National Vote Picks Up Speed as Gaps on the Ground Widen

Mar 14 , 2026. By NAHOM AYELE ( FORTUNE STAFF WRITER )

More than nine million voters registered in one week for the upcoming national election, officials of the National Electoral Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) disclosed. But with less than four months to go, 12.3pc of more than 52,000 polling stations have yet to begin registration. Early momentum in voter registration is colliding with implementation gaps. A sizable part of the electoral network remains idle as the calendar advances.

Over nine million voters have registered by last week through manual and online systems, equal to 23.5pc of the total recorded during the last national election, as the country moved toward its seventh national vote with less than three months remaining.

The registration drive opened a week ago and is scheduled to remain open until April 7, but the early numbers, presented by the National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) at a press conference at Skylight Hotel on Friday, March 13, 2026, have exposed the uneven terrain of the election.

More than 52,000 polling stations are operational across the country. Yet 12.3pc of them have not begun registering voters, leaving a sizeable share of the electoral network idle even as officials insist registration is moving ahead. For a vote after years of conflict and political strain, that gap is more than administrative. It revealed a divergence between the official electoral calendar and the conditions on the ground needed to make that calendar meaningful.

The Board blames the delays partly on logistics. Its officials attributed difficulties in delivering materials to insecure areas and, in some cases, to resistance from regional state administrations. Nowhere is the problem more evident than in Tigray Regional State, where voter registration has not begun. According to the Board, it cannot launch registration in the Region because the interim regional administration, under Tadesse Werede (Maj. Gen.), has not responded to its requests.

“So far, we haven’t received any response from them,” Melatwork Hailu, the Board’s chairperson, told journalists last month.

With less than two months left before the election, the standoff shows how difficult it will be to organise voting, with the Board having registered 10,934 candidates, of whom 2,198 are running for the federal legislative house.

The interim administration in Tigray Regional State has made clear that elections cannot be held until a series of conditions are met. According to Amanuel Assefa, deputy president of the interim administration and vice chairman of the TPLF, these include the return of internally displaced people (IDPs) to their neighbourhoods, proper allocation of the regional budget, restoration of constitutional order, normalisation of daily life, restoration of the TPLF's party registration and the return of disputed boundaries.

For many residents in the Regional State, these political conditions are inseparable from an immediate crisis of daily survival. Public servants have gone unpaid for the past two months, leaving them unable to cover rent or essential necessities. Fuel shortages have nearly paralysed transport, banks have little cash, businesses remain shut, and the threat of renewed conflict hangs over the region.

For Fikre Tensay, a resident of Mekelle, the seat of the Regional State and a former businessman, the crisis forced him to close his business in the Qedamay Weyane market.

“I closed my shop because bringing goods into Mekelle became impossible, and customers are too few,” he told Fortune. “For us, survival is the main concern. Elections are a luxury right now.”

That judgment captured the dilemma. While political leaders back the principle of elections, many argue that current conditions make voting impossible.

According to Dejen Mezgebe (PhD), a lecturer at the Faculty of Governance & Peace Studies at Meqelle University and chairman of the Tigray Independence Party, elections are urgently needed in the region, but it has been unable to hold them. He blamed both the federal government and the TPLF for the delay.

“After the Pretoria Agreement, the process should have moved directly toward elections,” Dejen said. “The delay is forcing ordinary people to pay the price. Right now, we're out of the game, and I don’t believe elections will be held in the remaining time.”

Dejen warned that trying to hold elections under current conditions could trigger renewed conflict. The SAWET Party has taken a similar view, with its leaders arguing that elections should come only after the preconditions set by the Pretoria Agreement are fulfilled. Berhane Asbah, the party’s head of communications, believes that voting without the return of displaced people, the restoration of disputed boundaries, and internal peace would be pointless.

“Holding elections now would only be a mockery,” he said.

Veteran politicians, such as Gebru Asrat, a former leader of the TPLF and former president of Tigray Regional State, have echoed that view. He believes holding elections now would be a major mistake.

"The necessary conditions don't exist in Tigray and in parts of Oromia and Amhara regional states," he told Fortune. "Elections could take place only after the Pretoria Agreement is implemented, peace is restored, IDPs return home, and disputes over boundaries are resolved. Only after an inclusive government is formed, armed groups are disarmed, and normal life resumes should elections be considered."

Tensions have risen further following a recent House of Federation decision on disputed constituency boundaries with neighbouring Amhara Regional State.

In calmer parts of the country, voter registration continues, and electoral officials say the pace could accelerate as the April deadline nears. Yet Tigray Regional State has come to demonstrate the broader difficulty of holding nationwide elections in a country emerging from conflicts, amid ongoing militarised conflicts and political strain. Millions of citizens have registered to vote. Millions more remain in places where peace, security and stability have yet to return, raising doubt over how fully the electoral process can reach them this time.

PUBLISHED ON Mar 14,2026 [ VOL 26 , NO 1350]