Yegna - የኛ ስደት Sidet (Migration); Ethiopian Group; British Aid Priorities

Yegna - የኛ ስደት Sidet (Migration) - Music Video - 1,273,687 views to date

Same song, Amharic lyrics

Yegna Manifesto - የኛ ነው የኛ

Ethiopian girl band Yegna's funding axed by UK - The Girl Effect Programme, which manages Yegna and promotes women's rights in Ethiopia, said its aims had been "wilfully misrepresented."

"Empowering women and girls around the world remains a priority"..."Humanitarian aid 'not just about food parcels'" - but....

Yegna is described as “inspiring positive behaviour change for girls in Ethiopia” (Telegraph article)

I would like to study an objective evaluation report  and impact assessment of this controversial aid- project support/funding partnership. A cost-benefit analysis, in old-speak. The outreach must have been considerable. Let's hope the project is now self-sustaining. It seems to have achieved many of its objectives.

Update: See Grant Shapps' article in The Sunday Times, 29 January 2017 - "I refused to sign off the now-infamous "Ethiopian Spice Girls" project - £5.2m to Yegna, a five-piece pop group, to 'inspire positive behaviour change in Ethiopia'. Discrimination against girls is real enough, but that approach was so obviously open to utter ridicule".

The priorities for the expenditure of taxpayers' money do have to be kept under regular review.

Andrew Mitchell, response about British aid, Sunday Times, 5.2.2017- Behind the huffs, British aid has helped millions to a better life

"Then we come to the so-called 'Ethiopian Spice Girls' project that so horrified Shapps and apparently the entire British media. Britain was a co-funder of the Girl Effect along with the Nike Foundation, other private organisations, philanthropists and private enterprise...The project, which created a five-piece girl group, Yegna, directly confronts issues that profoundly affect millions of the poorest girls in the world: early and forced marriage, isolation, violence and genital mutilation. The results that have been achieved are remarkable. International donors spend billions on schools, health centres and vaccines that are hugely underused when girls cannot or do not access them. This is sadly the case for millions of girls living in poverty. This project has now reached 8.5m people and 95% of boys who engage with Yegna say they would speak out against a girl being forced into marriage. Credit is due to the Nike Foundation for championing this so successfully and shame on the British media who bullied DfID ministers into withdrawing from it".

I look forward to seeing published independent summative evaluation reports. I hope the relevant media organisation will receive copies

For five years (in the 1970's) I worked for a successful project to help develop educational television and radio in Ethiopia, also supported by British overseas aid at the time. Proper, ongoing evaluation (formative and summative) is a vital part of the process.

An argument for tackling domestic priorities instead of international development aid?
NHS faces 'humanitarian crisis' as demand rises, British Red Cross warns, The Guardian - Dr Mark Holland, the president of the Society for Acute Medicine, said: “For a long time we have been saying that the NHS is on the edge. But people dying after long spells in hospital corridors shows that the NHS is now broken. “We have got to the point where the efforts of staff to prop up the system are no longer enough to keep the system afloat. We are asking NHS staff to provide a world-class service, but with third world levels of staffing and third world levels of beds".