In April 2019, Tadias Magazine spotlighted #MeTooEthiopia, a grassroots campaign whose blunt line was “Assault is a Crime, not a Culture,” after diaspora and domestic reports of gender-based violence kept breaking into public view.
The piece centered the suicide of Selemawit Tefera Kelbessa, a former Ethiopian Airlines crew member who had survived an acid attack in Maryland and then years of trauma. Activists used her story and others to argue that silence around assault was itself a social system, not private misfortune.
The campaign collected testimonials online and insisted media in Ethiopia and the diaspora stop treating violence against women as taboo gossip. That demand cut across politics: it was about courts, families, workplaces, and whether reformers in Addis actually prioritized survivors.
As reference, #MeTooEthiopia marks a moment when Ethiopian feminism forced a harder public vocabulary. Naming assault as crime, not culture, still sits at the center of rights reporting that refuses to look away.
Sources: Tadias Magazine
