BBC :
Ethiopians vote next week in twice-delayed elections overshadowed by warnings of famine and mounting reports of atrocities in the war-hit northern region of Tigray.
Some 37 million people of Ethiopia’s about 110 million have registered to cast ballots on Monday, although many will have to wait until September to vote due to logistical, legal and security-related challenges. Here are five things to know about the crucial polls in Africa’s second-most populous country.
In the areas where the elections will proceed, voters will pick national and regional parliamentarians. The national MPs are tasked with electing the prime minister, who is head of government, as well as the president – a largely ceremonial role.
The polls will mark the first test of voter support for Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, 44, Africa’s youngest leader and Ethiopia’s first from the Oromia region.
Abiy’s appointment as prime minister in 2018 – after years of anti-government protests forced his predecessor, Hailemariam Desalegn, to step down – was initially met by many with an outburst of optimism both at home and abroad.
Within months at the helm of Ethiopia’s ruling coalition, Abiy released tens of thousands of political prisoners and allowed the return of exiled opposition groups.
He also announced economic reforms, including opening parts of Ethiopia’s tightly controlled markets and the creation of a stock exchange.
In 2019, Abiy was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize partly for his reform drive and for making peace with neighbouring Eritrea by ending a long-running border standoff.
“We will secure Ethiopia’s unity,” Abiy said before his final campaign rally on Wednesday, repeating his pledge of a free and fair election after past votes – all won by the four-party alliance Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) – were marred by accusations of fraud and irregularities. In 2015, the EPRDF and its allies won every parliamentary seat in a process marred by allegations of voter intimidation.
More than a year after taking power, Abiy disbanded the EPRDF coalition as a whole and formed the Prosperity Party (PP) with his political allies.
The Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), which dominated the governing coalition for nearly 30 years before Abiy came to power, refused to follow the EPRDF’s other three ethnically based parties into the PP. It accused the prime minister of centralising power at the expense of Ethiopia’s ethnically-based regions, which he denies. PP officials said the EPRDF’s dissolution would reduce societal fragmentation and bolster democracy, with the highly anticipated elections scheduled for August 2020.
But in March last year, Abiy postponed the polls by 10 months citing the COVID-19 pandemic. The elections were postponed a second time to June 21 because of logistical setbacks, including delays in voter registration and a lack of electoral officials.
The initial postponement provoked the anger of much of the country’s political opposition, which accused the governing party of using the pandemic as an excuse to illegally extend its time in office, an allegation denied by the government.
