Voices of Courage Honoree Rim Tekie Solomon

Several months ago, Rozen Sigal of Hotline for Migrants (an ICER affiliate) received by e-mail a notice, calling for nominees to the "Voices of Courage" prize, granted by the Women's Refugee Commission. Reading the notice, she immediately thought about Rim Tekie. Rim now 20 years old was a prisoner at Saharonim prison when she was barely 16 years old. Because she spoke fluent Tigrinya, Arabic and English she worked without pay as translator for the prison Administrative Tribunal.

Despite her young age, Rim had to translate to the Administrative Tribunal judges. She had to spend long hours every day translating the stories of the Eritrean and Sudanese women who were regularly tortured and persecuted in their country of origin, and often raped in the desert by smugglers. When asked about her pro-bono translation work she simply replied “ it as a privilege to be able assist her fellow women refugees”.

Power Vacuum Seems to Be Eminent in Eritrean Politics, Are We Ready?

Eritrean organizations in the Diaspora and in the heart land, to be innovative, responsive and responsible require focusing on a number of leadership, power and influence issues. In a country where democracy prevails the leadership tries its best to inform, influence, and satisfy the peoples’ demands and needs. It is this attitude and practice that is absent in the Eritrean politics. The Eritrean opposition in general seems to lack the vision and management of change and the panic and helplessness observed in the Eritrean power politics in general with the rumor of death of dictator Isaias whether manipulated or not is vivid and clear.  Below are some ideas that I think will help to develop sound strategy, management and assessment of political situation and the need to re-organize.

ICER APPEAL: Save Eritrean Refugees from Human Smugglers

The International Commission on Eritrean Refugees (ICER) would like to appeal to all the political groups in particular to those whose operational base is Ethiopia to give focus on the issues affecting refugees in particular to the shady operation going on in the refugee camps. Frankly, since their base of operation is located stone throw away from Eritrea where the bulk of the refugees originate from we believe they are better placed than most of us to influence events, at least in as far as regulating the flow of persons from the refugee camps in Ethiopia and the Sudan. ...

This being the case, therefore, why is it so difficult for the political parties and in particular those operating from Ethiopia where part of the illegal activities is occurring cannot act in earnest to stop it?  Is it because  they are too preoccupied dealing with the more burning issues, for example, the overthrow of the unrepresentative regime and replacing it with democratic one? ...

Gebre's Story - an Eritrean Refugee's African Odyssey

Mai-Aini Refugee Camp, Ethiopia — They crossed the border at midnight, grief-stricken at the death of their daughter the previous day. Gebre's two-year-old girl Arsama perished from the flu. The night after they buried her, Gebre, 28, and his wife Teka, 25, decided to make their way to Ethiopia.

Arsama's death was just one reason for their escape. Gebre was exasperated with seven years in the military - part of Eritrea's obligatory decades-long national service - with not even enough money to pay for food for his family. There seemed no end to the misery, Gebre recalled, here in Ethiopia.

Mea Culpa, not Defensive Rationalization, is the Right Thing to Do

In highly contentious political joking and tussling environment rumors, misinformation and counter misinformation have found their own niche with devastating long range impact to the nurturing of a healthy political process. The use of “unconfirmed” and “unsubstantiated” information in a journalistic narrative will downgrade the reputation of the news outlet that generated the news, no matter the heroic effort to temper the blow when the “unconfirmed news” is discredited by iron clad evidence to the contrary.

The motivation of the reportage or the reporting organ is not an issue for reporting “unconfirmed news” is one of the tools of modern journalism but the spin and exaggerated extrapolation that explodes out of control due to the trigger “unconfirmed information” and the ensuing collapse of all scenarios built on the original unconfirmed reporting imposes a moral responsibility to genuinely reassess the process of how we deploy and utilize “unconfirmed information” in our new digital media.

Eritrea: President Isaias Afwerki’s Reign in Absentia

With this good opportunity to dispel the rumors of his death (an easy task), the message that the president wanted to convey to his followers was one and one thing only: that if he disappears for a lengthy time in the near future, as he anticipates he would, not to believe the rumors of his severe illness. ...

The president knows but too well that, in the event of these rumors of his terminal illness persisting for too long, his die-hard followers who cannot imagine a world without him would panic, many opportunistic followers would start jumping off the sinking ship, his juniors in the administration would be emboldened to seek an alternative to him, the opposition would be emboldened to put its house in order (for whatever it is worth); and Ethiopia might put him to test ...

(Photo: Isaias in his son's wedding on Fberuary, 2012; although deceptively dated later in the picture)

Correction: Ruling with Minimal Physical and Mental Effort

The task that the Ministry of Information faces is a tough one: it had to show the Eritrean public that the president is as energetic and fully engaged as he had been in the past with a sparse material in its hand. It had no other recourse than to make up the deficit in reality by superimposing images and concocting stories: the Tv montage and the udet story are examples of these two respectively, with many others to follow in the future. What these images and stories are meant to do is to portray Isaias as a strong, energetic and busy leader without taxing him much physically and mentally – something that he cannot do given his serious and recalcitrant illness.

(Photo: the Ministerial Cabinet meeting as shown in Shabait.com)

Eritrea Ranked as Most-Censored Country by Journalism Group

Eritrea is the world’s most-censored nation, ahead of countries including North Korea and Syria, the Committee to Protect Journalists said.

The three countries are joined in the top 10 by Iran and Equatorial Guinea, the New York-based organization said in a report on its website today. Reporters in Eritrea, a nation in the Horn of Africa which won independence from Ethiopia in 1993, are conscripted into their work and handed instructions on how to cover events, the group said. The last accredited foreign correspondent was expelled in 2007, it said.

“No foreign reporters are granted access to Eritrea and all domestic media are controlled by the government,” the committee said. “Ministry of Information officials direct every detail of coverage.”