The Federal High Court has lifted the ban on 21 organizations under the Tigray Rehabilitation Endowment Fund (EFFORT). The court also ordered that the responsibility of Commercial Nominees Limited Liability Company, which has been temporarily managing the companies, be revoked.
The decision was made on July 28, 2023, at a hearing held by the 1st Schedule Criminal Court. The court ruled that there was no “sufficient, convincing, and legal reason” for the ban to remain in place.
EFFORT was founded in 1994 with the aim of reforming the economy of the Tigray region, which was affected by war and drought. The organization manages a number of companies in the construction, textile, agriculture, mining, and transportation sectors.
The ban on EFFORT-managed organizations was imposed in November 2021, two weeks after the outbreak of the war in northern Ethiopia. The Federal Attorney General at the time said that the companies were suspected of “financially supporting terrorism.”
In September 2022, the Federal Attorney General asked the Federal High Court to remove the board members of EFFORT and appoint a new management team. The court granted the request, and Commercial Nominees were appointed to manage the companies.
However, Sur Construction, the largest company managed by EFFORT, filed a lawsuit in March 2023 asking the court to remove Commercial Nominees from its management role. The company argued that Commercial Nominees was not managing the assets of the companies properly.
The Federal High Court agreed with Sur Construction and ordered Commercial Nominees to be removed from its management role. The court also ordered the assets of the companies to be returned to their “legal representatives.”
The decision by the Federal High Court is a major victory for EFFORT and its affiliates. The lifting of the ban will allow the companies to resume their operations and contribute to the economic development of the Tigray region.
In order to prove the courts are independent more and more of such decisions are needed. This mega outfit should be allowed to operate but with a caveat. It should operate under charity’s law(if there is such a law in that country) as a thrift store or be allowed to run its business devoid of being a domineering monopoly. Other than that this court ruling is amicable and timely. Peace y’all!!!!!
I get crestfallen whenever I hear news of such senseless conflicts and destruction. In such fighting tens, hundreds and thousands of young people lose their Allah blessed and gifted lives. With every fallen youth I mourn as if I have lost one of my own children. As always I held both the regime and those who fan the flames of war from their protected joint in the bushes there and their comfy homes here among us. I hold the regime in sharing responsibilities for not reigning in some of its officials from giving hateful speeches at rallies and public meetings. On one side our noble Amhara brothers and sisters are maligned as ‘colonizers’ and sisters and on the other hand a bunch of ghouls congregated around so-called ‘liberation army’ kill and chase them away from their homes and farm where they lived for decades and some times for more than a century. I don’t blame for that Amhara for not feeling safe and protected in Oromia and even in his own region adjust to Oromia and Tigray. He/she is being given ear full whenever the president or another high regional official moves his jaw at meetings and rallies. The truth is the current population has nothing to do or bears responsibilities for what took place more than a century ago. These officials talk as such because they want to maintain their lucrative and rewarding status they have now. In stead of firing their poisonous asses the regime did not even admonish them. That, right there, will make the targeted youth feel unsafe and lethally vulnerable. That is when those connivers come in from their hideout bushes. They tell the disturbed, unemployed and gullible youth ‘We told you so. See, the regime wants you dead and gone. It is time to defend yourself and at least die trying. We have brand new and fully loaded with 250 ammo AK47’s for you. You remember so and so who was imprisoned by the regime last year? He/she is with us with a machine gun and 20 fighters under his/her command. Come on and join him/her’. So it goes, the country continues bleeding of its future, the youth. Meanwhile the number of paid subscribers is rising for those trouble ‘miners’ on YouTube and other social media outlets. You can them with ever bulging beer guts and double/triple fat chins. Some of these connivers and hate pushers do that shamelessly to embellish their political asylum applications. That is why I hold both the regime and these smart aleck con artists responsible for the bloodsheds both in Amhara and Oromia regions.