Jonathan Dimbleby is not only known for "breaking the news" to the world about the 1974 Ethiopian famine but also was the one courageous British broadcaster who asked Prince Charles, ex-husband of the late Princess Diana, a question other British jouranalists did not dare to ask: "You had an affair with Camilla Parker Bowls?"

Dimbleby's visit to Ethiopia is believed to have been sponsored by Meles Zenawi, the premier who shops out in the international market to purchase Peace products. News of the bogus "Peace Prize" had to be spread across, and one such dignitary worth inviting as a personal friend was Dimbleby. "Meles," says a former Meles confidant, is known for spending whatever it takes to meet his own greedy personal ends."

When Dimbleby asked Meles if he would accept defeat in the ballot box, Meles said he would consider himself a failure if he would not do that. Dimbleby took Meles true to his words. The British journalist doesn't have a background knowledge to challenge Meles who, when the majority of TPLF officials asked him to resign last year, he had warned that his resignation would only come at turning Mekelle into a sea of blood. (Why Mekelle? Because TPLF meeting that sought Meles' resignation was held there.)

But the story drastically changed with Dimbleby. The craftiness of Meles Zenawi stands at opposite ends with the late dictator Col. Mengistu. A similar question was hurled at Mengistu in the mid-'80s in Addis Ababa. When a foreign journalist asked Mengistu if he would consider allowing the formation of a party other than his own "Workers Party of Ethiopia," the Colonel said: "That is unthinkable. If any party is created that opposes WPE, it would be crushed in the same fashion EPRP was crushed." The journalist labeled Mengistu a "blood-thirsty Marxist autocrat."

However in reality, there is little difference between Mengistu and Meles over committing gross human rights violations. But Meles exploits the media for his own advantage by readying himself ahead of time with answers for questions western journalists are known for throwing at their interviewees.

All said, we have no regrets about Dimbleby, except underscoring that Ethiopia's woes are far from being heard. Dimbleby compared the current Ethiopia with the country 30 years ago. He brushed aside or didn't know that UN Development experts only last week said that "Ethiopia is worse as it was 20 years ago," and was spiraling down the development index.

The conditions that prevailed when Dimbleby came 30 years ago and when he visited the country recently are quite different. Today's Ethiopia is flooded with NGOs like World Vision or Munschen fur Munschen - two charitable organizations out of an estimated 140 NGOs that spend millions of dollars each year on humanitarian services and limited sustainable development ventures. These NGOs may not reduce the grinding poverty that is gripping Ethiopians. But it doesn't take a social scientist to consider the role NGOs play in thwarting famine-induced deaths.

In addition, there is the government-run Disaster Preparation and Prevention Commission (DPPC) which the tyrannical regime of Meles Zenawi uses as a flagship of its success story in averting deaths from hunger. In reality, Ethiopians see DPPC as a symbol of how a discredited regime would keep a country of 65 millions of people at the mercy of international food handouts in a country that has the potential to feed a population 10 times its current population.

But again, Dimbleby would not consider that as a fact. He said it was sad there was only one hospital for the 100,000 residents of Dessie town. Dessie is home to at least half a million people, and someone telling Dimbleby that Dessie's inhabitants number around 100,000 is part of the public relations exercise of the ruling clique. Second, Dessie having no other hospital means the failure of the current regime. If this could not be a failure of a government at the helm of power for 11 years, what else could be?

To sum up, Ethiopians have a war to win. No one understands our enemy better than us because we directly bear the brunt of being under the rule of an inimical regime. Though those Ethiopians capable of making friends out of foreigners of goodwill are encouraged to do so, the key to resolving Ethiopian problems lies in the hands of Ethiopians. The end of Meles Zenawi would not be as smooth as Meles told Dimbleby - 'a smooth transition of power.' If Meles had an intention of handing over power, he would have counted years in retirement. Like any African dictator whose end is marked by bloodshed, the end of Meles Zenawi would not also be any different: it would be a violent one.

By then, if Dimbleby regretted his words and said "Meles broke his promise of handing over power peacefully," it would not make sense to anyone: The damage is already done. The key to resolving our crisis lies when we act in one spirit to remove a mercenary regime, and save the country from being a perennial site of human tragedy in the conscience of human kind.

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