Development as Distraction: Ethiopia’s Wounds Beneath Abiy’s Showcase

By – Habte H.

In the grand theatre of Ethiopian politics, a familiar play is once again unfolding. Abiy Ahmed and his Prosperity Party (PP) are preparing to mark the Ethiopian New Year with spectacle: inaugurations of corridors, new projects, dazzling promises, and carefully staged celebrations. Propagandists (like Natnael, Abebe Tola, Sisay.,. etc are already listing what has been built and what lies in the pipeline.

Yet for many Ethiopians, these spectacles are not achievements to celebrate. They are insults – thinly veiled attempts to distract from suffering, repression, and inequality. Even if Abiy could build a replica of New York City in a year, many argue, it would not justify a single extra day of his rule. Because development without humanity is not development at all.

The Illusion of Development

The regime’s strategy is predictable: dazzle the public with infrastructure, buildings, and hollow rhetoric of transformation. But these projects are not designed to serve the people; they are designed to serve the propaganda reel.

Meanwhile, millions face hunger, displacement, and despair. True development is measured by whether children eat before school, whether mothers can access healthcare, and whether households can live without fear. On these real measures, Ethiopia is in crisis. What the government presents as transformation is little more than a façade, a Potemkin village masking profound governance failures.

A Detachment from Humanity

Perhaps the most damning charge against Abiy and is PP is not policy missteps but detachment from the suffering of his own people. Ethiopians see a leader accused of fostering division, inflaming ethnic tensions, and presiding over wars and policies that have cost countless lives. Critics like me describe him as a fascist and racist, driven not by a dream of unity but by ill dreams of domination.

The betrayal cuts deeper when those who once sacrificed for his cause are themselves abandoned, silenced, or worse. In such a climate, loyalty holds no value and trust evaporates. A ruler who sacrifices human lives for political survival cannot credibly speak of prosperity.

History’s Lessons on Authoritarian Development

The illusion that autocrats can deliver sustainable prosperity is not new. Ethiopia’s past offers sobering lessons. Mengistu Hailemariam and Meles Zenawi, despite their severe flaws and repression, left behind transformative projects and ambitious plans. But if infrastructure alone could secure progress, their regimes would have guaranteed Ethiopia’s permanent prosperity. They did not.

Authoritarian development always collapses because it lacks the engines of sustainability: democracy, accountability, creativity, and the collective will of the people. Leaders may flatter with corridors and towers, but the foundation is built on sand. Without freedom and justice, development is temporary, unequal, and ultimately self-serving.

What Ethiopians Truly Need

Ethiopians are not dreaming of corridors or glittering cityscapes. What they yearn for is simpler, deeper, and far more human:

• Peace that ends wars and silences guns.
• Justice that is blind and fair to all.
• Equality that transcends ethnicity and geography.
• Freedom that allows every voice to be heard.
• Dignity that values lives above propaganda.

This is the development that matters – the kind that cannot be staged in a ribbon-cutting ceremony. A single day lived in freedom and security is worth more than a hundred corridors or towers erected for political spectacle.

Beyond the Façade

The preference of countless Ethiopians is clear. They do not want a leader who builds monuments to himself while dismantling the humanity of his people. They want peace over propaganda, substance over spectacle, democracy over dictatorship.

The Ethiopian New Year should not be a stage for hollow inaugurations. It should be an occasion to reflect on what truly builds a nation: justice, equality, democracy, and humanity. Abiy Ahmed may try to secure legitimacy through projects, but history will not remember him as a builder. It will remember him as a divider, a killer, genocider and dictator who detached development from humanity and left scars deeper than any monument he could construct.

Conclusion

Ethiopia deserves more than fake projects and empty propaganda. It deserves genuine transformation rooted in democracy, equality, and human dignity. No corridor, no tower, no spectacle can replace that. The future of Ethiopia depends not on a leader’s illusions but on the collective pursuit of peace and justice.

Editor’s Note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com  

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