Agenda | Mar 02,2024
Felege Asmelash, 53, has spent nearly 26 years as a public service employee in Meqelle, the seat of Tigray Regional State. For much of this time, a government paycheck covered rent, school costs and basic needs. That stability has broken down now.
Felege, whose husband is retired, lives in a modest rented house and pays 8,000 Br in monthly rent. Her youngest daughter, in Grade 10, goes to a private school that costs her 3,000 Br. Those two bills alone absorb more than half of her monthly income. Four of her five children are working as public servants, but supporting the household still rests on her, as she works as a resource mobilisation coordinator in the HIV Control & Prevention Unit at the Health Bureau of the Regional State.
Her net monthly salary of 13,000 Br is the family’s only dependable income, or at least it was. Since February, it has stopped as the Regional Government has ceased paying more than 141,000 public servants after federal budget cuts. For Felege, it is a daily test of survival.
"I've no money left," she said. "I can't pay rent. I can't send my child to school. I go to work hungry."
It started during the civil war, which erupted in the late 2020 in Tigray Regional State, and engulfed the neighbouring states before a ceasefire was signed two years later. The conflict between the federal government and armed groups under the TPLF, the governing party of the Regional State, wrecked much of the economy and crippled public revenue. When the war ended, much of the region's formal economy had collapsed, almost.
Businesses had closed, banks struggled to operate, and tax collection had been dismantled or made ineffective. Many of the activities that returned afterwards were informal and largely outside the tax system. With its local revenue base weakened, the interim regional administration, first under Getachew Reda and now under Tadesse Werede (Maj. Gen.), whose term is about to end, came to rely on federal budget transfers from the Ministry of Finance to pay salaries and provide basic public services. During the two-year war, public servants had already gone unpaid for 16 months.
Dubbed a Cessation of Hostilities, the deal signed in Pretoria, South Africa, in November 2022, was supposed to mark a turning point. The federal government allocated 24 billion Br for the year, with funds released during the first three months. But since October, the flow has slowed. Only a fraction of the expected monthly transfers has reached the Regional State. Tadesse's Interim Administration tried to cover wages with limited revenue mobilised from internal sources.
Even that has stopped, and public service employees have gone unpaid for nearly two months.
At a mass gathering in Aksum during the Hidar Tsion religious celebrations, Tadesse admitted that his Administration is under serious strain because a federal budget freeze has left it unable to pay civil servants or maintain essential services.
Across the region, the consequences are visible. Fuel shortages nearly paralyse transport.
According to officials of the Regional State's Trade & Export Agency, fuel supplies to the region have been completely halted since January, with serious disruptions to public services, infrastructure work, and healthcare delivery expected. Monthly supplies of fuel and diesel, once between 12 million and 15 million litres, had fallen to 850,000 litres by February last year and have been fully stopped since January 2026.
Banks have little cash businesses remain mostly closed. The fear that another cycle of deadly conflict could return hangs over many, like Felege.
She is struggling to survive on small loans from relatives, stretching each Birr as far as it will go.
"But what happens when this money is gone?" she asked. "If there is no one left to help us, I don’t know how we will survive."
Transport costs have tripled. What used to cost her 80 Br for a round trip to work now costs nearly 240 Br. She walks nearly three hours each day, there and back, despite health problems, for she can no longer afford the limited transport available.
"We're already struggling to afford even one proper meal a day," Felege told Fortune.
The numbers show how little room the region has left.
The regional authorities blame the federal government for freezing budget transfers, which represent six percent of the 328.76 billion Br Parliament apportioned as federal subsidies to regional states for the fiscal year 2025/26. Inching close to 24 billion Br, the budget subsidy the Regional State was allocated to claims one percent of the country's GDP. But the region needs 2.8 billion Br every month to pay salaries for public service employees like Felege, and only around 700 million Br is generated locally.
According to Mihiret Beyene (PhD), head of the region's Finance Bureau, repeated requests to the Ministry of Finance have gone unanswered.
Felege is discontented with finding herself on the receiving end of this debacle.
"We aren't politicians. We've done nothing wrong," Felege told Fortune. "If mistakes were made, those responsible should answer for them. But why are we being punished?"
This same question has spread far beyond one household.
On March 24, 2026, thousands of civil service employees under the Regional Administration joined protests organised by officials of the regional Education Bureau, leaders of the Teachers’ Association, and PTA representatives. Held in towns including Meqelle, Adwa and Adigrat, teachers, parents and students marched protesting that "cutting the budget is starving teachers and denying children their future."
Among the over 46,000 teachers working in the Regional State is Tsige Abera, a 50-year-old mathematics teacher at Neblet Primary School in the Enbaslet District. For 24 years, he has taught Grade 6 students. Like Felege, he depends entirely on his salary.
"I've been asking for unpaid salary for 16 months so that I can clear my debts," he told Fortune. "Now that I’m not getting paid, I find it difficult to feed my family."
According to Tsige, the crisis follows him into the classroom, leaving him unable to focus. Standing before his students, he keeps thinking about how he could provide for his children. What hurts him most, he said, is what it does to his children.
"When I see my children hungry, I can't help but feel completely helpless," Tsige said. "It's very hard to teach with this burden."
Teachers across the region share the same plight, as many say they are losing motivation. Some are trying to leave their teaching jobs in search of any work that can sustain their families. However, Tsige still reports to school, still standing before his students.
"We're just teachers," he said. "We can't go even one day without our salary without feeling the impact. Everything depends on it. Why is this happening to us?"
The answer to Tsige's bewilderment goes back to the long-brewing political rupture between the federal government under Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed (PhD) and the leaders of the TPLF, which culminated in sharp differences after years of deteriorating relations. Rooted in its fall from the centre of power after nearly three decades as the dominant force in the ruling coalition, the EPRDF, that governed Ethiopia after 1991, TPLF leaders collided with Abiy’s reform agenda, his restructuring of the ruling party, and a mounting struggle over legitimacy, authority and the future of regional autonomy under the federal order.
The rift deepened after Abiy, who rise to power in 2018 on the back of nationwide protests against the old order, dissolved the ruling coalition and formed the Prosperity Party (PP), a new political vehicle the TPLF leaders under Debretsion Gebremicheal (PhD) refused to join, leaving them outside the governing party for the first time since 1991 and reinforcing their view that the federal government was seeking to roll back the federal system and their influence. The mistrust sharpened further when Abiy signed a 2018 peace deal with Eritrea's Issayas Afeworqi, which TPLF leaders interpreted as a threat to the region’s security and evidence that Addis Abeba was aligning with their regional adversaries.
The confrontation hardened in 2020 when national and regional elections due in August were postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic, and the House of Federation extended federal and regional mandates, a move the TPLF denounced as unconstitutional. Defying Addis Abeba, its leaders proceeded with a regional election in September 2020, which the House of Federation declared illegal and “nullified”. TPLF leaders in turn declared the federal government’s mandate expired, leaving each side openly questioning the other’s legitimacy.
What followed was a dangerous slide from institutional dispute to military confrontation. The federal government began cutting budget transfers to Tigray Regional State, as both sides accused each other of preparing for war. Hostile rhetoric intensified, and the final rupture came on the night of November 4, 2020, when armed forces under the Regional State seized control of the Northern Command’s bases, an action the TPLF leaders later admitted was "a pre-emptive" move.
The federal government denounced it as a “treasonous” attack on the national army, prompting the Prime Minister to launch what his government called a “law-enforcement operation” against TPLF leaders. This campaign rapidly expanded into a full-scale civil war in Tigray Regional State involving federal forces, regional militias and Eritrean troops.
The war inflicted severe damage, particularly on education, which comprised over 2,500 schools. Millions of children were pushed out of school for years, and many still do not have access to education. Schools were destroyed, and teachers died, were displaced or left their careers. The system was deeply disrupted to serve the 1.46 million student population in the Regional State, accounting for close to seven percent of the national student population.
Since November 2022, efforts have been underway to restore schooling, but the recovery remains in its early stages.
According to Kiros Guesh (PhD), head of the regional Education Bureau, budget cuts and delays in teachers’ salaries are creating severe hardship in an already fragile system.
"It's unfair to inflict more damage on a sector still trying to recover," he told Fortune.
The budget moratorium is pushing some schools toward closure, and the Bureau has received no official response from the Ministry of Education.
On March 9, the Education Bureau wrote to the Ministry, warning that years of progress in rebuilding the system after the war "faces a serious risk of reversal" without stable funding. The letter pointed directly to the federal government’s decision to withhold the budget subsidy since October 2025.
The alarm is not confined to schools. On March 5, the Health Bureau under the Regional State issued a similar appeal, warning that the healthcare system "faced imminent collapse" due to severe fuel shortages, discontinued pharmaceutical supplies, and growing financial constraints.
"Ambulance services and the distribution of medicines from central warehouses to health facilities had become impossible," reads the letter the Bureau issued. "Immediate intervention is required to prevent avoidable morbidity and mortality among millions of civilians."
Several attempts to get responses from the federal government have yielded little. Officials at the ministries of Education and Health insisted that the issue is budget-related, but the Ministry of Finance has not responded. According to Girma Kebede, its communications head, the matter is sensitive, and they have declined to comment.
Prime Minister Abiy, in an interview with the Ethiopian News Agency held in March this year, accused the TPLF of continuing military activities and preparing for another war. He affirmed that the federal government has no intention of initiating war in the region but alleged that the TPLF leaders are exploiting gold and other mineral resources in the region to finance the procurement of weapons.
Gebru Asrat, a veteran politician who once served as the founding president of the Tigray Regional State, voiced similar concerns, accusing the TPLF of preparing for another war. But he argued that the budget freeze places an "unfair burden" on ordinary civil servants.
"The Ministry of Finance should explore ways to pay public employees directly to prevent further harm to the people," he told Fortune.
For ordinary citizens like Felege, the politics offer little comfort. Rent, school fees and food still demand cash.
Cash has become the painful bottleneck. For businesspeople like Fikre Tensay, a resident of Meqelle and a former businessman, who closed his shop in the Qedamay Weyane market because bringing goods into the city had become impossible, and customers were too few, withdrawing cash has become nearly impossible in an environment where banks disburse only 1,000 Br a day, often after hours of waiting. An officer at Lion Bank’s Meqelle Branch, who requested anonymity, confirmed the shortage but blamed the scramble to hold cash out of fear that conflict could resume, while deposits have nearly disappeared.
Felege still goes to work, walking, and awaits a salary that has stopped coming.
PUBLISHED ON
Mar 28,2026 [ VOL
26 , NO
1352]
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