Parliament, Meles and the opposition

By Ephrem Madebo
December 9, 2005

In Ethiopia where the parliament is dominated by the executive branch, the entire legislative programme of the Parliament is determined by the government, and government bills virtually always pass the House of Representatives due to the nature of the governing party's majority. Constitutionally, in Ethiopia, sovereignty resides in parliament i.e., parliament is the ultimate legislative body in the country, and may remove power from or abolish local or regional government, and in theory pass any law it wishes. The governing party, from which the executive is formed, uses the speaker of the house to ensure that enough of its members of parliament vote in its favor when voting for government bills. During the recent parliament meeting (opening day) the former president of Ethiopia [Negaso Gidada] was begging the speaker of the house to give him time to talk by constantly waving his hand, but since the Honorable Dr. Gidada was in a hostile environment, Teshome Toga was not interested to listen to his talk. On the other hand, Seyoum Mesfin who waved his hand just once was given the opportunity to give his opinion.
On paper PM Meles’s rule is relative, restricted by law, constitution, or other social and political factors within the state. But Meles doesn’t care for the constitution, the legislative or judicial branches of the government because members of the judicial body are appointed by the executive branch [Meles] and there is no judicial independence. As to the parliament, members of the House of Representative are absolutely loyal to Meles, not to the people whom they represent. When the last parliament voted on the issue of Bademe, the ignorant representative of the Bademe area voted to hand over Bademe to Eritrea (Why in the hell was this man in the parliament?). Mind you, this is the level of loyalty the parliament has to Meles! The handful of opposition members who joined the parliament are not different from the Bademe Representative, though they view their presence in the parliament as an alternative venue of struggle; in reality they are loyal opponents of Meles! As a Southerner, I urge them for an immediate withdrawal from the parliament; as an Ethiopian I tell them that they are stones on the democratic path of the Southern people.

In May 2005, the whole world noticed PM Meles performing some legislative duties. He issued an emergency condition decree and killed 36 innocent people (God knows the actual number). The relationship between Meles and his rubber stamp parliament is vertical, Meles sends a bill to the parliament and 99.99% of the time the parliament sends the approved bill back to Melses. We just saw bill # 1 of the new parliament, MPs were asked rather told to strip the parliamentary immunity of those who boycotted the parliament, and they were happy to do so without even looking at its consequences. The other face of Meles is that he is unaccountable for what he does. He killed students [36 in May, 40 in November] in a broad day light, he got away with it, he fought unnecessary border war that consumed the life of more than 50k Ethiopians, he made Ethiopia a landlocked country, he changed the decision of the Ethiopian people and he used force to put himself on power….he got away with all this! Why worry when he has a parliament that doesn’t know what accountability is!


Ethiopia has an enemy that shoots at mothers, students and children, alters the law to serve its interest, and denies justice for all those who oppose it. How do we fight this enemy? The opposition parties know all the above facts, what they don’t know is how to fight such an enemy. Meles, the parliament, and the heavy weight western powers are all against the opposition, but yet the opposition listened to the western powers and dropped its ball to negotiate with Meles. What Meles wanted is not the negotiation it self, he wanted the ball to be dropped and he got what he wanted! Now some members of the opposition are in the parliament and some others have boycotted the parliament, and their parliamentary immunity is stripped (most of them are in jail). Who is going to call for the next demonstration and labor strike? All in all, who will ignite the match that devours Meles? For sure the loyal opposition in the parliament can’t ignite the match because their match box is empty, the boycotting opposition might not be willing to ignite the match because Meles knows how many match sticks are left in the box, therefore, the interest of the boycotting opposition is to keep the match box intact. Who? Who then ……….?

Who stands for the Ethiopian people who are ignored by western powers, undignified and left for misery by Meles and company, and betrayed by the loyal opposition? Here comes the failure of the opposition, despite the unwavering support of the people, the opposition reduced the power and will of the people. The opposition listened to external enemies (western diplomats) to negotiate with internal enemy (EPRDF). The net output of such a useless negotiation was that Meles successfully defused the grenade that would have destroyed him.
This is by no means an attempt to block or understate the value of negotiation, we need negotiation, but we should never go to the negotiation table laying aside our weapon. Mind you, the negotiation is not between CUDP and UEDF, it is between the people and enemy of the people! The opposition needs to know that Meles is shaking, all he needs is a push and he is gone. But the push is not an ordinary push, it needs the backing of the people and unity of the opposition. The force that Mels has is nothing when compared to the force of the people. Opposition parties please listen to the people, mobilize them and push Meles! Let me say the following in Amharic: Meles is like yemigenefil dist…..”YEMIGENEFIL DIST YEMIYABELASHEW ERASUN NEW”