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Warlord Abiy at campaign event: The first choice he has faced since taking office
Photo: TIKSA NEGERI / REUTERS
Before the blood of civilians stuck on his hands, before his troops and their allies used rape as a weapon of war in Tigray, before deliberately creating a famine that threatens hundreds of thousands of lives, Abiy Ahmed was once a star.
The praises sounded loud at home and abroad.
Ethiopia's prime minister appeared to many as the radiant innovator of a country that, although economically significant, has long closed itself off to democratic values.
Elections are now taking place in Ethiopia this Monday.
Despite the bloody conflict and famine in Tigray, despite escalating tensions in various regions of the multi-ethnic state.
Abiy has no legitimation from his people
This choice is especially important for Abiy.
Because so far he has no legitimation from his citizens: It is the first choice that he has had to face since he took office.
The election should have already taken place in August 2020.
However, the elections were postponed citing the Covid 19 pandemic.
The 547 members of the federal parliament stand for election.
The leader of the victorious party will be sworn in as Prime Minister.
But the concerns about the polls are great.
His zeal for reform earned Abiy the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019
It had started so well for Abiy: After growing protests against the coalition government of the Revolutionary Democratic Front of the Ethiopian Peoples (EPRDF), to which Abiy himself belonged, he was installed as Prime Minister in April 2018 and set out to stir up Ethiopia.
Abiy released thousands of political prisoners, lifted press censorship and invited once banned opposition groups to come back from exile.
He campaigned for a woman to become president, created gender parity in the cabinet and set up a peace ministry.
And he made peace with neighboring Eritrea.
His zeal for reform earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019.
The Unity Party should reduce ethnic tensions
But the seeds for today's escalation in the country were soon sown.
After taking office, Abiy dissolved the EPRDF.
That alliance of four ethnically based parties dominated by the Tigray TPLF, which had helped Ethiopia to achieve strong economic growth since 1991, but at the same time ruled the country with an iron hand.
Abiy replaced the EPRDF with a new unity party, the Prosperity Party.
With this party he hoped to reduce ethnic tensions in the country and forge national unity.
Many of the ethno-nationalists, who were growing stronger all over the country, some of whom had returned from exile, saw this as an attempt to take power from the states and to pool them in Addis Ababa.
The TPLF refused to join the new party.
Old conflicts break out
As soon as the euphoria of the first few days had subsided, long-simmering tensions that had been suppressed during the authoritarian rule of the EPRDF began to flare up.
Abiy could no longer capture the ghosts he was calling.
Ethnically motivated attacks also against individuals continued to increase.
Thousands of people died in violent clashes.
Almost two million people had fled their homes in 2019.
To curb the growing violence, Abiy reverted to the strategies of previous Ethiopian governments.
Internet and telephone lines are switched off again and again.
Suspects have been arrested en masse.
Prominent members of the opposition were arrested on suspicion of inciting violence.
Fighting has created a massive humanitarian crisis
Only a year later, the change to warlord was complete. In November of last year Abiy sent troops to the northern province of Tigray to overthrow the TPLF ruling there. Previously, the TPLF had attacked a military base after observing war preparations on the part of the central government. The expected war came.
The fighting has resulted in a massive humanitarian crisis.
At Abiy's invitation, Eritrean troops are also fighting in Tigray and proceeding with particular brutality.
More than 60,000 people have fled across the border into Sudan, and well over a million have been evicted from their homes.
Massacres and sexual violence are increasing.
More than 350,000 people are already suffering from famine.
The UN estimates that a total of more than five million people in Tigray need humanitarian aid.
Ethnically motivated violence creates tension
But there is also fighting in many other parts of the country today.
In April, the government declared a state of emergency in part of the Amhara region to halt clashes between ethnic Amharas and Oromos.
In the same month it was reported that 100 people were killed in a dispute over the border between the regional states of Afar and Somali.
And in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, too, ethnically motivated violence occurs again and again.
But Oromia in particular, the home region of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and that of the largest ethnic group in the country, the Oromo, could now become one of the focal points in the upcoming elections.
Increasing violence there leads to ever greater instability.
The Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) ramped up its attacks in the run-up to the elections.
On May 6, the Ethiopian parliament - together with the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) - classified it as a terrorist organization.
In Oromia, however, the organization still seems to enjoy broad support from parts of the population.
In Addis Ababa, the government pledges to resolve all issues related to Tigray, Oromia and beyond after securing its long-awaited legitimacy in the elections.
However, many Ethiopians remain skeptical.
It is likely that Abiy's party will win the election
Despite all the tensions, it is quite certain that Abiys Prosperity Party will win the election.
Because many opposition politicians do not even run.
Or sit in jail.
The Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) withdrew in March because of the imprisonment of some of its leaders.
The Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC), the party of the well-known Abiy opponent and ethno-nationalist Jawar Mohammed, also announced in March that it would be forced to withdraw from the election for similar reasons.
Jawar has been in jail for almost a year.
Peace cannot be expected in Ethiopia
The election will also not take place in Tigray.
Votes were postponed in 64 other constituencies in the rest of the country.
Overall, 102 of the 547 constituencies did not vote due to security and logistics problems.
"The government will not resolve the conflict that led to the civil war in Tigray, it will not end the OLA uprising in Oromia, it will not end the violence in Benishangul-Gumuz," said William Davison, the chief Ethiopia analyst the International Crisis Group.
"But the election will allow the Prime Minister and his ruling party to claim a democratic mandate that would enable them to pursue their agenda for the next five years."
Peace in Ethiopia will not mean that.