Sidama Liberation Front
header hb
.

SNLF Statement on Shiferaw Shigute’s Political Crimes in Sidama and South Ethiopia!
12/26/2017

Shiferaw Shigute is one of the current Ethiopian politicians. He was one of the EPRDF officials who masterminded and carried out the Loqqee massacre in Sidama in 2002 in which Sidama peaceful protestors were mass-slaughtered in a broad light in Loqqee suburb of Hawassa town.

Because he is from the Sidama region, people may think that he cares about the Sidama people and the nation at large. The reality is the very opposite. He can’t help it, but he detests the Sidama people although he loves to own their wealth and resources, as he is already doing in partnership with the TPLF bandits who are hell bent on remaining in power employing sheer level of brutality against the civilians of the entire country. Shiferw Shigute has amazed a vast wealth today (he is a Dollar Millionaire) by looting Sidama and the entire Southern region in partnership with top TPLF officials whom he serves with absolute loyalty. His family and close friends live a life style of wealthy western nations while many Sidama today are destined to live on food handouts. Moreover, Shiferaw also has been assigned by the late PM Meles Zenawi to play key role in displacing from their homes and properties; over 25,000 peoples of Ethiopia whose ethnic origin is Amhara, who lived in the south, notably in Guraferda for generations.

Shiferaw Shigute worked in one of the Sidama's district government offices, known as Horroressa, about 200 KM from Hawassa when he begged Hailemariam Desalegn to recruit him for a position in the Southern region in 2001, citing his ethnic affiliation with the latter. The offices where he worked were often dominated by TPLF's loyalists including himself. But he always went an extra mile to please the TPLF bandits to climb to a higher political ladder solely for his personal benefits.

Literally, Shiferaw Shigute is an immoral thug who has no sense of responsibility hence unable to empathise the pain of his own people. He is a typical example of self-centred and abusive individuals ever have existed in the world, not only in Sidama land and wider Ethiopia. He can’t help it simply because he is a criminal egoist who rejoices when the people are let down and subjected to dehumanising practices. This is what he is doing as we speak. Many believe that he is taking revenge on the Sidama people following condemnation of his corrupt practices and thuggery by the Sidama elders and the public during the 2012 Sidama New Year Fichchee celebration in Hawassa.

Due to his inherent nature, it didn't take him a long time to learn corrupt practices be it political, ideological, moral, religious, financial and all sorts- which he learnt earnestly from his TPLF’s bosses. As TPLF/EPRDF looks for such corrupt and anti- society groups to use them to perpetuate its minority rule in the country, Shefraw was their perfect choice. Today, he is paying TPLF back more than they demanded by keeping the Sidama and southern nations under perpetual slavery using public funds and the TPLF security forces to quash any dissent. Even when the Oromo and Amhara parliamentarians officially opposed the TPLF domination in the country, Shiferaw, as the political leader of the “Southern Peoples’ Democratic Movement” a puppet EPRDF constituent party in the south, he forced the parliamentarians from the south to side with the TPLF. He envisages the south to remain the TPLF domain even after the Oromo and Amhara achieve freedom.

As part of his vindictive measures against the Sidama nation, he hates the Sidama people and their national quest for freedom and democracy with passion. The “so called” Sidama people and their demand for their rights always infuriate him. The hatred of the Sidama nation aches him deep into his bone hence, he always plans new strategies to submit it to the TPLF so that they can allocate more budget to enslave the Sidama people and the entire south. This is what he has been doing for the last 17 years or so. Furthermore, he has also officially condemned all those who have shown tendency of Sidama nationalism. He has adopted various tactics and employed all measures in his capacity as a henchman of the TPLF to imprison, intimidate, harass, assassinate and displace those Sidama persons who say single word against the TPLF’s apartheid. He has done all at his capacity as a mercenary leader in the south to harm the Sidama people and other nations of the south and their national interests, to further dehumanise and humiliate them. He is doing it now and will continue to do so. This is Shiferaw and, he can’t help it.

Instead of punishing him for his inexcusable crimes, when he left Horrorressa district, he was promoted to Southern Region where he worked day and night to inflict more pain and suffering on Sidama people by strictly enforcing TPLF’s merciless measures against the nation. As we indicated earlier, he together with the rest of anti-Sidama elements masterminded several attacks on Sidama nation including the Sidama Looqee massacre of May 24, 2002 where the Sidama peaceful and unarmed protestors mass-murdered in broad day light. He has happily facilitated the displacement of tens of thousands of Sidama peasants from lands surrounding Hawassa city, to allow the TPLF generals and politicians trade with the Sidama land as is the case in Oromia, Amhara, Ogaden Somali region and in the rest of the country.

There is nothing which makes Shiferaw happier than seeing the suffering of the Sidama people due to manmade injustices. He gets personal gratification whenever he sees them suffering. He is determined to continue to do so unless the Sidama people stop him with their struggle for freedom and democracy. For the moment he has employed sheer level of the TPLF armed forces to totally subdue the Sidama and various southern nations. The TPLF/EPRDF regime has allocated millions of budgets (from the Sidama money) to implement these anti-Sidama policies on a regular basis.

Currently, he is handed one of the top jobs in TPLF/EPRDF authoritarian Ethiopian regime, simply because of his evil credentials, sadistic nature and barbarism to his own people for the last 17 years. Thanks to his being inhumane, he is automatically assigned to such a position of national TPLF/EPRDF's spokesperson although he was fired as minister of education for gross incompetence. He is protected by the top TPLF elites and Hailemariam Desalegn. Although utterly incompetent, he is groomed to do this job as he is the most faithful and subservient slave. He cannot feel the pain of those whom he brutalises, rather, he enjoys the fact that, he is in a position to do so. He does care dearly for his position and personal gains than the rights of over 5 million Sidama nation and 17 million subjugated southern nations.

When the other former cadres of the TPLF/EPRDF regime regret for their past mistakes by agreeing with their respective peoples to resist the TPLF brutal rule and domination, Shiferaw is the only ruler of the oppressed nations outside of the Ogadeni Somali ruler, who decided to maintain his loyalty to the TPLF, with renewed vigour and commitment. Hence, the current Oromo and Amhara rejection of the TPLF’s dominance and brutality, hugely infuriates him as a loyal servant of the incumbent regime. He does not possess such humanistic quality, hence is proving the total loyalty to the barbaric rule of the incumbent regime. Although the regime is in its final phase, he does not believe the end of his mentor (TPLF) authoritarian regime, until they are all dragged out of their cadges.

Finally, if the Sidama and southern nations unite with the Oromo and Amhara resistance, he knows his life will come to an abrupt end. If the TPLF is ousted, he can’t live in Sidama land due to the crime he has repeatedly committed against individuals and the nation. He can’t live in other parts of the country either as his crimes are known everywhere. He can’t even peacefully live in Europe or America enjoying his millions of dollars, he has accumulated by looting it from the Sidama and entire southern nations in the past 17 years simply because, they can potentially take him to an International Criminal Court (ICC) for the crimes he has committed thus far.

It is up to him to choose to immediately join the popular struggle for freedom from TPLF or be consigned to the dust bin of history with the TPLF rogue regime.

The Sidama National Liberation Front (SNLF)
December 26, 2017