In November of 2022, the brutal War in Ethiopia ended in a transitional peace process between the federal-led government and TPLF militias. This was supposed to mark a new beginning in the battered East African nation which has seen decades of instability after the fall of the monarchy, but tensions still remain.
Though Abiy Ahmed’s government formed a path of reconciliation with TPLF representatives, there have been continued massacres across the nation, which have targeted Orthodox Christians by Oromo extremist organizations.
The Oromia region, which encompasses the capital of Addis Ababa, is the most densely populated region of the country. During the war which took place in the northern regions, massacres persisted in the Oromia region and with little government action taken to quell the violence; this could bring a new round of sectarianism to Ethiopia.
Archbishop Abune Henok, the head religious figure of Addis Ababa stated the actions are shameful and have only inflated the country’s rift amongst its Christians. For much of his tenure, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has quietly allowed bishops to cause schisms that have weakened ethnic groups, such as Amharas who represent a large majority under the Tewahedo Church.
Amharas, who ruled the empire under the Solomonic Dynasty have become increasingly marginalized after its fall and have been persecuted by extremist organizations under successive governments over the past several decades.
Ethiopia’s leading Patriarch, Abune Mathias has also been skeptical of the government’s inactions and policies, as the federal government has made comments indirectly recognizing the breakaway synod. Effectively, PM Ahmed is now using an illegitimate section of the church as a wing to enact his will akin to how Vladimir Putin uses the Russian Orthodox Church as a front for the FSB.
The World Council of Churches has also received reports of Addis Ababa’s manipulation of the state in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church’s policies. Feeling blowback from his policies, Abiy Ahmed has restricted social media. This is not the first time he has done this as much of the war involved media blackouts and mass arrests of journalists.
One of the major controversies of the church split comes from rebel bishops, who are ethnic Oromos forming their wing. The majority of the federal government officials are of Oromo descent and many feel the federal government is holding a bias by not resolving the crisis.
This is not the first time the government has come under scrutiny for a slow response as much of the Amhara and Afar region was occupied by TPLF militias during the war and the government didn’t react until their armed forces nearly reached the capital in the Oromia region.
Both the Tigray and Amhara regions were decimated by the war with an estimated multibillion-dollar recovery ahead while the federal government has solidified control over the nation as both major critics of the government are severely weakened.
Government interference in manipulating church policies to promote themselves, is a recipe for disaster, as seen with how the Kremlin has used its own church as a front for intelligence gathering, collaboration during the War in Ukraine and cracking down on internal dissidents in Russia. A breakaway synod could have the same effect as Ahmed has cracked down on civilian activists for the past several months.
Already facing instability in lieu of government negligence, various militias with their own purposes, and continued sectarian violence, Ethiopia remains on edge. Despite the economic promise and a transitional peace process, if the continued corruption and ethnic massacres do not stop, the country could face renewed sectarian violence or at worst—a nightmare scenario akin to Bosnia in the 1990s.
[Photo by Office of the Prime Minister, Ethiopia, via Wikimedia Commons]
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author.
Julian McBride is a forensic anthropologist and independent journalist born in New York. He is the founder and director of the Reflections of War Initiative (ROW), an anthropological NGO which aims to tell the stories of the victims of war through art therapy. As a former Marine, he uses this technique not only to help heal PTSD but also to share people’s stories through art, which conveys “the message of the brutality of war better than most news organizations.”
