Continuing their peaceful struggle against the fascist regime of Mr. Zenawi, Oromo students at the University of Gonder, Bahir Dar and Maqale began hunger strikes in their respective campuses. The strikes were first begun in the University of Gonder earlier and later followed by Oromo students in Bahir Dar and Maqale Universities. In these strikes more than 5,000 Oromo students have participated.
The aim of the strike at the University of Gonder was two-fold. Their first demand is to protest government's collective punishment of all students in the case of 280 burned houses in Gonder. Failing to do anything in this case, the government is engaged in a blatant harassment of students under the pretext of apprehending the culprit. They demanded the government stop the harassment immediately.
The second, perhaps the most important, aim is to protest the killings of Oromo school kids in Oromia and elsewhere perpetrated by the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) and its Trojan horse, the Oromo peoples Democratic Organization (OPDO). In co-operation with other Universities in the northern part of the country, Bahir Dar and Maqale Universities, Oromo students are in a general hunger strike.
These striking Oromo students have forwarded the following demands:
1. The killing of Oromo school kids must stop immediately and the perpetrators must be brought to justices without a delay.
2. Stop fighting on Oromo land and natural resources.
3. Oromos right to self-determination should be respected.
4. All imprisoned members of the Mecca and Tulama Self-help Association must be freed and their organization allowed to operate.
5. The fundamental questions raised by the OLF are indeed the questions of the Oromo people and Oromo students as well. Therefore, let the OLF take over the administration of Oromia.
6. The past, May 15, elections were held in the absence of the true representative of the Oromo people, the OLF, therefore the Oromo people cannot accept the results of the elections. We demand that another round of election be held in the presence of the OLF.
7. We demand all Oromo political prisoners (estimated about 18,000) released immediately and those who were working reinstated to their jobs with appropriate back payments
8. The names of all Oromian cities, renamed by successive Abyssinian regimes, must be restored to their proper names and the administrations of Finfinne and Dirree Dhawaa must be under the jurisdiction of Oromia state.
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Victory to the Oromo People.
External Information Division
Foreign Relations Department
Oromo Liberation Front
November 17, 2005
