Since November last year, Ethiopia has been fighting a devastating civil war with the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front. Hibist Kassa argues that the scale of misinformation on the war, lack of context and attempts to impose false narratives is deeply troubling and pervasive. Kassa calls for a nuanced and historically grounded approach to properly analyse the course of events.
Call for an immediate cessation of hostilities and call on all civil society organizations in our country to focus on activities of transforming conflicts as well as engaging in comprehensive peacebuilding and reconciliation efforts.
The AU, its member states -- particularly Ethiopia’s neighbouring states -- must not allow Ethiopia to dictate the terms of their engagement in seeking resolution to this conflict.
The real story of the conflict in Ethiopia is not about the atrocities and the damage to the Ethiopian peoples and state as a whole. It is about the consequences of the Meles Zenawi-TPLF fall from power.
As the recorded number of infections in Africa edges towards the six million mark, it has become clear that COVID-19 is not only a public health challenge.
The ongoing displacement and killings of minorities and the ongoing war in Tigray—labeled by the federal government as enforcing law and order—are disturbing. It can't go on.
The plethora of political, judicial, economic and military reforms for the betterment of the People of Ethiopia and beyond that were introduced by PM Abiy since he came to power are still in place with an ever-increasing vitality and returns, to which the people of Ethiopia and other persons of common sense could attest to.
For a political system in a country like Ethiopia that is a “no-accountability zone” for state actors and powerful political elites, the social field is critical to building a political community that is more democratic and more in sync with the logic and sociality of “the governed”, argues Semeneh Asfaw.
Abiy Ahmed’s legitimacy hangs on conjuring up an improbable military victory in the total war he has declared on the people of Tigray.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's dramatic move to recentralise governance in Ethiopia has an old and predictable logic to it. Eritrea's leader Isias Afwerki has pushed for it as well. But it has meant Ahmed abrogating the Ethiopian constitution and shredding the underlying political contract between elites from the different regions of Ethiopia. It immediately led to war with Tigray that has literally collapsed Ethiopia's once-mighty military machine. As July ends the Prime Minister has been forced into the dangerous move of mobilising ethnic militias. Matt Bryden argues the only way out is negotiation.
Eritrea is Africa's most closed society and most fiercely authoritarian state. Its President Isaias Afwerki has been president for almost 30 years and is considered one of the continent's most gifted and ruthless strategists. As both Somalia and Ethiopia convulse, the now not so hidden hand of Eritrea's leader has become increasingly apparent as Eritrea very effectively leverages limited resources but deep experience into a disproportionate impact on the entire Horn of Africa. The Elephant in conversation with Matt Bryden.
Ethiopia seems set to enter a new phase of a brutal civil war. For some of the country's communities, an existential contest between a centralising logic in Addis Ababa and self-determination among the regions has begun. Oromo activist and storyteller, Ms Soreti Kadir, argues that the brutality against civilians in Ethiopia is about to intensify and prospects for the Ethiopian state are bleak.