Benishangul-Gumuz is also home to the government's prestige $5 billion Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. Sudan - The number of Ethiopian refugees in eastern Sudan - OCHA It shares common borders with the State of Amhara in the east, the Sudan in the north-east, and the State of Oromia in the south. Are there fears of exclusion? They have ritual specialists called gafea. Trend Reports - Deep dive analysis on market updates. [15][14], Later in the 19th century, Benishangul was affected by the Mahdi uprising. Bambasi (also known as Abba Moti) is a town in western Ethiopia. . The claim stems from the belief that Guba was gifted to Emperor Menelik II of Ethiopia (1889-1913) by Khalifa Abdullahi, a Sudanese Mahdist leader, in 1897. Various trade routes met in Benishangul, and local gold and Ethiopian amole (salt bars) were exchanged for slaves, cattle, horses, iron, civet, musk, coffee, ivory and honey (which also came from the Oromo areas of Sibu and Leeqaa). According to their traditions, in earlier times they inhabited the western parts of the province of Gojjam, but were progressively banished to the inhospitable area of the Blue Nile and its tributaries by their more powerful Afroasiatic-speaking neighbors, the Amhara and Agaw, who also enslaved them (Wolde-Selassie Abbute 2004). Unless the government and concerned parties give their attention to Benishangul-Gumuz, the country and the Horn of Africa as a whole is likely to soon feel the awful effects of an out-of-control conflict. Memos - premium analytical writing: actionable insights on markets and geopolitics. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed headed a meetingof Ethiopias National Security Council on April 24 to discuss the developments in Benishangul-Gumuz. People are not receiving the humanitarian support they need and the attention they deserve. Concise, actionable scenarios and predictions from top regional experts. This claim gained momentum after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed assumed power in April 2018. Some observers are now saying that the atrocities committed in Metekkel are reaching holocaust proportions. Turmoil blocks aid as communal conflict rages in gold-seamed Sister exchange marriage. Dozens killed in 'gruesome' bus attack in western Ethiopia All the cooking and brewing is carried out in earthen pots, which are made by women. The Benishangul-Gumuz conflict was an armed conflict mostly in the Metekel Zone of the Benishangul-Gumuz Region in Ethiopia that started in 2019, until peace agreement signed between the rebel groups and the government of Ethiopia in October 2022. The Benishangul Gumuz Peoples Liberation Movement (BPLM) was Sudan based rebel group built its operational zones in Benishangul Gumuz Region around remote areas of Assosa zone. It is the administrative center of Bambasi woreda . The five largest ethnic groups in Benishangul-Gumuz were the Berta (27%), Gumuz (23%), Amhara (22%), Oromo (13%) and Shinasha (7%). Gumuz: a dialect survey report. . They fired their guns and used swords to attack anyone they came across women, children, elderly people.. Since 2019, a cross-border collaboration programme has been implementing activities aimed to develop and enhance income-generating opportunities in the border area of Benishangul-Gumuz Region (Ethiopia) and Blue Nile State (Sudan), as a means of strengthening the population's resilience to instability and displacement and to improve overall living conditions. On April 19, Ahmed said that Ethiopia will fill the GERD reservoir in July and August, despite objections from the two downstream countries, Egypt and Sudan. The access situation in Benishangul-Gumuz and parts of western Oromia has evolved since OCHA's map from late January - some improvements but still large areas "hard-to-reach" due to the security situation & related restrictions. The officials believe that the Prosperity Party, to which they now belong, wants to eliminate the existing federal arrangement which guarantees self-rule to ethnic groups in the country. Text Alerts - Be the first to get breaking news, exclusives, and PRO content. Over 10,000 militia members were recruited and received government-sponsored military training in all weredas of the Metekel Zone. Egypts Al-Bawaba News, which is close to the state, reported in an April 23 article that a civil war is unfolding in Ethiopia due to the poor economic and social conditions in the country and its citizens being marginalized and isolated. Grottanelli, Vinigi, L. 1948. They speak the Gumuz language, which belongs to the Nilo-Saharan family. The murky politics behind the Metekel massacres, Benishangul conflict spurred by investment, land titling, rumors, Although the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE). Though a transit road has been built and commercial farms established in the lower basin the Gumuz people were seen in 2018 as politically "peripheral" in regard to the Ethiopian highlands that hold the power in the country. Conditions for travel within zones varies, but is often poor and subject to disruption by the rainy season. [1] Around 67,000 Gumuz also lived in Sudan. Haavisto also warned that Sudan is struggling to cope with the influx of people fleeing the fighting and said it risked creating a major refugee crisis. Photo: Benishangul Gumuz communication bureau Addis Abeba - A peace and development conference between senior officials of Ethiopia's Benishangul Gumuz region and Sudan's Blue Nile state has started today in Ad-Damazin city, the capital city of Sudan's Blue Nile state. 4 February 2022 Humanitarian Aid UNHCR, the UN refugee agency, and partners are rushing life-saving aid to more than 20,000 refugees after they fled clashes in Ethiopia's Benishangul Gumuz. What we need from the Ethiopian government is the green light to the humanitarian community to negotiate access to the Eritrean-controlled areas, to the opposition-controlled areas, he said. and militarization in Ethiopia's Benishangul-Gumuz Region led to the closure of the . Major roads are still closed. John Young, "Along Ethiopia's Western Frontier: Gambella and Benishangul in Transition". Comparative Komuz grammar. UNHCR and partners move refugees to safety in the Benishangul Gumuz region in Ethiopia. [13], According to Negasso Gidada, Oromo penetration into the region began in the mid-18th century. Bambasi has a longitude and latitude of 945N 3444E with an elevation of 1668 meters above sea level. Many of those who are still in the region are not getting humanitarian aid. Guba is the closest district to Sudan. Benishangul-Gumuz Region is one of the peripheral regions of Ethiopia bordering the Sudan. UNHCR and partners have moved refugees from Sudan and South Sudan to safety in Ethiopia's Benishangul Gumuz region. The government and its intelligence sector should reassess the routes and ways through which the militias are getting logistical support. This figure does not include the uncounted and unreported displacement of Gumuz and Shinasha people that took place within Metekel Zone. [citation needed]. All Gumuz are organized in clans. With widespread instability and difficulty reaching IDPs, victims of violence are out of arms reach from humanitarian assistancewhether from the regional government or from national and international non-governmental organizations. 28 Apr 2023 16:34:36 They said that many of the victims were ethnic Amharas and Agaws, who are a minority in that region. Over 80 killed in attack in Ethiopian border region with Sudan - state This is because the Blue Nile, which originates from Ethiopia, supplies up to 80% of the Nile waters. CAIRO Violence has been ongoing in Ethiopia's western region of Benishangul-Gumuz where the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) is located, with Ethiopiaannouncing April 26 that more than 200 people were killed and thousands were displaced in the ongoing clashes between the government forces and armed groups. As time passes, the Gumuz militias are strengthening their holdings and capacity, expanding and imposing their presence into Kamashi and Assosa zones. Uzar, Henning. Opposition political parties, like the Boro Democratic Party (BDP), rejected the 18 May agreement between the regional government and the leaders of the militias, which included power-sharing elements, as illegitimaterecalling that the only way to assume power should be through an election. [citation needed] The Gumuz number around 200,000 individuals. Even small-scale farm holders used to produce surpluses each year. The growth in needs here mirrors what we see happening around the globeand we implore the world not to turn its back on this region and, in particular, the extremely vulnerable communities of refugees who have limited access to livelihoods and rely on WFP to survive.. Violence Displaces Sudanese, South Sudanese Refugees in Ethiopia - VOA As such, one could go so far as to argue that even bothering to conduct an election in Assosa while postponing elections in Metekel and Kamashi is effectively pointless. Egyptian Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation Mohamed Abdel Ati said in a statement April 18 that Cairo submitted15 different proposals for the filling and operation of the GERD over the past years, so as to meet the Ethiopian demands without causing any damage to Egypt and Sudan. The attacks further threaten the stability of Africas second-most populous nation at a time when Mr. Abiy is already embroiled in an escalating conflict in the northern Tigray region, where he launched a major military operation on Nov. 4 that he said was intended to capture defiant local leaders. The violence might have ethnic undertones but this is a political conflict at heart. Benishangul-Gumz Regional Health Bureau; Benishangul-Gumz Regional Health Bureau. The dam's impact on the water supply depends on how fast it's filled, according to Elgendy. It is worrying indeed that the attention of national and international actors is turned almost exclusively to the war in Tigray. The Gumuz practice shifting cultivation and their staple food is sorghum (Wallmark 1981). 1993. (Calverton: Macro International, 2008), http://catalog.ihsn.org/index.php/catalog/3583/download/50086, "Exhibiting Cultures of Contact: A Museum for Benishangul-Gumuz, Ethiopia", "Ethiopia and the Mahdiyya You Call Me a Chicken? They also began to spread Islam among the Berta. [4] On 28 July 2009, the Regional Rural Roads Authority reported that over the previous year almost 600 of the 800 kilometers of local all-weather roads had been upgraded at a cost of 11.5 million birr, and an additional 447 kilometers of roads constructed. Ethiopia may not have control over the behavior of Egypt and Sudan. Read more: January 6, 2021, 4:10 AM On Dec. 22, Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed visited the vast lowland territory of Metekel in Ethiopia's far western region of Benishangul-Gumuz, the so-called. The Ethiopian Prime Minister called out his neighbors for fueling the recent round of violence in Ethiopia's western Benishangul-Gumuz region where the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam is located. With national and international attention being pulled in many directionsmost notably towards war in Tigraythe problems of Benishangul-Gumuz are being eclipsed. ", Ethiopia: Tackling environmental challenges with trees, "Benishangul Gumuz State Council appoints Ahmed Nasir as chief of state", Map of Benishangul-Gumuz Region at UN-OCHA, Map of Benishangul-Gumuz Region at DPPA of Ethiopia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Benishangul-Gumuz_Region&oldid=1151047051, This page was last edited on 21 April 2023, at 15:41. Separately, a European Union envoy warned the crisis in Tigray appears out of control, after visiting Ethiopia on behalf of the bloc. News: Benishangul Gumuz, Blue Nile States hold peace and security Haavisto repeated urgent calls from the international community for the Ethiopian government to grant full humanitarian access to Tigray, including areas beyond its control. Their claim to the entire Metekkel zone has fuelled Gumuz militia attacks on non-Gumuz residents. [14], Little is known about its history before the 19th century. 7,000 seek Sudan asylum after fleeing western Ethiopia violence From aboriginal to frontier society in western Ethiopia. Dessalegn Chanie, an Amhara opposition politician, said there had been signs in recent days that armed men from the Oromo and Gumuz ethnic groups were preparing an attack, particularly in areas where there was little federal security presence. As of 2007, there were around 159,418 Gumuz in Ethiopia. Finally, Benishangul-Gumuz local government officials have owned up to orchestrating ethnic targeted killings in Metekkel as push back against Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's new Prosperity Party,. Unseth, Peter. The regional government announced the signing of an agreement with the militia group on 18 May in Gilgel Beles town. #NEWS ALERT The number of #refugees in eastern Africa has tripled in the last decade to almost 5 million. The rights group said the Gumuz set the homes on fire and stabbed and shot residents. A general view of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in Guba, Ethiopia, Feb. 20, 2022. Bashanga, das Strafrecht der Baga-Gumuz. The massacre in Benishangul-Gumuz region, along the border with Sudan, is the latest challenge to the regime of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, who came to power in 2018 promising to unite Ethiopia but has struggled to contain a growing wave of ethnic violence.
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