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Of: TT
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Photo: AP / TT
A man casts his vote in Mekele, the administrative capital of Ethiopia’s Tigray region.
A disputed regional election raises concerns about rising ethnic tensions in Ethiopia. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has postponed the fall elections with reference to the crown pandemic, a decision that is now being questioned in the Tigray region.
Even before dawn, polling station lines were long in Ethiopia’s mountainous region, AFP reports.
“We want the federal government to learn a lesson from this: they must hold elections as well, so that we can work together to build the country,” construction worker Hailay Haileselassie told the news agency when he cast his vote in the city of Mekele. .
For nearly three decades, that’s where Ethiopian power came from, when the country was ruled by the TPLF regime, which mainly represents the Tigranes. But after the wave of protests that brought Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to power in 2018, the Tigers’ power has been decimated and ethnic tensions have risen.
Stops in power
Abiy Ahmed, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2019 but has recently been increasingly questioned, postponed the elections announced for August in reference to the June pandemic. This means that his government will remain in power for up to another year, which has received criticism from the opposition and sectors of the people. Therefore, Wednesday’s parliamentary elections in Tigray are not taken lightly by the central government in Addis Ababa, which considers the elections to be illegitimate.
– The election of Tigray is contrary to the Constitution and the decision of the Electoral Commission. This is a very serious fact, Redie Bereketeab, who grew up in neighboring Eritrea and is today a conflict researcher at the Institute for Nordic Africa in Uppsala, told TT in July about Tigray’s plans.
– If they hold elections, in practice they will leave Ethiopia entirely and end up in conflict with the federal government.
Journalists were hampered
The TPLF, which led the armed struggle that toppled the brutal Dergen regime in 1991, still rules in Tigray and is a huge favorite in the elections.
– This is important for me. We fought for this, so that elections would be held every five years, veteran Hailu Kiros, 62, told AFP.
Whether the central government will respond to Tigray’s arrogance, and if so how, Abiy Ahmed responds in ambiguous terms in an interview with state media.
– The election that will take place in Tigray is a fraudulent construction. And when you do a fake construction, the authorities will see you some days and not others, he says.
According to the al-Jazeera media company, the security forces prevented several people, including journalists, from flying to Tigray to report on the elections.
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