(July 26, 2012, VOA)--Ethiopia does not have a firm leadership succession plan if Prime Minister
Meles Zenawi is no longer able to head the government, according to a
former defense minister.
Seeye Abraha, who
worked with Meles on the ruling party’s executive committee but who is
now a member of the political opposition, said Tuesday that uncertainty
and anxiety is growing over the nation’s leadership during the prime
minister’s so-far unexplained absence. He blamed it on the country’s
one-party electoral system and Meles’ one-man-rule style of governing
over the past 12 years.
“They don’t have a system" [of leadership succession], Seeye said. “This is a crisis situation and the dust has not settled.” He said leaders of the ruling Tigrai People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and larger Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) parties had discussed a succession plan, but postponed any decisions until prior to a scheduled 2015 national election.
Meles has not been seen in public for about three weeks, even missing the African Union conference in Addis Ababa that was attended by 29 other heads of state or government. Some reports in the international press have speculated he is suffering from a serious illness and has been receiving treatment since June 26 in a Brussels hospital.
Information Minister Bereket Simon told reporters in Addis Ababa last week that a doctor has prescribed sick leave for the prime minister. Bereket assured the public that Meles is in “good and stable condition” and will return to work when he has recuperated.
Reliable news about the prime minister’s health has been hard to come by in Ethiopia. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the most recent edition of the independent weekly newspaper, Feteh, contained a report on the prime minister’s health, but that issue of the publication was confiscated by the government printing house.
Ethiopia 'approaching the end of the one-party system'
Seeye Abraha said he does not know where the prime minister is or the nature of his illness. “I have serious political differences with the prime minister and his party,” Seeye said of Meles and the TPLF. But he said that now is the time for Ethiopia’s political and military leaders to work with the nation to plot a peaceful way forward.
“We are approaching the end of the one-party system,” Seeye said. Seeye was commander of the TPLF’s rebel forces and a member of the small leadership team of TPLF fighters who ousted Mengistu Haile Mariam’s Derg leadership in 1991. They then created the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Seeye was defense minister for five years and later led planning strategy for Ethiopia’s border war with neighboring Eritrea. Read more from Voice of America »
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| Seeye Abraha, former defense minister, in Boston, Massachusetts (Photo courtesy - Berhane Nguse) |
“They don’t have a system" [of leadership succession], Seeye said. “This is a crisis situation and the dust has not settled.” He said leaders of the ruling Tigrai People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) and larger Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) parties had discussed a succession plan, but postponed any decisions until prior to a scheduled 2015 national election.
Meles has not been seen in public for about three weeks, even missing the African Union conference in Addis Ababa that was attended by 29 other heads of state or government. Some reports in the international press have speculated he is suffering from a serious illness and has been receiving treatment since June 26 in a Brussels hospital.
Information Minister Bereket Simon told reporters in Addis Ababa last week that a doctor has prescribed sick leave for the prime minister. Bereket assured the public that Meles is in “good and stable condition” and will return to work when he has recuperated.
Reliable news about the prime minister’s health has been hard to come by in Ethiopia. According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, the most recent edition of the independent weekly newspaper, Feteh, contained a report on the prime minister’s health, but that issue of the publication was confiscated by the government printing house.
Ethiopia 'approaching the end of the one-party system'
Seeye Abraha said he does not know where the prime minister is or the nature of his illness. “I have serious political differences with the prime minister and his party,” Seeye said of Meles and the TPLF. But he said that now is the time for Ethiopia’s political and military leaders to work with the nation to plot a peaceful way forward.
“We are approaching the end of the one-party system,” Seeye said. Seeye was commander of the TPLF’s rebel forces and a member of the small leadership team of TPLF fighters who ousted Mengistu Haile Mariam’s Derg leadership in 1991. They then created the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia. Seeye was defense minister for five years and later led planning strategy for Ethiopia’s border war with neighboring Eritrea. Read more from Voice of America »
Related topics:
“Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in stable condition -The issue of stepping down has not been raised,” says Ethiopia’s Government spokesman
Recovering' Zenawi Returns to Addis - Source
Mystery of the sick and missing PM
Meles Zenawi, Ethiopia Prime Minister, Health Questions Raised During Absence
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