Ayalew A in his article “Do we need expat CEO at ETC?” tried to lump IT and ICT, pasted unrelated matters from
here and there, and concluded that one can work with whatever he got within his 6 months or a year-long study by totally ignoring
or putting to rest for good previous four- or five-year-long study. This is outrageous! This is unbelievable! In Ethiopia
today many of the physics, chemistry, math graduates end up as teachers at high schools or places like SISA. Teaching as a
profession is not popular for it doesn’t pay off. I understand this and I sympathize with guys like Ayalew A. My heart
goes out to them. As Ethiopia prospers and advances in technology and gets a good governance after Weyane, this situation
may change.
I did study Information Science for one year after graduating in physics from Addis Ababa University (AAU). But I never
ever dare to say I am no more a physicist, but IT specialist, leave alone ICT which is a completely different area as compared
to IS. I rather dare to say such a move is a waste of resource when viewed from the point of view of the nation’s interest.
I hope all of you know we do have at present a totally ignorant government on such and other important matters. So, Ayalew
A is endorsing the sneaky act of Tesfaye Biru who got a position he doesn’t deserve by presenting himself to the government
as an ICT connoisseur. I went to the same university where Tesfaye Biru went to. I am using IS as a best tool as a physicist.
Tesfaye Biru could have done a lot to Ethiopia if he had used IT as a tool to Mathematics. The whole point towards training
individuals in IS is to let them use it as their tool for their respective areas of specialties.
I remember one of the beneficiaries of former Science Commissioner Abebe’s project (under the Derg) is now a general
manager of Ethiopian Telecommunication Agency (ETA). ETA is supposed to be a telecom regulatory body in a monopoly environment.
In ETA’s day-to-day activity, there are, inter alia, a bundle of legal matters, telecom engineering, broadcasting and
frequency issues, which are purely technical and legal. Is there any relation whatsoever between chemistry and ETA’s
work? Not at all!. Is there any relation between IS and ETA’s day to day activities? Only as a tool to all the departments
of ETA. Should the ETA’s General Manager be a Chemistry graduate? This could happen only under the totally ignorant
Weyane parochialist regime. Actually, the prime minister bluntly said, “I will appoint even an illiterate who can hardly
read and write his name so long as he supports my government.” The ETA General Manager, Eshetu Alemu, is an AAU graduate
in chemistry. Commissioner Abebe sent him to Africa or Europe for a one year study on Information Science. He was using IT
as a tool in his day to day activity on his area of specialty, i.e chemistry. About two years ago, at about same time Tesfaye
Biru was appointed, he was also appointed general manager of Ethiopian Telecommunications Agency. It gave a real shock to
everybody who knew the real situation. By the way both Tesfaye Biru and Eshetu Alemu are “comrades in arms,” and
were recruited by one guy who is currently an ETC Board member. This guy, the ETC Board member, is responsible for the massacre
that took place some 13 years ago at AAU during a visit by then UN Secretary General Boutros-Boutros Ghali. He shall have
his day in court when the Ethiopian people get their own government truly elected by a perfect democratic process. There is
also ethnic politics in the appointment of both Tesfaye Biru and Eshetu Alemu.
Ayalew A confessed he has no idea about the telecom. He further said, he doesn’t know Tesfaye Biru in person. This
is a “good” move to make a story credible and think his totally pseudo analysis would earn readers' trust. Ayalew
A’s worry to use his own verbatim is “I am a little bit worried about the idea of Ewnetu and Takele that a graduate
of mathematics with an information science background cannot be appointed as CEO at ETC.”
Dear Ayalew, what do you mean when you said “information science background”? Why didn’t you say “mathematics
background”? Isn’t mathematics actually the background of Tesfaye Biru? Which one outweighs which? Four years
at AAU or less than a year minor course somewhere in Europe? Why didn’t you at least say basically mathematics background
and then after IS as an additional input??? Your approach destroys logic! Let us say Tesfaye Biru has an information Science
background. I know this makes you happy. But the flaw in your analysis and conclusion can not be hidden behind your own creation
which is non-existent “IS background”. Takele Hirpo in his article “Is Telecom CEO talent extraordinaire
or Corrupt extraordinaire?” said Information Science is to data processing and library science whereas Information Communication
Technology (ICT) is to telecom engineering, telecom technology, broadcasting etc. What does a mathematics graduate with a
one year Information Science training know about telecom technologies like satellite, VSAT, exchanges, mobile technologies,
internet infrastructure, radio system etc??? What does he know about all these telecom technologies? Please answer me! I agree
with your definition of Information Science as “Information Science or Informatics is the science of information. It
is studied as a branch of computer science and information technology and is related to database, ontology and software engineering.”
It is therefore safe to conclude Information Science is the sciences concerned with gathering and manipulating and storing
and retrieving and classifying recorded information. What is then its relation with Information Communications Technology?
None. No relation whatsoever. As Takele Hirpo flawlessly put it, Information Science is data processing and library science.
By the way ETC currently does have plenty of Information Science guys and all are working in the Data Processing Department.
It is only Tesfaye Biru, “annointed” by Weyane as telecom expert, who became a CEO of the Ethiopian Telecom Corporation.
And the result is a disaster as written by Ewnetu Tessema and Takele Hirpo.
Finally, I also ask Tesfaye Biru and/or ETC to give a reply to the corruption issue. The website Ethiomedia is visited
by millions all over the world. It is not like the Reporter or Nation weekly Amharic newspapers with 5000 copies. Millions
of this website visitors will be forced to take Tesfaye Biru’s silence for acceptance. I am also curious to hear about
the school net project which I know for sure it has failed though well over $30 Million US dollars was spent on it. I was
shocked to hear ETC is still paying 1.5 Million USD to INTELSAT for the space segment meant to create a link for the satellite
education. I now tend to believe both articles by Tsegaye T and Ayalew A came from ETC. I advise ETC guys to refrain from
such sneaky acts like sending articles by a pen name, but to give an official reply in the name of the company or Tesfaye
Biru himself as all the accusations are directed to him. I want also to beg Ethiomedia to formally request a reply from ETC
on what is written by Ewnetu Tessema and Takele Hirpo.
