Abiy Ahmed Has Lost the Moral Case to Lead Ethiopia Enough is Enough!

By Dr. Haymanot Assefa Nadew
Maryland, USA — June 2026

Abiy Ahmed rose to power on a promise that felt transformative: peace after years of paralysis, unity after division, and prosperity after stagnation. For many Ethiopians at home and abroad, that promise was not merely political branding. It was a national wager on renewal.

Today, that wager looks broken.

Ethiopia remains burdened by conflict, displacement, and severe economic strain. Families across the country continue to absorb the costs of violence and insecurity, while inflation and currency pressure have made ordinary life markedly harder. Whatever hopes defined Abiy Ahmed’s ascent, many Ethiopians now see a government that has not delivered on its most consequential promises.

Showcase Development Cannot Mask National Crisis

While the country remains under severe strain, the government has promoted highly visible urban renewal projects as evidence of progress. The most prominent example is the widely publicized Corridor Development initiative in Addis Ababa.

Critics of this agenda argue that the narrative functions less as a development strategy than as a political communications effort—one that can obscure the scale of the country’s humanitarian and governance crises.

• Urban Renewal and Displacement: Critics contend that, under the banner of modernization, redevelopment has displaced residents, disrupted neighborhood markets, and weakened heritage communities in the capital, often with inadequate compensation or recourse.
• A Contrast in National Priorities: Opponents argue that the emphasis on showcase projects in the capital stands in stark contrast to conditions in conflict-affected regions, where many communities continue to face displacement, food insecurity, and limited access to essential services.

Viewed in this light, Corridor Development is presented by opponents not as evidence of broad national progress, but as a symbolic project that projects order and modernization while deeper conflict, displacement, and instability persist beyond the capital.

A Politics Built on Shifting Enemies

A central feature of Abiy Ahmed’s politics, critics argue, has been the repeated use of external and internal threats to consolidate support and frame his leadership as indispensable to Ethiopia’s survival. That claim deserves scrutiny: no democratic system should depend on the permanence of a single leader.

Early in his tenure, the administration’s confrontation with the TPLF helped unify parts of the public behind the federal government, including many in Amhara and members of regional Fano groups who aligned with the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF). After the November 2022 Pretoria Peace Agreement, however, that alignment deteriorated sharply.

Subsequent efforts to disarm Amhara regional forces became a major political flashpoint and, in the view of many critics, contributed to the escalation of armed resistance across the region. The government now faces accusations that it has replaced one security narrative with another, using new internal enemies to justify continued centralization and emergency measures.

Critics argue that these policies have weakened, rather than stabilized, the state:

• Heavy artillery and devastating drone strikes have been turned against civilian infrastructure and historic towns in the Amhara region.
• Prolonged regional states of emergency have paralyzed local economies.
• Our historic external vulnerabilities have widened, with regional proxy dynamics and border anxieties alongside Sudan and Eritrea reaching their highest friction points in decades.

Accountability Still Has Not Come

There are also longstanding unanswered questions surrounding violence, political killings, and the treatment of dissent during Abiy Ahmed’s tenure. To build public trust, independent investigations into major incidents and allegations of abuse remain essential.

1. Engineer Simegnew Bekele (July 2018): The tragic death of the illustrious engineer who sacrificed everything for the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) remains an unresolved mystery, wrapped in official silence.
2. The 2019 Amhara Leadership Assassinations (June 2019): The killings of Regional State President Dr. Ambachew Mekonnen, General Asaminew Tsige, and General Seare Mekonnen remain central to public debate about accountability, with critics arguing that the official narrative did not resolve broader questions raised by the events.
3. Haachaaluu Hundeessaa (June 2020): The killing of the popular Oromo singer became a pivotal political moment, followed by arrests and intensified tensions. Critics cite the case, along with later incidents such as the killing of OLF political figure Bate Urgessa, as evidence of a broader pattern of politicized repression.
4. Pressure on Journalists and Civil Society: Critics say the space for independent media and civil society has narrowed significantly, citing suspensions, regulatory pressure, and restrictions on local and foreign reporting as evidence of a broader clampdown on dissent.

An Election Alone Cannot Restore Legitimacy

The government is attempting to ground its legitimacy in the June 2026 General Elections, but serious questions remain about whether the process can be regarded as genuinely competitive or broadly credible under current conditions.

The National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) is moving ahead with an election in which the ruling Prosperity Party (PP) is expected to face limited competition in a number of constituencies, particularly in Oromia and Amhara. Critics argue that arrests, exile, and exclusion have substantially narrowed the field of meaningful opposition participation.

In addition, large parts of the country continue to face armed conflict and acute insecurity, raising practical and ethical concerns about voter access, candidate participation, and the fairness of polling conditions. Under such circumstances, the election risks being viewed less as a meaningful democratic exercise than as a process whose legitimacy will be widely contested.

Why Leadership Change Is Now Necessary

For years, many in the global Ethiopian diaspora extended Abiy Ahmed broad political and financial support, often in the belief that he represented a path toward national renewal. In the view of the author, that support ultimately reduced scrutiny at a time when stronger public accountability was needed.

The consequences of that silence are now visible in a fractured country, ongoing unrest across multiple regions, serious economic strain, and a state increasingly accused of treating political dissent and civilian populations through a security lens rather than a democratic one.

There comes a point when the defense of a leader becomes an evasion of reality. In Ethiopia today, the central question is no longer whether Abiy Ahmed once inspired hope. It is whether he still offers a credible path out of the crisis. The evidence, for many Ethiopians, increasingly suggests that he does not.

That is why the case for political change is no longer abstract. It is urgent. Ethiopia needs leadership capable of restoring public trust, reducing violence, and reopening the possibility of a legitimate national future. From that perspective, Abiy Ahmed should step aside and allow that transition to begin.

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

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