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The Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front was an ethnic federalist political coalition in Ethiopia that existed from 1988 to 2019. It consisted of four political parties: Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), Amhara Democratic Party (ADP), Oromo Democratic Party (ODP) and Southern Ethiopian People's Democratic Movement (SEPDM). After leading the overthrow of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, it dominated Ethiopian politics from 1991 to 2019. In November 2019, the EPRDF was dissolved, and Prime Minister and EPDRF chairman Abiy Ahmed merged three of the constituent parties into his new Prosperity Party, which was officially founded on 1 December 2019.
The Tigray People's Liberation Front, also known as the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front, is a left-wing ethnic nationalist, paramilitary group, and the former ruling party of Ethiopia. It was classified as a terrorist organization by the Ethiopian government during the Tigray War until its removal from the list in 2023. In older and less formal texts and speech it is known as Woyane or Weyané.
The Oromo Democratic Party, formerly known as the Oromo People's Democratic Organization, was a political party in Ethiopia, and part of the alliance with the Amhara National Democratic Movement, the South Ethiopian Peoples' Democratic Front and the Tigrayan Peoples' Liberation Front that formed the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). In the August 2005 Regional assembly elections, the party won 387 out of 537 seats in the Oromia, and 14 out of 36 seats in the Harari Region.
The Amhara Democratic Party (ADP), formerly known as the Amhara National Democratic Movement (ANDM), was a political party in Ethiopia. The party was one of four members of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) that ruled Ethiopia at the time. In 2012, the party chairman was Demeke Mekonnen, who replaced Addisu Legesse in 2010. In November 2019, prime minister Abiy Ahmed, holding the role of EPRDF chair, unified the constituent parties of the coalition into a new party called Prosperity Party.
Ethiopian nationalism, also referred to as Ethiopianism or Ethiopianness, according to its proponents, asserts that Ethiopians are a single nation, and promotes the social equality of all component ethnic groups. Ethiopian people as a whole regardless of ethnicity constitute sovereignty as one polity. Ethiopian nationalism is a type of civic nationalism in that it is multi-ethnic in nature, and promotes multiculturalism.
Abiy Ahmed Ali is an Ethiopian politician who is the current Prime Minister of Ethiopia since 2008 and the leader of the Prosperity Party since 2019. He was awarded the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize "for his efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea". Abiy served as the third chairman of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) that governed Ethiopia for 28 years and the first person of Oromo descent to hold that position. Abiy is a member of the Ethiopian parliament, and was a member of the Oromo Democratic Party (ODP), one of the then four coalition parties of the EPRDF, until its rule ceased in 2019 and he formed his own party, the Prosperity Party.
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The Prosperity Party is a ruling political party in Ethiopia that was established on 1 December 2019 as a successor to the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front by incumbent Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed.
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The ongoing Ethiopian civil conflict began with the 2018 dissolution of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (ERPDF), an ethnic federalist, dominant party political coalition. After the 20-year border conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, a decade of internal tensions, two years of protests, and a state of emergency, Hailemariam Desalegn resigned on 15 February 2018 as prime minister and EPRDF chairman, and there were hopes of peace under his successor Abiy Ahmed. However, war broke out in the Tigray Region, with resurgent regional and ethnic factional attacks throughout Ethiopia. The civil wars caused substantial human rights violations, war crimes, and extrajudicial killings.
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The fallof the Derg was a military campaign that resulted in the defeat of the ruling Marxist–Leninist military junta, the Derg, by the rebel coalition Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) on 28 May 1991 in Addis Ababa, ending the Ethiopian Civil War. The Derg took power after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie and the Solomonic dynasty, an imperial dynasty of Ethiopia that began in 1270. The Derg suffered from insurgency with different factions, and separatist rebel groups since their early rule, beginning with the Ethiopian Civil War. The 1983–1985 famine, the Red Terror, and resettlement and villagization made the Derg unpopular with the majority of Ethiopians tending to support insurgent groups like the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) and Eritrean People's Liberation Front (EPLF).
The 1995 Ethiopian Federal Constitution formalizes an ethnic federalism law aimed at undermining long-standing ethnic imperial rule, reducing ethnic tensions, promoting regional autonomy, and upholding unqualified rights to self-determination and secession in a state with more than 80 different ethnic groups. But the constitution is divisive, both among Ethiopian nationalists who believe it undermines centralized authority and fuels interethnic conflict, and among ethnic federalists who fear that the development of its vague components could lead to authoritarian centralization or even the maintenance of minority ethnic hegemony. Parliamentary elections since 1995 have taken place every five years since enactment. All but one of these have resulted in government by members of the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) political coalition, under three prime ministers. The EPRDF was under the effective control of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), which represents a small ethnic minority. In 2019 the EPRDF, under Abiy, was dissolved and he inaugurated the pan-ethnic Prosperity Party which won the 2021 Ethiopian Election, returning him as prime minister. But both political entities were different kinds of responses to the ongoing tension between constitutional ethnic federalism and the Ethiopian state's authority. Over the same period, and all administrations, a range of major conflicts with ethnic roots have occurred or continued, and the press and availability of information have been controlled. There has also been dramatic economic growth and liberalization, which has itself been attributed to, and used to justify, authoritarian state policy.
In the face of widespread protests against the government, Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn resigned from office on 15 February 2018, becoming the first politician to resign from office in modern Ethiopian history. The day prior, he announced in state television that his resignation is "vital in the bid to carry out reforms that would lead to sustainable peace and democracy," linked to the 2014–2016 unrest in Oromia Region, in which hundreds were killed by government crackdown in Oromia and Amhara Region between 2015 and 2016.
Oromo nationalism is an ethnic nationalism advocating the self-interest of Oromo people in Ethiopia and Kenya. Many Oromo elites, intellectuals and political leaders struggled to create an independent Oromia state throughout 19th and 20th century, since the start of Abyssinian colonialism under Emperor Menelik II. No consensus has been reached yet regarding the motives of this type of nationalism, whether the Oromos librate themselves to form a nation-state or offer self-determination in federal Ethiopia.
Anti-Amhara sentiment is opposition, hatred, discrimination and bias against Amhara people in Ethiopia. Amharas are subjected to longstanding ethnic hatred among the Tigrayan and Oromo elites. Persecution of Amharas are typically stemmed from accusation of Amhara for atrocities and land acquisition during the colonial rule in the Ethiopian Empire; many Oromo activists and intellectualists pertained Amhara of being "Neftenya", a feaudal lord and vassal who manages the lands loyal to the imperial government.
References
- ↑ Tamrat, Taddesse (December 2009). Church and State in Ethiopia: 1270 - 1527. Tsehai Publishers. ISBN 978-1-59907-039-1.
- ↑ "Ethiopia's Tigray war: The short, medium and long story". 2020-11-17. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ "Tigray crisis viewpoint: Why Ethiopia is spiralling out of control". 2020-11-15. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ "Ethiopia's Tigray war: The short, medium and long story". 2020-11-17. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ "Tigray crisis viewpoint: Why Ethiopia is spiralling out of control". 2020-11-15. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ Burke, Jason; correspondent, Jason Burke Africa (2020-11-25). "Rise and fall of Ethiopia's TPLF – from rebels to rulers and back". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077 . Retrieved 2024-10-24.
{{cite news}}:|last2=has generic name (help) - ↑ "Ethiopia swears in first PM from ethnic Oromo community". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ Allo, Awol. "Why Abiy Ahmed's Prosperity Party could be bad news for Ethiopia". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ "Ethiopia's Tigray conflict explained in 500 words". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ "Ethiopia's Tigray war: The short, medium and long story". 2020-11-17. Retrieved 2024-10-24.
- ↑ Melesse, Kassahun (2020-11-19). "Tigray's War Against Ethiopia Isn't About Autonomy. It's About Economic Power". Foreign Policy. Retrieved 2024-10-24.