Back in the 1960s, the then Hailesellasie I University had a revered professor in engineering, credited for the establishment of the technology faculty at Amist Kilo. However, the German born Yehuda Peter (Prof) is remembered for instilling dreams in his engineering students, many of whom are in their 60s today.

For over three decades, some of Peter’s students have been turning into the nation’s finest and most celebrated engineers. These include Getachew Tasssew; Tadesse Hailesellasie and his partner in Berta Construction, Brehane Abate; Girma Muluneh (once Addis Abeba’s chief engineer); as well as Negussie Tebeje (Prof Em), a prominent structural engineer.

Peter inspired a generation of Ethiopian engineers to keep alive his dream and conviction that it is possible to develop vast tracts of fertile land in Afar Regional State and the Ogaden Desert by irrigating it with a network of canals to channel the Abay River. This would require connecting Abay with Awash and Wabi Shebelle rivers, down in the Somali lowlands.

These engineers also thought that such a grand project could be of help to upstream countries because it would avoid sedimentation and floods in Sudan, save 10 million cubic metres of water per year from evaporating from Aswan Dam, and retain a significant portion of unutilised water flowing into the Red Sea.Were this project to be implemented, it would have cost a projected half a billion Birr at the time, according to one of Peter’s students