Desta, Asayehgn, Ph.D.
Sarlo Distinguished
Professor of Sustainable Development,
Dominican
University of California
According to Singh,
Resident Representative of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Ethiopia,
the IMF has made positive assessments on Ethiopia’s strong economic growth and has
come to understand that the lifestyle of the people is getting better as
compared to the past decades. In his conclusion, Singh asserts that there is no
difference between the IMF and the Ethiopian Government data, that despite the
world-wide financial crisis, Ethiopia has recorded economic growth over these
years. Given such economic achievement therefore,
Singh is of the opinion that the IMF is ready to back Ethiopia in order to sustain
the fast and stable development registered over the years (Walta
Information Center, 2010). Similarly, Dulane states that “Ethiopia is one of the fastest growing
non-oil economies in Africa and the country has registered an average 11.5 %
economic growth for the last six consecutive years.” By quoting the Economist’s World Economic Forecast for 2010, Dulane
underlines that Ethiopia is the fifth
fastest growing economy in the world (Japan SPOTLIGHT, September/October 2010).
In his book
entitled “Endemic Poverty That Globalization Can’t Tackle But Ethiopians Can,” Dr. Aklog Birara (hereafter referred
to as Birara), a former employee of the World Bank
and who used to be an adherent of the “Washington Consensus,” seemed to be impressed
by the current economic record registered by Ethiopia (see p. 452). However, Birara goes one step further to
argue that the developmental state in Ethiopia was not designed to advance
equitable growth and development throughout the country. It was designed to serve
the ethnically-based ruling class. To reinforce
his argument Birara states that close to 70 percent
of the urban dwellers of Ethiopia live in slum-like conditions (p.7).
According to Birara, the Foreign Direct Investment which has
been recently flowing to Ethiopia in the form of farmland grabs was designed not to advance
Ethiopia’s development but was tailored to export farmland products to foreign
countries in order to accumulate foreign exchange (p.7) so that the ethnically-based
ruling party (i.e., Tigrai
Peoples Liberation Front/ The Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic
Front, TPLF/EPRDF) could sustain their comfortable life-style. Birara states that “an ethnically-based and leftist single
party is unlikely to care for the poor” (p. 7).
Given its socioeconomic realities, the country
is still unable to achieve food self-sufficiency. Birara
is of the opinion that there is a growing disillusionment among both the Ethiopian
elites and the common people with regard to all forms of foreign aid that has
been flowing to the country. After all, according to Birara,
channeling donor monies directly to the government won’t improve wellbeing and
reduce poverty. In fact, Birara asserts that except for the concerted effort of the
Ethiopian people, neither FDI, land-lease and sales in
the range of 3 to 6 million hectares to foreign investors, nor the globalization
wave of foreign aid will transform Ethiopian society from poverty to a
sustainable and equitable prosperity (pp. 3-8). Birara
argues that all Ethiopian opposition political parties, civic and professional associations,
and intellectuals, who accuse the TPLF/EPRDF party are
in actuality fighting one another, forgetting that they themselves may be the
problem. He then suggests that the opposition group need to carry out their solemn
role of serving the Ethiopian people by challenging the ruling party. According
to Birara the ruling classes in Ethiopia are bloated
with egos and show minimum empathy for others. They trivialize important
concepts and preach the rule of law, democracy, and freedom, but in their
actions they reveal that they themselves are unable to put into practice these
concepts (p. 8). Emphasizing the main purpose of his book he stresses that a
country’s development needs to be about effective voice and participation in
the development and political process. Furthermore, Birara
outlines that among other things, Ethiopians need to have a supply of clean
water, have electricity on tap, be able to live in a decent home and have a
good job, be able to send their children to school, and have accessible health
care. To reinforce his argument, Briara depicts Ethiopia as
…among the few
countries in the world that still serves as an incubator or laboratory of
development for a variety of experts, non-governmental organizations
(NGOs), the United Nations system and bilateral and multilateral development
institutions. These experiments have made minimal headway in putting the
economy on a sustainable and productive path. Political divisions among
ethnic-elites prevent the society from creating social cohesion and integration
that are vital in the 21st century. Most of these parties have
fallen directly into the trap of the ruling-party …accepting the notion that
the country is a composite of irreconcilable nationality groups. As a
result they have adopted and practice the “them against us” ideology created
for them (p.9).
To further illustrate
his argument that the country is one of the least underdeveloped countries, in
Chapter I, Biara describes the educational system in
Ethiopia as totally ethnicized and politicized, and
references and songs were not about Ethiopia but about their ethnic-affiliation
and identity. Birara
argues that Brazil, China, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Mauritius, achieved
development by building social building blocks by investing heavily in
education, health, infrastructure, and by promoting policies and programs that
included value-added manufacturing (p. 12). In Chapter II, Birara
narrates his life story. He states that
even though the opportunity for education in Ethiopia was mainly tailored to
serve the sons and daughters of the ruling class, some urban dwellers and some
lucky people like him have been able to come to the United States to
study. He attained his Ph.D, from one of the most prestigious higher educational
institutions, Johns Hopkins University.
At the
beginning of Chapter III, Birara analyzes the various
public policy mistakes made by the ruling party, the EPRDF. In Part One he uses proxy
variables. For example, he states that Ethiopia’s landlocked status costs
Ethiopian exporters and importers four to five times more than competitors who
have access to their own ports. In 2006, shipping a container from the Port of
Baltimore to a landlocked country was about $3,450 higher relative to a base
price of $4,620 to non-landlocked country. Non-landlocked countries possess a
comparative advantage compared to Ethiopia. To illustrate, he uses the
unforgettable public policy mistake of the willful and deliberate turnover of
Ethiopia’s access to the port of Assab to the
Eritrean government. Instead of using
proxy variables from the United States, Birara could have
had a more convincing argument if he referred to Begashaw’s
credible article. According to Begashaw, compared to shipping via the Port of Assab, the costs of transportation via ports in Kenya,
Sudan, and Djibouti are prohibitive because of the long distances and poor
transportation facilities. To make the matter very specific, as estimated by Chowdhury and Erdenebileg, the
real GDP per year of landlocked countries is about 1 percent less than the real
GDP of coastal countries (2006).
Instead of
reviving the emotional flames already rekindled by various websites and mass
media outlets, it would have made sense for Birara to
review the valid documents written Belai Abay and Zeru Kihishen
(2000) to expose his readers to the fact that the Port of Assab
was bought in 1869 by the Rubattino Shipping
Company from the local Sultan on behalf of the Italian government. Then in
1882, the Italian government acquired the Port of Assab
from the Rubattino Shipping Company. If the Eritreans claim
that the Port of Assab belonged to them because Eritrea used to be part of the Italian
colony, a moot argument, instead of prolonging the fighting between Ethiopia
and Eritrea after 1991, it would have been better for the EPRDF to engage in
genuine, diplomatic negotiations with Eritrea for a global partnership. Instead the ruling party of Ethiopia minimized
the importance of the Port of Assab for Ethiopia.
If we are to
make sense of Albert Einstein’s words that Birara has
quoted in his book that “we can’t solve problems by using the same kind of
thinking we used when we created them” (p. 68), the EPRDF, could have
effectively negotiated with the Eritrean Peoples
Liberation Front in order for Ethiopia to have long term commitment from Eritrea
to have access to the Port of Assab. In other words,
given the political upheaval that existed in Ethiopia in 1991, it did not make
sense for Birara to argue that the “TPLF had a choice. (I don’t know why Birara is using TPLF instead
of EPRDF.) It had the military, political, and economic means, and popular support to reject
any overtures from EPLF or its foreign supporters like Egypt and Sudan to
undermine the country’s national interests and its economic viability” (p. 77).
After all, Birara was in a better position to know that
because of the political upheavals that existed in Ethiopia in 1991, the EPRDF
had no capability nor even the support of Ethiopians in 1991 to prevent Eritrea
from having full access to the Port of Assab. In short, given the fact that Ethiopians were
exhausted from the unnecessary war which Mengistu and
his supporters expanded, the EPRDF had no means nor
the necessary support to prolong the war between Ethiopia and the Eritrean
fighters ongoing since 1962.
In Part Two of Chapter III, Birara asserts his personal view that institutionalization with
the implementation of the “legalization and institutionalization of an
ethnic-state, ethnic-politics and ethnic-federalism that was created in
Ethiopia by the EPDRF in Ethiopia is now tearing the Ethiopian society apart. (This addresses article 39 of its constitution
which advocated the right to self-determination, including secession.) In his
book, Birara talks very highly of Malaysia. But I am
surprised he forgot to note that Malaysia has achieved economic growth because
following the civil disturbance of 1969, Malaysia’s Coalition Front government became
composed of Bumiputras
(or sons of the soil or Malays), Chinese Malaysians and Indian Malaysian
(see for example, Desta,
1993). Thus, the lesson we can learn from Malaysia is that it is worth
researching in detail the composition of political parties based on ethnicity
or national origin before we arrive at a conclusion as to what may determine
economic growth, or might tear the Ethiopian society apart, as Birara argues. Actually, the data from the IMF clearly shows
that Ethiopia’s economic growth is relatively better and relatively more stable
under the current ethno-federalism model of administrative organization than it
used to be under Haile Selassie’s
highly centralized and semi-feudal
authoritarian regime, or Mengistu’s most cruel and
bureaucratic military regime. Birara would agree with me that Ethiopia would have been in
a different stage of development had Mengistu’s
regime not purged the most creative and educated Ethiopians and forced others
to suffer from lingering nightmares of his atrocities.
The IMF and the
World Bank in its statement of conditions encourages borrowing nations to practice
competitive free markets, privatize existing state-owned enterprises, promote free trade, and
advocate for the creation of a conducive environment for foreign direct
investments. What is not clear to me is why now, at
this juncture, Birara is saying that the Washington
Consensus is an outdated model. If I am not mistaken, was he not a major
functionary and at times strongly promoting the Washington Consensus model in
order to convince a number of developing countries to undertake structural
adjustment programs (SAPs) in order to qualify for access to financial credit
from the IMF and the World Bank? Why is
he now against the flow of foreign direct investment to Ethiopia when Ethiopia
is making its environment attractive to investors? To put the matter in his
words,
Concentration
of political power in a single party allows use of institutional and coercive
instruments to make policy decisions and defend interests. Take Gambella as illustrative. It is among their country’s
potentially richest regions. Its fertile farmlands are being leased and sold to
Indian and Saudi investors. Close to 600,000 hectares of Gambella
farmlands have been leased or sold to these investors. In the process, an
untold number of farmers and other households have been forced to move. Many of
those dispossessed will work for the new investors at wages below poverty
level. By any social or economic indicator, the region is among the most
neglected and poorest (p. 81).
Though it is
not worth discussing hearsay, according to Birara the
third public policy mistake which the EPRDF chiefs have committed is allowing “ …the country’s central or national bank and commercial
banks are used to enrich party-owned
supported and endowed enterprises and individuals, the case of corruption becomes
incontestable” (p. 87). In addition, it
is sad to learn from Birara, who has supervised a
number of projects for the World Bank, that “…the physical infrastructural and
manufacturing investments and outcome are relatively higher in Tigray than in any other regional states.” It might be very difficult to convince Birara but if he undertook a well-designed, objective
research, he would find out that a large portion of the investments in Addis
Ababa, Awasa, Gonder, Behre Dar, and Tigray, to mention
only a few, are mostly financed either by humanitarian philanthropic
organizations, or the Diasporas. For Birara’s information, even the Ethiopian nationalist Falashas, who the dictator Mengistu
orchestrated to get hefty amounts of
money from Israeli humanitarians to make them leave their county
of origin are returning and undertaking major investments in Gonder. Rather than believing in second-hand information, I
would encourage Birara to go to Tigray
and objectively document for himself if Tigray
is doing better than the rest of the regional states.
The fourth
public policy mistake committed by EPRDF according to Birara
is that “it claims that it has created a solid institutional foundation for
democracy, the rule of law, human rights, equality of nationalities, a free
market economy, respect of civil liberties and human rights, administrative
efficiency and rapid socioeconomic development… these realities do not remotely
resemble democratic, representative and just governance. Ethiopia
is among the poorest and least developed,” (p.89). (Underlined by the writer of this article). First, countries, for example, like India and
Mauritius have democratic types of governments but are
not necessarily developed nations. Also, Singapore has emerged as the new Tiger
of Asia but by no stretch of the imagination is it democratic. Thus, why is Birara arguing that democracy and development in Ethiopia should
complement each other? Over the years,
there are general objections to the advocacy of democratic governance as a
means of achieving sustainable development in non-Western countries. As
documented in my article (See Desta, 2010) for
instance, in contrast to the tenets of democratic governance, Mohamed, the former
Prime Minister of Malaysia argues that democratic values are in essence Western
constructs. They are purposely geared to impose Western cultural values on
non-Western countries. According to Mohamed the components of Western
democracy that were forcefully implanted on non-Western nations to make them be
dependent on Western nations’ value systems include: 1) putting the
individual at the center of good governance; 2) practicing of liberal views of
human rights; 3) establishing multi-party systems of government; and 4) using
the free market system to encourage competition (1994).
In addition, some of the leaders of Third
World countries are of the opinion that democratic governance is associated
with their historical experience of the West, and can be a hindrance to
achieving sound, healthy economies in non-Western nations, unless they are
modified to reflect the cultural perspectives of non-Western nations.
Based on the notion ‘development first, democracy later,’ opponents
of democratic governance argue that instead of hallucinating and imposing
lofty and unachievable values of democracy, it would be better to give
bread to the poor in non-Western countries ( UNDP 2002). Those who are
against the spread of a Western image of democratic government in non-Western
countries further argue that the democratic governance promulgated by Western
nations, inflicts suffering rather than freedom on those who do not belong to
the ruling majority in a democracy. Given this, they are of the opinion that
the vulnerable groups will be better served by the protection that
authoritarian governance can provide, rather than getting hand-outs from a
class-based democratic system. (See for example, Sen,
2003.) In fact, Habisso succinctly argues that
imposing democracy on the poor and ethnically divided authoritarian states, and
insisting they hold instant elections and democratize rapidly, can trigger some
of the world’s bloodiest national struggles (2010, p. 6.) Second, as far as I know and from what I have
read about Ethiopia, until today the Ethiopian authorities have never claimed that
they have created solid foundations of democracy in Ethiopia. Actually, as I stated
in my recent article (Desta, 2010),
Ethiopia is in transition to democracy.
The fifth
public policy mistake orchestrated by the executives of the EPRDF ruling-party discussed
by Briara “refers to the land leases and sales to
foreign investors… it is an admission that the TPLF/EPRDF model of Agriculture
Development Led Industrialization( ADLI) has failed”(
p. 92). Actually, in the age of
globalization, “…it might be absurd to suggest to the Ethiopian Government that
Ethiopia should isolate itself from the rest of the world.” Nonetheless,
Ethiopian policy makers should cease to see globalization as an end itself. The
real end is environmentally sustainable economic development of Ethiopia. To
the extent that multinational enterprises add value to the achievement of this
goal, they could be welcomed. But, the Ethiopian government needs to stay on
the alert and keep the abuse of foreign investments in check through judicious
governmental policies (Desta, 2010, p. 2-3).
As claimed by Birara if ADLI is “failing” because it is facing unexpected
shocks, “…then the only way the existing backbone of Ethiopia’s economic and
social problem can be at the cutting edge and environmental sustainability can
be achieved is if there is a modification in revising the ownership and
management of land. The local Ethiopians (with the help of the government and
genuine foreign investors) are willing to form cooperative joint ventures at
the local level that can create employment and emancipate workers. Thus
harnessing the energies of local communities and private investors (such as the
Ethiopian Diaspora who are willing to give back to the people in their country
of origin) to form agro-business cooperatives would have been the cornerstone
for revitalizing self-sustaining socioeconomic development in Ethiopia” (Desta, 2010, p, 3).
From the
section of “Learning from Others” Birara states that
firstly, Ethiopia could learn a lot from the Peoples Republic of China. Yes,
having worked and written a book about investment in China ,
I definitely agree with Birara. But, Birara should be
aware that in China each state, though not as ethnically-based as Ethiopia, is
administratively autonomous. For example, when it comes to FDI, each state
decides to accept foreign investment if the investment will accelerate
industrialization, improve the standards of living, create employment,
and increase the accumulation of foreign exchange. In addition, it is worth noting that the
Chinese Diaspora have shown special love and admiration for their home country.
The Diaspora (even the Taiwanese) were the first ones
to invest in their original mother country when China established the four
Special Economic Zones in Shenzen, Zhulai, Shanton and Xiamen in 1980.
Secondly, Birara tells his readers that he admires the micro-credit
of Bangladesh as a source of development. However, a detailed study which explored
the role of microcredit for poverty alleviation in Africa (see Desta, 2010), and another study by Khandker
of three leading microfinance institutions in Bangladesh, for the period 1990
-2003 show that:
Microfinance
matters a lot for very poor borrowers and also the local economy. In particular, micro-finance programs matter
a lot to the poor in raising per capita consumption, mainly on non-food, as
well as household non-land assets. This increases the probability that the
program participants may be able to lift themselves out of poverty. …yet the
aggregate poverty reduction effects are not substantial enough to make a large
dent in aggregate poverty at the national level. This concern brings to the
fore the effectiveness of micro-finance as an instrument to solve the problems
of poverty in Bangladesh (2003).
To conclude, if
we assess Birara’s book based on the hallmarks of scientific
research or the distinguishing characteristics of research, let me say that the
book in its introductory section gives the writer’s background and the nature
of the problem has been investigating.
Therefore, the book has a purposive focus and the book was presented in
a very creative manner. Particularly, since the title of the book is very close
to President Obama’s slogan “Yes, We Can”, it is marketable.
However, the
book does not seem to be rigorous. The book lacks a good theoretical base and a
sound methodological design. Although the book has attempted to summarize the
current state of knowledge in the area of investigation, by design or default,
the book seems to be tailored to appeal to a certain segment of the market. The
writer was inclined to appeal to those who are politically against the EPRDF Party
in Ethiopia. Since some of the content of the book was reported previously by
other writers on a number of politically-sensitive websites, as a scholar and
academician Birara should have established carefully the
reliability and validity of some of his tables and sources of information. For example, the source of information for
Table 2 , pp. 292-296
and Table 3, pp. 382 are not given. Since the sources of the tables are
not given, it has been very difficult for me to verify Birara’s
data.
Concerning the figures about Official
Development Assistance (ODA) given on p. 164, it would have been appropriate if Birara had converted
the data into Real ODA by adjusting for inflation. Then, these real ODA should have been analyzed
in detail for what purpose they were used by the Military regime and compare
their usages by the current regime. If Birara, as he
stated it, thinks that the real ODA assistance
the current regime has received over the years has 1) not reached the
common people, 2) failed to achieve minimal growth, and 3) made Ethiopia to be
dependent on foreign aid, then he should empirically substantiate his argument.
Otherwise, I see no clear evidence how his hypotheses could be ascertained
except to say some sections of the book were written purposely to add fire to
the already the emotionally charged anti-EPRDF regime.
In addition, regarding the Official
Development Assistance (ODA) depicted on p.164, it is possible to say that the
tables don’t seem to be derived from factual data, but consist of subjective or
emotional values. It is further
interesting to note why Birara did not pay much
attention to some of the research papers that have been written by the Ethiopian
government, multilateral organizations, and other neutral researchers. Also,
though Birara now seems to be against foreign
multinational investors, why did he forget to mention China’s investment in Ethiopia. For example
Mersha outlines that China produces barley, oilseed,
and sesame seeds in Ethiopia, and it is likely to bring in Chinese workers to
do the job (2009). If Birara is genuinely interested in the unemployment and
exploitation of Ethiopian workers, why were not Mersha’s
comments introduced in his book?
As mentioned
before, the first section of the book attributes Ethiopia’s poverty to ethnic-federalism
type of management style and highlights some of the policy mistakes undertaken
by the EPRDF. The final section of the
book, on the other hand, seems to be written as an afterthought because all of
a sudden Birara appreciates, as does the IMF, the
economic growth of Ethiopia and Birara goes one step further
to make some constructive suggestions. Given the contradiction between the beginning
of part of the book and its conclusions, it is rather very difficult for any other
objective researcher to replicate the study and arrive at the same conclusions.
Also, Briara should know that policy implications have
to emerge from the data analysis. Though minor, assuming that the book was
published by a well-referred publishing company, Birara’s
book needs to have an index at the end of the book and all the tables need to
be listed in the table of contents.
Given the
positive and negative aspects of my review of Birara’s
book, I would like to salute Birara for asking other
Ethiopians in the Diaspora to have a worthwhile discussion that might benefit
our country of origin. After all, most
of us were disassociated from our beloved country not by design but by default.
Therefore, I hope Birara will not take a defensive
stand. I rather would like to salute him
for his noble call for all Ethiopians to be architects of their country’s
sustained development rather than leaving Ethiopia to be a benevolent guardian
of the Western-initiated globalization wave. Based on Birara’s
call for constructive endeavor, I have no doubt that we can extricate Ethiopia
from the malaise of poverty, revitalize its economic system, and put Ethiopia’s
development firmly on the global agenda. This will generate new confidence in
Ethiopia that it can emancipate from poverty and achieve a people-oriented type
of sustainable development.
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