ESAT News (May 11, 2016)
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The number of people coming to the city from areas seriously affected by drought has been on the rise. ESAT‘s stringer in the capital Addis Ababa has seen an increase in the number hunger stricken people from Tigray in the last few weeks.
Some of the farmers who spoke to the stringer said they have come to the capital seeking help as they run out of food. The farmers told the stringer that the seriousness of the drought has forced them leave their villages and coming to the capital was the only thing they could do to save their lives and that of their children.
Meanwhile 100 quintals of food aid has been found at the residences of local officials in Ebnat Woreda of North Gondar as police were searching house to house for the food aid that reportedly disappeared suddenly. Source say authorities did not take legal actions against the local officials who hide the food aid at their houses.
Heavy rains and flooding have meanwhile obstructed the delivery of food aid to areas affected by the drought. Muddy conditions of dirt roads have cause a delay in the delivery of life saving aid to people in remote areas.
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ESAT News (May 11, 2016)
Hundreds of families in Akaki and Kality in the vicinity of the capital would be forcefully relocated despite objections by the farmers who wish to stay on their land. At a meeting with the farmers, government officials warned that the farmers would be removed by force if they failed to heed to government’s orders to be relocated.
The farmers who attended the meeting told ESAT that they had already given their farmlands at dirt cheap prices and they have now been asked to leave their houses to build condominiums for some members of the Ethiopian community in the diaspora who are sympathizers of the autocratic regime.
The farmers were forced to sell their farmlands at 11 birr (0.51 cents) per hectare and the government in turn sold the land at 5000 birr (250 dollars) per hectare, leaving the farmers to be destitute in their own lands.
The government has continued to uproot farmers from their land despite its promise to stop displacing farmers at the height of the protest in the Oromia region. Uprooting poor farmers from their land to make space for condominiums for the diaspora community has been one of the reasons for the protest in the Oromia region that is still continuing despite heavy presence of the military and security all over the region.