Africa 2000

This, the first year of the new Ethiopian millennium, is also a celebratory year for all of Africa. It is recalled that 8th A.U. Summit of Heads of State, which convened a few months before the grand, nationwide and internationally celebrated dawn of our third millennium, declared the event to include all of Africa.

This is a great honor bestowed upon our country by our African brothers and sisters and as a token contribution of appreciation, Capital for the last 49 issues has devoted this space to support the initiative.

Togolese Republic

Togo is a silver of a country sandwiched between Benin and Ghana and capped by Burkina Faso. The nation is nearly 25 times smaller than Ethiopia. Yet it has a diverse ethnic mix of over thirty seven distinct tribes with the Ewe, Mina and Kabre being the largest.
Although it is a fairly small country, Togo is very fertile and enjoys abundant rainfall. The country is relatively well endowed with natural resources including exploitable deposits of phosphates, limestone and marble among others.
Togo’s early political history reflects the historical realities of European colonialism and the Scramble for Africa. The was called Togoland and partitsicned area among Germany, France and Britain . The British part of Togo land became the Republic of Ghana in 1957 and the French sector emerged as the Togolese Republic on April 27, 1960.
Post-independence Togo has been synonymous with the late Gnassingbe Eyadema, who assumed power seven years after independence and went on to be Africa’s longest serving head of state until his death on February 5, 2005. President Eyadema was succeeded by his son and political heir Faure Gnassingbe, by a process that met with the disapproval of the international community Under pressure to hold a free ballot, young Faure eventually won and was elected president on April 24, 2005. There was a brief period of strife when the opposition claimed foul and some rioting erupted in the capital.
Togo is a member of all major international organizations including of course the A.U. The nation has played constructive roles on numerous continental issues ranging from anti-colonialism to anti-apartheid and development to sports and culture. Africa 2000, Capital’s unique contribution to promoting the African character of the new Ethiopian millennium, bids the Togolese delegation welcome to Addis Ababa. May the summit be a resounding success!

Facts and Figures

Location- South coast of West Africa, Ghana on west, Burkina Faso on north, Benin on east,Atlantic Ocean on south.
Area- 56,785 sq.km
Topography- Hill country from Southwest to Northeast divides Togo into two plains regions
Population- 5,701,579
Distribution –40 % urban
Ethnic Make-up- 37 tribes including the Ewe, Mina and Kabre.
Languages – French (official) Ewe, Mina, Kabye, Dagumba others
Religions –Indigenous beliefs,Christian and Muslim.
Capital City – Lome, pop- 1,337,000
Government Type – Republic
Head of State–President Faure Gnassingbe, since 2005
Head of Government- P.M. Feleti Sevele, since 2006
Currency- CFA Franc (XOF) = 472.78=$ 1 US
Gross Domestic Product - $ 9.3 bln
Per Capita GDP -$ 1,700
Economy –Coffee, cocoa, cotton, yams, corn, phosphates, cement, handicrafts
Electricity Production – 180 mln kwh
Life Expectancy – 55.8 male, 60 female
AIDS Rate – 3.2 %
Airports – 2
Literacy rate- 53.2%
Ports- Lome’
Rail roads – 568 kms
Vehicles –76,000 units
Telephones –82,100 lines
Radios – 244 per 1000 people
TV sets – 22 per 1000 people
Internet – 320,000 users

Facts and figures are the latest available at time of publication and may not necessarily be the most accurate.

Africa Unite: A Celebration of Bob Marley’s Vision

By Abiy Demilew

The yet-to-be-released Africa Unite A Celebration of Bob Marley’s Vision captures Marley’s dream of African unity and the efforts to make it a reality.
The documentary focuses on the ‘Africa Unite’ concert, held in 2005 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, and the other activities that took place then to celebrate the mission of reuniting Africa.
Directed by Stephanie Black, who is also known for the documentary Life and Debt, the film is a coherent flow of events past and present. It brings together the lives of the Marley family, national figures in Africa, members of UNICEF, devout Rastafarians and the youth who are trying to make a change in their world.
The film begins with clips from the ‘Africa Unite’ concert as Marley’s sons Ziggy, Stephen, Ky-Mani, Julian and Damian take the stage, all dressed in white, African-style tops.
The focus is on the fervent response from the massive crowd as Ziggy quickly goes into the Bob Marley song, Africa Unite. The concert is used as a means of showing not only the family and Bob’s music, but also to present the different messages in the music that are touched on throughout the documentary.
Although the film is centered around Bob Marley and the concert, it explores many themes and shows the impact of the dream of unity on the lives of others. It shows the significance of Marley in people’s lives as different persons attest to his influence, some even citing him as a father figure and someone to always look up to.
Persons traveled from across Africa, Japan and Jamaica to the ‘Africa Unite’ 2005 concert, at which clips of Bob Marley talking about why unity was so important to him and his world views were shown.
Vital role by young people
Young people play a vital role throughout the film as they give their reasons for being involved in the ‘Africa Unite’ movement. Whether they want to be musicians, doctors or economists, they all have one goal - unity among all Africans. Juxtaposed to this are stories from the older generation through Jamaican politician Dudley Thompson, actor and UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador Danny Glover, and various lecturers on what it means to be truly free, not worshipping a colonial flag. Thompson captures it best when he says, “Now you don’t need to look at the Western world for knowledge, but to Africa.”
Probably the most touching part of the film is the journey of Ras ‘Bongo’ Tawney. Tawney is a devout Rastafarian who highlights the persecution of Rastas in the beginning as he emphasised “the system tried to wipe us out”.
Touching scene
He talks about the discrimination Rastas faced in the early days, which is supported by video and newspaper clips of the crimes against Rastafarians in the early ’70s. Tawney sees the accomplishment of a lifelong dream - to enter Ethiopia. In a touching scene outside of the Cathedral of Haile Selassie, Tawney almost breaks down in tears as he describes how he has dreamed of coming home to Africa for almost all his life.
The sections on the Marley family are narrated in large part by Ziggy Marley, who tells of how happy he and his brothers are to be in Ethiopia for their father. Giving brief looks at the various functions attended by the brothers, it gives rare insight into the interaction of the Marley sons.

‘Gin Lemin?’

Directed by: Solomon Muhe
Written by: Esmael Hassen
Type: Suspense
Duration: 110min.

By Kirubel Tadesse

He was seven or eight when his mom left him. Even if he cried his eyes out to keep his mother around, his mom had to walk away from him. But to his advantage, she left him rather to a caring woman who left him all of her fortune when she died. He was adopted and lived a fancy life with his new mom before she passed away and created an opportunity for his real mom to reinvent herself.
Zekareyas, the main character in this Amharic new film ‘Gin Lemin’ (Why?) couldn’t just forget in the past and accept his mom after decades of abandonment. But his decision of just offering help from a distance killed his mom since being a mom to her only child was the only thing that kept her alive. Even if Zekareyas rushed to her after learning the old history of his mom, it was too late to save her life. She took her own life after losing hope to be a mother of her son who she conceived through horrible group rape.
‘Gin Lemin’ takes a real twist after this. Even if the people who raped her contributed some to his mom’s years of pain and suffering, it was his rejection which made the woman take her own life, but the main character Zekareyas decides to take a revenge for his mom without at least showing emotional break down of some kind for his part.
Looking for revenge for Zekareyas didn’t become a road to bad experiences but to love too. All the surprises and how every thing wraps up smartly at the end are for viewers to find out. Even if the director tells this touching and sad story, he still managed to have funny scenes and keep the audience entertained.
A family related story, where one has some dark secrets and it hunts him down at the end or it hurts the ones he loves is almost a theme of all Amharic films. As one actress told Capital, it is the fact that these films are the ones who were found to be appealing to an Ethiopian audience but, the directors and the authors should be able to find some other themes for their films who can find an audience. Otherwise, all Amharic films are soon to fall under one category and bore away the audience they wish to keep.