BBC’s Gift to Bereket Simon

The BBC’s unreserved apology for broadcasting a series of reports which gave the impression that million of pounds collected by Live Aid in a famine relief effort 26 years ago is an enormous gift for EPRDF’s spin machine. The damage the BBC’s original report had done to the Ethiopian government was not mainly related to historical responsibility although that is not an insignificant matter by itself. Politically speaking, what hurt the government most was its reinforcement of the view held by many that Meles Zenawi’s party had no qualms to divert aid for political purposes. What it resulted then was in more calls by the media, civil society groups and politicians in donor countries for stringent aid accountability mechanism, not for the trial of the former rebel leaders who are now in the position of power. In this context, therefore, the BBC’s apology could not have been better timed for the government. Just a couple of weeks ago, a report published by Human Rights Watch documented widespread use of aid to suppress dissent in Ethiopia. The first thing a creative propaganda machine does is to tie the two by cognitive association. Here is how it can be done through a tortured logic: The admission of the BBC that its aid abuse report was based on insufficient evidence raises questions about aid abuse reports generally. The rest, as they say, is twitter.

Martin Plaut, the author of the BBC’s report, is one of the most knowledgeable British journalists about the Horn of Africa. His research for the corporation and Chatham House are widely quoted and appreciated for their insights and detail. Unsurprisingly for a man of such profile, the government in Addis Ababa does not like Plaut. The animosity started when he stated, based on impeccable analysis, that contrary to claims by Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ethio-Eritrea Border Commission’s ruling handed Badme to Eritrea. He was proven right. Since then Plaut’s largely unflattering reports on Ethiopia had left government officials angry, but they could do little to discredit them. The BBC’s apology today provides them with what they have sought for nearly ten years. Plaut comes from today’s apology with his reputation battered and bruised and with his future in the BBC in serious doubt if the Andrew Gilligan saga is indicative of the corporation’s modus operandi.

Yet a close look at today’s ruling by the BBC’s Editorial Complaints Unit’s (ECU) shows that the central claim of Plaut’s report that aid was diverted by the TPLF rebels to buy weapons was scantily challenged. At one point, it criticized the report for not being clearer that the evidence given by former rebel leader Aregawi Berhe was “open to doubt”. But unless Plaut took Aregawi’s statement as unimpeachable in his report(which he didn’t), the implication of the criticism would be mainly procedural. With the necessary changes having been made, the substance of the claim remains the same. The significant part of the ruling was largely limited to whether the report gave an impression (tacitly and explicitly) that Band Aid money was used to buy arms without sufficient evidence, and it decided in favor of Band Aid trust which said it did. This is a problem of division – ascribing what is true for the whole to its parts. It is a serious error, but not one that discredits the claim about the whole. Obviously the headlines do not reflect this nuance, which suits the Ethiopian government all too well.

A couple of miles from the Martin Plaut’s office in London, Ben Rawlence, author of the new HRW report, must be scratching his head in frustration.