SELF-HELP IN EDUCATION
Ever since We were entrusted with the
responsibility of leading Ethiopia, one of the several wishes We cherished for
Our people has been to witness the arrival of a time when Our people will be
able to realize their problems as well as potentialities and through mutual
discussions come out with solutions for improvement. In order to bring about
the fulfilment of Our idea, We established the Ministry of National Community
Development eight years ago.
Our first directive
to the Ministry was in short to go down to village level and give instructions
by which the people can improve living conditions and solve social problems.
This project has been remarkably expanded since then. Many people who received
proper training at training centres set up by the Ministry at Majite, Awassa
and other places are currently engaged throughout the Empire in drilling wells,
cleaning pools, maintaining village sanitation, starting schools and other
activities designed to assist the community at large.
It gives Us great satisfaction to note the
enthusiasm shown by the many young men wherever they have been assigned in
carrying out this programme, as it has become apparent from the undertaking of
the 10 places in the District of Ada.
Hard Challenge
Although great effort is being exerted by
Our government by way of planning and formulating ways and means of eradicating
community problems, it is not sufficient for the people to rely on government
support alone. As has already been manifested by your endeavours the people
themselves must come to realize their own difficulties in the development of
their community and try to solve them by collective participation, following an
order of priority and taking their potentiality into account. It is well known to
you all that recognizing one’s problems and striving hard to challenge them is
a mark of an attempt at self-sufficiency.
A country belongs to both leaders and
people. The mutual co-operation between them is testimony to this fact. Unless
the people help Us, our attempt to help them will be fruitless. Why did We
become a leader? Is it not for the benefit and welfare of the people?
This year, more
than ever before, the people of Ethiopia motivated by their own will and
diligence, have awakened to the task of raising their standard of living. You
hear every day that people are engaged in raising funds to either construct
roads or to use them for whatever projects they have in mind. How noble and
great a deed is the act of sacrificing one’s wealth, land and money, to one’s
needy community instead of for selfish purposes! The gratitude remains for ever.
Self-Help
If the programme of “self-help” is pushed
forward with this same degree of motivation, you will undoubtedly leave a
tradition worthy of remembrance by your children. It is believed that having
seen your children lined up in front of the schools, you have realized that your
efforts in taking the initiative to compete in the programme of self-help
undertaken by all to build these four schools We just visited were altogether
rewarding. One who does not contribute to his community and the coming
generation remains to be a burden to his society and an object of ridicule to
outside observers.
By building the schools near your village,
you have spared the time and energy of your children from travelling to too far
away places for their education and moreover you have secured the opportunity
of seeing them grow up under your close care. And similarly if you continue to
consult one another and strive to get rid of the other handicaps, say problems
of obtaining clean water, better roads and sanitation for your community, you
will find that the accomplish-ment is within your capacity.
It is both the responsibility of the
governor as well as elders to create harmony among the people in initiating
them to discuss their common problems and work towards the betterment of their
standard of living. There has not been a single Ethiopian who has not been
filled with pride and rejoicing in hearing of the great efforts and
co-operation manifested by the people of Guragie in the fund-raising scheme to
finance the construction of the roads linking the peoples of Bale, Addis Ababa
and the provinces. These efforts being made by the people of Our country
towards progress has also served as a means to influence Ethiopia’s overseas
friends.
We also pledge,
therefore, those elders and community leaders to study and formulate methods on
problems affecting their respective communities such as schooling, water
supply, community and home sanitation, roads and agriculture in addition to
their long - practised profession.
Active Participation
The co-operation and, what is more, the
active participation in working along with the people played by you, the
members of the IEAF, the Airborne Division and the Farm Experiment Station in
helping the people living in your area achieve a better standard of living has
highly pleased Us.
The principal idea towards this motive of
assisting your fellow neighbours lay in the fact that some of you have been
fortunate to evidence the progress made in other countries while most of you
collected experiences from reading books at home; and it has been this spirit
of enthusiasm of witnessing the same trends of progress being enjoyed by your
brothers at home that led towards this objective.
There is no single soul who would not
cherish and hail the introduction of progress to Ethiopia and partake of the
benefits thereof. It is but through co-operation in working side by side with
the people by way of setting up schools, drilling water-wells and the
construction of roads, and it is through the realization and devotion in
solving these problems that wishes could be interpreted in terms of tangible
forms. As We have been informed you have, in constructing these schools,
equally shared the work with the people: that of quarrying stones, fixing the
frames and in mixing the mud, which no doubt will earn you the love of your neighbours.
Exemplary
Act
Particularly all
among those gathered here have come through the same process of the historical
past. Therefore, assuming that there are set up 100 schools for a population
exceeding 20 million and even then if these numbers were increased to a
million, there is not one person who would not still judge them insufficient.
Self - help in the benefits to be acquired through education will save the
individual from asking someone’s assistance.
We wish that this exemplary act of yours
will serve to create the same spirit among the entire people of Ethiopia and
the Armed Forces, the Naval Force, the Boy Scouts, students and particularly
those people engaged in the world of business. We are confident that if these
and all other organizations combined follow the same path in working closely
with the people, that they would easily overcome problems of water-supply, education,
roads and house sanitation within their respective communities and We further
believe that the same would help the people to achieve the desired standard of
living which all of Us hold dear.
Jan. 10, 1963.
Selected Speeches of His
Imperial Majesty Haile Selassie - page 81 –
