The Eritrean Martyr’s Cemetary at Asmara, has once again received one of Eritrea’s most revered and dedicated heroes in its realm of eternal custody. Memhir Gebrekristos Andemariam’s untimely death has come as a shock to thousands of Eritreans at home and abroad. On August 9, 2008 those who loved and cherished him for decades flocked to the Eritrean Martyr’s Memorial Cemetery to pay their final respects to him. He was buried with all the honor and tribute due to a true martyr.
Many Eritrean dignitaries and high ranking government officials, including General Sebhat Ephraim (Eritrea’s Defense Minister} attended Memhir Gebrekristo’s funeral.
“Memhir”, as many of his friends and compatriots use to call him so fondly, was born in the early 1940’s from his father Balambaras Andemariam Ogbu and Mother LeteZion Teklehaimanot in the village of Adi Gebrai, Logo-Chiwa about 15 miles southwest of Asmara. After completing his elementary and secondary school education in Asmara and a teacher education program at the Evaneglical Lutheran College of Debrezeit in Ethiopia, he moved on to becoming a stalwart of the Eritrean struggle for Independence by dedicating 17 years of his precious life for the cause.
Memhir is survived by his wife Wo. Mebrat Kifleyesus and his children Meseret, Mihret, Emanuel, and Aaron.
When missionaries from the Swiss Nile Evangelical Luth eran Church set their foot in Adi Quala Eritrea from Switzerland in the mid-sixties they could not have found a better liaison and partner than Gebrekristos to accomplish their ministry. The project was a success story, thanks to the relentless and iron will of “Memhir”. Thousands of Eritreans are benefiting from the project since it inception.
In the late seventies, there were many windows of opportunities open for Memhir for the comfort and advancement of his own personal life - a scholarship to Switzerland, and a comfortable middle class life for his family. But he shoved all these opportunities aside to commit himself to the call for Eritrea’s struggle for freedom.
Memhir was one of the first freedom fighters with an unparalleled vision who recognized the need for political reconciliation between the major liberation fronts in the late 70’s. And as such he played a leading role in the initiatives that took place to get the competing and clashing fronts (ELF vs EPLF) resolve their differences and struggle united to defeat the enemy. And Memhir’s name will go down in Eritrean history as a visionary who had done what he could to bring a spirit of brotherhood and reconciliation in Eritrea at a time when the liberation effort was challenged by in-fighting and splintering. Although his counsel and oversight on the matter was not given the respect it deserved at that time, his iron will, wisdom and prudent judgment will endure forever in the minds of those who witnessed his noble acts and visionary spirit.
During the long struggle for independence Memhir served outstandingly in administering the liberated areas assigned to him. His god-given gift of connecting with people and feeling the heart beats of his fellow Eritreans helped him greatly to ensure that law and order prevailed and that people are availed with basic civic services in the liberated areas. His abilities to resolve conflicts were so astounding that thousands of people looked up for him for counsel and advice like a trusted brother, a father and above all a confidant and genuine liberator. He cajoled and wooed the people in their moments of despair and encouraged them to be steadfast in their support for the heroic fighters while at the same time maintaining an environment of peace and quiet and respect for the age-old Eritrean tradition of caring for one other during trying and turbulent times.
After independence Memhir was one of those well-deserving liberators who could easily have secured a well paying government job for himself. However, his vision of Eritrea was beyond rewarding himself in any way or form. So, he set on a different journey to accomplish his dreams. He was very steadfast in his belief that Eritrea needed to take up its fight to the economic front in order to tackle the economic challenges of a country which finds itself in the aftermath of a long and bitter war. His entrepreneurial instincts took him to Sahmbuko where he set up a commercial farm which turned out to be a model of success for the region. However, this success was short-lived as marauding invading soldiers vandalized and destroyed his farm and machinery during the 1998 border conflict between Eritrea and Ethiopia. However, there is neither a set back nor a feeling of desperation that could undo the iron will and love for work that he inherited from his father. He went on establishing a modern poultry farm powered by solar energy in Milala – a place that is 1.7 Km away from the Mai Nefhi Polytechnic Institute. By doing so, he prime pumped an economic life in that area which motivated many others to start ventures of one kind or another turning Milala into one of the sprawling economic centers in the whole of Logo Chiwa. His legacies will endure for ever among those who saw him working from morning to dusk to achieve reach a horizon that would seem to the average person as out of bound.
At a time when thousands of Eritreans are suffering from a frenzy of immigrating to Europe and America, Memhir has been resisting his wife’s and children’s persistent pleadings for him to come and live with them in a much more settled and comfortable environment in Charlotte, North Carolina where he could have been able to get a world class medical attention for his chronic Asthmatic condition. However, his love of his country held him back from accepting many of the things that his family and well wishers wanted him to do. And it was at this critical juncture that death knocked at his door and separated him forever, from his wife, children and large extended family both at home and abroad by whom he was loved and cherished so dearly.
May God Bless His Soul
