Poll standoff leaves Ethiopian capital without administration
Oct 11, 2005 (ADDIS ABABA) — A standoff over disputed polls has left Ethiopia’s capital with no elected team to run a city home to four million people, the African Union headquarters and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, officials said Tuesday.
Monday’s planned swearing-in of a new city council was cancelled after elected members from the country’s main opposition group, which won all but three of the 138 seats on the panel in the May polls, boycotted the ceremony, they said.
“The formation of the city council has been cancelled because council members of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) … failed to show up,” the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia said in a statement.
The refusal by CUD councillors to attend means the opposition stronghold of Addis Ababa will continue to be run by an appointed transitional administration dominated by the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF).
The CUD, most of whose elected members of parliament are also boycotting the federal legislature to protest alleged massive fraud in the May 15 polls, says it will not take its city council seats until the national government restores certain powers to the body.
“The laws enacted by the government about the city administration are totally unacceptable,” CUD chairman Hailu Shewal told AFP on Tuesday.
“We have written a letter to the government to revoke those laws so that we can take our seats on the city council as mandated by the people,” he said. “If they are not going to do so, we are not taking over the city administration.”
The laws in question relate to the transfer of some city tax revenue from the council to the federal government and a provision that requires the local board to report to the prime minister who has the power to dismiss its members.
Prime Minister Meles Zenawi’s government has thus far refused to change the laws and has said unless the CUD takes its 109 seats in parliament the party will not eligible to run the local administration in the capital.
The Addis Ababa city council is responsible for providing most services — with the notable exceptions of water and power — to residents of the capital.
(AFP/ST)