Next year’s elections in Ethiopia will be unlike the previous five polls. The ruling coalition, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), is widely discredited, including at the grassroots. Add to that the nationwide ethnic polarisation and local micro factors and the local dimension will be critical.
Only the future will reveal if the polls will be held on time. The EPRDF has pledged that they will, although the country is still suffering from politically inspired violence, millions are unable to return to their homes and there is no date for a postponed census, which is needed to ascertain how many representatives each region should elect. If the election does take place, however, we may well see voters following traditional approaches to the appointment of leaders that could revitalise local democratic structures.
That would contradict the dominant view of Ethiopian elections, which posits that parties are the key actors. This notion rests on both international norms and observation of elections in recent decades. Even in the 2005 vote, arguably the fairest in the post-1991 federal era, with some leaders having become household names during the campaign, voters first and foremost chose a party, not its candidate. When you asked them – at least in the countryside – “For whom will you vote?” they typically responded “The bee” (the symbol of the EPRDF), “The V” (the Coalition for Unity and Democracy), and so on. When asked: “In your constituency, who represents this party?” only a tiny minority could name the candidate.
