FROM EIR DAILY ALERT

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Ethiopian Prime Minister Steps Down, As Party Leadership Attempts To Head Off Destabilization

Feb. 18, 2018 (EIRNS)—Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn—who has headed the government since the death of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi in 2012—abruptly resigned his position on Feb. 15, stating that he would remain as prime minister until Parliament approved his resignation and a replacement is named, which could take up to three months. At the same time, a state of emergency was declared in the country, and hundreds of people were released from prison. Protracted ethnically based destabilizations have been fostered against the government since 2014. The resignation is being seen as an effort by the ruling party to quell the ongoing destabilizations by shifting from a heavy-handed response to the unrest, perhaps naming a Prime Minister from the Oromo ethnic group, the largest in the country.

Ethiopia’s economy has been growing rapidly for over a decade, largely in cooperation with China. Even the World Bank had to admit that Ethiopia’s economy has been growing at more than twice the average rate of the rest of the region, growing by 11% per year over the last decade. Ethiopia—the second largest nation in Africa, with a 107 million population—is being targeted because of this China-aided development progress.