What is the current status of the preparations?

We have at the moment, finalized the action plan and also grouped secretariat projects into two categories i.e, legacy and festivities. We have also worked on all recommendations made by the Millennium Council on the logo, strategic plan document and other comments made by the council to make it very holistic.

As we aren't going into government or public coffers, we need organizations to fund our projects. So, we are also approaching those who can provide funds. We have received positive feedback from the potential fund providers.

What exactly do you mean by legacy and festivities?

As you may understand, this millennium is all about us, so we are going to celebrate it by showcasing our tradition and culture, the nations, nationalities and peoples will be promoted.

We will try to exploit the historical roots that have been here forever. We also want to display things that portray the geographical aspects of our country.

As part of that plan, we have a Millennium Walk that covers 2000 km along historical heritage sites in Ethiopia that are not as well publicized like Lallibela and Axum . This will help add to the existing historical route.

We also have the Africa Week where we show the traditions and cultures of African nations and that Addis Ababa is the capital of Africa . An African Film Festival (the Ouagadougou Film Festival) will be brought to Addis Ababa .

Sports and other activities will also be put on display, as we want to show our African brothers and sisters that we are celebrating this as an African Millennium. These are the kinds of festivities that add color to the celebration.

About legacy then, that is a completely different angle where this generation leaves its legacy to the coming generation. We are going to start this part by asking each household in Ethiopia to plant two indigenous trees. That, by the way, is how we are going to launch the celebrations.

Apart from launching the millennium, planting the trees has environmental implications of its own. Ethiopia has lost its image due to environmental degradation and we want to restore that by bringing the issue into families.

As you might remember, the millennium cornerstones were laid in Addis Ababa a couple of months ago and now we are replicating the cornerstones in all regional states. These cornerstones will be built into the museums of that regional state that will display different aspects of the region's tradition. A simple example is the coffee museum being planned for Kaffa and Bonga, we are going to build statues of different nations and nationalities that represent the nine regions of Ethiopia and show ‘unity through diversity'.

There are also plans for an athletics museum in Bekoji. Ethiopia has produced some of the greatest middle and long distance runners in the world. Ethiopian athletes were the first to bring Olympic gold to Africa and for that, we need to have a museum of some kind, where the souvenirs must be kept for the next generation.

Africa will have its own statue, making the statues ten in all.

Our plans also include placing a ‘Cradle of Mankind' book at the airport so that any foreigner that comes to Ethiopia can sign the logbook. This is one of the things that we gave the world and we want people to acknowledge that they have come to the ‘Cradle of Mankind'. If anyone wants to go to Afar and visit the place where Lucy was found, then they will be given a certificate following their trip, just like it is done in the North Pole and at the Equator.

All of these things are targeted at changing the image of Ethiopia (always associated with famine) that has been portrayed by media. Of course, famine has occurred, but it is a blip in our history, and does not represent 3000 years of rich history where we have contributed a lot to the world.

What poor friendly projects have you planned, especially for the many street children?

As part of our poor friendly projects, we have plans to lay a millennium school foundation where about 2000 under privileged students can obtain education. We believe that these children are not in school because they never had the chance and not because they are not intelligent enough. We plan to gather 2000 children from all over the country and give them the chance of a decent education here in Addis Ababa .

Once the school in Addis Ababa is launched, then we will pass the model on to other regions.

Apart from building the school, we have other projects in collaboration with other NGOs where we give lessons in entrepreneurship.

In this program, we do not provide jobs to street or underprivileged children, but we try to make them creative. Imagine a small project where you provide 200 shoeshine boxes per zone in Addis Ababa and train these children how to use them and with thousands of people coming for the millennium season, these children could go straight into making money.

Apart from the above projects, we have plans with Major Haile Gebreselassie to sponsor 2000 street kids to participate in millennium projects such as city cleaning and other trainings so that they could consider themselves as part of the society. Our approach is that the society is to be in the lead to celebrate the millennium.

These plans will not only be carried out in Addis Ababa as regional states will also be involved, and these regions have their own large projects as well.

Do you feel that it is rather late in the day? With time running out, do you think that you can reach your goals on time?

There is no question about it, we are late for various reasons. This office for instance, was opened about four months ago from scratch. We believe that it is time to get straight into the implementation and for that, we need money.

Our philosophical approach is that we say to the public ‘this is your millennium, let's celebrate it together in a very sensible way'. We don't want this millennium celebrated like just any other new year. We want to advocate attitudinal change where we can talk to and listen to one another in a very harmonious manner.

The council has four objectives; first is a national consensus, the second is to have a shared vision, the third is ‘let's change Ethiopia 's image using our national heritage and fourth, let's show the world our directions for the future.

We have to break the cycle of poverty, and for that to happen, people have to take responsibility.

Yes, I believe we can make our messages heard even though we are late. You see it is all about the people, where we all have to realize it is not only national, but also individual, where people have to take matters into their own hands.

We are about to leave a generational landmark and we have to work together on it. I mean it when I say that we are the lucky generation to see what Ethiopia looks like at the threshold of a millennium. If you pause and look at it, this is an opportunity as a nation to see where we are in terms of our culture and heritage and whether or not we are really walking together as a nation.

Of course, we are running short of time, but so what? We will do exactly how we planned it and I do not think that people will say that it is wrong to do the things we have planned. Even if it is late, I do not think that it is wrong for children visiting museums and learning about their heritage and history.

The important thing is that we have created the hype and we could use that to generate economic income. One thing we are also looking forward to introduce is an Ethiopian Day that will be celebrated along with ‘Constitution Day' where we are going to ask the entire population to wear traditional clothes.

This will be a beautiful and proud day to celebrate and with people agreeing to do so, imagine the job opportunities that will be opened for a line of people (cotton farmers, transport workers, weavers and wholesale and retail businesses).

What I am trying to say is that as long as public interest is galvanized, then we are not too late in delivering our projects.

The 8 th Ordinary Summit of the AU Heads of States made two resolutions sponsored by Ethiopia, namely; the year is to be African football year and also for the Ethiopian millennium to be celebrated as an African millennium. What is being done in this regard? Exactly how is Africa going to celebrate the millennium?

That was a very huge diplomatic and national victory for Ethiopia because Ethiopia 's contribution to Africa in many aspects is not to be ignored. Ethiopia has been at the forefront of contributing its share in de-colonialization, peacekeeping, the socio-political aspects and even in literature and history.

The fact that AU heads of states agreed to make this an African millennium shows that they acknowledge Ethiopia 's heritage. For other African countries, Ethiopia is a symbol of pride, independence, and endurance.

The decision coincides with the millennium council's plans of launching the African Week in May, where African countries can display their cultures and traditions along their designated streets.

There are projects such as sending artistic troupes to other African countries to promote Ethiopia 's culture and heritage so that the African countries can learn more about us. We also want to utilize the media to let the rest of the world know that Ethiopia is not what the media usually depicts it to be.

Is there a joint committee with the AU? How about funding?

We are going to work with the African ambassadors group and we have a meeting scheduled with the dean of the ambassador's group. We have also started discussions with the head of the African Heritage Commission - Advocate Gawanas - who is very interested in the matter. Advocate Gawanas, the AU chairperson and the Head of the ECA are members of the council and we are all going to work together on this.

Regarding funds, the AU will be involved as a body or individual member states will be involved through their embassies. They can also be involved in one project where on the eve of the millennium - the grand party - we are planning to bring prominent musical groups from Eastern, Western, Northern, Southern and Central Africa - the five regions of Africa .

Can you give us a realistic estimate of the number of expected guests for the celebrations?

We have been asked about this many times. If we go back to records of every year, we can see the trends of visits to Ethiopia . You can see that on any given year, 65-70,000 Ethiopians visit their country and adding the millennium factor, you can multiply that number by four or five, so we expect somewhere between 250 - 300 thousand visitors for the celebrations throughout the year.

The next question that could be raised is that of accommodation. We have to remember that all the visitors who come to Ethiopia will not stay only in Addis Ababa, they will go to the regions and most of all, they will be staying with close families (assuming that more than half of the visitors will be first or second generation Ethiopians), so it would be fair to say that there won't be problems concerning accommodation.

For example, the Harrari will be celebrating the 1000 th year of the founding of Harrar and so you can expect those people to go to their families in the Harrari region. We hope that this will be an eye opener, so that of people see that hotel and lodgings are a problem, then they will invest because we have no reference or precedent to what we are doing right now as to how Ethiopia can celebrate such a huge occasion. We do not want this to be a panic session where we will worry how and where people will sleep, we are more concerned with it being an eye opener to the general state of things.

About 290 million birr has been budgeted for the celebrations. How is it being utilized? Several projects have been approved for the millennium. How many have been launched and are you still open for other projects?

To begin with, this is going to be a documented fact, we didn't want this to be a government only project, so we invited the public to take part in it. The response was positive.

We came up with our projects and after assessing the cost of our projects, we are now trying to raise funds and we have received positive responses. But one thing is that the budget could stretch more than the 290 million or could shrink to a lesser figure.

We need to set the record straight on one matter - we do not approve or disapprove of any public projects. We have sent out letters of appreciation to some of the owners of the projects that we believe go hand in hand with the council's plans, but we don't approve any budget for the projects. If there are projects that could coincide with ours, then we will say that there is a problem with that.

We have planned the millennium lottery and raffles to be launched for the celebrations and other ways of raising our own funds, but we don't provide funds to other proposed projects. There are some companies that have asked to promote our projects or to provide services. We told them that if the need arises we would contact them.

It seems as if domestic business participation is limited and the diaspora are more involved in the matter?

There are Ethiopians from all over the world that have expressed their interest to get involved in the celebrations of the millennium, but I have to say that the domestic involvement is overwhelming. There are several proposals from the public and we have even gone as far as suggesting some ways of making their projects more vibrant and suitable.

It does not seem like the country is going to celebrate the greatest new year's party in its history. Do you think people are enthusiastic enoug about the millennium? Hasn't there been adequate promotion work?

We can't feel any festive mood because we don't know what to expect. But with the coming of the Millennium and with the holiday just a few days to go, you will definitely feel the vibe. The grass, sheep and chicken being sold everywhere will give the right note to kick start the festive mood in Ethiopia .

When I was in Europe for the Western Millennium celebration, the Westerners themselves did not know what to feel because this was the first time to celebrate such an event. But I assure you, with the approach of time, the festive feeling will definitely come.