Ethiopia at the polls in 2026: Managed elections, unmanaged conflicts
- The upcoming elections in Ethiopia are set to take place in a context of heavy repression and widespread instability.
- Elections, particularly under these circumstances, cannot address the conflicts at the root of Ethiopia’s instability – in fact, they risk exacerbating them.
- Further instability in Ethiopia threatens to spill over into the broader Horn of Africa region and beyond.
- To prevent this, the EU should focus its effort on supporting negotiated settlements to the country’s multiple conflicts.
Ethiopia is gearing up to conduct general elections for the second time since the 2018 transition that promised to open the country’s political space. The ruling Prosperity Party, which won 96% of parliamentary seats in the last elections in 2021, presents the process as a demonstration of democratic progress under its rule.
This policy brief shows that the situation in the country tells a different story. The elections are taking place in a repressive political environment and amid widespread instability, including active conflicts in the two most populous regions of the country. In this context, the elections are unlikely to be free and fair or to address the core drivers of instability.
The brief shows that the main issues affecting Ethiopia’s stability – most notably active armed insurgencies in Amhara and Oromia, and the unravelling of the Pretoria Agreement in Tigray – operate entirely outside regular political processes and will not be resolved by any electoral outcome. In this context, international support to the electoral process risks legitimising the government’s military-centred approach and reducing the urgency to negotiate with its opponents.
The brief concludes with recommendations for the European Union and the Netherlands, urging them to resist treating the elections as a marker of democratic progress or stability, and to redirect their diplomatic capital to support negotiated settlements to the country’s multiple active conflicts.
