Bogus Claims and Press Releases in the name of our Vanguard Organization by a group of renegades & an unprincipled faction do not represent the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF)
OLF Press Release
As the most senior and the vanguard Oromo political organization that spearheaded the Oromo People’s liberation struggle for almost half a century, the OLF has, incessantly, been providing a comprehensive leadership to the Oromo people’s quest for freedom. Undeniably, the organization has endured innumerable ups and downs filled with the alternating vices and virtues of success stories as well as devastating setbacks. Attacks from within the organization by some renegades and associated machinations from outside had subjected the OLF to many difficult terrains at different times.
In the course of the last three years, a clandestine group that camouflaged itself as part of the OLF leadership also returned to Finfinne (Addis Ababa) in September of 2018 along with the entire OLF leadership that relocated from Asmara to Addis Ababa following talks between the OLF and the then Ethiopia’s ruling party, the EPRDF. The cancerous clique that barricaded within the leadership for years, eventually allied itself with the newly formed ruling prosperity Party (PP) and took off its mask around 2019, while still attempting, though in vain, to disguise themselves as part of the legitimate leadership. Ever since, they came to be known, to Oromos and other Ethiopians alike, as OLF-Hilton/OLF-PP because their founding meetings used to be conducted at Hilton Addis Ababa aided by the ruling PP with all the necessary logistics for its missions.
In light of these circumstances, the group, hereafter, known as OLF-Hilton/PP has played vital roles in the incarceration and jailing of almost all the OLF leaders at different levels for the purpose of executing the group’s very mission of debilitating or destroying the strong foothold OLF has commanded within the Oromo populace. The OLF-Hilton/PP group, primarily composed of such gullible souls as Ararso Bikila, Ibsaa Nagawo, Tolera Adaba, Qajeela Mardaasaa, and Atoomsa Kumsaa openly embarked on the mission of smear campaign and misleading propaganda press releases against the Oromo people’s struggle led by the OLF, only in exchange for some handouts from the ruling PP discharged to them in the forms of petty cash par-dime including food & beverages.
Once the group succeeded in putting all the best & the brightest of the OLF leadership behind bars including the home confinement (house arrest) of the Organization’s legitimate Chairman, Mr. Dawuud Ibsa, the OLF-Hilton/PP’s self-appointed Chairman’s & Deputy Chairman’s continued deception of appearing as legitimate leaders of OLF couldn’t materialize as orchestrated but remained a hoax. Adding to the paradox of this fake group’s claim, the illegitimacy of the OLF-Hilton/PP was ratified by the Commission of Ethiopia’s Electoral Board, the very right arm of the ruling PP itself for which the group was in service, when the commission determined the group as an illegal entity that cannot represent the OLF.
Currently, the conflict-ridden ruling party, the PP, which is in its deepest crisis of all times found it necessary to pull its jokers that it set aside as its fire fighters at the time of such tensions. Subsequently, it called the very group, that it deemed illegitimate through the decisions of its Electoral Board, to the rescue assigning each member of the OLF-Hilton/PP to appear on government as well as government affiliated media outlets and release press statements in the name of the OLF with the intent of condemning any opposition to the ruling party. The group has openly declared a propaganda warfare on the Oromo People’s struggle in all its forms.
In the fire fight campaign to the rescue of the PP, renegades in addition to the Hilton group, individuals such as Galaasa Dilboo, Diima Nagawo & Co., who parked the Oromo people’s struggle in their own terms 21 years ago decided to side with the PP in the ruling Party’s fight against the Oromo people. We, therefore, convey our concerted message to the Oromo people both at home and abroad to be vigilant of the destructive efforts of these traitors.
In conclusion, OLF re-affirms that the conflicting propaganda campaigns and press releases blubbered by such traitors as Ararsoo Bikilaa, Qajeelaa Mardaasaa & associates in the name of the OLF, as well as those similarly floating on the various government owned/affiliated media groups do not represent our vanguard organization, the OLF by any standard. It is also imperative to carefully watch for directions being given by the legitimate structures of the OLF at different times. We believe that it is a high time to discern between propaganda and legitimate messages pouring in the name of the OLF now a days.
Lastly, it is our sincere advice for those who knowingly or unknowingly joined the camp of the unprincipled and those who chose to seek refuge under the armpits of the Oromo people’s enemy late in life despite the natural course to have ones’ own people as a sanctuary at an old age to reconsider a return from the path that you have currently charted. The long journey to freedom that the OLF and the Oromo people started decades ago has already entered a new phase. And that is ascertained by the establishment of the Oromo Youth Movement for Freedom (QEERROO) which is a generational transfer of the struggle as an act a continuity that cannot be halted by any earthly power. We believe, taking this realty into account would help find ones’ own place in the dynamics of the Oromo people’s struggle for liberation.
Long Live OLF!!
Victory to the oppressed masses!!
Oromo Liberation Front- Foreign Organizational & Political Aff