Ethiopia’s opposition call for three-day national strike
Oct 1, 2005 (ADDIS ABABA) — Ethiopia’s two main opposition groups called Saturday for a three-day general strike to protest the parliamentary election results, opposition member arrests and press for the formation of a national unity government.
The Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) and the United Ethiopian Democratic Force (UEDF) are asking people to stay home starting Monday to show their discontent with the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front party (EPRDF) that was declared the winner of May polls, said Birtukan Mideksa, vice chairwoman of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy.
“We are asking the people to stay home for three consecutive days to express to the ruling EPRDF and the government in unequivocal, but peaceful and legal terms, their legitimate discontent,” she told journalists, speaking on behalf of the two parties.
Yakob Hilemariam of the CUD said that they wanted the government to respond to their proposals, including forming a government of national unity, during the three-day strike, but if the government did not, the opposition would devise new ways to get its attention.
The CUD and the UEDF had planned to hold a major rally in Addis Ababa on Sunday, but postponed it when the government demanded they unconditionally accept the results of the controversial May 15 parliamentary elections.
In June, police killed dozens of people in demonstrations in Addis Ababa to protest alleged election fraud.
On Thursday, the two parties said that between Sept. 19 and Thursday, authorities had arrested 859 opposition members across the country and security forces had killed one opposition member in the Amhara region, 400 kilometers (250 miles) south of the capital, Addis Ababa.
Final results released by the National Electoral Board gave Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Democratic Front 327 seats in the 547-seat parliament, enough to form the next government. Opposition parties got 174 seats – a substantial improvement over the 12 that they won in the previous 2000 elections.
European Union observers and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter have expressed serious concerns about the elections, but also said that, overall, the experience would encourage democracy. It was the first Ethiopian election that foreign experts were allowed to observe.
(AP/ST)