From Fuel Pumps to Plug Points, Wired Ambitions Meet Weak Current

Nov 19 , 2025.

The late-afternoon sun slants across Tewodros Square, on Churchill Road, gilding the dust that rises from the cracked asphalt. On the left side of the square behind the fountain, Michu Corner, a charging station opened eight months ago, is located. It is equipped with a terrace for an open-air cinema. Adjacent to it, a fast food establishment is vibrating with the buzz of people's chatter and soft background music.

Inside the station, a grey BYD E5 was tethered to a charging portal, its cable plastered like a thick black vine into the port. Besides it, two more BYDs, one white and the other grey, were lined up waiting for their batteries to be charged. A lone pink BYD Seagull stood out from a white and grey colour palette. Within 10 to 15 minutes, the three fully charged vehicles depart the post to charge the next batch of EVs.

Fraol Adem, the facilitator, dashed between them, driving the charged one out and making room for a new one. He yanked a plug free with practised ease, beckoned the next driver in, and recorded their plate number on a piece of paper to identify the charging time.

Eyob Legese, owner of a grey BYD E5, waited nearly an hour in the queue to charge, paying 900 Br. He bought the car six months ago for 3.2 million Br and uses Michu Corner exclusively due to its proximity to his home. The home charging overexerts the circuit, and the cable supplied by the importer overheats. When he plugs the vehicle into his home charger, he cannot even use a light bulb due to the low power.

Eyob does not trust the overheating cable that came with the vehicle importer to do the job. For long trips, he relies on his petrol-powered Toyota Yaris, which he bought a decade ago, when new vehicles were sold for hundreds of thousands of Birr. Though the EV’s 450Km range covers a 350Km round trip to Hawassa, Eyob remained cautious. The availability of a charging station remains a concern to him, as there are only a few stations working outside of Addis Abeba.

“I would confidently travel to Debre Zeit and back, which is 120Km total in full charge,” he said.

In the city, however, the savings are 800 Br to 900 Br for a full charge, compared to triple that amount for fuel, when he compares it to his Yaris. He noted that the comfort he has in his vehicle is also different from that of the Yaris. The new one, he noted, has more comfort.

His new vehicle, which he has only used for a few months, has an unavoidable future maintenance issue lurking at the back of his mind. He noted that, although there is nothing to be serviced right now, there comes a time in any vehicle's life when it is mandatory to be serviced. Being a new model has its perks when it comes to finding a qualified technician.

Most drivers leave their vehicles after connecting them to the ports. Some exit the gate to take a walk, while others visit nearby cafés, and some engage in a cordial conversation with fellow drivers.

Michu Corner is more than a charging point. Awarded to businessman Tesfaye Adugna through a city bid, the site includes a children's playground, a fast-food outlet, a café, and a vehicle décor shop. The food and beverage infrastructure alone required over 10 million Br in investment. All chargers, offering 60, 80, and 120-volt fast-charge options, were imported by the city administration. The rate is fixed at 20 Br a kilowatt-hour.

As the city's pioneer EV charging station, Tesfaye faced steep challenges. Burnt cables, bureaucratic delays in maintenance, and frequent power outages have plagued his operations. Repairs rely on the Chinese manufacturers, causing an extended delay. Electricity costs remain unclear, as the station’s bill combines charging, corridor lighting, restaurant power, and the fountain near the roundabout.

"I'm asking for bill clarification," he told Fortune.

During power outages, Tesfaye uses a diesel generator, but the high fuel costs limit its use to only when necessary.

“It’s not ideal to run a business with,” he told Fortune. “Only for emergencies like charging ambulances with dead batteries.”

Future plans include a car wash and mobile charging units.

“I want it to be an all-in-one destination,” Tesfaye said.

The Michu Corner station employs 80 people across three shifts, with 10 workers on duty at a time until midnight. The expansion plans to double the number of staff. Charging times vary from 30 minutes to four hours, depending on battery capacity and condition. However, owners leave fully charged vehicles on the premises, blocking bays. Fraol moves them to non-functional chargers and enforces time-based penalties.

Michu Corner is one of the new scenes in Addis Abeba where federal transport authorities, under the stewardship of Alemu Sime (PhD), the Chinese-educated transport minister, pin their hope on replacing combustion engines with electric motors. Their ambitions are grand, as they are determined to slash a multibillion-dollar fuel bill, clean Addis Ababa’s smog-filled sky, which accounts for 78pc of its source due to fossil fuel, and build an industry that can assemble, service, and eventually design its own cars.

Their draft e-mobility strategy reads like a manifesto for change, pushing the country from isolated pilots to full-scale adoption with mandatory chargers at fuel stations, mobile and swapping networks, and training pipelines that promise to localise 30pc of production by 2030. But on garage floors, in the Ministry's corridors on Churchill Road and across 1,590 fuel stations, the numbers do not always add up.

Alemu and his policy wonks have set a 10-year goal of 152,855 battery-powered vehicles, comprising 148,000 cars and 4,855 buses. Beginning next year, every new tuk-tuk, motorcycle, government-plated car and urban bus would be electric. By the end of the decade, 15pc of new freight lorries and five percent of freight traffic should plug in, while a fifth of shared bicycles would run on batteries.

The current manufacturing blueprint claims a capacity for 63,900 two- and three-wheelers, 14,900 cars, 1,200 light trucks and 3,500 minibuses and coaches a year, enough, on paper, to meet demand if factories are busy every shift.

Registrations of electric cars have jumped from 7,000 in 2022 to 115,000 this year, and transport officials say 60pc of new vehicles sold in 2024 carried no tailpipe. Transport already accounts for 15pc of carbon emissions nationwide, leading policymakers to develop a strategy that pledges to cut 13.9 million tonnes of carbon dioxide by 2030. They hope this will help avoid a rise in pollution-linked deaths from 935 recorded in 2016 to a projected 1,531.

They also pin their hope that doing so saves hard currency. Last year, Ethiopia spent 2.5 billion dollars on fuel imports, equivalent to 32pc of export earnings and 17pc of all imports.

Nearly 500 chargers have already been installed beside shopping malls and apartment blocks, with one-fifth of them rated super-fast. Mobile units roll to football matches and concerts, while private operators run battery-swap kiosks where motorists trade depleted packs for fresh ones in minutes. Minister Alemu plans to expand the network to 1,176 chargers in the capital and 1,054 elsewhere, complete with an app that displays prices, distances, and nearby repair shops, as well as reserved traffic lanes for quiet cars.

However, many experts and industry insiders see the financial front as brutal.

“Gas stations in the country are generally small, and electric cars require more than seven hours to charge,” says Ephrem Tesfaye, a board member of the Ethiopian Petroleum Dealers Association, which represents 500 gas station owners across the country.

He did the maths, hoping to transition to a station operation providing electric charging services. He was not pleased with the result. Installing two 30-minute fast chargers needs a 220kV transformer that costs over six million Birr. Add cables, switchgear and a stable power link, and the cost hits 15 million. To earn that back, he would have to charge more than a thousand Birr a vehicle, and most people already top up at home or work.

Power itself is unreliable, with vehicle owners complaining that domestic metres trip when they plug in overnight, blackouts halt daytime charging, and voltage swings shorten battery life. Energy planners have promised upgrades, but drivers still queue at the handful of fast units, risking the congestion the new lanes are meant to ease.

Few people feel the tension more sharply than Melkamu Assefa, a shareholder and founding managing director of Marathon Motor Engineering Plc. It is a company incorporated in 2008, in partnership with Haile Gebresellasie and Getaneh Reta, a prominent architect. Entering into a partnership with Hyundai a year after its founding, the company is a pioneer in expanding electric vehicle (EV) adoption, long before federal transport policymakers began to aggressively push for it.

Its assembly plant, a flagship for the “Let Ethiopia Manufacture” campaign, operates six training centres, has an expanding charging network, and has developed 15 local models.

In October, EV manufacturers walked into the Ministry of Industry off General Wingate St., near Abrehot Library, to deliver a blunt message. Initially, he understood the five percent gap between import and manufacturing duties, a policy decision to help people understand EVs.

“But that time has passed," he told Fortune, arguing that importing has suddenly become more lucrative than assembling. "The tax structure should now encourage manufacturing, not imports.”

Manufacturing requires heavy investment. Melkamu insisted that the point of the plant is not merely screwdriver assembly, but technology transfer, human capacity building, and the creation of excellence centres that can test batteries and certify parts. He also warned that if nothing changes, companies will be forced to leave manufacturing and import to survive.

Industry leaders, such as Semereab Serkebirhan, vice chairman of the Ethiopian Automobile Industries Association, share his frustration and echo his concerns. Assemblers pay eight to 10 percent duty to import a bare car body, more than the five percent incentive granted on the finished vehicle.

“Importing is more profitable than manufacturing,” said Semereab, who is also chief executive officer (CEO) of FB Automotive Engineering.

Wages, electricity and packaging swallow the margin, and even the Ministry's offer to waive tax on machinery worth up to half a million dollars still requires clearance from other federal agencies.

Transport officials insist the levers exist.

Kedilmagist Ibrahim, an adviser at the Ministry of Transport & Logistics (MoTL), ticks them off. Duty-free privileges for assembler inputs, land grants, and even an exemption from business registration for companies that build chargers are some of the benefits provided to them.

“When we import batteries, they are swap batteries,” he said. “Commercial areas and government offices will open swapping stations. It is mandatory for one motor to have two batteries.”

The Ministry intends to push for converting petrol buses first, then private cars when prices fall, licensing garages to perform conversions and counting public vehicles on a service lifespan of 20 to 25 years.

The private oil business tried to match that vision. The idea was that charging services would be provided exclusively by oil companies at gas stations, which would operate as dual service systems. A technical committee defined the roles of oil firms, transporters and staff, but “the regulations were never finalised,” according to Ketema Sileshi, general manager of African Oil.

His company installed a pilot charger last May, which has yet to be powered up.

“In this business, visibility is low, and many variables are unpredictable," Ketema told Fortune. "Setting up infrastructure requires substantial investment.”

FB Manufacturing industry is now building a modern complex on the Debre Zeit expressway, with chargers, a tyre garage and a café.

For users, the story is changing fast. Elias Haile, an EV consultant trained in China, acknowledged the authorities' support.

“It’s a good trend," he told Fortune. “In past years, buyers were mostly rich men willing to take risks, but now everyone is buying.”

Even so, he warned that fast chargers, used by most public points, can shorten battery life, and that replacement packs attract a 60pc duty, sometimes half the price of the car. Power cuts, he contended, mean that public chargers are best used as a backup, not as the main supply.

Globally, the trend is hard to miss, with volumes having climbed from 1.2 million in 2017 to 17 million by 2024. Some countries, such as Norway, have reached 80pc EV sales in 2022, shifting 150,000 units that year. Several African countries use tax holidays and public charging stations to attract buyers. Minister Alemu and his people want to leapfrog straight to batteries, but the national grid still blinks in and out.

E-mobility expert Bereket Tesfaye praised the implementation strategy but issued a sober checklist of barriers.

How many universities teach battery chemistry or high-voltage maintenance? How wide is the urban-rural electricity gap? Where is the manual for phasing out diesel cars? What rules will govern battery recycling?

“Drafting an implementation strategy is good,” he said. “But, it also needs an implementation plan. The tax system is not currently supportive of manufacturing.”

Import taxes remain high, while most drivers do not trust electric cars, and reliable repair shops are hard to find. Bank loans are scarce, shipping is expensive, investors are hesitant, and mechanics require additional training. There is no system for recycling old batteries, and used petrol cars remain much more popular and affordable.

However, buyers continue to arrive, lured by the promise of zero fuel bills during a currency crunch. Policymakers hope to support that enthusiasm with bank credits, cheaper insurance for battery cars, and new rules that reduce import duties on spare parts. Workshops, test drives, celebrity social media clips, and online help lines are planned to dispel myths about range, cost, and repair.

Everything depends on whether manufacturers stick it out. Semereab argued that charging stations help motorists but do nothing for factory cash flow unless the incentive rises.

Bereket’s other anxiety is where worn-out batteries will go. He notes that other countries publish detailed manuals on reuse and recycling, but Ethiopia’s strategy has yet to spell out collection centres, recovery processes or producer responsibilities.

PUBLISHED ON Nov 19,2025 [ VOL 26 , NO 1334]