{"id":85941,"date":"2018-02-20T14:13:48","date_gmt":"2018-02-20T19:13:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ethiopianreview.com\/index\/?guid=fb316a74f3a3fbd53f17a9be025e9ff5"},"modified":"2019-02-05T02:40:05","modified_gmt":"2019-02-05T07:40:05","slug":"will-a-power-struggle-within-ethiopias-ruling-party-lead-to-reform-or-more-repression","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/85941","title":{"rendered":"Will a power struggle within Ethiopia&#039;s ruling party lead to reform \u2014 or more repression?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.ethiopianreview.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/Protests-in-Ethiopia.jpg?resize=780%2C439\" alt=\"\" width=\"780\" height=\"439\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-86489\" \/><br \/>\nBY TOM GARDNER | Foreign Policy<br \/>\nOn the day that Bekele Gerba, a prominent Ethiopian opposition leader, was released from prison, thousands of people took to the streets in celebration. It was a scene unlike any other in Ethiopia over the last quarter century, during which the ruling Ethiopian People\u2019s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) has kept a tight lid on dissent. On Feb. 13, jubilant crowds thronged into the streets and over soccer pitches, waving political flags and chanting Bekele\u2019s name. Two days later, Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn abruptly resigned. After nearly three years of sporadic anti-government protests, demonstrators in Ethiopia\u2019s disaffected Oromia and Amhara regions finally appeared to have gained the upper hand. Then on Feb. 16, the tide seemed to turn against them once again, as the government announced the imposition of a national state of emergency, the second of its kind in as many years.<br \/>\nBekele\u2019s release was the culmination of a three-day standoff between the government, which had previously announced its intention to release some of its many thousands of political prisoners, and the protesters, who had grown impatient with the slow pace of the promised amnesties. For nearly a month, the wind has seemed to be at the protesters\u2019 backs: More than 6,000 political prisoners have been freed since January, meeting one of the demonstrators\u2019 most central demands. \u201cWithin a month, the political environment has completely changed,\u201d says Hallelujah Lulie, a political consultant based in Addis Ababa. [&#8230;] <a href=\"http:\/\/foreignpolicy.com\/2018\/02\/20\/ethiopias-great-rift\/\">CONTINUE READING<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BY TOM GARDNER | Foreign Policy On the day that Bekele Gerba, a prominent Ethiopian opposition leader, was released from prison, thousands of people took to the streets in celebration. It was a scene unlike any other in Ethiopia over the last quarter century, during which the ruling Ethiopian People\u2019s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) has [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-85941","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ethiopian-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-mm9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85941"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85941\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":264024,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85941\/revisions\/264024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}