Examination of Witnesses (Questions 217
- 219)
TUESDAY 20 FEBRUARY 2007
RT HON
HILARY BENN
MP, MR ELWYN
GRAINGER-JONES,
MR GREG
BRIFFA AND
MR IAN
CURTIS
Q217 Chairman: Good morning, Secretary
of State. Thank you for coming to this our final evidence session
on Water and Sanitation. First of all, would you like to introduce
your team?
Hilary Benn: On my left is Elwyn
Grainger-Jones, Head of Sustainable Development Group; on his
left is Greg Briffa, the Team Leader in the Water, Sanitation,
Energy and Transport Sustainable Development Group; and on my
right is Ian Curtis, Senior Adviser on Growth, Pan-African Strategy
Department.
Q218 Chairman: You will know that
two weeks ago the Committee was in Ethiopia. We are doing our
report on water and sanitation internationally but we went to
Ethiopia as our case study and had an interesting and enjoyable
visit. Before we get onto water and sanitation can I say we did
come away with some serious concerns about the political situation
in Ethiopia. We had a meeting with the Prime Minister, Meles Zenawi,
a good exchange of views of about an hour and a half, but we also
met opposition members of parliament who expressed their concerns.
We have received a letter since our return from the chairman of
the Kinijit Support Organisation in the UK basically saying, first
of all, that the elections were won by the opposition and that
the government had falsified the results. I know that was not
borne out by international observers but, secondly, and much more
seriously, they felt there was a systematic attack on opposition
leaders, imprisonments, harassment and serious charges which technically
could lead to the death penalty. Certainly they said it is a systematic
attempt to root out opposition. Clearly, given that Ethiopia,
although budget support has been withdrawn, will have the largest
DFID aid support in Africa, I wonder if you could perhaps give
us a comment on how you feel and indeed what is going on. It was
not entirely clear to us what is actually happening in terms of
people being jailed and harassed and so on.
Hilary Benn: Up until polling
day in the elections what happened in Ethiopia was, in the context
of the history of the country, quite remarkable: an open campaign,
debates on television, and so on and so forth. The fact that the
opposition parties won a significant number of seats showed that
people went and as well as voting for the government party voted
for the opposition too. What happened subsequently is a tragedy,
there is no other word I can use to describe it: the shooting
dead of protesters on the streets, the locking up of the leaders
of the opposition party who had just won a lot of seats in the
election, putting them on trial for their lives potentially because
they are facing treason charges, and the locking up of two of
the Action Aid staff. You may have received representations about
them while you were there. As I said at the time, I thought what
the government of Ethiopia had done was a clear breach of the
relationship of trust we had between us and it was for that reason
I took the decision to stop direct budget support, and all other
donors in Ethiopia did the same. We continue to press the government
of Ethiopia on human rights and a fair judicial process. I spoke
to some of the opposition leaders on a previous visit and I met
some of the families, once the trials had begun, when I was there,
and we have kept in contact with them. I have to say our ambassador
in Ethiopia has done a very, very good job in providing support
to them. As far as our programme is concerned, the dilemma we
face in such circumstances, and the dilemma I face, is you have
a government which is doing this but you also have a lot of poor
people in Ethiopia and to what extent should the poor people be
punished by what their government has done. That is why I took
the view that we should find a different way of giving our support.
I think it is right and proper to try and persuade the government
to do the right things, but also to continue to provide support
to poor people. If you up sticks and leave, then in the end you
will be punishing them twice over for what their government has
chosen to do. The situation is very serious and genuinely I do
not know what the outcome of the trials will be.
Q219 Chairman: It is obviously not
a happy situation if it means that the voice of the opposition
is silenced for whatever reason.
Hilary Benn: The election results
were contested. There is a process for trying to deal with that
but the fact that so many people are on trial, and the court process
has yet to take a decision, when the opposition have just won
a lot of seats and promptly they get arrested and put on trial
for their lives, we are all pretty clear about the conclusions
you can draw.
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