A Piecemeal Approach Cannot Remove Structural Political and Economic Injustice.
OLF Statement on the Unfair Policy of Safaricom
The recent action of Safaricom with regards to staff recruitment has shown a lack of fairness. That has triggered substantial social media campaigns in which the Oromos have taken the lead in protesting against the injustice. OLF encourages voices and activism against all kinds of injustices.
OLF condemns any form of injustice. The right of access to equal work opportunity is one of the milestones of economic freedom. It is not clear why the injustices in the process of staff recruitment by Safaricom have been so obscure so far and have just surfaced at this particular time. Yet it is another incident that has scratched Oromo wounds once again.
However, this should not be engineered in a way that makes Oromo youth dwell on this piecemeal rather than focusing on broader Oromo political and economic rights. The Oromo are systematically marginalized for over a century from the major, institutions, companies such as the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia, Ethiopian Airlines, Ethiopian Telecom, and other economic sectors such as import and export, real estate, industry, and local commercial sectors. The higher government officials confirmed this, including the current Prime Minister, in front of the Federal Parliament.
What has taken place in Safaricom is one of the systemic marginalization of the Oromo, and portraying it as if that is exclusively the deeds of Safaricom is a ruse made to divert the Oromo youth’s struggle for a broader political and economic freedom. It is another vindication that the systematic marginalization of the Oromo is deep and further entrenched in the economic and political structure of the country such that international companies themselves imitate the established system. It shows, once again, that economic structures, including foreign direct investments, perpetuate the conventional system of injustices and marginalization as long as they are promoted by a government that represents and upholds oppressive political and economic systems. This particular drama, we believe, is orchestrated by a group who intend to reap political gain, and after some time, they would tell us that ‘the issue is resolved.
It has to be clear for the Oromo at large, and the Oromo youth in particular, that struggling for a Democratically elected government that abides by laws designed to protect Oromo interests is the only viable solution. A piecemeal approach is intended to divert attention and elongate undemocratic institutions and state apparatus’s that has structural and systemic problem.
Victory to the Masses
Oromo Liberation Front
17 August 2022
Finfinnee
