Ethiopian students defy demo ban, police surronds campuses

ADDIS ABABA, June 6 (AFP) — Ethiopian police surrounded two university campuses in Addis Ababa on Monday as hundreds of students defied a government ban on demonstrations to protest last month’s disputed elections, witnesses said.

Armed officers from the federal police blocked access to the Faculty of Social Sciences and the nearby Faculty of Science and Medicine at the University of Addis Ababa as up to 900 students at the two campuses chanted and sang, protesting alleged ruling party fraud in the May 15 polls, they said.

Between 400 and 500 students were locked in at the medical school and between 300 and 400 at the social sciences school, according to an AFP correspondent on the scene.

The students accuse the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) of trying to steal the election through massive vote rigging and fraud, complaints first raised by the country’s opposition.

“We are demonstrating because EPRDF is making a fraud, misleading the whole international community saying they have won,” one student yelled through the gates of the social science school.

“We don’t accept the victory of EPRDF, the CUD has won,” the student shouted at reporters, referring to the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, the main opposition group.

“Enough is enough,” yelled other students. “Get up, stand up for your flag.”

Demonstrators said the protest began overnight and that police had arrested at least five students.

Ethiopian security sources declined to comment on the protests, which are illegal under a month-long ban on all post-election public demonstrations in the capital imposed as the polls closed on May 15 by Prime Minister Meles Zenawi.

It was not immediately clear if or when Ethiopian police would move to break up the demonstrations.

The protests came as the CUD and other opposition await a ruling by an Addia Ababa high court on a suit they have filed to prevent election authorities from validating provisional results which show an EPRDF victory.

The National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) on Friday announced that it would delay by one month — from June 8 to July 8 — the official release of final results due to the large number of fraud allegations it has to investigate.

Provisional results announced thus far give the EPRDF and allied parties 320 seats in the 547-member parliament.

Those returns, from 513 of the 524 contested constituencies, show opposition parties, which had only 12 seats in the previous parliament, and independents with 193 seats.