Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
09ADDISABABA1672
2009-07-15 13:37:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Addis Ababa
Cable title:  

GROWING WAHABI INFLUENCE IN ETHIOPIA - AMHARA

Tags:  KPAO KISL KIRF SCUL PROP ET 
pdf how-to read a cable
VZCZCXRO8014
RR RUEHROV
DE RUEHDS #1672/01 1961337
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 151337Z JUL 09
FM AMEMBASSY ADDIS ABABA
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 5491
INFO RUCNIAD/IGAD COLLECTIVE
RHEHAAA/NSC WASHDC
RUEKDIA/DIA WASHINGTON DC
RUEKJCS/SECDEF WASHINGTON DC
RUEPADJ/CJTF HOA
RUEKJCS/JOINT STAFF WASHINGTON DC
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHINGTON DC
RUZEFAA/HQ USAFRICOM STUTTGART GE
C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ADDIS ABABA 001672 

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/06/2019
TAGS: KPAO KISL KIRF SCUL PROP ET
SUBJECT: GROWING WAHABI INFLUENCE IN ETHIOPIA - AMHARA
REGION AND THE "JAMA NEGUS MOSQUE"

REF: 08 ADDIS ABABA 3230

Classified By: Ambassador Donald Yamamoto. Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D

FIRST OF THREE CABLES ON COUNTERING WAHABI INFLUENCE IN
ETHIOPIA

-------
SUMMARY
-------

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ADDIS ABABA 001672

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/06/2019
TAGS: KPAO KISL KIRF SCUL PROP ET
SUBJECT: GROWING WAHABI INFLUENCE IN ETHIOPIA - AMHARA
REGION AND THE "JAMA NEGUS MOSQUE"

REF: 08 ADDIS ABABA 3230

Classified By: Ambassador Donald Yamamoto. Reasons 1.4 (B) and (D

FIRST OF THREE CABLES ON COUNTERING WAHABI INFLUENCE IN
ETHIOPIA

--------------
SUMMARY
--------------


1. (C) PAO visited Dessie, in Wello province of the Amhara
Region, June 3-5, to visit the Jama Negus Mosque, which is a
site for a potential Ambassador's Fund for Cultural
Preservation (AFCP) grant proposal for FY-10. A major Sufi
shrine, the mosque is the focal point of the &Moulid
al-Nebi8 (&Birthday of the Prophet8) celebrations each
year in which more than 100,000 people converge on the hills
surrounding the mosque to celebrate this high holy day. As
Wahabism does not recognize moulids as being &Islamic,8
encroaching Wahabism in the area has led to conflicts with
the local community over these celebrations. With over 150
mosques built in the region by Kuwaiti NGOs in the past ten
years, pressure to curtail popular (mainly Sufi) celebrations
of the faith, and Wahabi-style veils increasingly common
throughout the countryside, the Ethiopian Muslim community in
the area is under growing cultural and religious pressure to
adopt Wahabi ways. END SUMMARY.

-------------- --------------
KUWAITI MOSQUES AND SAUDI VEILS DOT THE COUNTRYSIDE
-------------- --------------


2. (C) In the wake of two AFCP projects in Ethiopia
specifically targeted to the Muslim community (FY-06 Sheikh
Hussein Shrine in the Bale Region and FY-09 Teferi Mekonnen
Palace in Harar),the Islamic Affairs Supreme Council (IASC)
approached the Embassy about a restoration/conservation
project for the Jama Negus Mosque in Dessie, about 400 km
north of Addis Ababa in the Wello province of Amhara Region.
PAO visited the mosque with a LES and a Muslim official from
the area. During the 8-hour drive to Dessie, the official
pointed out numerous &cookie cutter8 mosques that were
built by Kuwaiti NGOs over the past ten years. Each one, he
said, cost about USD 30,000 to build and over 150 have been
built to date from the Dessie area north to Tigray region.
Easily spotted, each one is green, one-story, with a square

minaret. While attractive and fitting in with the local
landscape (unlike the steel-and-glass mosques built in other
areas),these were clearly distinguishable from the more
traditional Ethiopian mosques.


3. (U) At the same time, many women were seen throughout the
villages wearing the traditional Wahabi-style face veil that
was not seen in Ethiopia until recent years. Although no men
were seen sporting the &Wahabi beard,8 the number of veiled
women was very high. In fact, the IASC representative who
accompanied us said that they estimate about 40% of the
people in that region are now Wahabis. Women of all economic
classes were seen wearing the veil, from the poorest wood
carriers bent double under their load of wood in the hot sun
or working in the fields, to wealthier women in cars and on
horseback.

-------------- --
OVERVIEW OF THE MOSQUE AND THE PROPOSED PROJECT
-------------- --


4. (U) The mosque itself is situated on a high hill, about 40
km and 2.5 hours by SUV from Dessie. The site centers on the
tomb of Mujahid, an early Muslim &saint8 who introduced the
celebration of the Prophet's Birthday to the area. In the
ensuing 200 years since Mujahid died, this mosque has become
the focal point of moulid celebrations in Ethiopia,
attracting large numbers of people to the three-day
celebrations. Our source said the number of people who come
each year is over one hundred thousand, a number that was
easy to believe when he pointed out all the hills around the
mosque that are covered with tents and people sleeping in the
open air during the celebrations. The number is so great, he
said, that the faithful have to rotate through the site in
shifts in order to accommodate the large number of people who
come mostly by foot from long distances to reach the site.


ADDIS ABAB 00001672 002 OF 003



5. (U) The mosque complex is built around the tomb of Said
Mujahidin, who was born in 1744 in Wello, in the village of
Dure. Local tradition has it that Mujahidin successfully
completed his Islamic education and founded the site in order
to celebrate the Moulid al-Nebi, the Birthday of the Prophet.
He organized the first celebration of this Moulid in 1764
when he was just 20 years old. This makes the age of the
site to be 245 years old. Recognized early on as an
important Sufi teacher in his region, Mujahid's celebrations
of the Moulid grew in importance as Muslims from throughout
the area and beyond began to make his mosque a pilgrimage
destination, much like the Sheikh Hussein Shrine in Bale.
The site has thus become a center for the expression of
Ethiopia's indigenous Muslim/Sufi culture and a &hot spot8
for Wahabi influence in the region.


6. (U) Architecturally, the structures on the site are not
that old. Although Mujahid died in 1807, at the age of 63,
the building that shelters his tomb (and the tombs of his
family) was built by the Italians in the late 1930s. The
current mosque, a simple wattle and mud structure, is about
35 years old. This simple structure has been rebuilt a
number of times over the years and is not important
architecturally, but the site itself is of spiritual
significance.


7. (C) The importance of the site, however, lies in its
status as the first place where Ethiopian Muslims celebrated
the Moulid al-Nebi, one of the most important celebrations
for Ethiopia's largely Sufi Muslim community. After the
local Islamic Affairs Council was repeatedly turned down by
Arab NGOs to repair and preserve the site, the council turned
to the Embassy for support in the wake of the AFCP grant for
the Sheikh Hussein Shrine that has just been completed months
before. In doing so, the Council representative pointed out
how support for this project will be seen not just by Muslims
in the Dessie area, but will be known across Ethiopia because
of the large numbers of pilgrims who visit the shrine every
year. Embassy likewise believes it is in the U.S. national
interest to support this project and will work with the
council in FY-10 to submit an AFCP grant proposal.

--------------
IASC'S GROWING CONCERN ABOUT WAHABIS
--------------


8. (C) In the meantime, the IASC continues to be very
concerned about growing Wahabi influence in Ethiopia. The
newly appointed Council is decidedly anti-Wahabi and speaks
openly of their concern about Wahabi missionaries and their
destabilizing influence in Ethiopia. In a recent meeting
with PAO, the Council Vice-President asked that the USG
undertake a special effort to provide schools for pastoralist
children in Afar, Somali, and Gambella regions because the
people are generally uneducated and children end up getting
their education only from small madrassas that are
propagating Wahabi thought to children of all ages.
Providing small schools, he said, would help these
communities to become more settled and would undercut Wahabi
missionaries who are currently making significant inroads
into those communities.


9. (C) That same Council member also told PAO how Wahabi NGOs
are laundering money to support their operations in Ethiopia.
Large numbers of Ethiopians work in Saudi Arabia and other
Gulf countries as domestics, laborers, and other unskilled
occupations, as well as in better paying skilled jobs. Many
of these people send money home through the &Hawala8
system, whereby money is paid to an operative in the Arab
countries and money is then paid out in Ethiopia to family
members. There are low or no fees for this service, thus
enabling the Ethiopian to send more money home than he/she
would be able to do through Western Union or commercial bank
transfers. The operative then buys appliances or other
durable goods with cash that are then smuggled into Ethiopia
through Somalia or Djibouti, sold on the open market without
taxes (but at a substantial mark-up that is still below the
going market rate),with the profits accruing to a Wahabi
NGO. Through this mechanism, the NGO leaves no financial
trail that can be followed by the GoE as everything was
handled in cash. Ethiopian Muslims are thus able to send
more money home to their families and Wahabi NGOs increase
funding that cannot be tracked through the financial system.


ADDIS ABAB 00001672 003 OF 003



10. (C) As a result of Wahabi activism in Ethiopia, conflicts
have arisen at several universities between Muslims and
Christians as Wahabi activists seek to establish first
&prayer rooms8 and then mosques on campuses. Conflicts
within the Muslim community have also arisen over control of
mosques, which imams should be allowed to preach, and over
control of Islamic education. The IASC wants to build an
Ethiopian Muslim theological school so that young Ethiopian
men will not have to go to the Middle East to study in
preparation for becoming Imams, as they must now. These
young men are increasingly studying in Saudi Arabia due to
the generous scholarships and subsidies available there, and
when they return to Ethiopia to take up their posts in new
Saudi-funded mosques, they continue to receive subsidies from
Saudi Arabia or Islamic NGOs. Unfortunately, the
Sufi-dominated Muslim community in Ethiopia does not have
sufficient funds to start their own theological school, nor
can they counter the financial advantage Wahabis have in
Ethiopia.

-------------- --------------
WHY SHOULD THE U.S. CARE ABOUT WAHABISM IN ETHIOPIA?
-------------- --------------


11. (U) As a result of traditional Sufi tolerance, and
Ethiopia's long history of significant Muslim, Christian, and
Jewish co-existence, a very real culture of tolerance and
mutual respect between the faith communities has developed
over the centuries. This development was also helped by the
presence of a sizable Jewish community in Ethiopia that long
pre-dated the advent of Christianity in the Horn of Africa.
In spite of occasional inter-communal conflicts, the
Ethiopian record of inter-faith co-existence remains quite
good. Both Muslim and Christian leaders speak out often and
forcefully of the need to respect the other faith, to have
peace between the communities, and otherwise to teach
tolerance and mutual understanding by example and not just by
words.


12. (C) With the advent of Wahabism in Ethiopia, however,
this delicate balance is in danger of being upset. Conflicts
have begun first within the Muslim community, but have also
begun to spread out to include Christian groups as Wahabis
seek to assert themselves on college campuses and in smaller
towns outside the capital. The threat of inter-communal
conflict in Ethiopia between Muslims and Christians, as well
as between Muslims themselves, can only give a foothold and
operating space to Salafist and extremist groups that might
seek to exploit the situation.


13. (C) In a shift from past practice, the IASC is now
completely purged of Wahabi members. In a luncheon with PAO
and the CJTF-HOA Chaplain, the Council members acknowledged
that the Council is now all Sufi and in their public
statements they repeatedly make reference to Ethiopia's
tradition of religious tolerance and co-existence with the
Christian communities. As the Ethiopian government appoints
the members of the Islamic Council, it is clear that the GoE
shares this concern about growing Wahabi influence and is
supporting moderate Muslim leaders in trying to counter that
influence.

--------------
CONCLUSION
--------------


14. (C) Although Wahabi influence continues to grow in
Ethiopia, there are signs that many Ethiopians resent their
presence and want to engage them actively in a real debate
for the hearts and minds of the Ethiopian Muslim community.
In fact, there is a growing perception that they are victims
of &Arab Cultural Imperialism8 and want to fight back
against this threat to their own indigenous cultural
traditions. They cannot do it on their own, however, but
need help to counter the money and infrastructure that Wahabi
NGOs bring to this fight. Post believes there are ways to
counter this growing influence through aggressive cultural
programming, as will be outlined in the second and third
parts of this series.

YAMAMOTO