On Monday, August 23, 2010, at about 11:30 am, Wes Haws of the Alyssa Farm, was attacked by an angry mob over a land dispute. He was struck on the back of the head with an axe. He is currently in the hospital in Tel Aviv, Israel.
On her blog, Shelly Baum, a farm manager, describes her husband, Alan, running into the yard and quietly but urgently saying, “Where’s the satellite phone, I need it now, Wes has been shot!” Scared for Wes and his family, Shelly confirmed that his wife, Alyssa, was with him and ran to find the first aid kit at Wes’s house. Alan was busy calling the office in Addis Abada and quickly arranged a flight to get him there.
After an interrogation, it was found out that Wes was outside the farm with a land clearing crew opening up some new land. Some villagers were there and were trying to stop the land clearing because they claimed they had not had compensation and felt that MAI was trespassing. Barouk, a GPS operator, was ahead of Wes and the dozer trying to figure out where to strike a line. Some people from a nearby small farm were there as well as the villagers. They warned Barouk and Kadir, telling them to stop and go back to the farm. Barouk and Kadir told Wes that they were in danger and needed to leave; that they were threatening to kill him. One man tried to throw a rock and Wes grabbed the man’s arm, making him drop the rock. That man, threatening to shoot Wes, ran to one of the guards and tried to get the gun from him. Wes, being unaffected, took the GPS from Baruk and was looking at it when he was struck on the head from behind. Not realizing exactly what happened after receiving a blow to the head, Wes asked Baruk if he had been shot. In the commotion he didn’t get a clear answer. Baruk and Kadir quickly got him to the land cruiser. Since Baruk doesn’t know how to drive, they managed to make it to the farm with Baruk steering and Wes shifting, even in his dire condition. They came roaring into the camp, the land cruiser going as fast as it could in first or second gear, and Alan went to see what was happening. Wes, with a shirt wrapped around his head, was helped out of the Land Cruiser by two men and told Alan he had been shot as he was rushed into the clinic. Alan could see the blood covering his shirt and ran for the satellite phone.
Alyssa and Abdul were there immediately. Everyone jumped into action at the clinic and did very well to take care of him and access his injuries. It then became clear from witnesses that he had received a blow to the head from an ax. Nate and Alyssa tried to stop the blood flow, but due to the fact that it was a head wound, there wasn’t much to be done. His skull was fractured from the blow to the right back of his head. There was a three to four inch gash and many bone fragments. His blood pressure and heartbeat were slowly dropping. They soon realized that Wes would have to be flown out of the farm if he were going to be saved. An emergency flight was arranged with Abyssinian Airlines, who got permission to fly through the no-fly zone covering a large area between the farm and Addis Abada. This cut down the flight time by 20 minutes. The plane arrived after a couple of hours and Wes was carefully taken in the back of a pickup truck over to the runway and loaded onto the plane. The plane was only here a total of about 15 minutes before it took off to Addis Abada with Wes and Alyssa and family.
Wally Odd, the executive vice-president of MAI, came to the farm on the same plane that took Wes to Addis Abada in order to manage the situation and put fears to rest. During the flight back to Addis Abada, the US embassy was contacted to insure that there would be blood available for a transfusion. At the airport in Addis Abada they were met with an ambulance and doctors who took him directly to the Korean hospital where he underwent a CAT scan. They did think about sending him for surgery to Cairo or Nairobi, which have larger hospitals, but decided against that and kept him in Addis Abada where he underwent brain surgery for 6 1/2 hours. It was fortunate that Wes was kept here in Ethiopia because his brain was quickly swelling and there would have been no time for him to make it to another country.
It was heard the next morning that his skull was indeed fractured and there was damage to a sinus on the right back of his head. He lost a lot of blood on the farm as well as in surgery. There is an American doctor there who was helping in some advisory capacity and he is being well looked-after. Wes had a number of very hard days. He is in a lot of pain and discomfort. They decreased his sedation and pain medication because his heart rate and oxygen levels were very unstable and low. However, his heart rate and oxygen levels did not improve, so after a lot of consultation with his American doctors and his neurosurgeon there, they decided to send him to a very reputable and modern hospital in Tel Aviv, Israel where he will get much better care. They are concerned with the pain and discomfort because in order for the swelling to reduce and his brain to heal, he needs to be calm and rested during this time. Wes and Alyssa left on a medivac flight early Sunday, August 29th for Israel. Alyssa’s family came on a commercial flight later. Their 5 children will be staying in Addis Abada with friends and going to school there for the time being. Depending on his speed of recovery, he will have to be at the Israel facility a month or so.
The police from Beltu were summoned to the farm in the afternoon and they promised they would find the perpetrator. They did arrest the young man’s relatives– brothers and sisters, father, and were in the process of arresting the whole village when Wally found out how they were handling the situation and went to Beltu and prevent anymore random arrestings. A policeman came here to the farm asking Alan if he could get some fuel for his vehicle so he could go after the suspect. The police heard that the man’s mother took him to Jara to escape the police. Alan, unsure of the truth of the situation, warily agreed, asking the man to sign a paper saying how much he was given.
The whole farm shut down, after the event, even Bracken, a diligent worker was hurried in from the field. Alan and Bracken later decided that they wouldn’t be intimidated and that it would be a good time, with all the villagers running scared, to get some disking done. So, Bracken went back to work (with a gun). Many of the people here on the farm were scared and took off running to their huts, if they lived nearby. Ashreka, a farm worker, hid in Shelly’s house when she saw all of the police. She was very scared but she bravely undertook the washing of the bloody pans that had been used at the clinic. She only looked at Shelly a little funny when she asked her to wash them and asked, “Ees Wes’s blood?” “Yes, it is,” Shelly said, and Ashreka bravely responded, “I wash.”
Wally will stay at the Alyssa Farm for a little while, until he needs to get back to Addis Abada. He will work with the government and advise them on how to manage the difficult situation. The farm has suddenly become a target for dishonest people who see an opportunity to get money by claiming they have land at the farm, when they have never been seen before. They come and claim they have land here and should be paid a compensation when they have never been here before. Although dishonest, usually the situation does not turn violent and it is believed to be an isolated incident.
As we receive updates, they will be posted here. Please include Wes and his family in your sincere thoughts and prayers as all of us at MAI are.
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