WARSAI-YIKAALO-“Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers”
Sophia Tesfamariam
August 08, 2007
As I traveled across Eritrea, I have had the pleasure and opportunity to see the many development projects being carried out by the people of Eritrea and most especially the members of the Eritrean Defense Forces. Ever since the Warsai Yikaalo Program for development (WYP) was launched in 2002, I have tried visit as many projects in an effort to understand Eritrea’s nation building strategy, which includes not just the development of Eritrea’s major infrastructure such as airports, ports, hospitals and roads, but also the development of Eritrea’s human infrastructure. The Warsai Yikaalo Program for development accomplishes both.
Much has been written about Eritrea’a WYP and most of it by western “analysts”, “experts”, “journalists” etc. etc. who have deliberately misrepresented its goals and ideals. Eritrea has become a threat-“a threat of a good example”, a beacon of hope in a continent filled with misery and despair, and where Africans, despite their abundant resources, because of corruption and greed, and most of all because of economic programs prescribed by self-serving external forces, have been relegated to live on handouts from the “generous” west… but that is another topic for another day.
Today, I want to briefly respond to another misrepresentation of Eritrea, this time from an Eritrean academic. Habtu Ghebre-Ab, a disgruntled Eritrean history professor at Clermont College, University in Ohio decided to author an article, “Eritrea’s New Symbol of ‘Progress’”, in which he exposes his ignorance. In his condescending piece posted on an enemy site on 27 June 2007, he not only attacks the Government and people of Eritrea, but also dares to undermine the courageous efforts and contributions of Eritrea’s youth, and especially the members of the Eritrean Defense Forces.
This is the same person who has been quoted in several “Christian” publications wherein he maliciously and shamefully attacks Eritrea’s principled and visionary stance on religious freedom in Eritrea and the desire of the Government and people to defend and protect Eritrea’s exemplary traditions and cultures of religious and ethnic tolerance from the modern day “missionaries” who are threatening the peace and stability of the nation, and attempting to thwart its development efforts. So this latest piece from a naysayer and an avouched disciple of the “gloom and doom” camp, comes as no surprise.
I have ignored all of his previous tantrums, but this time I have decided that I owe it to the thousands of Eritrea’s bravest and most magnanimous people to respond to the good Professor and because the members of the Eritrean Defense Forces and the Government and people of Eritrea he set out to undermine and insult are too busy with their nation building endeavors to engage in fruitless intellectual adventures with a detached and disaffected absent minded Professor. Bear with me as I address the concerns of this erudite radical Eritrean evangelist, a pawn who serves as a runner for western evangelical cartels, and give him some insight to the world of Warsai Yikaalo. A morally bankrupt individual, who thrives on laundering information and serving western predators as they “harvest” their brand of religions in Eritrea, has no right to demean and insult a people he no longer associates with, and folks like him must not be allowed to go unchallenged.
Professor Habtu’s article mostly centers on an image of a young man found on a commemorative stamp he received from Eritrea. Here is how this arrogant man describes it:
What grabbed my attention to the particular group of stamps on the envelope from Eritrea was the side-view picture of a well-developed Eritrean young male carrying, in an awkward posture, a rather heavy stone on his back. The frame of the young man in the picture is slightly bent over under the weight as he lurches forward with certain purposefulness towards an unseen destination to unload his sorry burden… As I stood by the mailbox, puzzled and trying to make some sense of the symbolism - what the image was supposed to represent - I recalled seeing sometime back another picture of a life-size statue standing on a raised pedestal on the front lawn of a hotel-like edifice in a town called Gel’alo somewhere along the new road between Massawa and Assab. Lo and behold! The picture on the stamps is the same wretched figure as that statue…”
Hotel Gelalo and the many statues in its magnificent compound are symbols of courage, commitment, determination, unwavering sacrifice and magnanimity. The statue that the Professor is so offended by was erected on the grounds of the beautifully designed new hotel, built by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces stationed in Gelalo, entirely on their own. The hotel is their generous contribution to Eritrea’s nascent tourism industry.
What is wretched and shameful is a “Christian” Professor who seems to have forgotten two most important Christian values- humility and service to mankind. I bet the good Professor would save for posterity if he found a stamp in commemoration of young and brave Americans, members of the US Army, who built the roads and highways that he now proudly rides.
The Professor continued his unwarranted wrath with this:
A working man does not have enough time in a day to try to figure out the meanings and symbolisms of a stone-carrying human being in commemoration of whose miserable life a stamp has been issued and a statue erected…the meaning and the message the image is supposed to convey simply eluded me…”
Whatever the academic credentials of this Professor, there is a lot more here that has eluded him then just “the meaning and the message that the image is supposed to convey”. This “working man” has the time to insult and ridicule others who are defending and developing a nation that he dares to call home, but has long since abandoned. The part that got to me, and provoked me to respond, was his myopic and rather simplistic comparison between the youth in the US and Eritrea and his warped intellectual assessment. He wrote:
The young people whose graduation we celebrated have a bright future, one that is limited only by one’s own imagination and personal choices. For them, the sky is the limit. On the other hand, the hundreds of thousands of the youth in Eritrea are cursed to a life of stone hauling…”
This history professor ought to know that if it weren’t for the “stone hauling” of America’s young, the self-absorbed Professor wouldn’t be driving today on the many highways and roads in Ohio and throughout the United States, that were built by the US Army Corps of Engineers. This second generation “westerner” would not be vacationing in seaside vacation spots and national parks, if it weren’t for the “stone hauling” of some of America’s best and brightest, members of the US Army Corps of Engineers who have lived very successful lives since. I doubt that he would undermine and insult them, but I am sure he believes he is being “smart” when he goes out of his way to insult one of his own to impress his partners, the anti-Eritrea “gloom and doom” campers.
For him and all the other “intellectuals” that are sitting around engaging in their favorite sport -“Eritrea bashing”, allow me to introduce the US Army Corps of Engineers and their immeasurable contributions to the lives of the American people. Maybe, just maybe, it will help them understand what the young men and women in Eritrea’s Armed Forces are doing to not only defend Eritrea’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, but who are ensuring Eritrea’s economic and political independence.
This will also help the Diasporan youth understand the meaning of Warsai Yikaalo Program and the vital role played by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces- “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers” and so much more, in achieving the goals and aspirations of the Eritrean people.
According to the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) site, the Corps serve “the Armed Forces and the Nation by providing vital engineering services and capabilities, as a public service, across the full spectrum of operations, from peace to war, in support of national interests” and lists its core missions in five areas: Infrastructure, Water Resources, Environment, Homeland Security and War fighting.
Here is more on the US Army Corps of Engineers taken from the Corp’s website (http://www.hq.usace.army.mil/history/), I urge all of Eritrea’s Diasporan youth, or for that matter, all African youth, to read it in its entirety:
"...The history of United States Army engineers can be traced back to June 16, 1775, when the Continental Congress organized an army with a chief engineer and two assistants…In 1794, Congress organized a Corps of Artillerists and Engineers, but it was not until 1802 that it reestablished a separate Corps of Engineers. The Corps' continuous existence dates from this year..."
"...At the same time, Congress established a new military academy at West Point, New York. Until 1866, the superintendent of the academy was always an engineer officer. The first superintendent, Jonathan Williams, also became the chief engineer of the Corps. During the first half of the 19th century, West Point was the major and for a while, the only engineering school in the country..."
"...From the beginning, many politicians wanted the Corps to contribute to both military construction and works "of a civil nature." Throughout the 19th century, the Corps supervised the construction of coastal fortifications and mapped much of the American West..."
"...The Corps of Engineers also constructed lighthouses, helped develop jetties and piers for harbors, and carefully mapped the navigation channels..."
"...The greatest legacy the early Corps of Engineers bestowed to future generations was its work on canals, rivers, and roads. America was a young nation, and rivers were its paths of commerce. They provided routes from western farms to eastern markets and for settlers seeking new homes beyond the Appalachian frontier… Both commercial development and national defense, as shown during the War of 1812, required more reliable transportation arteries. Out of those unruly streams, engineers carved navigation passages and harbors for a growing nation…agreed that national defense and inland transportation were complementary and interdependent.
"...Responding to the needs of the growing nation, they built houses and more than half a dozen marine hospitals…a number of lighthouses … contributed substantially to the construction of many public buildings and monuments in Washington, D.C..."
"...During the last half of the 19th century, the Corps improved navigation on the Potomac River and its tributaries; expanded the local water supply system; completed the Washington Monument; helped design and construct numerous structures including the Executive Office Building, the Lincoln Memorial, the Library of Congress, and the Government Printing Office; undertook swamp reclamation which resulted in the Tidal Basin; and developed Rock Creek Park as a major urban recreation area..."
Etc. etc.
Need I say more?
I hope the good history Professor is smart enough to understand where I am going with this. After all, as an Eritrean-American, he should be armed with information from both sides to make informed conclusions and comparisons.
Now back to the real topic for today… more on Assab, Eritrea’s beautiful port city.
A day after I arrived in Assab, I was told about a project that would be of interest to me. I was too excited to sleep and was up and ready in the wee hours of the morning. I headed to the site where a new wind farm was being constructed. As usual my heart was beating a mile a minute and my mind was racing, I didn’t know what to expect. Whatever it was, I knew it was going to be good…good for the people of Eritrea.
I had seen many wind farms from afar, but here was an opportunity for me to see one being built …by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces – “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers”. I was off to take my very first hands-on lesson on the benefits of wind energy and what it takes to build a wind farm in one of Eritrea’s hottest and most inhospitable environments.
I arrived at the site just a couple of days after the young men began the arduous task of breaking the huge rocks, digging deep into the ground, to make a long and narrow canal in which cables will be buried. While they used some machinery for breaking up the rocks, this type of work required manual force and lots of “stone hauling”. It only took lifting one rock with lots of assistance to let me know what it entailed.
As was explained to me by “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers”, when completed, the energy from the wind farm will be used to pump irrigation water, provide electricity for everyday use, and power desalinization plants that provide fresh drinking water to seaside fishing villages. More than 300 of 2,500 villages in Eritrea will receive clean water for domestic and commercial (mostly agro farming) uses.
The decision by the Government of Eritrea to explore other energy sources is not only prudent and smart; it is also in line with its stated desire to become economically self-reliant. According to scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who have been involved in developing efficient methods for utilizing wind energy generation in Eritrea:
Eritrea's location is ideal. As air heated over the Sahara desert rises, it is replaced by cooler air from Red Sea, which in turn is replaced by air that is pulled through the constricted south end of the Red Sea. This creates powerful and sustained wind currents in the strait of Bab al Mandab and strong winds along the Eritrean coast…”
The men were installing three wind turbines of 250 kilowatt each. They were laid out across the property waiting to be lifted once the ground work was completed. Power leads from each turbine have to be buried on site and that is not an easy task, the property is in one of the hottest and most unforgiving terrains. The energy is supposed to feed into the main power grid through the cables that were going to be buried in the narrow canals that the men were digging.
When planted, the tower hubs will be approximately 262 feet high, each with three rotors of 118 feet, for a total height of about 380 feet. The turbines will be connected to a transmission facility already constructed on the property, and power will then be channeled to the main electricity grid for distribution.
According to the Eritrean Energy Department, there will be an estimated saving of 684,000 liters of fuel oil per year, reduction of carbon dioxide emission by 1700 tons each year and since each wind turbine is expected to serve 20 years, there will be a total reduction of 34,000 tons of pollutants during a 20-year period.
The wind farm in Assab is the first urban, coastal, onshore, multi-turbine wind farm of the many others slated for construction throughout Eritrea. Wind powered energy has several advantages for Eritreans, who are relying mostly on their own internal, human and material resources, to rebuild and rehabilitating a country devastated by 40 years of war. The project is nearing completion and will be visible to all visitors when they drive past it as they enter Assab’s city limits. I too will be looking for it on my next visit.
Understanding Eritrea’s development strategy requires knowledge of Eritrea’s rich history, and Eritrea’s diverse cultures, norms and social traditions. Non-pecuniary motivations such as love of people and service to country, self -reliance, dignity and self esteem, values cultivated during the long 30-year bitter struggle for Eritrea’s independence, remain the driving force and guiding principles today, as they did then.
These uniquely Eritrean notions have yet to be captured in western economic models produced by the Bretton Woods Institutions and imposed on Africans. Warsai-Yikaalo and “Eritrea’s Corps of Engineers” are producing immeasurable benefits for the country and people of Eritrea. As in all the other projects underway throughout the country, the wind farm in Assab is not only going to provide much needed service for Assab and the surrounding villages, it will also contribute to the development of Eritrea’s internal talent and capacity.
More on Eritrea’s Southern Red Sea Zone next time…
Much has been written about Eritrea’a WYP and most of it by western “analysts”, “experts”, “journalists” etc. etc. who have deliberately misrepresented its goals and ideals. Eritrea has become a threat-“a threat of a good example”, a beacon of hope in a continent filled with misery and despair, and where Africans, despite their abundant resources, because of corruption and greed, and most of all because of economic programs prescribed by self-serving external forces, have been relegated to live on handouts from the “generous” west… but that is another topic for another day.
Today, I want to briefly respond to another misrepresentation of Eritrea, this time from an Eritrean academic. Habtu Ghebre-Ab, a disgruntled Eritrean history professor at Clermont College, University in Ohio decided to author an article, “Eritrea’s New Symbol of ‘Progress’”, in which he exposes his ignorance. In his condescending piece posted on an enemy site on 27 June 2007, he not only attacks the Government and people of Eritrea, but also dares to undermine the courageous efforts and contributions of Eritrea’s youth, and especially the members of the Eritrean Defense Forces.
This is the same person who has been quoted in several “Christian” publications wherein he maliciously and shamefully attacks Eritrea’s principled and visionary stance on religious freedom in Eritrea and the desire of the Government and people to defend and protect Eritrea’s exemplary traditions and cultures of religious and ethnic tolerance from the modern day “missionaries” who are threatening the peace and stability of the nation, and attempting to thwart its development efforts. So this latest piece from a naysayer and an avouched disciple of the “gloom and doom” camp, comes as no surprise.
I have ignored all of his previous tantrums, but this time I have decided that I owe it to the thousands of Eritrea’s bravest and most magnanimous people to respond to the good Professor and because the members of the Eritrean Defense Forces and the Government and people of Eritrea he set out to undermine and insult are too busy with their nation building endeavors to engage in fruitless intellectual adventures with a detached and disaffected absent minded Professor. Bear with me as I address the concerns of this erudite radical Eritrean evangelist, a pawn who serves as a runner for western evangelical cartels, and give him some insight to the world of Warsai Yikaalo. A morally bankrupt individual, who thrives on laundering information and serving western predators as they “harvest” their brand of religions in Eritrea, has no right to demean and insult a people he no longer associates with, and folks like him must not be allowed to go unchallenged.
Professor Habtu’s article mostly centers on an image of a young man found on a commemorative stamp he received from Eritrea. Here is how this arrogant man describes it:
What grabbed my attention to the particular group of stamps on the envelope from Eritrea was the side-view picture of a well-developed Eritrean young male carrying, in an awkward posture, a rather heavy stone on his back. The frame of the young man in the picture is slightly bent over under the weight as he lurches forward with certain purposefulness towards an unseen destination to unload his sorry burden… As I stood by the mailbox, puzzled and trying to make some sense of the symbolism - what the image was supposed to represent - I recalled seeing sometime back another picture of a life-size statue standing on a raised pedestal on the front lawn of a hotel-like edifice in a town called Gel’alo somewhere along the new road between Massawa and Assab. Lo and behold! The picture on the stamps is the same wretched figure as that statue…”
Hotel Gelalo and the many statues in its magnificent compound are symbols of courage, commitment, determination, unwavering sacrifice and magnanimity. The statue that the Professor is so offended by was erected on the grounds of the beautifully designed new hotel, built by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces stationed in Gelalo, entirely on their own. The hotel is their generous contribution to Eritrea’s nascent tourism industry.
What is wretched and shameful is a “Christian” Professor who seems to have forgotten two most important Christian values- humility and service to mankind. I bet the good Professor would save for posterity if he found a stamp in commemoration of young and brave Americans, members of the US Army, who built the roads and highways that he now proudly rides.
The Professor continued his unwarranted wrath with this:
A working man does not have enough time in a day to try to figure out the meanings and symbolisms of a stone-carrying human being in commemoration of whose miserable life a stamp has been issued and a statue erected…the meaning and the message the image is supposed to convey simply eluded me…”
Whatever the academic credentials of this Professor, there is a lot more here that has eluded him then just “the meaning and the message that the image is supposed to convey”. This “working man” has the time to insult and ridicule others who are defending and developing a nation that he dares to call home, but has long since abandoned. The part that got to me, and provoked me to respond, was his myopic and rather simplistic comparison between the youth in the US and Eritrea and his warped intellectual assessment. He wrote:
The young people whose graduation we celebrated have a bright future, one that is limited only by one’s own imagination and personal choices. For them, the sky is the limit. On the other hand, the hundreds of thousands of the youth in Eritrea are cursed to a life of stone hauling…”
This history professor ought to know that if it weren’t for the “stone hauling” of America’s young, the self-absorbed Professor wouldn’t be driving today on the many highways and roads in Ohio and throughout the United States, that were built by the US Army Corps of Engineers. This second generation “westerner” would not be vacationing in seaside vacation spots and national parks, if it weren’t for the “stone hauling” of some of America’s best and brightest, members of the US Army Corps of Engineers who have lived very successful lives since. I doubt that he would undermine and insult them, but I am sure he believes he is being “smart” when he goes out of his way to insult one of his own to impress his partners, the anti-Eritrea “gloom and doom” campers.
For him and all the other “intellectuals” that are sitting around engaging in their favorite sport -“Eritrea bashing”, allow me to introduce the US Army Corps of Engineers and their immeasurable contributions to the lives of the American people. Maybe, just maybe, it will help them understand what the young men and women in Eritrea’s Armed Forces are doing to not only defend Eritrea’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, but who are ensuring Eritrea’s economic and political independence.
This will also help the Diasporan youth understand the meaning of Warsai Yikaalo Program and the vital role played by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces- “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers” and so much more, in achieving the goals and aspirations of the Eritrean people.
According to the United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) site, the Corps serve “the Armed Forces and the Nation by providing vital engineering services and capabilities, as a public service, across the full spectrum of operations, from peace to war, in support of national interests” and lists its core missions in five areas: Infrastructure, Water Resources, Environment, Homeland Security and War fighting.
Here is more on the US Army Corps of Engineers taken from the Corp’s website (http://www.hq.usace.army.mil/history/), I urge all of Eritrea’s Diasporan youth, or for that matter, all African youth, to read it in its entirety:
"...The history of United States Army engineers can be traced back to June 16, 1775, when the Continental Congress organized an army with a chief engineer and two assistants…In 1794, Congress organized a Corps of Artillerists and Engineers, but it was not until 1802 that it reestablished a separate Corps of Engineers. The Corps' continuous existence dates from this year..."
"...At the same time, Congress established a new military academy at West Point, New York. Until 1866, the superintendent of the academy was always an engineer officer. The first superintendent, Jonathan Williams, also became the chief engineer of the Corps. During the first half of the 19th century, West Point was the major and for a while, the only engineering school in the country..."
"...From the beginning, many politicians wanted the Corps to contribute to both military construction and works "of a civil nature." Throughout the 19th century, the Corps supervised the construction of coastal fortifications and mapped much of the American West..."
"...The Corps of Engineers also constructed lighthouses, helped develop jetties and piers for harbors, and carefully mapped the navigation channels..."
"...The greatest legacy the early Corps of Engineers bestowed to future generations was its work on canals, rivers, and roads. America was a young nation, and rivers were its paths of commerce. They provided routes from western farms to eastern markets and for settlers seeking new homes beyond the Appalachian frontier… Both commercial development and national defense, as shown during the War of 1812, required more reliable transportation arteries. Out of those unruly streams, engineers carved navigation passages and harbors for a growing nation…agreed that national defense and inland transportation were complementary and interdependent.
"...Responding to the needs of the growing nation, they built houses and more than half a dozen marine hospitals…a number of lighthouses … contributed substantially to the construction of many public buildings and monuments in Washington, D.C..."
"...During the last half of the 19th century, the Corps improved navigation on the Potomac River and its tributaries; expanded the local water supply system; completed the Washington Monument; helped design and construct numerous structures including the Executive Office Building, the Lincoln Memorial, the Library of Congress, and the Government Printing Office; undertook swamp reclamation which resulted in the Tidal Basin; and developed Rock Creek Park as a major urban recreation area..."
Etc. etc.
Need I say more?
I hope the good history Professor is smart enough to understand where I am going with this. After all, as an Eritrean-American, he should be armed with information from both sides to make informed conclusions and comparisons.
Now back to the real topic for today… more on Assab, Eritrea’s beautiful port city.
A day after I arrived in Assab, I was told about a project that would be of interest to me. I was too excited to sleep and was up and ready in the wee hours of the morning. I headed to the site where a new wind farm was being constructed. As usual my heart was beating a mile a minute and my mind was racing, I didn’t know what to expect. Whatever it was, I knew it was going to be good…good for the people of Eritrea.
I had seen many wind farms from afar, but here was an opportunity for me to see one being built …by members of the Eritrean Defense Forces – “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers”. I was off to take my very first hands-on lesson on the benefits of wind energy and what it takes to build a wind farm in one of Eritrea’s hottest and most inhospitable environments.
I arrived at the site just a couple of days after the young men began the arduous task of breaking the huge rocks, digging deep into the ground, to make a long and narrow canal in which cables will be buried. While they used some machinery for breaking up the rocks, this type of work required manual force and lots of “stone hauling”. It only took lifting one rock with lots of assistance to let me know what it entailed.
As was explained to me by “Eritrea’s Army Corps of Engineers”, when completed, the energy from the wind farm will be used to pump irrigation water, provide electricity for everyday use, and power desalinization plants that provide fresh drinking water to seaside fishing villages. More than 300 of 2,500 villages in Eritrea will receive clean water for domestic and commercial (mostly agro farming) uses.
The decision by the Government of Eritrea to explore other energy sources is not only prudent and smart; it is also in line with its stated desire to become economically self-reliant. According to scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory who have been involved in developing efficient methods for utilizing wind energy generation in Eritrea:
Eritrea's location is ideal. As air heated over the Sahara desert rises, it is replaced by cooler air from Red Sea, which in turn is replaced by air that is pulled through the constricted south end of the Red Sea. This creates powerful and sustained wind currents in the strait of Bab al Mandab and strong winds along the Eritrean coast…”
The men were installing three wind turbines of 250 kilowatt each. They were laid out across the property waiting to be lifted once the ground work was completed. Power leads from each turbine have to be buried on site and that is not an easy task, the property is in one of the hottest and most unforgiving terrains. The energy is supposed to feed into the main power grid through the cables that were going to be buried in the narrow canals that the men were digging.
When planted, the tower hubs will be approximately 262 feet high, each with three rotors of 118 feet, for a total height of about 380 feet. The turbines will be connected to a transmission facility already constructed on the property, and power will then be channeled to the main electricity grid for distribution.
According to the Eritrean Energy Department, there will be an estimated saving of 684,000 liters of fuel oil per year, reduction of carbon dioxide emission by 1700 tons each year and since each wind turbine is expected to serve 20 years, there will be a total reduction of 34,000 tons of pollutants during a 20-year period.
The wind farm in Assab is the first urban, coastal, onshore, multi-turbine wind farm of the many others slated for construction throughout Eritrea. Wind powered energy has several advantages for Eritreans, who are relying mostly on their own internal, human and material resources, to rebuild and rehabilitating a country devastated by 40 years of war. The project is nearing completion and will be visible to all visitors when they drive past it as they enter Assab’s city limits. I too will be looking for it on my next visit.
Understanding Eritrea’s development strategy requires knowledge of Eritrea’s rich history, and Eritrea’s diverse cultures, norms and social traditions. Non-pecuniary motivations such as love of people and service to country, self -reliance, dignity and self esteem, values cultivated during the long 30-year bitter struggle for Eritrea’s independence, remain the driving force and guiding principles today, as they did then.
These uniquely Eritrean notions have yet to be captured in western economic models produced by the Bretton Woods Institutions and imposed on Africans. Warsai-Yikaalo and “Eritrea’s Corps of Engineers” are producing immeasurable benefits for the country and people of Eritrea. As in all the other projects underway throughout the country, the wind farm in Assab is not only going to provide much needed service for Assab and the surrounding villages, it will also contribute to the development of Eritrea’s internal talent and capacity.
More on Eritrea’s Southern Red Sea Zone next time…