{"id":839015,"date":"2026-11-14T16:30:00","date_gmt":"2026-11-14T21:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/?p=839015"},"modified":"2026-11-14T16:30:00","modified_gmt":"2026-11-14T21:30:00","slug":"harar-residents-tell-dw-amharic-a-corridor-project-has-bulldozed-centuries-old-homes-inside-the-jegol-wall","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/839015","title":{"rendered":"Harar residents tell DW Amharic a corridor project has bulldozed centuries old homes inside the Jegol wall"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Badri Bari gate in the Jegol wall of Harar, in a file photograph from April 2015; residents told DW Amharic that corridor work has demolished old houses near this gate [file photo]. Credit: Bikoadem via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).<\/em><\/p>\n

Residents of Harar’s walled old city of Jegol, a UNESCO World Heritage site, told DW Amharic that a corridor development project has bulldozed centuries old houses near one of its five historic gates.<\/p>\n

One resident said houses more than 600 years old were torn down around the Badri Bari gate, also known as Buda Ber, and that families who had lived in them for generations were displaced and given nowhere to go. “Jegol is a heritage city. Everything in Jegol is heritage, the houses, the buildings, the mosques, the footpaths and even the trees,” the resident said, calling the demolitions a crime against history. Residents said the cleared land is now being offered to investors.<\/p>\n

Another former resident said the people of Jegol were angry because the old buildings are the mark of their identity. “They say they will rebuild it as it was, but how can heritage return once it is destroyed?” the resident asked, adding that people who spoke out were now afraid. Several residents told the broadcaster that the corridor work had cleaned up dirty areas and was welcome in itself, but that it should never have touched protected buildings.<\/p>\n

Abdunasser Abdullahi, a historian of Harar’s culture and heritage, told DW that Jegol is known as a living museum and that “none of us will escape responsibility” for its destruction. A DW listener, Bashir Ahmed, wrote that during Ramadan this year elderly residents were forced from traditional homes in Badri Bari and that the regional government had demolished 64 traditional Harari houses, a figure Mereja Media could not verify.<\/p>\n

The wall was built in the 16th century under Emir Nur ibn Mujahid, and the old city, listed by UNESCO in 2006, holds 82 mosques, more than 2,000 traditional houses and 102 shrines, according to DW. The broadcaster said its efforts to reach Ethiopia’s Authority for Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage were not successful. Mereja Media found no statement from the Harari regional government or UNESCO on the demolitions by Friday evening.<\/p>\n

Sources<\/h4>\n