A Tale of Two Ethiopias - Spectacle of Wealth Amid Widespread Poverty

[Addis Standard] Addis Abeba -- In recent weeks, a short clip began travelling across Ethiopian TikTok and Telegram. According to the captions that came with it, a family had presented a newly married couple with a gift worth one billion birr. Within days, the figure had become a hashtag, a punchline, and, for a great many viewers, a provocation. I cannot verify the sum, and I have no interest in the family. What caught my attention was something else: almost nobody who shared the clip seemed to find the number implausible.