EPRDF Cheats Thousands Out of The winners of Ethiopian Millennium Pageant and More

The winners of Ethiopian Millennium Pageant and State owned Ghion hotel have now joined the queue and chorus in the escalating row over past due payments and are also demanding to be paid for the Millennium Pageant held in October 2007 under the direction of State Minister for Culture and Tourism: Mohamuda Ahmed Gass, who has left a long trail of unpaid debts in his wake since 2007 after extensively obtaining the services on credit and misusing official instruments of the Ethiopian government, i.e Official letter heads and his position as State Minister to issue official guarantees to obtain services on credit and promises to pay for the event that was supposed to be a positive enhancement for Ethiopia’s poor international image.

The winning Beauty queens were never paid or given any of their prizes, and many are still even to this day still owed money for their Air tickets to Ethiopia, they were told to buy their tickets and promised by State Minister for Culture and Tourism: Mohamuda Ahmed Gass that they would be fully reimbursed once they got to Ethiopia, but on arrival in Ethiopia apparently Mohamuda Gass and the local partner: Aklilu Telwelde of Ezana Entertainment deliberately delayed paying them in hard currency until the very last minute, and instead would try to give them about 9000 birr instead of US$950, just a few hours before they were due to leave Ethiopia, knowing fully well they could not take Ethiopian currency out of the country.

Several of the girls were thus forced to go to the local black market to change their Ethiopian money into hard currency, a very dangerous practice for them until the main organiser insisted that all the girls must be paid in hard currency and not exposed to danger by going to Illegal black markets.

Aklilu Tewelde of Ezana Entertainment the local partner would deliberately go AWOL and arrive hours after he thought the girls had left for the airport, in one instance Miss Argentina Gisselle Fuentes [photo] refused point-blank to leave Ethiopia until she got her money in hard currency and even changed her flight, but 18 months later she is still owed US$450, Miss Bahamas is owed over US$900, Miss Brazil over US$900, and the list goes on, and this is a big shame for Ethiopian Ministry of Culture to do this to these girls who came to experience Ethiopian hospitality only to be deceived and conned by the Ministry of culture and Tourism, how is it possible for the Minisitry of Culture and Tourism to make such a huge mess of coordinationg just 37 Queens visiting Ethiopia? and this is why this event will sadly never return to Ethiopia again.

Miss Venezuela the winner was never paid her token prize of just US$5000, nor was the runner up Miss Costa Rica: Silvana Sánchez Jiménez paid her prize of US$2000, Miss Tourism Congo: Katissa Kouta, Miss South Africa, Palesa Makwa also did not get their US$1000 prizes from the Ethiopian Ministry of Culture & Tourism and Mohamouda Gass who simply said “that can all be pending, we have no money”

Ghion hotel recently warned and took the Ministry of Culture and Tourism court over it outstanding debts for lodging services provided to the Ministry in October 2007 for the visiting beauties amounting to over 741,000 ET Birr and apparently got an order from the Federal court to pay the money and additional interest of 9% but apparently the Ministry has still not paid them, see newspaper article attached
What is shocking is the belligerent attitude to the whole affair by the Ethiopian Ministry of Culture and Tourism to say they had a budget deficit despite it being held in 2007 and they have to date made no attempt to pay a single penny since 2007, claiming a budget deficit, blaming Sheik Al amoudi and every other convenient excuses they can come up with.

The State Minister at the center of this fiasco: Ato Mohamouda Ahmed Gass has surprisingly simply continued to collect his State Ministerial salary and benefits, keep his plush office and drive around Ethiopia in his official big car since October 2007 to date, whilst everybody else who came to Ethiopia and made huge positive contributions towards enhancing Ethiopia’s International Image have all been left out of pocket since October 2007, with no attempt to settle this matter honorably or in a timely manner, we have repeatedly asked State Minister : Ato Mohamouda Ahmed Gass to act honorably and with integrity and settle this matter over the last 18 months but his response has always been simply to give us more excuses, and finally say: “don’t contact me again” all of which we have documented and will be making public shortly.

Respectfully

Ethiopian Life Foundation