Presidential spokesperson and the permanent secretary in the ministry of Media, Information and Broadcasting Services George Charamba has said that President Emmerson Mnangagwa’s government was not going to extradite former Ethiopian dictator Mengistu Hailemariam. This comes after reports that the opposition has been calling for Hailemariam to be extradited to Ethiopia so that he can face justice. Charamba also told the opposition not to meddle in issues that it had no knowledge on.
Hailemariam fled from Ethiopia in 1991 after a brutal reign that left thousands of people dead and was granted asylum in Zimbabwe as an official guest of former president Robert Mugabe. Mengistu who was given the nickname “the Butcher of Addis Ababa” was convicted of genocide in absentia in December 2006 and sentenced to life in prison. However, after an appeal, he was sentenced to death in absentia by the Ethiopian High Court which overturned his life sentence.
Charamba said that Mengistu’s extradition was not on the new government’s priorities. Speaking to the Daily News, Charamba said:
I thought that was not a domestic issue, Where are they (the opposition) coming in?
The Ethiopian government has not said anything, who then are they to poke their noses when his own government has not said anything?
We cannot be seen spending time and effort on that issue when there are pressing national issues to attend to.
After all, we have so many other people in this country. Don’t we have the Rwandese, the Congolese and Mozambicans, why then him.
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the new Zimbabwe has to correct itself and has to respond to the standing demand of the Ethiopian people
This is great decision. In my opinion Mengistu Haile Mariam has done a lot to his country. A lot of people in Ethiopia still love him. To mension some of his achievements are: Land to the tiller, land reform. The first time in centuries every farmer is entitled to get 10 hactars of land. Before that proclamation Ethiopia had the worst land holding system in the world. Land was owned by royal families, aristocrats, land lord feudals and according to emperial constitution one third of fertile land belongs to Orthodox Church. Most of the farmers were tenants. His campaign to irradiate literacy was admired by UNESCO and many countries.He is also admired for declaring first time in history religion equality in Ethiopia. While the masses still love him very much of course there are other groups who dislike him.
This group of people are feudals who lost their massive land holdings to the people, royal families who lost power and domestic wealth, anarchists, sessetionists and other political groups.I know this Zimbabwe leadership understands this fact and are behind Ethiopian people.
Thank You, God Bless Zimbabwe.