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*The News
The Ethiopian parliament approved a new president to replace one that was widely seen as controversial amid ongoing political differences with the government.
Sahle-Work Zewde, a former United Nations diplomat, was replaced with Taye Atskeselassie who has held the position of foreign minister for the last eight months.
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The role of president is largely ceremonial in Ethiopia, with limited political authority. Executive power is mainly wielded by the prime minister. Sahle-Work became Ethiopia’s first female president in 2018.
The outgoing president was appointed during the early years of the Abiy Ahmed premiership that saw prominent women appointed in important positions as part of an administration that sought to embrace gender parity for the first time.
In a post on X on Sunday that pressaged her impending resignation, she quoted a famous Amharic song about hopelessness and silence being the only option, stating: “I tried that for a whole year.”
Samuel’s view [the Journalist's view]
While the position of president is symbolic, Sahle-Work’s appointment was seen as groundbreaking. It was hoped she would bring a positive influence to a position usually held by male politicians at the end of their career.
But her tenure coincided with bloody conflicts — first the two-year war in the northern Tigray region, which ended in 2022, and then fighting in the neighboring Amhara region.
Sahle-Work faced heavy criticism for her silence, especially on issues of gender violence during the Tigray war in which thousands of people were killed and millions displaced. More that 120,000 women were sexually abused in the conflict, according to estimates by Genocide Watch, a non-governmental organization.*