Shashamane
Encyclopedia
Shashamane is a town in central Ethiopia
Ethiopia
Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...
. It is located in the Misraq Shewa Zone
Misraq Shewa Zone
Misraq Shewa is one of the 12 Zones of the Ethiopian Region of Oromia. This zone takes its name from the kingdom or former province of Shewa. Misraq Shewa is located in the middle of Oromia, connecting the western regions to the eastern ones...
of the Oromia Region
Oromia Region
Oromia is one of the nine ethnic divisions of Ethiopia...
. The city lies on the Trans-African Highway 4 Cairo-Cape Town, about 150 miles (241.4 km) from the capital of Addis Ababa
Addis Ababa
Addis Ababa is the capital city of Ethiopia...
. It has a latitude of 7° 12' north and a longitude of 38° 36' east.
Based on figures from the Central Statistical Agency
Central Statistical Agency (Ethiopia)
The Central Statistical Agency is an agency of the government of Ethiopia designated to provide all surveys and censuses for that country used to monitor economic and social growth, as well as to act as an official training center in that field. It is part of the Ethiopian Ministry of Finance and...
in 2005, this town has an estimated total population of 93,156, of whom 46,882 were males and 46,274 were females. The 1994 national census reported this town had a total population of 52,080 of whom 25,426 were males and 26,654 were females.
The resort of Wondo Genet
Wondo Genet
Wondo Genet is a resort town in Ethiopia. Located southeast of Shashemene in the Sidama Zone of the Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples' Region, with a latitude and longitude of and an elevation of 1723 meters....
lies near Shashamane, as does the Senkele Wildlife Sanctuary.
Rastafari and Shashamane
In 1948 Emperor Haile Selassie IHaile Selassie I of Ethiopia
Haile Selassie I , born Tafari Makonnen, was Ethiopia's regent from 1916 to 1930 and Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974...
donated 500 acres (2 km²) of his private land to allow members of the Rastafari movement
Rastafari movement
The Rastafari movement or Rasta is a new religious movement that arose in the 1930s in Jamaica, which at the time was a country with a predominantly Christian culture where 98% of the people were the black descendants of slaves. Its adherents worship Haile Selassie I, Emperor of Ethiopia , as God...
, Ethiopian World Federation
Ethiopian World Federation
Ethiopian World Federation, Incorporated - History :The Ethiopian World Federation, Incorporated , was originally a not-for-profit membership organization, incorporated in the State of New York, United States of America...
(EWF) officers and members and other settlers from Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
and other parts of the Caribbean
Caribbean
The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...
to go to Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
. The return would be under the auspices of the EWF, founded in 1937 by the Emperor's special emissary to Black America, Melaku E. Bayen. The official letter confirming the "land grant" of 1948 was submitted to the members and executives of the Ethiopian World Federation in 1955 . Following up on this, the first West Indian family and Federation members from Montserrat were Mr. James Piper and his wife Helen who arrived that same year as the first land grant administrators, returning to make a permanent settlement in 1955 on behalf of the Federation.
In 1961, the Jamaican government sent a delegation composed of both Rastafari and non-Rastafarian leaders to Ethiopia to discuss the matter of repatriation, among other issues, with the Emperor. He reportedly told the Rastafarian delegation, "Tell the Brethren to be not dismayed, I personally will give my assistance in the matter of repatriation" . The first actual Rastafarian brother and fellow settler, Gladstone Robinson, who was also an official delegate of the EWF, was sent to Shashemene on behalf of the organization in June, 1964, followed by Papa Noel Dyer
Noel Dyer
Bongo Papa Noel Dyer I was a Rastafarian elder renowned within the movement as the man who "walked to Ethiopia" after hitchhiking there, becoming in 1965 one of the first Rastas to settle on the Shashamane land granted in 1948 by the Rastafarian messiah and Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie I of...
, who hitchhiked and thus found his way to Ethiopia from England, eventually arriving in September, 1965. Mr. Robinson, however, would later be duly appointed as the land grant administrator by the Federation executive council in 1967 thus replacing Mr. Piper and his wife in Ethiopia .
On his 1966 visit to Jamaica, Haile Selassie reportedly encouraged Rastafarian leaders to repatriate to Shashemene, but stressed that there was still important work to do in liberating Jamaica. It was within a couple of years that a moderate trickle of Rastafarian immigrants began, with the population swelling past 2000 at one point. In fact, it was recently reported that their numbers have dwindled from more than 2,000 to fewer than 300 according to a recent CNN Interview with Dr. Robinson and other Rastafarian settlers in Ethiopia .
It is said that Haile Selassie stopped his imperial motorcade when passing the Shashemene settlement once circa 1968, got out, and asked "Where are my people?" Local Rastafarians stepped forth and replied "Here we are Your Majesty, here we are" and "Hail to the Lord’s Anointed Great David’s Greater Son here in this time appointed his reign on earth begun", bowing profusely. He asked them if there was anything they wanted, and they replied, "We want to stay here your Majesty". The Emperor then responded "Really, well why not, why not, let them stay". In the words of one Rastafarian resident on the land for nearly 40 years "says he's not going anywhere."
On 23 August 1969, Rastafarian settlers petitioned Emperor Haile Selassie I for Ethiopian citizenship and other benefits. A few weeks later, the Jamaican Daily Gleaner reported that EWF members in Jamaica left for Ethiopia on September 5 to develop the settlement.
After leaders of both Jamaican political parties, Hugh Shearer
Hugh Shearer
Hugh Lawson Shearer, ON, OJ, PC was the third Prime Minister of Jamaica, from 1967 to 1972.Born in Martha Brae, Trelawny Parish, Jamaica, near the sugar and banana growing areas, Shearer attended St Simon's College after winning a parish scholarship to the school.In 1941 he took a job on the staff...
and Michael Manley
Michael Manley
Michael Norman Manley ON OCC was the fourth Prime Minister of Jamaica . Manley was a democratic socialist....
, each paid visits to the community in September 1969, Selassie himself again visited and, according to EWF #37 leader Mortimer Planno
Mortimer Planno
Mortimo "Kumi" Planno, was a renowned drummer and Rastafari elder and considered one of the ideological founders of this back-to-Africa movement...
, cautioned them against bringing Jamaican politics to Ethiopia. The following year, the Imperial Court ordered ten hectares apiece to be parceled out to twelve "pioneer" Rastafarian settlers, as reported in the Gleaner on September 5, 1970.
According to the EWF, Selassie again paid a visit on 1 October 1970, asking to speak to the then land grant administrator, James Piper, who was not a Rastafarian. Piper declined to appear, claiming it was his Sabbath. This resulted in a change in administration at the settlement. It is reported that due to this and other incidents, Mr. Robinson replaced the Pipers to administer the land prior to the Derg revolution. In his own words, the former International President of the Ethiopian World Federation is reported to have said in Paul Theroux's book entitled Dark Star Safari: Overland from Cairo to Capetown that, "After I had joined the Ethiopian World Federation, I was put in charge of repatriation" .
However, because of the "anti-organization" sentiments of many Rastas of that day, the Federation's official authority was compromised. Many created other organizations, entities and groups in attempts to further deal with their own ways and means of repatriation . For example, one of the Rasta settlers, Clifton Baugh, was a main representative for the Rasta community in palace discussions on the land grant with minister Ato Tesfi, and Baugh also continually delivered the first fruits of their produce to the Palace in Addis right up until 1974 when stopped by the Derg Revolution. .
When Haile Selassie I was deposed in 1974 the new government of Mengistu Haile Mariam
Mengistu Haile Mariam
Mengistu Haile Mariam is a politician who was formerly the most prominent officer of the Derg, the Communist military junta that governed Ethiopia from 1974 to 1987, and the President of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia from 1987 to 1991...
confiscated all but 11 hectares.
In January 2005 there were reports in the media
Mass media
Mass media refers collectively to all media technologies which are intended to reach a large audience via mass communication. Broadcast media transmit their information electronically and comprise of television, film and radio, movies, CDs, DVDs and some other gadgets like cameras or video consoles...
that Bob Marley
Bob Marley
Robert Nesta "Bob" Marley, OM was a Jamaican singer-songwriter and musician. He was the rhythm guitarist and lead singer for the ska, rocksteady and reggae band Bob Marley & The Wailers...
's remains were to be exhumed and then reburied at Shashamane. His wife Rita Marley
Rita Marley
Alpharita Constantia Anderson , better known as Rita Marley, and sometimes called "Nana Rita", is the widow of reggae legend/musician Bob Marley, and a member of the trio the I Threes, Bob Marley's backup singers.-Biography:...
described Ethiopia as his spiritual
Spirituality
Spirituality can refer to an ultimate or an alleged immaterial reality; an inner path enabling a person to discover the essence of his/her being; or the “deepest values and meanings by which people live.” Spiritual practices, including meditation, prayer and contemplation, are intended to develop...
home, provoking controversy in Jamaica
Jamaica
Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...
, where his remains lie.
At the beginning of the following month, thousands of fans gathered in Shashamane for a month of celebrations for what would have been Marley's 60th birthday. Until 2005 his birthday celebrations were always held in Jamaica. These recent events brought Shashamane to wider prominence throughout the world.
The Rastafarian settlement in Shashamane was recently reported to exceed two hundred individuals.
In January 2007 it organized an exhibition and a bazaar in the city. It was also reported recently prior to the Ethiopian Millennium that various pro-Ethiopian World Federation groups, consisting of indigenous Ethiopians and Rastafarians, have given support to one of many five year plans proposed for sustainable development of Shashamene, Ethiopia.