Editorials

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Editorials

Dec 10 , 2022

Accountability, Justice: State Duties in Tall Order

The Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), under the leadership of Daniel Bekele (PhD), issued a statement last week pronouncing what it described as "grave violations of human rights" unfolding in...

Dec 4 , 2022

Survival Upstaging Moral, Societal Values

Last week saw enraged university lecturers' threatening to stage a strike. They addressed their complaints to Parliament and the Ministry of Education, bitterly complaining about the rising cost of li...

Nov 26 , 2022

To Liberalize Finance Holy, Regulating It Is Divine

In the wake of the liberalization of the telecom sector, Ethiopian authorities have made a milestone move opening the door for foreign capital to enter the financial sector. In effect, people talk mor...

Nov 19 , 2022

Restore Faith in Constitutional Institutions to Achieve Social Cohesion

The rounds of talks to end wars in Ethiopia held in Pretoria, South Africa, and Nairobi, Kenya, have outcomes exceeding the expectations of many, from naysayers to pundits and from mediators to the ne...

Nov 12 , 2022

Nairobi Must Double Down on Pretoria

Two weeks have passed since negotiators from Ethiopia's federal government and the TPLF reached a deal that brought the war in Tigray to a lull. So have the talks moved from Pretoria to Nairobi and fr...

Nov 5 , 2022

Pretoria Deal Represents Courage, Despair and Anxiety

Hardly were people prepared for the deals announced last week from Pretoria, South Africa. For many, it was a bolt from the blue moment. Negotiators representing the federal government and those of...

Oct 30 , 2022

Pretoria Can Pivot an Arduous Path to Peace

Africa's brutal war in the continent's largest country - in population - continues to rage unabated. This week, the civil war marks its second commemoration. The carnage it resulted, the suffering...

Oct 22 , 2022

Embargo on Imports a Respite, Not Antidote

Suppose one policy move can reveal the degree to which Ethiopia's economy is in the chasms of disquiet. In that case, hardly any matches the measure federal authorities took last week capping imports...

Oct 15 , 2022

Telco Liberalisation Offers Lessons for Financial Opening

Last week saw a milestone in Ethiopia's telecom industry. For over a century, the industry has been the sole domain of the state-owned Ethio telecom, with a captive market. Safaricom Ethiopia Plc has...

Oct 8 , 2022

Central Bank Stick Out Like a Sore Thumb

It is fitting that the financial sector and the monetary regime are riddled with reforms, the former more than the latter. The most recent could be establishing a federal regulatory agency separate fr...

Oct 1 , 2022

Rip the Band-Aid Off. Float the Birr. Liberalize Capital Account

The foreign exchange market is seeing a war of attrition, with the Dollar gradually taking out its opponents as its strength grows unmatched. Neither is the green buck taking any hostages. A blitzk...

Sep 24 , 2022

Why Ethiopia's Economy Catches Cold When Europe Sneezes

Look no further than the flower industry to appreciate the importance of the European market to underdeveloped economies such as Ethiopia. Within a decade and a half, the country has shot up the list...

Sep 17 , 2022

Long Overdue Finance Sector Opening Not Silver Bullet

The debate shortly after the Council of Ministers nodded a bill to open the financial sector to foreign capital was emblematic of how the economic discourse has deteriorated. Some thought this entails...

Sep 10 , 2022

Export Performance Seems Impressive. Details Say Otherwise

Ethiopia's policymakers and wonks began planning the economy and directing its course in the 1950s. There have been only two years since Ethiopia registered a positive balance of payment: in 1972 and...

Sep 3 , 2022

The War's Tragic Resumption. Not Too Late to Stop It.

The late American President, Ronald Reagan, went back after 50 years to a college in Chicago where he graduated to give a commencement address. A year into his consequential presidency, Reagan used th...

Aug 27 , 2022

This Time Must be the Charm for Capital Markets

Review history; a developed capital market in Ethiopia in this age and era would have seemed settled. It was not. A courtship with the money market dated as far back as over a century ago, when par...

Columns

Commentaries | Sep 13,2025

In Climate Talks, Africa Mortgages Tomorrow Simply to Survive Today

At its launch in Nairobi two years ago, the Africa Climate Summit was billed as the forum...

Editorial | Sep 13 , 2025

Digital Payments Reshape Economy While Service Workers Lose Out

The way the Birr moves is changing, and with it, habits that have shaped daily life for ge...

Featured | Sep 14 , 2025 . By NAHOM AYELE

Student Tax ID Push Triggers Logjam

The yellow flush of Aday Abeba flowers has returned to Addis Abeba, heralding the arrival...

Agenda | Sep 13 , 2025 . By NAHOM AYELE and YITBAREK GETACHEW

Monument to National Ambition, Geopolitical Agency

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), Africa's largest hydroelectric power project,...

Fortune News | Sep 15 , 2025 . By AMANUEL BEKELE