalaan sirnaa fi tartiiba kanaan hojjataa jira.

Waan hundumaa caalaa kan nama gaddisiisu osoo oggeeyyotaa fi ummanni Oromoo irraatti mariyatee rakkina jiru hin hubatin hannaa fi dhoksaan tariibaa fi karriikulama haga ammaa jiru jijjiiruun shakkii shira dhokataatu duuba jira jedhu daranuu gadi jabeessa!

Afaan Oromoo afaan dubbii irraa gara afaan barreeffamaatti jijjiiruuf shorri ABCn gumaache hiriyaa hin qabu. Qubee Afaan Oromoo maddisiisanii Afaan Oromoo gara barreefamaatti jijjiiruuf wareegama qaqqaaliin kafalamee jira. Ijoolleen Oromoo sirnaa fi tartiibni Qubee Afaan Oromootiin barachuun sabboonummaaa Oromummaa dhabamarraa hanmbisuu qofaa osoo hintayin mallattoo cancala gabrummaa kan ta’ee qubee imaammata afaan tokkicha qofaa dirqiin barachuu cabsee jira. Afaan Oromoo sirna afaanota addunyaa keessa seenee jira. Sirnaa fi tartiibni Qubee Afaan Oromoo sirnaa fi tartiibaa Qubee Latinii keessa seenuun Oromoon ogummaa fi qaroomina baraa akka qabaatu godhee jira.

Sirnaa fi tartiibni qubee afaan Oromoo qabeenya ummata Oromootii fi dhaloota haarawaa ta’ee jira. Qabeenyaa ummata Oromootii fi dhaloota haarawaa akka qabeenya dhuunfaatti lakkaawatanii yeroo barbaadan akka barbaadanitti laaquu fi jijjiiruun yakka hiriyaa hinqabne jenne amana. Sirnaa fi tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromoo jallisuuf yookin jijjiiruuf yaaliin godhamu hegeree fi jireenya dhaloota qubee (qubee generation ) gaafii jal galchuudha jenne amana.

Kanaafuu ADOn shira sirnaa fi tartiiba Qubee Afaan Oromoo jijjiiruuf godhamu kana ummanni Oromoo akkuma kaleessa shiroota biroo doomsuuf gurmuu tokkoon dura dhaabbate, ammallee murannoon shira kana fashalsiisuuf gurmuu tokkoon akka dhaabbatu waamicha sabummaa goona!