Ethiopian children in an aid camp.
Ethiopian children in an aid camp. Credit: Bethy Bayeh Credit: Bethy Bayeh

“Some days I cry and cannot talk.” That’s what Bethy Bayeh told rabble.ca during an interview about her experiences helping children at internally displaced persons camps (IDP) in Amhara, Ethiopia.

Born in Assab, Eritrea to Ethiopian parents, Bayeh attended college in the U.S. Over 32 years later, the nurse returns to her ancestral homeland bringing humanitarian aid assistance.

Bayeh had landed in the US a few days before we spoke via zoom. She was renewing her visa and gathering supplies before returning to a country entering its third year of internal war.

Bayeh works with family, friends and the Ethiopian diaspora to raise funds and gather supplies. She has become a compelling, seasoned storyteller that allows her to be a conduit between donors and those in dire need.

About 2,700 children are struggling to survive at the internally displaced persons (IDP) camp in the town of Debre Birhan 120 kilometers north east of the country’s capital city, Addis Ababa.

According to Bayeh, the children in the Debre Birhan camp are civilians from Wollega in the Oromia region. They may have come alone, or with one parent, a relative, or neighbours.

Bayeh interviewed some of the people in camp and was told that most of the children saw their mothers raped and their fathers slaughtered by Oromo Liberation Forces (OLF)-Shene which had a relationship with the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA). The TPLF forged a formal alliance with the OLA during the conflict.

In the camp, Bayeh saw a child clutching the teacher’s clothing and following him everywhere. When asked if the boy was blind, the teacher told Bayeh the boy had watched his father being slaughtered and that his trauma was still very raw.

Bayeh knows she can’t remove the trauma but she can help the children feel settled, like they belong and know they are loved. She said they also need an education to avoid falling into the vicious cycle of hatred.

“We want them to play. We want them to be children again. We try to sustain at least a normal environment for children. Over time, they start smiling, running, they come and hug you. That’s a change for us to see,” said Bayeh. “They may sleep on the floor. They may not have enough food. But at least they’ve become a child again.”

When the volunteers serve lunch, the children come with plates that have holes, pot lids for plates and even plastic bags torn in half so they can hold their food.

Bayeh has also travelled to the Afar region and admits having a soft spot in her heart for the Afar people. She noted, “It’s too far away. Nobody’s looking at them. Nobody sees them. And, they’re not as often on the news. I don’t think they have much representatives or diaspora.”

Afar is home to nomadic goat herders. Their way of life was already being irreversibly impacted by climate change and attacked by government policies encouraging them to move into permanent settlements. But now the war has wreaked havoc on the region and its people.

Bayeh interviewed a displaced woman who had made her way to the Dubti hospital in the capital city, Semera. She had arrived at 1 a.m. the night before with her nine children.

She told Bayeh that she had over 400 goats and camels, a sign of wealth in this region. But she had to abandon her herd when the fighting forced her to flee with her children and elders through the mountains. Their wealth was gone and all they had was the clothes on their backs.

Bayeh was able to travel around Afar and as far as the Eritrean-Tigrayan border with the help of Valerie Browning, Program Coordinator of Afar Pastoralist Development Association in Ethiopia (APDA) and co-founder of the Barbara May Foundation (BMF) which provides maternal health care free of charge.

Affectionately referred to as ‘Mother of Afar,’ Browning is an Australian nurse who came to Ethiopia in 1973 and never left. In 1989, Browning married Ismael Ali Gordo, an Afar leader, and in 1993 the couple co-founded ADPA to address unmet health and education needs with a focus on vulnerable women and children.

Via email Browning told rabble.ca that March 2018 was the liberation of Ethiopia from TPLF control.

“The incoming PM was full of enthusiasm. He was eager for dialogue and discussion to get the country going in the direction of one nation. Previously, Ethiopia had never known free-speech. It was totalitarian and repressive for so many including the Afar I live with,” Browning wrote.

Browning recounted TPLF invasions and wars that have taken place in Afar since the start of the war on November 4, 2020. The TPLF initially entered central western Afar displacing almost 220,000 people while destroying all health facilities, education facilities, water schemes and community houses and herds. That invasion ended December 3, 2021.

From December 17, 2021 to early May 2022, there was fierce fighting that included the use of rockets and tanks. About 280,000 people were displaced and all facilities and property looted.

From August until the present, another 210,000 people have been displaced due to various battles.

Displacement means people are literally living under trees with extremely limited access to food and clean water. APDA health workers are the only source of health care, maternity care, and water purification.

Browning observed, “While I have been living with the Afar society for 33 years, this is really by far the worst catastrophe I have seen with injury, people dying of lack of food, living under trees with no real shelter, no ability for more than health workers’ assistance – hospital up to 800 kilometers away.”

With hospitals destroyed, or great distances away, and ambulances burnt, women are birthing under trees. Browning said that 368 children under 3-years of age died while their parents were in displacement near Dubte because they only had contaminated water to drink.

Ethiopian water contains lethal levels of sulphur that have to be filtered out before it’s safe to consume. Desperate children are dying from drinking unfiltered water.

The entire region has massive food insecurity that has resulted in malnutrition in the hardest to reach areas.

“People are still isolated from food. APDA buys up food for pregnant and breast-feeding mothers as well as children, taking it to the hardest to reach areas by camel. Also, those affected need immediate recovery — need to get their livelihoods back,” said Browning.

According to Browning, most TPLF soldiers are under 20-years of age and many are girls. She has seen them lying dead on the battlefields after the TPLF leave.

Ann Fitz-Gerald, director of the Balsillie School of International Affairs and a professor in Wilfrid Laurier University’s political science department, told rabble.ca that the TPLF is not only using child soldiers, but they are telling the children, ‘do not give your hand,’ which means never surrender – kill yourself first. And, there is no returning to Tigray if you do surrender.

It’s now widely confirmed that the TPLF demand each family surrender one child to the army otherwise parents face imprisonment. It’s known as the ‘one fighter per family’ rule.

Fitz-Gerald calls this the loss of a generation.

She travelled this summer to two IDP camps and interviewed 162 people of varying ages in focus groups and one-on-one. The camp in Amhara was home to 620 Tigrayan civilians while the Afar camp held over 15,000 Tigrayan fighters who were either captured or surrendered.

The TPLF ruled Ethiopia for 27 years and during that time established an elite squad that has been infiltrating international organizations. They were also amassing a large budget to create what Fitz-Gerald refers to as a ‘digital army’ ready to do battle on the internet.

When the TPLF left office in 2018, the government coffers were empty. Those funds are now being used to launch digital attacks and pay Washington-based lobbyists and law firms that have issued threatening letters to individuals, and their employers, who deviate from the TPLF narrative.

Fitz-Gerald was told by interviewees that United Nations (UN) aid trucks entering Tigray were redeployed to support the TPLF armed insurgence into Afar and Amhara regions. The trucks were used to transport fighters and distributed the supplies to TPLF leaders, fighters and businessmen with links to the rebels.

One respondent described the TPLF shooting down surveillance drones used by the Ethiopian government. When hit, the drones sprayed shrapnel. The TPLF told local and international media that the shrapnel was proof the federal government was bombing the area.

Hunger drove 71 per cent of respondents to leave Tigray region. Women also fled because they were being threatened with imprisonment after their sons had left the region to avoid forced conscription.

Every fighter interviewed said they were forced to join the TPLF and said they were told to take their own life instead of surrendering to the enemy.

Respondents also described persecution of non-Tigrayan members of their families along with forced separation and forced divorce during the crisis.

The accumulation of wealth by the TPLF that was redirected to family members, many of whom lived in the US, was mentioned by 78 per cent of fighters.

TPLF claims of tensions between Tigray and bordering regions were refuted.

A full 64 per cent of those interviewed indicated the constitution needs to change because the current constitution facilitated and supported the TPLFs ‘divide and rule’ ideology.

A truce between the Ethiopian government and Tigrayan forces was signed November 2, 2022. It brings hope for peace, but Fitz-Gerald maintains the child soldiers will require psycho-social support to transition back to a stable, age-appropriate life. She also believes that the world needs to hear from more ordinary Tigrayans to really understand what happened on the ground and who is telling the truth about the internal conflict.

Doreen Nicoll

Doreen Nicoll is weary of the perpetual misinformation and skewed facts that continue to concentrate wealth, power and decision making in the hands of a few to the detriment of the many. As a freelance...