DEVELOPMENT-ERITREA: Old Dusty Records Offer a Glimpse of Hope for the Poor

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Jennie Street

ASMARA, Feb 20 2003 (IPS) - After disruption by war in Eritrea, records and property hidden away 30 years previously were found in the basement of a hotel. They proved a boost to the re-establishment of a small Rotary club.

Eritrea may have struggled through a 30-year war, but in 1997 the spirit of community service re-emerged among a group of business people. Now Eritrea has a small and active Rotary Club, which meets monthly in Asmara, the capital.

Rotary clubs are found in every country in the world. Rotary aims to foster the ideal of service as a basis of worthy enterprise, to advance international understanding, goodwill and peace through a world fellowship of businesspeople. While doubt may exist in the minds of the sceptical that Rotary is just a businessman’s club the record of Rotary shows that their financial and practical support can make a significant contribution to local communities.

Rotary International, to which Rotary Clubs belong, is the international body promoting the work of Rotary clubs round the world.

Eritrea’s first Rotary Club was established in May 1957 and in December that year it was chartered by Rotary International with 30 members. ”We had a membership of over 100 by the mid-1960s,” Fecadu Gebreselassie, a past Vice-President of Asmara told IPS. In the early 1970s Asmara had the highest membership among the 42 clubs within its District (Horn and East Africa).

The club existed for nearly 20 years, with a membership not only of Eritreans and Ethiopians, but also Americans, British, Indians, Greeks, French and Germans who lived and worked in Eritrea. A second club was established in the port city of Massawa sometime in the late 1960s.

However, after the fall of Haile Selassie, and the start of atrocities by the new government of Mengistu Haile Mariam, many Rotarians fled the country and the club finally collapsed in 1977. Its charter was withdrawn in March 1979. All records were lost as members dispersed round the world.

For more than 20 years no Rotary club existed in Eritrea as the country was engulfed by war.

But after independence in 1991, a group of former Rotarians started to discuss re-establishing a club in Asmara. In April 1997 the new club was recognised by the Government of Eritrea, and its charter was granted by Rotary International in September that year.

But a former Rotarian, Manu Premjee, precipitated a search for the former club’s property and records. Everyone had assumed they were lost, but he contacted the government-run Ambasoira Hotel where the club used to meet. Though it took some time to persuade the manager to allow a search, a ”Rotary Meets Here” wall plaque eventually turned up in the laundry room! Further enquiries revealed that unwanted items from the Ambasoira had been moved to another government hotel – the Selam.

The storekeeper of the Selam was very reluctant to allow a search, but finally in a small hut in the back of the hotel, drapes and membership badges were found in some dusty boxes. The storekeeper did not want further intrusion and it took another seven months before Manu was able to negotiate a deal with him which included a dinner, money for hotel helpers and no other outsiders to come in. After a six-hour search many more items were located including things belonging to a former Lions Club. ”It was like diving into a deep dark sea to locate the sunken bell from a shipwreck," he laughed.

Since re-starting five years ago, the Rotary Club of Asmara has donated money to various projects, most of which reflect the needs of a country trying to recover from war. Hailom Negassi, Rotary President told IPS "in 2002/003 our project activities include polio immunisation, assistance in drilling wells, supply of books to schools, HIV/AIDS awareness, assistance in the supply of artificial limbs and wheels for the handicapped, assistance in reforestation programmes”.

Asmara Rotary Club has several women members, one of whom Dahab Abraha, is the Treasurer. ”We do not have an Inner Wheel (the wives’ group) but women are members in their own right and we welcome them,” says Berhe Tekie, president.

Tekeste Asghedom, a former Director of the Eritrea Chamber of Commerce, joined Rotary in 2000. ”I joined as I have an obligation to serve the community at large. I saw it as self-actualisation. I found Rotary activities go to great lengths to help humanity. I was impressed with what they do, so I was happy to join.”

That a Rotary Club exists in the tiny new state of Eritrea is tribute to the determination of Eritreans to make a contribution to the rebuilding of their country. Eritrea needs every little help it can get.

Today, some 70 percent of Eritrea’s 3.3 million people are facing hunger because of drought in the country. A third of those are already showing signs of malnutrition, according to the World Food Programme (WFP).