Ethiopia on verge of political crisis
The US and the EU are likely to keep playing a waiting game with Ethiopia - a
game that favors Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawo - until one of the
government’s adversaries gains a clear advantage.
Commentary by Dr. Michael A. Weinstein for PINR (27/10/05)
During the week of 10 October, Ethiopia - the dominant power center in the Horn
of Africa - moved closer to a political crisis with the seating of a new
parliament elected in a May 2005 vote that was succeeded by a period of
uncompromising conflict between the government of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi
and opposition parties, which contended that Zenawi’s Ethiopian People’s
Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) had stolen the elections.
Defying pressures from the US and EU - the two outside power centers with the
greatest influence in Ethiopia - the largest opposition block, the four-party
Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD), which had recently reconciled its
internal divisions and had evolved into a single party, boycotted the
parliament, refusing to take its seats.
In a quick response to the boycott, the EPRDF-dominated parliament, having
installed Zenawi as prime minister for a third five-year term, moved to deny
elected CUD legislators immunity from criminal prosecution. In a parallel action
in a coordinated campaign, Ethiopia's National Electoral Board refused to
recognize the CUD’s merger officially, citing a technicality in the coalition's
1994 recognition request. Zenawi followed by accusing CUD leader Hailu Shawel of
“treason” for engineering the boycott and for threatening civil disobedience if
the EPRDF refused to concede to the opposition’s demand for a “national unity
government” that would set up new parliamentary elections.
The CUD believes that the removal of immunity and Zenawi’s rhetoric portend a
severe crackdown on the noncompliant opposition going beyond the temporary
arrests and harassment of opposition leaders and supporters to which the
government has resorted since the May elections. Zenawi fears that the CUD
intends to foment a “Green Revolution” in Ethiopia along the lines of Georgia’s
Rose Revolution, Ukraine’s Orange Revolution and Kyrgyzstan’s Tulip Revolution.
Although each side denies that its adversary’s suspicions are well founded, both
have reasonable grounds to take their fears seriously.
Ethiopia’s diversity
The current political impasse in Ethiopia grows out of the
settlement that was reached in the country after a successful armed insurgency
led by the EPRDF overthrew Ethiopia’s Marxist Derg regime in 1991. The EPRDF was
centered in the Tigray region and was dominated by members of the Tigrayan
minority ethnic group.
In order to turn its military victory into political power, the EPRDF
reorganized Ethiopia into nine regions according to the dominant ethnic group in
each, and gave the regions substantial administrative autonomy. The federal
system allowed the EPRDF and its leader Zenawi to construct a political machine
that has dominated Ethiopian politics for the past 15 years. The machine has
enabled the Tigrayan political class to maintain its power, despite discontent
among larger ethnic groups, particularly the Amhara and Oromi.
The EPRDF survived the test of multi-party parliamentary elections in 2000 that
were generally boycotted by opposition groups, which received only 12 seats.
Since then, the regime has faced growing public discontent, which surfaced in
the run-up to and the aftermath of the 2005 elections.
With a burgeoning population of more than 77.4 million people that grows at a
yearly rate of 2.4 per cent, according to October UN estimates, Ethiopia is
Africa’s second most populous country after Nigeria. Dwarfing its neighbors in
the Horn of Africa in population and land mass, Ethiopia is also the major power
center in a region that owes its strategic significance to its proximity to the
Arabian Peninsula.
Due to Ethiopia’s regional power, Washington and Brussels operating in tandem
have supported the Zenawi regime with economic aid and military assistance, and
have urged it to democratize. That support, however, has not been sufficient to
save the country from persisting poverty. With agriculture accounting for 40 per
cent of GDP, 80 per cent of exports and 80 per cent of the labor force, Ethiopia
has been severely weakened by drought and depends on food aid that is supplied
primarily by the US, with the EU, Japan and Italy also contributing.
Economic development has been further inhibited by the failure of Ethiopia and
Eritrea to resolve a border dispute that led to a costly war from 1998-2000.
Persisting tensions between the countries have discouraged foreign investment
and diverted resources to the military sector.
Ethiopia’s persisting economic problems and the Zenawi government’s failure to
make credible progress in solving them - despite generous foreign aid, which
accounts for ten percent of the country’s GDP - provided an opportunity for a
diverse political opposition to exploit in the May elections. Abandoning boycott
for participation, opposition coalitions presented a clear alternative to the
EPRDF.
Addressing structural reform in the economy, CUD leader Shawel called for
privatizing Ethiopia’s agricultural land, which is currently owned by the state
and allotted to farmers who are not permitted to buy or sell it. The government
responded that the state should continue to act as a “custodian” in order to
prevent land sales in circumstances of duress, such as drought.
The opposition also proposed altering Ethiopia’s constitution in the direction
of centralization by limiting regional autonomy and especially by revoking the
right of a region to secede from the country. A more centralized system would
favor larger ethnic groups and is predictably opposed by the EPRDF.
On the issue of the conflict with Eritrea, the opposition, attempting to outdo
the EPRDF’s nationalism, criticized the Zenawi government for ceding access to
the Red Sea port of Assab after Eritrea gained independence from Ethiopia in
1993, leaving the latter landlocked.
The May elections brought significant gains for the opposition, which won 173 of
the 547 parliamentary seats at stake, including a sweep in Ethiopia’s capital
Addis Ababa. Although they reported irregularities in the polling process,
international monitors deemed the results to be acceptable. The donor powers
breathed an initial sigh of relief, expecting the opposition to use its gains as
a springboard to further success by working within the system.
Instead, the opposition turned intransigent, claiming that the elections had
been stolen, demanding a re-vote, and mounting protest demonstrations and a
strike. The government struck back with force and, on 8 June, 28 protesters were
killed by police. Since then, EU efforts to mediate the dispute have failed and
the adversaries have hardened their positions, paving the way for the CUD
boycott of parliament and the government's retaliatory measures against it.
Zenawi has made it clear that he does not intend to permit “a ‘Rose Revolution’
or a ‘Green Revolution’ or any color revolution in Ethiopia”. The opposition is
equally insistent in its demand for a “national unity government”, creating a
sharply polarized stand off. At present, Zenawi seems to have the advantage, but
as was shown recently by a similar situation in Kyrgyzstan, appearances can be
deceiving, especially when the opposition is dominant in the capital city. At
the very least, Ethiopia has entered a period of instability.
The bottom line
The strategic interests of Ethiopia’s donor powers would
have been served best had the opposition acquiesced in the electoral results and
had Zenawi shown signs that he would move democratization forward. Since neither
requisite for stability has been met, Washington and Brussels are left with a
dilemma. If they back either side, they drive the other into opposition to them.
Yet if they do not enter the fray, they risk chronic instability in a country
that is essential to their strategic purposes in the region. For the moment, the
Washington-Brussels partnership is reduced to calling for dialog between the
adversaries.
Since the May elections, the donor powers have continued to provide and expand
aid to the Zenawi government and to criticize it for election irregularities and
suppression of dissent. At the same time, they have attempted to pressure the
opposition to limit the scope and intensity of its resistance to the regime.
Both adversaries have expressed their dissatisfaction with that response.
Look for the donor powers to keep playing their waiting game, which favors
Zenawi, until one of the adversaries achieves a clear advantage.
Dr Michael A. Weinstein is a professor of political science at
Purdue University and an analyst with the Power and Interest News Report, at (www.pinr.com).
This article originally appeared in PINR. All comments should be directed to
content@pinr.com.
Sidama Music
|
Sidama Times |
Sidama Coffee