At the Expo grounds, a seminar with the strange title of Cultural Assessment was held for three days. This is one of the tricks of Isaias and his cronies. Whenever the overall situation of the people is at its worst, they invent something such as holding a seminar, a workshop, a symposium etc.

The three days session bore no fruit at all. Every participant was amazed as to why it was being held. It had no agenda and nobody knew what he should say. Where there is no cultural policy you never know what to say! There was a discussion that there should be a policy and a draft was read, but it was too short a time to talk about it. There was also a discussion on why people are fleeing the country. No body gave any answer. Most of the attendants were frustrated and sort of kept silent as if they were numb. This has become usual in all meetings held after 2003. Most of the time was consumed in criticizing the Bahlawi Guadayat chief for sending people he favored on foreign cultural tours etc.

Bahlawi Gudayat is headed by a mediocre person named Ibrahim Ali Akla. And so it has been for over ten years. Many an artist has wept under his nasty and misguided leadership. The only tangible thing that Bahlawi Gudayat has done for the last fifteen years is organizing the singing and dancing of the independence celebrations.  Unfortunately for them, it is one that people have become the most fed up with!

The bahlawi gudayat has no job description and no accountability for the many offenses it commits. There is no criteria for choosing artists who should go for the annual festivals in Europe, America and the Middle East. The bahlawi gudayat office tells female singers, "Zkonet seb ab bahli ket'atiw kela kitichamaleq mikwana kitfelit alewa." [you should be prepared to compromise your chastity if you want to be accepted.]  Artists who are boycotted face total punishment: they are denied exit visas, they cannot produce cassettes, they cannot perform at nightclubs and their songs will not be played in the PFDJ media.  In 1997, Nigeria plainly stated this in an interview with the free press of the time: Ms Halefti bahlawi gudayat xbuq diplomaciawi zmdna entezeyblka ktm'ebil zeyhiseb iyu. [unless an artist has a good relationship with the leadership he will not be successful even if he is a gifted artist.]

I know ladies who were courted sexually by the various leaders of the bahlawi gudayat. They refused to submit and they are suffering the consequences. Some gedayim derefti tegadelti [veteran singers/combatants] were told �Even if you have the talent you have become old!� These are veteran fighters and gifted artists like Abrehet, Gwal Halefa, Gwal Ankere, Tanki, etc. Mind you, these ladies were the pearl of our front some twenty years back. As usual the PFDJ has now discarded them.

A person who knows first hand what it is like to be discarded is the so-called Defense minister, General Sebhat Efrem.  Sebhat made a three hour speech lambasting Ethiopian music by denigrating it as melancholic and un-relaxing etc. He appreciated Eritrean music for its-nation building principle etc, he said.   As he put it, nay ityopia musiqa quzamen tztan tray iyu, natna gn hanaxi nhagernet zema'ebel wezete.

A few of those who spoke criticized why it took so many years to hold the seminar or workshop or whatever it is called. Mistakes could have been averted earlier, participants stressed. They presented the examples of four unnecessary deaths of their comrades:

1. Idris who burned himself by pouring kerosene on his body when the chief refused either to lend him cash from the organization or send him on a tour;

2. The singer of �Agamet� (I forget his name now, but he is the ex-husband of Elsa Kidane) who committed suicide because of financial problems similar to Idris's case.

3. Mekonnen Bit Bito who committed suicide by hanging himself after the chief of bahlawi gudayat refused to send him on a tour. Bit Bito's aim was to get some cash and buy anti retroviral drugs. This did not materialize and he finished himself.

4. Mekonnen (another Mekonnen) who contacted aids and Akla fired him on the pretext that he is a danger to other member of the Bahlawi Gudayat. He committed suicide.

Most participants stressed that the death of these dear fellows could have been averted.

So what do Isaias or Zemihret [Yohannes] want to tell us? After all, the artists, painters, authors, sculptors etc. are not free and don't have an association of their own. Excepting for Bereket Mengesteab (who has dual citizenship), nobody is free to go out and come back without a permit of Mr. Akla.  If you want to produce a cassette, you should pass the rigorous censure. You will probably get distribution privileges if you have someone in that section, if your songs are connected with the Warsay Yikealo or you sing a love story. Most artists know this and prepare the ground in advance.

The seminar, or whatever you call it, concluded by calling for having more seminars frequently, which is something they will forget as soon as they issue their proclamations. The last time they had this seminar was in 1995, so some of my friends joked with each other, "See you in the next cultural assessment seminar, in 2017!"