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Haile Selassie (Power of Trinity) (July 23, 1892 – August 27, 1975) was the last Emperor (1930–1936; 1941–1974) of Ethiopia, and is a religious symbol in the Rastafarian movement.
Biography
Haile Selassie was born in the town-village of Ejersa Goro, Ethiopia, as Tafari Makonnen His father was Ras Makonnen, the governor of Harar and his mother was Wezero (lady) Yeshimebet Ali. He didn't remember his mother, who died on March 14, 1894. He came about his Imperial blood through his paternal grandmother, Tenagnework Sahle Selassie, who was an aunt of Emperor Menelik II and a claimed direct descendant of Makeda, Queen of Sheba and King Solomon of ancient Israel.
In September 1916, an assembly of nobles with the agreement of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church deposed Emperor Lij Iyasu (Iyasu V), the grandson and heir of Emperor Menelik II, for suspected conversion to Islam. In his place they crowned Menelik's daughter Zauditu as Empress of Ethiopia and her cousin Ras (Duke) Tafari Makonnen as Crown Prince and Regent. As Ras Tafari (Amharic Fearsome), he ruled Ethiopia as regent and crown prince (1916–1928) for his cousin the empress Zauditu, and as king (negus) (1928–1930), assuming the title of Emperor upon Zauditu's death (April 2 1930). He was crowned emperor November 2 1930, taking the full title His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Haile Selassie I, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, Elect of God, King of Kings of Ethiopia.
In 1911 he married Wayzaro Menen Asfaw, daughter of the Jantirar Asfaw of Ambassel and maternal granddaughter of King Mikael of Wolo. She was the niece of the deposed Lij Iyasu. Emperor Haile Selassie and Empress Menen had six children, Princess Tenagnework, Crown Prince Asfaw Wossen, Princess Tsehai, Princess Zenebework, Prince Makonnen Duke of Harar, and Prince Sahle Selassie. Emperor Haile Selassie, by a previous marriage, had a daughter, Princess Romanework.
Emperor Haile Selassie developed the policy of careful modernisation initiated by the emperor Menelik II, securing Ethiopia's admission to the League of Nations in 1923 and abolishing slavery in the Empire that same year. He introduced Ethiopia's first written constitution in 1931. It provided for a bi-cameral legislature, which although completely filled by appointment, was the first time that non-noble subjects had an active role in setting official government policy. The League's failure to stop the Second Italo-Ethiopian War—Italy's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935—led to five years in exile, during which he was based at Bath in England, but spent some time elsewhere, for example in Great Malvern.
Returning in 1941 after Italy's defeat in Ethiopia by British and Ethiopian patriot forces, he introduced a revised constitution in (November 1955) under which he retained effective power while extending political participation by allowing the lower house of parliament to become an elected body. Ethiopia became a charter member of the United Nations. Modern educational methods were more widely spread throughout the Empire, and the country embarked on a development scheme and plans for modernization, tempered by Ethiopian traditions, and within the framework of the ancient monarchial structure of the state. In 1951, after a lengthy fact finding inquiry by the allied powers and then the United Nations, the former Italian colony of Eritrea was federated to the Ethiopian Empire as a compromise between the sizable factions that wanted complete Union with the Empire or complete Independence from it. In 1961, the Eritrean parliament voted to dissolve itself and abolish the Federation, making Eritrea a province of Ethiopia. This triggered a long simmering war for Independence that plagued the regime of Emperor Haile Selassie and the communist Dergue regime that would eventually replace him. In 1963 the Emperor presided over the establishment of the Organization of African Unity and convinced the new organization to set up its headquarters in Addis Ababa.
Following an abortive coup attempt (December 1960) by his Imperial Guard forces, Emperor Haile Selassie pursued more conservative policies, aligning Ethiopia with the West in contrast to the more radical leftist African governments that were more common in that era. An increasingly radical student movement took hold in the University and High School campuses, and student unrest became a regular feature of Ethiopian life. Marxism took root in large segments of the Ethiopian intelligencia. Resistance by conservative elements at the Imperial Court and Parliament, in addition to within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, made proposals of widespread land reform policies impossible to implement, and also damaged the standing of the government of the Emperor. The majority of the largely agricultural population remained tenant farmers on land owned by a small number of wealthy absentee landlords which included members of the nobility, the Orthodox Church, and the Imperial family itself. Finally, a devastating drought in the Province of Wollo in 1972-1973 caused a large famine which was covered up by the Imperial government and kept from the Emperor himself. This in the middle of much pomp and ceremony surrounding the Emperor's 80th birthday. When a BBC documentary exposed the existence and scope of the famine, the government was seriously undermined, and the Emperor's personal popularity was shaken. Simultaneously, economic hardship caused by the OPEC oil embargo and widespread military mutinies in the country further weakened the monarchy. A coordinating investigative committee set up to investigate the demands of military mutineers, calling itself the Dergue, took advantage of the government's disarray and orchestrated the depostion of Emperor Haile Selassie on September 12, 1974 in a military coup. The Emperor and those members of his family that remained in the country were all placed under arrest. A year later, on August 28, 1975, the state media reported that the deposed Emperor died in prison on August 27, 1975, following complications from a prostate operation. His doctors denied that any complications had occurred and rejected the government version of his death. It is widely believed by historians that he was suffocated in his sleep, and his remains buried beneath the president's personal office. (On November 5, 2000, the late Emperor was given an Imperial funeral by the Ethiopian Orthodox church, but the new post-communist Ethiopian government refused to give it the status of a state funeral.)
The Emperor's seat as a Knight of the Garter in St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle had the unusual feature of a double-sided banner, one side representing the Emperor of Ethiopia, and the other for the Lion of Judah. He had originally asked for two seats.
Haile Selassie in Rastafari
Amongst followers of the Rastafarian movement, a religion which developed in the 1930s in Jamaica under the influence of Marcus Mosiah Garvey's "Back to Africa" movement, Haile Selassie is seen as God, the Black messiah who will lead the peoples of Africa and the African diaspora to freedom. Most Rastafarians believe that Haile Selassie is still alive, and that his widely reported death was part of a conspiracy to discredit their religion.
The state visit of Selassie to Jamaica, during which the Emperor was greeted by 100,000 stoned, drumming Rastas, was reportedly quite unsettling for the monarch. He took one look at the crowds and refused to leave the plane for an hour, until persuaded to do so by Mortimer Planner, a Rasta elder. It was during this visit that Selassie famously told the Rastafarian community leaders that they should not emigrate to Ethiopia until they had liberated the people of Jamaica. After the visit, the Emperor is said to have told Ethiopian Orthodox Archbishop Abuna Yesehaq: "There is a problem in Jamaica.... Please, help these people. They are misunderstanding, they do not understand our culture.... They need a church to be established and you are chosen to go." In the light of the deep longing of Rastafarians to return to Africa he donated a piece of land at Shashamane, 250 km south of Addis Ababa for the use of Jamaican Rastafarians. There is still a community there. He is also reported to have said that he did not want to disturb the faith of the Rastas. He remained a devout member of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church his entire life.
It is almost certain that more people have now heard of Haile Selassie through the Rastafarian movement than know of him as a historical or political figure, a situation likely to continue. Many of them are very concerned that the world should see Haile Selassie in a positive light.
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- "That until the philosophy which holds one race superior and another inferior is finally and permanently discredited and abandoned: That until there are no longer first-class and second class citizens of any nation; That until the color of a man's skin is of no more significance than the color of his eyes; That until the basic human rights are equally guaranteed to all without regard to race; That until that day, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion, to be pursued but never attained." – Haile Selassie, United Nations, and popularised in a song called war by Bob Marley.
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