The Q

  This piece is inspired by a conversation between Soli and Tsion, two political women in Ethiopia, on Ajrit podcast . Ajrit podcast is run by Addis Powerhouse, a feminist online advocacy platform. In this episode, Soli refers to an article she and Mahi wrote on Zone 9 blog and received a response from myself and Endalk, along with others . Soli stressed how ridiculous we were in our response and was forced to revisit it. I still didn't recover from the embarrassment of learning that I used to think like that. 

  Befekadu Hailu  My friends and myself, who passed through Maekelawi's torturous experience, along with others campaigned and had the government decide to close the most notorious Detention Center that live three regimes and almost half a century in Ethiopia. In February 2019, Five years after I was detained and tortured in Maekelawi, I went to the closing Center to fetch my laptop confiscated five years before. I arrived while the name tag of the Center was being shattered and one of the uniformed guards said to me, “ you have this place closed ”; I shrugged like ‘proudly’. That little moment gave me a sense of victory, telling me that the activism and its subsequent sacrifice was not in vain. I felt we actually effected a change. Six years later, I started to doubt it all retrospectively.  The political transition that started six years ago is known by many as ‘the change’ ( lewtu in Amharic), but what really explains it is ‘the violence’ ( newtu in Amharic).  Ho...