Young people held in a crowded enclosure, from a Mereja album post on the arbitrary mass arrest of Addis Ababa youth, September 29, 2018. Photo: Mereja album [file photo]
Young men in several Ethiopian regions say militias in army uniforms are picking them up from streets and cafes, especially those without identity cards, and sending them to military service, DW Amharic reported.
The broadcaster’s youth program spoke to young people in the Amhara and Oromia regions, in Wolaita and in South West Ethiopia, who described the roundups as a fear that now shapes their daily lives. Most asked not to be named, and some asked DW to change their voices, for their safety.
Birhanu, a young man in Wolaita Sodo, said many of his friends who work as motorcycle taxi drivers had been taken. “We cannot stay out in town in the evening as before. When it is six o’clock, we go home,” he said, in Mereja Media’s translation. A young man in South Wollo said people could be picked up right where they were sitting. “We are living in shame. We are sure that tomorrow we will be taken too,” he said.
A young man who travels for work to Debre Birhan said he saw militia members in the Weragit area on Wednesday putting young men into cars and buses. He said he overheard militia members drinking coffee behind him complaining that each of them had been ordered to bring two young men. “Where are we supposed to find two each?” one of them said, according to his account.
A resident of Lude Hitosa district in Arsi, Oromia, said his own relative, a boy too young to fight and without parents, was among those taken. “Those with money get out with money. Those without money are in trouble,” he said, and he asked the government to respond. Young people told DW that the roundups usually happen after dark, that those taken are held at police stations for three or four days before being sent away, and that people who look rural, or who wear their hair long, are stopped and questioned at checkpoints. Several said that boys under 18 are among those being taken, and that the families of some who were taken earlier still do not know where they are.
Omar, a resident near Mizan Aman, said the roundups there were at their worst in August and September, when “anyone found on the road was caught,” but had eased this week. Birhanu said they had also slowed in Wolaita, which he put down to public anger and media attention. One young man who said he is a member of the army told DW that he had not heard of any order from the government, but he did not deny that the roundups were taking place.
The accounts come as the federal government fights Fano forces in the Amhara region and armed groups in Oromia, and as it faces renewed fighting in Tigray. Several young people said they did not object to serving the country, but to the way recruits are being taken. “If it were voluntary, nobody in our area would stay behind when the country calls,” a young man from Oromia said, adding that what is happening now “is like being kidnapped without the family knowing.”
DW Amharic said it called the head of the Amhara regional peace and security bureau, the head of the Oromia regional communication bureau and the Wolaita zone administrator for comment, but none answered. Mereja Media sent questions on Friday to the Government Communication Service and the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission asking whether any authority had ordered forced recruitment or quotas and whether minors were being taken. Neither had responded by the time of publication, and the accounts could not be independently confirmed.