A Horn without borders……….

The Pankhursts are an illustrious family with a history of engagement in political, civil rights and academic pursuits. Professor Richard Pankhurst has followed in his family’s tradition and for the last half century has defined modern studies in Ethiopian history. Capital’s Tesfu Telahoun caught up with the busy scholar and presents excerpts from an extensive and exclusive interview with the eminent Ethiopicist.

Our readers would welcome an update on what you are doing and also about the rest of your family…
Thank you for asking. My wife Rita, our son and daughter and myself are all very well. At the moment I am busy preparing for the 17th International Conference of Ethiopian studies in Trondheim, Norway. Its part of an international series began in Rome in 1959 and since then, has been organized in various cities including Manchester, Addis Ababa, Rome again, Paris, Kyoto- Japan, Moscow and now in Trondheim. This conclave is going to be different from the others because it will be the first conference since the advent of computerized communications technology. Formerly, we used to have some difficulty in getting conference participation letters and applications across. Now, everything is on -line as they say – so it has been easier organizationally.
My wife Rita is doing a paper on what she calls, ‘The Foremothers of Empress Taitu’. You know, we have the English word, ‘forebearers’, which means male ancestors but Rita has invented a new word ‘Foremothers’, to specifically refer to female ancestors. Her paper is on Empress Eleni, Empress Seble and the wife of Ahmed Gragn, Webera. It will deal with these three important women of the 16th century and their historical influence on Empress Taitu – Emperor Menilik’s queen.
I am writing about innovation during the last years of Emperor Menilik’s reign and the short lived Lij Eyasu period. Alula is also writing a book but I don’t recall the title.

Something seems to be wrong with the terms we use when referring to September 11, 2000 and onwards. Is it the new Ethiopian Millennium, the end of the second millennium, the dawn of the third…? How should we refer to it…?
Well, its officially been called the new Ethiopian Millennium….
It certainly is a new Millennium. However, it is not the millennium. Would you agree that we have passed two millenniums and are two months shy of entering the third?
Yes, I would say that the more exact terms are to call it as either the end of the 2nd Ethiopian Millennium or as the third new Ethiopian Millennium. In any case, it is a new thousand years.

It can be safely said the you have almost single-handedly defined the direction of the compilation of works on Ethiopian history. What is the secret of such prolific academic output?
I suppose its due to hard work and a commitment to collecting historical material. I am always gathering materials on Ethiopian history and eventually, a time comes when there is enough information collected in order to form it into an article or either a so- called learned journal. These are journals which probably will be read by half a dozen people or the artist’s friends!
Oh, much more, according to Capital’s regular readership surveys and the fact that your fortnightly Pankhurst’s Corner receives thousands of hits, making it one of the most popular pages on www.capitalethiopia.com
I used to write for the Ethiopian Herald and later on for the Addis Tribune and now I’m writing for the Capital. I also write for Selamta (in-flight magazine of Ethiopian) with an article in each quarterly issue, mainly for the encouragement of tourism to Ethiopia.
I love writing for a newspaper that reaches the wider public, like does Capital. I do get many e-mails and other correspondence after people read Pankhrust’s Corner.
I feel that if you do research about something, it should not be only for scholars but more importantly, accessible to the wider public.

Do you have any idea of how many articles, journals, books and other works you have written?
I’ve written about two dozen books and maybe 200 hundred scientific papers but the more popular articles, I’m afraid I haven’t counted them.

Do you have a record of all your works?
I do of the so-called scientific ones.

How would we identify your scientific writings from the popular (newspaper) ones?
The scientific ones have footnotes!
Entertaining me with amusing anecdotes from history, the jovial master of Ethiopian studies poured excellent coffee brewed of course the Ethiopian way and served in tiny cups and saucers exquisitely detailed in Ethiopian motifs. Not being able to resist a question I had promised myself not to omit, I took advantage of the less formal atmosphere the coffee break offered.
As should such questions be put, I gently asked him how he would like to be remembered and indeed, if he could tell us how old he is…
Its much too early to answer the part about being remembered. As for how old I am, well, I will tell you about the great Persian poet Hodja. He had once told an enquirer that he was 47 years old. Twenty years later, he was still saying he was 47. He was again confronted by the age question in public so he replied, “I have said I am 47 and shall remain so because I am a man who does not go back on his word.”

Amused and also somewhat chagrined at perhaps having committed a faux- pas, I immediately went to more serious matters. Professor, from your vantage point of studies in Ethiopian history, how would you describe the last half century and what is your forecast of the Ethiopia of 2050?
The last 50 years is the Haile Sellasie period, the Derg era and the current period of EPRDF government. There have been major changes during these regimes and all within a relatively short period of half a century. Now, what about the future? I think the population will go on increasing. The rate of population growth in Ethiopia is far too rapid so I fear the economic gains from improved agriculture, industry and so forth will be largely overtaken by the pace of population growth. The average wealth will not increase as much as one would expect from a growing economy. I think urbanization will continue to increase greatly. We are going to have more and larger roadside towns and unfortunately, the difference between rich and poor will probably widen quite substantially.
On the cultural front, much has to be done for the preservation of antiquities. Whether this will be done or not is difficult to see because it depends on policies. Finally, as far as the future is concerned, one thing we can say for certain is that the future, by definition, is unknown.

What are the main challenges that have faced our country historically?
In the past its been the preservation of territorial integrity, independence and national unity. It may well still be a question of integration of the country; unity of the nation at large. However, I think that one shouldn’t look at Ethiopia in isolation, one has to look at Ethiopia in the Horn of Africa. It seems to me that the barriers that have divided the Horn of Africa into various countries have to be overcome. Essentially, I think in the long run, you can’t have a separate country to the north controlling the ports with very little hinter land and a huge country in the interior without access to the sea. Sooner or later, it seems to me, that has to be solved. In economic terms. I’m not necessarily prescribing what the political structure would be, but economically, there has to be monetary union, federation – or some other kind of economic union.
It sounds like the nucleus of a Confederation of Horn States …
Yes, and its quite possible. It could be modeled on the highly successful E.U model, adapted to the particular concerns of the larger East Africa region. Such a union I think, will eventually be the only way of solving the complex problems of the Horn. This will be the challenge of the future for especially, Ethiopia, which is the region’s center of gravity and the one force that stands the best chance of pulling the other sides together.

Professor, the vision of the OAU’s founding fathers and that of its successor the AU’s, was and still is to create a United States of Africa. In your opinion, has this dream been effectively acted upon by the OAU/AU ? Do you think regional and continental unity is at all possible given the state of disunity in Africa?
It has certainly not succeeded in all of Africa as a whole. It seems to me that the question of Darfur is a very significant case in point. It’s a major catastrophe that has not even begun to be solved despite the fact that it is almost a holocaust.
As far as unity is concerned, I think that the people of the Horn of Africa can become more successful than the rest of the continent, This is because so many cultural links exist among the Horn countries. You may recall many years ago, Donald Levine wrote a book about the similarities of the different peoples of Ethiopia. Traditions and people cross frontiers. Many ethnic groups are found on both sides of boundaries- in terms of Ethiopia with Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia, Kenya and Sudan. So I think integration is the natural order of things. After all, there is a strong case for union because separately, none of these countries mobilize great wealth. If the Horn of Africa and Ethiopia could unite in what we would call the Greater Horn, it would be a major market and an economic powerhouse. Think about the cultural developments. I believe its worth creating this union.
We have seen enough conflict on the basis of separate states on the Horn of Africa and it can’t be any worse to have a union and probably, would be much better in economic and social terms, I would like to see a Horn without borders. Then there wouldn’t be the problem of people being on the ‘wrong side’.

Any particular messages you would like to convey?
Yes. I would like to see them put up the Axum obelisk that was brought back from Rome. I would like to see them erect the other obelisks. It seems to me that the Rome obelisk deserves to stand in its very own spot once again, where it was produced. At the same time, if it should be erected, so should all of the others. There is nothing special about the returned obelisk. That’s what the people of Aksum wanted in ancient times. It would be of major value to re-establish the pride of the people of Ethiopia and a major event in terms of history.
Are the problems technical in nature or is it a matter of resources?
I don’t think its technical. It could be done quite easily. I don’t buy this idea of financial difficulties. If people really want to do things, they do then. I’m not saying they should all be put up immediately. You put up what you can when you can. The most difficult one would be the large (35meter) stelea which is splintered in several places but we could start with the smaller ones.
I would also like to see the return of the loot from Meqdella.
We at AFROMET (Association For the Return of Meqdella Treasures), believe that these treasures contain some of the finest manuscripts ever produced in Ethiopia.