CIVICUS condemns suspension of 42 NGOs
July 25, 20009
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation condemns a move designed to further restrict civil society activities by the Ethiopian Government -- which has suspended the operations of 42 NGOs for "acting out of their mandate". Authorities in the Southern region of Ethiopia have accused NGOs reporting on human rights abuses as seeking to interrupt peace and development of the region.
"The latest action by the government is another sign of Ethiopia's rapid slide toward increasing levels of authoritarianism," said Ingrid Srinath, Secretary General of CIVICUS. "It seems that no stones are being left unturned to curb democratic dissent and marginalise voices seeking accountability of public institutions."
Earlier this month, a new anti-terrorism law was passed with provisions ambiguous enough to label peaceful blockade of public services or incidental damage to property during public demonstrations as terrorist acts. The broad ambit of the law curbs media freedom and gives security forces extensive powers to carry out surveillance and intercept communications, restricting civil liberties.
The suspension of the 42 NGOs is the latest in a series of moves to restrict civic space in the country. In January 2009, the government introduced a law to limit the activities of civil society organisations (CSOs) to a mere service delivery role by preventing them from promoting human and democratic rights, gender equality, conflict resolution and accountability of law enforcement agencies if they received more than 10 per cent of their funds from international sources. The law also curbs the independence of CSOs through provisions that permit the authorities to institute inquiries against them on unspecified grounds and require them to give advance notification of meetings.
CIVICUS fears repression and further restriction of democratic rights in Ethiopia in the run up to 2010 national elections. The disputed 2005 national elections in which the present government held on to power were followed by large scale arrests of opposition activists, journalists and civil society defenders.
CIVICUS calls upon the Government of Ethiopia to revoke the suspension of NGOs and review restrictive aspects of the Charities and Societies Proclamation and the Anti-terrorism Proclamation to bring them in line with international standards and best practices.
CIVICUS: World Alliance for Citizen Participation is a global movement of civil society with members and partners in over a hundred countries. The Civil Society Watch (CSW) programme of CIVICUS tracks threats to civil society freedoms of expression, association and assembly across the world. In 2008, CSW tracked threats in 61 countries across the globe.
For more information contact:
Devendra Tak (devendra.tak@civicus.org), Communications & Media Manager
or Mandeep S.Tiwana (mandeep.tiwana@civicus.org),
Civil Society Watch Programme Officer
Tel: +27- 11 -833 5959 mob: +27 714698121
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July 21 2009 - Ethiopian authorities have suspended the operations of 42 non-governmental organisations allegedly involved in activities that are “out of their mandate” in the Southern region of the country.
Ethiopia’s Southern regional state justice office chief Mr Yilma Meresa told this writer that those NGOs were out to interrupt the peace and development of the region.
Mr Yilma refused to disclose the name of the suspended organisations. However, he hinted that most of them were local NGOs.
The Nation has learnt that international humanitarian organisation Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) and two local gender rights organisations are among the suspended NGOs.
The Ethiopian government moved to revoke the licence of the NGOs following accusation of their alleged involvement in reporting human right abuses in the rural areas.
Ethiopian government publicly accused some NGOs of supplying “inaccurate” information to the United States’ State Department, which was published in March 2009.
Food aid
Meanwhile, United Nations humanitarian office in Ethiopia has warned that the number of people who need food aid in Ethiopia will increase to 6.2 million unless more food aid can be secured.
The recent number of people requiring food aid has been 4.9 million and now the country needs additional 390,000 metric tonnes of emergency food aid for the coming three months.
Ethiopia leads the region by registering an average 10 per cent annual economic growth, has been avowed to end hunger but has achieved less success.
Landlocked Ethiopia is also facing port congestion at port Djibouti which delays the flow of food aid to the country.
Recently, World Food Program (WFP) urged Ethiopian authorities to prioritise the transport of food aid rather than agricultural fertilizer, which is equally important for the second most populous African nation at 85.2 million (UN, 2008).
According to WFP, Ethiopia government agreed to prioritise transporting food aid and allocate more berths for ships to offload available food aid at port Djibouti
Source: Reuters
