There have been efforts recently to politicize who gets credit for planning GERD.
The current official narrative in Ethiopia tends to downplay the role of former Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in conceiving the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) project and promote that of Emperor Haile Selassie.
Efforts to re-write the genesis of the dam reflect the current government’s desire to deny any accomplishments of the previous government and re-write the EPRDF-era as “27 years of darkness.”
This tendency about the dam probably first appeared in mid-2020, when a photograph captioned “Emperor Haile Selassie visiting the Nile dam project” was posted on a blog by Muluken Bekele, an entrepreneur who occasionally writes about Nile. Many blogs and social media accounts now use the photo to highlight Emperor Haile Selassie’s role.
More recently, President Sahle-Work Zewde tweeted: “First Emperor’s vision, then audacity, followed continuity: the 1st turbine is on!”
Some international media have also started attributing the paternity of the dam to Haile Selassie.
This article analyzes the historical evidence for the claim that Haile Selassie first conceived the plans for GERD and investigates what we really see in that iconic photograph.
British study
In the 1920s, the British planned to construct a dam at the Chara-Chara outlet of Lake Tana, as part of the regulation of the Nile water flows. These plans took place at a time when the British were emphasizing Egypt’s rights to the Nile waters over Ethiopia’s.
The aim was to have a more regular flow of water, allowing more land to be irrigated in the British colonies of Egypt and Sudan. By building a two-meter high weir, 4.3 billion cubic meters of water could be stored at the Lake Tana Reservoir and released when needed.
Diplomatically, the idea to build this reservoir was a complex issue. Aside from the British and Ethiopian governments, Italy was also involved. There were also disagreements between the British and Egyptians about the extent to which the Blue Nile needed to be controlled.
A first detailed hydrological study of the plans to dam the Lake Tana outlet was carried out from 1920 to 1921 by G.W. Grabham and R.P. Black, and was published in 1925. As the study’s authors detailed, challenges were not only political but also technical.
The problems included determining how the weir should be constructed and how to channel the water efficiently downstream towards the British territories. The upper Nile segment—between the Chara-Chara outlet and the Blue Nile falls, where the river runs and meanders across Quaternary lava flows—was planned to be rectified, including by digging a tunnel to cut off the Egirbarr meander (Fig. 1).
Despite these plans by the British, the works were ultimately never carried out.
Fig. 1 Design cross-section of channels and a tunnel suggested for construction in the 1920s along the Blue Nile downstream from the Lake Tana outlet.
Italian exploration
Detailed exploration was initiated to build a major dam across the Blue Nile during the Italian occupation of Ethiopia that began in 1935.
The CONIEL (Compagnia Nazionale Imprese Elettriche) was established in Addis Abeba with the purpose of hydropower planning. Jointly with the Istituto Geografico Militare, they recorded aerial photographs all along the Blue Nile and its major tributary streams (Fig. 2).
The work was forcibly interrupted due to the Italian defeat in 1941.
Fig. 2 Aerial photographs of the Blue Nile gorge at Zadi (Benishangul-Gumuz) taken on 6 December 1938 by the Italian Military Geographical Institute.
American study
In the 1950s, Britain’s approach moved towards restricting Nile’s water from an increasingly confrontational Egypt. Following the nationalization of the Suez Canal in 1956, there were high-level arguments inside the British administration over whether damming or diverting the Nile could be used as a weapon against Gamal Abdel Nasser.
At that stage, the U.S. entered into the picture. The Blue Nile investigation in Ethiopia was one of the United States Bureau of Reclamation’s (USBR) main international endeavors in the 1950s.
The Bureau’s involvement in the Blue Nile region was a mix of geopolitics, development assistance, and technical intervention.
Given Haile Selassie’s politically effective demands for speedier and more widespread American support, the Ethiopian government’s response to the USBR’s projected development of the Blue Nile is regarded as being particularly important.
What the study achieved was to come up with suggestions for a huge layout of reservoirs in the Blue Nile basin. The USBR indicated 111 potential sites for hydroelectric power, including 25 along the Blue Nile itself.
The river segment adjacent to Mankush or Guba—some 20 kilometers upstream of the GERD site—was marked as one of the 25 potential sites, as well as reservoir areas. Most locations were not seriously considered further for reservoir construction, such as a reservoir in the main Blue Nile gorge.
We need your support to analyze news from across Ethiopia
Please help fund Ethiopia Insight’s coverage
In some of these locations, a dam has since been realized; in others, construction is currently underway.
However, there was no specific study or plan about building a large-scale dam across the Blue Nile except weirs like the one at the outlet of Lake Tana.
USBR gave more attention to the potential for reservoir construction in the upper Blue Nile basin, such as Finchaa in the first place, also Megech and Ribb. Even in the case of Finchaa, no particular plans were drawn up.
Only the most relevant locations were identified by the USBR study, to the great dismay of the emperor who had preferred at least one dam to be built rather than only conducting exploration studies.
Photographic evidence
Now, let us explore the photographic evidence. Was the photo of Haile Selassie on a previously unknown lakeshore really taken in the framework of the USBR study?
Doubts have arisen because: (1) on that photo there is already the presence of a constructed reservoir, (2) the landscape does not fit with the Blue Nile, and (3) many of the USBR Blue Nile Basin photographs conserved in archives are monochrome and they do not include photos of on-site visits by the emperor.
Fig. 3. Reconstruction of the surroundings of Haile Selassie’s Koka palace in the 1960s.
The scenery could be attributed to the Main Ethiopian Rift Valley given that the deposits across the water body seem to be volcanic products, particularly pyroclastic deposits, which are entirely absent from the GERD dam area and its vicinities. The presence of an acacia tree that is common in the Main Ethiopian Rift Valley is an additional hint.
In contrast, the topography around GERD includes river incisions into granite and metamorphic basement rocks, and the vegetation is relatively lush there.
It appears that the photo was taken from a hill overlooking a reservoir, as one can see a drawdown. This fact narrows down the possible location, given that there were only two reservoirs in Ethiopia in the 1960s: Koka and Aba Samuel.
Fig. 4. Aba Samuel reservoir, filled with sediment.
Aba Samuel (Fig. 4) was constructed by the Italians in the late 1950s, in part as compensation for war damages. The reservoir is across the Akaki River, some 20 kilometers southwest of Addis Abeba.
The sides of Aba Samuel reservoir are less sloping, with a lot of cropland. Before it was filled with sediment, as it now is, there were always flamingos. Based on these details, we discarded this reservoir as a possible location where the iconic photo was taken.
Further details reveal that the photo was taken on the grounds of the emperor’s Koka palace overlooking the Koka reservoir, which was completed in May 1960 to irrigate the Dutch HVA sugar plantations.
The mountain behind Haile Selassie’s head in the photo (Fig. 3, in the background) was identified as Mount Yerer, which is located close to Addis Abeba. The photo was taken after 1960, given that the Koka reservoir was already filled with water.
The viewpoint in the photo (Fig. 3, top left) is just outside of the palace, in the surrounding lands where bushes had been allowed to re-grow; there are acacia trees on the edge of a cliff overlooking the reservoir.
The opposite shoreline fits well with another photo (Fig. 3, top right) that was taken overlooking the reservoir from the palace gardens.
GERD politicization
There is a strange movement to politicize the history of plans to construct a dam across the Blue Nile and associate GERD with Emperor Haile Selassie.
Besides Meles’ initiative, Tigrayans gave a lot of money for GERD’s construction. The contribution per capita for GERD was high in Tigray, probably higher than in any other region of Ethiopia.
One Ethiopian colleague explained this situation as such: “I think the movement to associate the dam with the emperor is very well organized and it is part of the plan to erase the memory of Tigrayans’ contributions in the development of Ethiopia. It is sad but it is happening.”
Follow Ethiopia Insight
It must nonetheless be recognized that there were a number of issues in relation to the construction of GERD.
These include politico-financial intrigues, negligence of the World Commission on Dams’ framework for decision-making, sedimentation, Nile basin hydro-politics, the lack of a commonly agreed Environmental Impact Assessment by the upstream and downstream countries, and possible misallocation of resources.
Probably the most overlooked factor in the whole equation is the indigenous communities.
In addition to earlier land grabbing, in recent years the GERD building works have attracted an important workforce as well as petty trade near the site and along the main roads. This has attracted more settlers to the region, further marginalizing the indigenous population.
Most significantly, an estimated 20,000 Gumuz who were living in the reservoir area and five-kilometer buffer strip have been relocated to villages along roads.
As we showed here, Emperor Haile Selassie, just like the Italian colonial planners and every other Ethiopian ruler, was enthusiastic about the idea of building a large water management infrastructure. In fact, the 1974 demonstrators in the streets of Addis Abeba chanted, “As soon as the work on the dams is done, wealth will accrue to everyone.”
The iconic photo of Haile Selassie (Fig. 3, top left) fits that purpose, as it showcases the Koka reservoir after its construction. Without a concrete planning initiative, however, this is certainly not evidence that, at that time, there were advanced plans to build a dam across the Blue Nile.
What’s beyond doubt is that the late Meles Zenawi’s role in the project is unrivaled, and it was under his watch that Ethiopia began the construction of the dam on 2 April 2011, with the main aim of producing electricity for Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa.
Query or correction? Email us
Follow Ethiopia Insight
This is the authors’ viewpoint. However, Ethiopia Insight will correct clear factual errors.Main photo: The picture of Emperor Haile Selassie that got incorrectly captioned as being a picture of him visiting a Nile dam project.
Join our Telegram channel
Published under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. Cite Ethiopia Insight and link to this page if republished.
We need your support to analyze news from across Ethiopia
Please help fund Ethiopia Insight’s coverage
I just finished reading a book called “Greater Tigray and the mysterious magnetism of Ethiopia,“ written by historian Haggai Ehrlich, one of the world’s greatest authorities on the Horn of Africa. While Erlich’s research was conducted entirely separately from ours, he found that the GERD “was envisioned and carried out in the spirit of Tigray’s tradition of courage and defiance at home as well as in external affairs” (p. 165).
https://lib.ugent.be/en/catalog/rug01:003175555
https://www.hurstpublishers.com/book/greater-tigray-and-the-mysterious-magnetism-of-ethiopia/
Ethiopian leaders Meles and Haileselassie about Nile and Nile dam
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8Ahp5j7TqY
Please enlighten your self that it is a continued effort and drop your dissect agenda … just read the following two, among others:
1. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download;jsessionid=447931C80B5C6D3278B2BDCA7B1B04CE?doi=10.1.1.733.1956&rep=rep1&type=pdf
2. https://css.ethz.ch/content/dam/ethz/special-interest/gess/cis/center-for-securities-studies/pdfs/Ethiopia-and-the-Nile.pdf
Good article: Fake news, here: fake photos, have to be stopped, no matter, from which political motive.
Additional comment: The figure of 20,000 displaced Gumuz seems to be exaggerated, considering their migration/seminomadic culture and population density.
his is totally fabrication as all Ethiopian leaders have contributed for the construction of GERD, including Mengistu H/Mariam. Rather, Meles and his tribe made a big mess on the construction and a lot of money stolen by TPLF members which contributed by poor Ethiopians. Please don’t politicize, all Ethiopians knew the fact. Why didn’t talk about the corruption of Kinfe, one of TPLF members who stolen Billions from GERD money?
It seems certain that the construction of the dam will soon be completed and that it will start running in full steam. The big question is , in the country where there is so much injustice, strife, and hatred among ethnicities, could the wealth from the dam be distributed fairly among all Ethiopians or,as it always has happened throughout our history, be reaped by only one ethnicity of the officials who are all-powerful and self-centered. Only time will tell whether the dam will be a blessing or a curse to Ethiopia, Sudan, Egypt, and Africa as a whole. How will it be managed, wisely or foolishly ? there lies the question and the uncertainty!
The dam was part of the 27 years of nation-building, a renaissance/transformation project. GERD is Meles’ legacy, his place in history is secure, no amount of revisionism can alter that.
Meles’ role will be preserved and so will Mengistu’s and Hailesilasse’s.
Despite the attempts to claim all credit of the dam to Meles Zenawi, the documented facts show that this has been a process that took decades beyond TPLF’s regime to build up to where we are now.
You will swallow this hard pill, or else the next regime will completely wipe out Meles’/TPLF’s role in Etihiopia, just like you’re trying to do right now.
Meles’ role will be secure in history IF and ONLY IF you are willing to knowledge the facts above. Your choice.
Very interesting perspective. I’m conducting a research on online narratives with regards to the GERD and conflicts transformation in the Nile basin. Is it possible that we can have a chat on the same
Dear writers of the Article! I recognise the value that has been given to Meles in getting the GERD off the ground. But you miss the value of taking balance in not considering interconnection of generations. Haile Selassie had a vision for the dam, laid the ground for it and faithfully said ‘we can’t do it; next generation will handle it’ (paraphrased) . There is nothing wrong with dreaming for the nation. Meles worked hard on Nile initiative to get consensus of the counties of the Region. He boldly lead the way to start building regardless of the odds against the process. His subjects, however, were to kill the dam after his death. Abiy came to picture to save the GERD and the process. There is nothing wrong with that since he stood on the way of saboteurs, liars and thieves. Here we are able to get the power flow with bold stand of true citizens who believed in unity; as opposed to few elites trying to sabotage by drafting map to put GERD under possession of only one Region. ToConclude: Haile Envisioned, Meles Initiated, Abiy Ahmed Accelerated it. Whether you like it or not it is Inter Generational Effort that winds up with ‘ Medemer’
Stupid article. Noone in Ethiopia doubts Meles got it going. But equally noone here now , mentions the name of Meles as he was the founder of the 27 years of the TPLF dynasty that stole 40 billion dollars to line their own pockets, made sure generals and brigadiers were 90% from Tigrai, gave vast chunks of the economy to Tigrai etc etc. Then when they lost power started a civil war to get power back. Trouble is those who run EthInsight like Dabvison all love the TPLF. THEY don’t love TPLF quite as much as Alex the Faal..but close. SAD.
This article appears to be a cheap shot at the original contribution of HIM Hailesilasie. The title quiet tells the insurgent nature of the authors. How can a simple analysis of a picture, posted by whoever for what ever reason, be utilized to dismiss anyone’s contribution?
Here is a balance article on the arduous journey of realizing the dam on the Nile. https://www.hornafricainsight.org/post/ethiopia-storturousone-hundred-year-longefforttobuildonedam
Why do we lose time, effort and money? Atz Haile Selassie, Meles or …. Is it that important to give the credit to someone if we are not sure? Doing this will cause harm.
No one denies the role of Meles Zenawi, even in his speech Abiy also recall it. So i don’t understand the aim of the article.
Moreover no one denies or can deny the role of the Tigrians in the development of their country Ethiopia. They gave everything, even their precious life, for the unity, prosperity and peace of Ethiopia. We all are one, and Ethiopia is beyond party politics. Her fate is on the hands of God and her people so please leave us alone we have a solution for each of our problems.
How could Derg had time and interest in dam building when it was fully occupied with butchering youths in hundreds of thousands, raping and mutilating women and girls,expropriating land , housings and buildings.It was a time of terror, madness and chaos ; it was not a time of sanity .
I heard of the attempt made by His majesty Haileselaie to develop the dam some 40 yrs before, but failed due to lack of support/cooperation from or intregue by the British, that is long before Meles. We appreciate Melesis action as Ethiopians, no one denied. My father died nearly 17 years before was telling me, His Majesty had the intention to build the dam on Abay which was not realized due to the British and other foreignners intervention. I’ve been in Cairo some 10 yrs before and heard almost same story from an old man in jewelery shop! He told me His Majesty was to build a dam and starve us but the British and Americans saved us. 23 yrs before when I was in The Neatherlands a student like me told me almost same story! Most Ethiopians, including me grew being told we are poor because we were not able to develop our resource.
My father was telling me Ethiopia is Gifted, blessed country, Ethiopia is responsible to feed its neighbors,…. The dam is realized by generational effort, we built it, we will support our African brothers we are responsible…
Dear authors, I really doubt why there shall be an issue of attribution and recognition. My understanding is that there shall be a collective celebration for this consistent engagement of leaders from 1960-ies till now to build the dam.
Even in the middle of the cold war contributions were being made, by the derg, under a unified Ethiopian River Vallies Authority.
It is a little sad that mr. Nysses, and mr. Billie had overstretched their competency area–assuming nobody would pay attention to the details.
An elucidating and educative article on the history of the waterworks in Ethiopia.If it is true what you say about the official stance of the current government on GERD,that the credit be given to Haile Selassie rather than the true creator of the dam , Melesse Zenawe then it follows and must be true that the country is in a better position economically, politically , socially and security-wise now than it was during the reign of Melesse! The time of Haile Selassie was marked by the domination of one ethnicity and one religion (yet, I was young, life was stable, peaceful and sweet ) ; shall we revive or go back to that system of government again? If the administration denies the reality on the ground, then where would they lead the country to ? The country should look forward rather than backward. Minority rights and welfare should have been upheld, but no one ever cared about it , especially now when people go about their business half hungry.