Begging As A Survival Strategy Conferring With The Poor At The Orthodox Religious Ceremonial Days In Addis Ababa

In the absence of any means of livelihood, more and more people were driven to begging, somerntemporarily and some permanently. Today, as a result, begging has assumed enormous proportionsrnand for thousands it is a means of earning livelihood in urban areas in general and in Addis Ababa inrnparticular. It is one of the most conspicuous, readily visible social problems especially in the religiousrncomemmorable days of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. Like most of the socio-economic problems ofrnthis country, Ethiopia, the beggary problem, is of colossal magnitude, and yet we have no muchrnknowledge of its dimensions; little has been done on the problem of beggary. Besides, the Ethiopianrnliterature on poverty and poverty related issues shows that the ‘macro’ level approach has often beenrnfavored by researchers based on statistics and categorizations. These attempts often fail to specifyrnthe problems, relationships and processes usefully and adequately. As such, micro sociologists and/orrnanthropologists of an empirical bent have done little research in Ethiopia on poverty in general andrnthe problem of beggary in particular. The objective of this research is therefore to contribute to thernapparent literature gap and to compensate the in balance by utilizing qualitative and ethnographicrnanalysis of the beggary problem in the context of the saint days of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.rnTo this effect, participant observation, individual and focus group interviews and in depth casernstudies have been composed in an effort to present moving and intimate views of the poor in relationrnto their past and present in the framework of the dynamics of the socio- economic history of therncountry at large. This was done amid the complexity of the beggary problem and the diverse nature ofrnthe life experiences of each individual beggar considered in the study. As such, attempt has been madernto explore matters pertaining to the overall event or scene of the beggary problem in the context of thernOrthodox religious ceremonial days, precipitating causes for begging as a way of life, the beggars’rnmultifaceted impoverishment and modes of social interaction among others.rnThe beggary problem has a lot to do with the country’s socio-economic and historical aspectsrncharacterized by low incomes, high unemployment rates, fast rising cost of living, high rates ofrnpopulation growth, inappropriate public policies and continued rural- urban migration andrndisplacement of mass human beings to the city. Thus, the cardinal reason for most of the differentrnvulnerable categories of beggars to earn a meager living on the streets, churchyards and otherrncollective quarters of the city is poverty precipitated by different factors and events. The beggars, asrnimpoverished underclass, presently find themselves in multifaceted and extreme impoverishment whichrncan generally be characterized by chronic food shortage and insecurity, illiteracy, homelessness or poor housing often on unsuitable land, disease, in sanitary living conditions, death and above all marginalization and exclusion. Presently, there are no committed groups, including the government of course, helping the beggars. Virtually all beggars live through their own efforts and depend on alms givers

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