Beshir's follow-up to Faya Dayi is an Esoteric Discussion of "Language."

I will end here my expose of Beshir, the director of Faya Dayi. My article that is available in several Ethiopian news and commentary sites holds ground. And my question to Beshir remains unanswered.

"What are you going to do about the khat-disoriented Oromo youth, on whose backs you made the film Faya Dayi, and which gave you substantial monetary remuneration?" 

Why not give this money to the Oromo youth, through a local employment center, for example, or a drug rehabilitation center? 

Beshir is revealing her "next" release as a "follow-up" to Faya Dayi.

Here she is in London, in June 2022, a year after the accolades and prize money from Faya Dayi, talking about her film, and the inevitable comes up, when the interviewer asks her about her next project:

I’m fascinated by form and language, and ways of delivering it, and just cinema itself, and what it’s doing, and what I can do.”

Beshir's "follow-up" is an esoteric discussion of "language."

Right up the indie (that is "independent for those who don't follow the intricate maneuvers of off-the-grid filmmakers) film world's alley. Let's latch on to an obscure, and irrelevant (to the topic at hand) subject, and just go for it!

Continues Beshir:

“I am not just inspired, but I am excited about African cinema, and what those incredible filmmakers are doing. (Saul Williams and Anisia Uzeyman’s sci-fi hip-hop musical set in Rwanda) Neptune Frost breaks open the imagination and possibilities of the future. It’s an incredible time for African cinema.”

 

Who cares about picking with a fine-toothed comb the intricacies of language? Who cares about African Cinema? I say this for the sake of argument. Of course I am interested in African Cinema, and in language, just read this blog. 

But why not Ethiopian Cinema? Why not the Oromo youth in their totality, without dissecting language through them?  

This is Beshir clever tactic of distancing, eradicating, "Ethiopia" from the context of cinema. "Ethiopian Cinema cannot exist separate and apart from African Cinema" is her underhanded argument. What could be more false (more on this later - but there is a rich history of filmmakers in Ethiopia, who LEAD the way for African Cinema).

And in lazy, elitist, fashion, going to the Oromo youth, figuring out ways, even if just giving them her Faya Dayi award money, is just too much work. And too boring, when she can sit in her smart Brooklyn apartment and google (and get paid for it) "Oromo Language" while sipping her cup of home-brewed latte.

What WE want from her is a follow-up film, or just a documented report on:

What happened to those Oromo Youth?

Where are they now?

How are they adapting to PM Abiy's assistance (and promise)?

Here is PM Abiy in Harar, in the Oromo region, visiting and inaugurating a Dire Dawa Free Trade Zone (from his Facebook page): 

 

The languages of Ethiopia are an age-old phenomenon. The Oromo language exists, as does the Tigrigna as dominant languages of the country.

But is is Amharic, which built the Ethiopian civilization, and which introduced script into the language, and which all the others refer to.

Oromo youth need to speak Amharic in order to be fully Ethiopian. This is the reality, and the practicality. PM Abiy, son of an Oromo father and an Amhara mother, speaks in Amharic on all his functions, and speaks Oromigna AND Amharic at Oromo-centered events when he visits local regions (and I think he also speaks some - minimal - Tigrigna). I would say that ALL Ethiopians speak Amharic, and their local, ethnic-based languages, but only the Amhara speak ONLY Amharic. The Ethiopian society is based around the Amharic language.

What does Beshir have to say about this, other than, as per the title of this posting: "an esoteric discussion of "'language'" revolving around the region/ethnic-based Oromigna?

Beshir's embittered, anti-Ethiopia, anti-Amhara, stand rears its head in this next "project," an esoteric rambling about language. Just as I predicted - the esoteric, disconnected, part.

As I said in this article, published at various international online magazines:

If Beshir were really up to it, and not in her mental cinematic mood, which apparently isn’t going away any time soon, she would contact these local Oromo centers, and why not, PM Abiy himself, to go ahead with putting her money where her mouth is. 

 

And I continue with:

Instead, Beshir lives in her smart Brooklyn apartment, plotting her next film against Ethiopia, and her false, distant, allegiance to the Oromo of Ethiopia. 

 

Beshir, now, has told us exactly what she will do. And it isn't about those Oromo youth who bared their souls to her, and through whom she extracted a nice sum.