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THREAD: Oromo Liberation Army involvement in the kidnapping of 17 @dambi_dollo students of Amhara origins? No proven link thus far. But tweets by the armed group suggest that OLA fighters may have been in the vicinity as the students were being abducted.
It has been nearly two months since 18 students, fleeing a bout of violence at their Dembi Dolo University campus, were kidnapped. The group were aboard vehicles headed to Gambela when attackers forced the vehicles to stop & took the students into the nearby Qellem Wollega forest
The students haven't been seen since. A coverup of sorts has ensued as the @PMEthiopia's office claimed it had obtained the releases of 21 of them, although there has been no trace of the freed students. Parents of the students continue to plead the return of their children.
A number of family members have spoken to media outlets. Family members have told local outlets that they were told by their children that they were kidnapped some 30 km or so on the road out of Dembi Dolo.
Asmra Shumiye is the lone student who managed to escape the kidnappers, three days into the hostage ordeal. She told Addis Standard that the abductions happened just after their vehicles left a small town on the Dembi Dolo to Gambela road (Image: Asrat TV)
There is a lengthy road to Gambela from Dembi Dolo and it has a couple of alternative roads that later fuse back into one major one. It isn't clear exactly which path the doomed vehicles took. I've pinpointed what towns are roughly ~30km on the road from Dembi Dolo to Gambela.
This area is 34 km away from Dembi Dolo University. You can trace it with coordinates 8.640594, 34.655700. As you can see, there is a small town dissected on the road & upon leaving the town is road surrounded by thick forest, as described in multiple interviews by Asmra Shumiye.
Using alternative roads, this town at about the same distance. Coordinates are at 8.620414, 34.632585. Small town, with what appears to be large scale farming or industry linked properties and small homes nearby.
Both towns/villages are in areas which fit the description by Asmra as being surrounded by thick forest and greenery. They are the only ones that would fall in the 30km location radius that relatives told media was the approximate distance from Dembi Dolo.
The OLA use a Twitter handle, @OLA_Command to issue communiques about their movements across parts of Oromia. There is no way of independently confirming the claims. They claimed to have inflicted battle field losses against the Ethiopian army in November. https://twitter.com/OLA_Command/status/1202046897239871488
The OLA claimed to have routed Ethiopian army divisions on the Western front, Wollega. A witnesses told @dw_amharic in November that the army attempted to encircle OLA fighters in the area & failed to do so. The army appears to have sustained losses. https://www.dw.com/am/%E1%89%A0%E1%88%9D%E1%8B%95%E1%88%AB%E1%89%A5-%E1%8B%88%E1%88%88%E1%8C%8B-%E1%8B%8D%E1%8C%8A%E1%8B%AB-%E1%8A%A5%E1%8B%A8%E1%89%B0%E1%8A%AB%E1%88%84%E1%8B%B0-%E1%88%98%E1%88%86%E1%8A%91%E1%8A%95-%E1%8A%90%E1%8B%8B%E1%88%AA%E1%8B%8E%E1%89%BD-%E1%89%B0%E1%8A%93%E1%8C%88%E1%88%A9/a-51110191
The Ethiopian army rarely release communiques and when they do, never admit to battleground defeats. But if what has been reported is relatively accurate, much of the western front area was under unchallenged OLA control for much of late November, early December.
Since their reported victories, the OLA hadn't released any communiques about the western front command coming under attack until late December. Then they claimed that OLA camps in Mugi & Anfilo were attacked nearly a month after the military's failed attempt at taking the area.
The OLA's claims would put their bases in Mugi and Anfilo, both within the western Wollega front. But these bases are also only 26km and 15km away respectively from this first location where the students are believed to have been abducted. https://twitter.com/ZekuZelalem/status/1221972592023785473
If we take the other village suspected of being near where the abductions took place, it would be 23km from Mugi and about 15km away from the Anfilo forest, which in early December, were said to be the location of OLA camps. https://twitter.com/ZekuZelalem/status/1221975367864504320
The road to Gambela would have taken them through Mugi. Barely weeks after battles in the area, local drivers are likely to avoid driving through a town prone to breakouts of battles, but Asmra Shumiye also told the BBC that the drivers collaborated with the kidnappers.
All in all, if what the OLA claim is true, the area where the abductors forced 18 Dembi Dolo students of Amhara ethnicity into the forest, was surrounded by OLA fighters from the western command. No Ethiopian army units contested these areas on Dec 4th, the day of the abductions.
If what the OLA claim is accurate, the only encounter they had in the western zone with the Ethiopian army, was in Begi, nearly a hundred kilometers way from the territory where the kidnappings took place. There are no other known armed groups operating in the area.
In its military campaign to rout out the OLA presence from Wollega, the Ethiopian army has committed countless state sanctioned killings of civilians in the area. The Oromia Support Group documented many of them in a report published this December. https://advocacy4oromia.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/osg-report-51-human-rights-abuses-in-ethiopia.pdf
The Oromia Support Group's findings were covered by the BBC's Afaan Oromo Desk and it has become painfully obvious that the government would be unlikely to win votes in the region due to its heavy handed military tactics against the local population. https://www.bbc.com/afaanoromoo/oduu-50731592?ocid=socialflow_facebook
It is believed that the mass kidnapping would benefit the government, if the larger public were to believe that the OLA were behind it. It would get support behind the military campaign. But in recent weeks, its own silence has garnered it bad press and nationwide condemnation.
At the same time, kidnappings by the OLA would also portray the government as weak and unable to maintain control of the country. Which could partially explain why the government has gone to great lengths to keep the story under the wraps.
It isn't clear who is behind the mass abduction. But if what the OLA stated via Twitter is true, they would at the very least have an idea or have heard about it. It's hard to believe that their forces, which collect intel in the area would miss out on an abduction of this scale.
In a recent interview, OLA Western front commander Kumsa Diriba, better known by his nom de guerre Jaal Marroo, claimed that he had first heard of the kidnappings when a BBC journalist asked him about it over the phone. I would say that it is safe to say that this isn't true.
The OLA would likely be unwilling to admit any culpability as it would seriously tarnish their image & serve to prop up support for the military campaign against them, in particular amongst the Amhara populace. Which would explain their unwillingness to acknowledge the issue.
Whatever the case, the students remain missing & both parties in the ongoing military conflict in Wollega likely know the truth and refrain from notifying an increasingly frustrated Ethiopian population.
The agony of the families goes on as we enter day 54 of their ordeal.
The agony of the families goes on as we enter day 54 of their ordeal.
For more background information, check out our coverage at @AddisStandard here.
Thank you. https://addisstandard.com/analysis-more-questions-than-answers-as-news-of-kidnapped-university-students-turns-into-political-ping-pong/
Thank you. https://addisstandard.com/analysis-more-questions-than-answers-as-news-of-kidnapped-university-students-turns-into-political-ping-pong/
