Striking that they call themselves "Qeerroo, an Oromo word traditionally used to describe a young, unmarried man". Not voluntarily unmarried, but through lack of land, and of the money to buy land. They are, in fact, involuntarily celibate...
It is odd that the article doesn't mention Addis Ababa at all. Isn't the national capital where landless younger sons with few prospects traditionally go to seek their fortune?
Maybe both are happening, and the article's author chose to focus on the more dangerous, distant migration. Maybe Saudi seems like El Dorado, where they can live like a prince, instead of the likelier fate of living like a slave on a construction site and maybe dying for a soccer stadium.
I thought those were safer after Hillsborough.
Addis Ababa is literally in Oromia - but the Oromo themselves have not profited thereby. The imperial government was largely Amharic, and I think the Derg were as well, and settled a lot of Amhara in Derg territory. The article notes that Abiy is the first Ethiopian leader ever to call himself an Oromo - the Oromo were pretty marginalised under the empire.
Addis Ababa itself is 48% Amhara - only 20% Oromo.
IIRC the capital was actually peripatetic until the late 19th C.
That sounds right. IIRC Magdala was Tewodros' capital, hence why the battle happened there.
4: At the bottom of the OP article you'll find this:
https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news-feature/2023/11/22/ethiopia-south-africa-human-cost-neglected-south-south-migration-route
Origins in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durame
and
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadiya_Zone
, also not winners in the long Ethipian dureé.
IIRC the capital was actually peripatetic until the late 19th C.
Yes, peripatetic in part for ecological reasons. I read an interesting article on this recently that I'll try to track down. One of the main things that made a large permanent capital possible was the import of eucalyptus trees, which grow fast enough in that environment to support the city's fuel needs.
13 fascinating! Mediaeval European courts were peripatetic too, for two reasons - first, proximity to the king meant power and therefore it was politically useful to spread that favour around; second, it was bloody expensive hosting the court and after a few weeks theys have eaten all your food so they more or less had to move on. Which j guess is ecological too, sort of.
There's a new pope. We could discuss on this thread to avoid clogging up the others.