Addressing members of parliament this morning on the current situation in Ethiopia, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed stressed that his country believes in peaceful discussion and diplomacy.
“My message to those outside the country who are interested to work with Ethiopia in consultation and agreement, our door is wide open,” Abiy Ahmed said. “… But those who think that they will win Ethiopia with game, I advise them to sit and learn history. It is impossible. It is only possible to work with us through peaceful, discussion and diplomacy,” he said.
Commenting why his government will not negotiate with the criminal TPLF leaders, Abiy said that no country would negotiate when its defense force is attacked…He stated that some countries have advised Ethiopia to negotiate because the country is poor. Commenting on the question raised by the members of parliament about external pressure in relation to its operations in Tigray region, he indicated that Ethiopia is a country that knows diplomacy. “It’s a founding member of the UN and AU. My message to friends of Ethiopia is that we may be poor but we are not a country that will negotiate our sovereignty. Threatening Ethiopia for coins will not work,” Abiy said.
Prime Minister Abiy today responded to several questions of the members of parliament. Most of the questions were related to the ongoing law and order operations the military has been engaged over the past few weeks in Tigray region after Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) has attacked the northern command of Ethiopian army on November 4, 2020.
Ethiopia is a country that knows diplomacy. It’s a founding member of the UN and AU. My message to friends of #Ethiopia is that we may be poor but we are not a country that will negotiate our sovereignty. Threatening Ethiopia for coins will not work. #PMAbiyResponds
— Office of the Prime Minister – Ethiopia (@PMEthiopia) November 30, 2020
After about three weeks of offensive, on Saturday the Ethiopian federal government has announced that it has liberated the Mekele, the capital of Tigray from where the leaders of TPLF have been leading the military operation against the federal government.
Where it started
After losing its power in central government when the ruling coalition elected Abiy Ahmed in April 2018, headliners of the TPLF have been at odds with the federal government claiming that the federal government has deliberately targeted and prosecuted TPLF for the human rights crimes and mega corruptions Ethiopia witnessed since TPLF came to power in May 1991.
Within a few months period after Abiy came to power, most of the hardliners within TPLF have run to Mekele refusing to appear and defend themselves in federal court in the capital, Addis Ababa.
On the contrary some of the progressive members of the TPLF have decided to stay in the ruling coalition, Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Party (EPRDF), which later liquidated into Prosperity party bringing aboard the ruling parties in the peripheral regions of Ethiopia- Somalia, Afar, Benishangul Gumz, Harari, and Gambella.
EPRDF, which is the brain child of TPLF was born in Sudan in 1983 comprising three ethnic (TPLF, Oromo party now led by Abiy, and Amhara party, and one regional – Southern party.
After overthrowing Derg Regime of Colonel Mengistu Hailemariam, who now lives in Harare, Zimbabwei, the EPRDF introduced an ethnic based regions in Ethiopia with controversial constitutions which also associated land of the country to different ethnic groups in Ethiopia. TPLF claims that it represents all people in Tigray region, which is about 6% of the total population of Ethiopia.
The political and economic dominance in the ruling coalition for over three decades along with severe human rights violation and mega corruption has led to series of political protests. In 2018 the protests have led to political unrest that led to the resignation of Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn, who was from Southern party – one of the four members of EPRDF.
Today Abiy in his briefing to the members of parliament indicated that since he came to power the hardliners of the TPLF, which he called ‘junta’ have orchestrated and sponsored 113 clashes mainly along ethnic and religious in all parts of the country except in Tigray region, “where the TPLF leaders were hiding”.
Not long before attacking the northern military base of federal army, TPLF has conducted regional election refusing the federal parliament’s decision to postpone all elections because of the global pandemic – coronavirus.
Among those wanted by the federal government include, the former spy chief, Getachew Asseffa, Seyoum Mesfin former foreign minister and IGAD head, Sibhat Nega, one of the founders of TPLF considered as godfather of the Front.