Addis Abeba Vote Ending Peacefully Despite Pressure on Polling System

Jun 1 , 2026.

By the time the last light faded over Addis Abeba, the pressure at some polling stations had begun to ease.

At Gerji Roba polling station in Woreda 13, the number of voters waiting in queues had decreased substantially in the past hour, leaving fewer than 50 people outside a station that earlier in the evening had seen hundreds. Elsewhere, the city’s electoral machinery moved unevenly toward closure, revealing both the discipline of voters and the fragility of the administrative systems meant to serve them.

At the “Teramaj” polling station in Woreda 1, the system worked almost precisely as designed. By evening, 739 of the 821 registered voters had cast their ballots, a turnout of about 90pc, leaving election executives to wait idly for the final 82.

In Yeka District's  Woreda 2, the situation was different. A late surge forced voting to be extended until midnight, turning what had been expected to be a routine finish into a test of endurance for election workers, observers and voters.

The turnout pressures were not uniform, order was visible, but the process depended heavily on the capacity of each polling station to absorb late voters, verify names and preserve public confidence. In some places, queues thinned. In others, voting hours stretched deep into the night.

In Addis Abeba’s Council races, the political field had fragmented into a crowded battlefield. A single regional race drew 122 candidates, including 32 from the opposition Hidase Party, 24 from a prominent coalition, and 23 from the ruling Prosperity Party. High-profile figures, including Enatalem Melese, the minister of Government Communications Services, faced an array of minor party challengers, among them candidates from the Selam for Ethiopia Party.

Some polling stations were tightly packed with observers, ranging from a four-person coalition bloc to representatives from the opposition EZEMA party and independent Civil Society Organizations (CSOs). Their presence demonstrated a contest watched not only by voters and candidates, but by political organisations intent on documenting every step of the process, from the opening minutes to the counting of ballots.

At the polling station in Lideta Health College, a 20-year-old female student stood in queue for five hours, only to be turned away when election executives informed her that her name could not be found on the register. Like many young voters in the capital, she admitted she was initially reluctant to participate, fearing political or personal consequences for her family. She had only joined the queue at 10:00am on her family’s insistence.

“There is no my name. I can’t vote,” she said, her voice a mix of exhaustion and quiet resignation. “I’m here because of my family’s order to vote, not because I wanted.”

A similar administrative failure played out at Mesrake Goh School in the Kirkos District, where a steady trickle of citizens, including a woman turned away late in the evening, were sent home because their names were missing from the registry books.

Outside, in the courtyard, a small circle of residents who had already voted or given up on the process gathered to talk and laugh, creating a surreal pocket of lightheartedness against an otherwise demanding evening.

In other instances, the registry errors resembled a bureaucratic comedy of errors. At the Jagema Kelo station in Nifas Silk Lafto District, one voter was told he was at the wrong site and was directed to an adjacent station. Upon arriving there, electoral officials promptly sent him right back. He was eventually sent to a third station.

Despite these localised frustrations, the broader narrative of the day was one of order, calm and peaceful, a reality not taken for granted in a country with a history of turbulent transitions. The calm was not the absence of problems, but the ability of voters, observers and polling staff to absorb them without visible breakdown.

“I’ve been through many elections, but I’ve never seen such a peaceful and calm election,” said Menbere Ketsela, an election observer for the EZEMA party at Jagema Kelo. “Even as the sun beat down on them or the cold set in, people waited very patiently, sitting down, and casting their votes in a highly disciplined and civil manner.”

According to Menbere, the process had not been free of tensions. In the morning, she was barred from taking photos of the opening official minutes by a station chief. But she witnessed the process had remained transparent.

“We’ll be capturing the final minutes and the ballot-counting process this evening through both video and photos,” she told Fortune. “Poll workers had spent the day treating observers to roasted barley (Qolo), and bottled water.”

By late evening, finality was settling over the city. At Jagema Kelo, only four voters remained in line. Against the schoolroom wall, three ballot boxes for the city Council election sat entirely full, padlocked and sealed. Next to them, a lone box for the federal Parliament sat locked and waiting, a heavy plastic vault holding the immediate political future of a country.

PUBLISHED ON Jun 01,2026 [ VOL 27 , NO 1362]