Gedo has long served as a useful barometer for the health of relations between Nairobi, Mogadishu, and Addis. Straddling the tri-border Mandera Triangle, the Mareehaan-dominated region of Jubaland has been a key staging post for Al-Shabaab's continued infiltration into Kenya and Ethiopia for years. And as such, both Nairobi and Addis have a vested stake in Jubaland as a security buffer zone against the jihadists, developing close ties with key political actors within Gedo and the southern Federal Member State-- which they helped co-establish in 2013. Over a decade later, with Hassan Sheikh Mohamud back at the helm in Mogadishu, the focus has returned to Gedo, as he has resorted to a well-known destabilising playbook by attempting —and failing —to wrest the Mareehaan into Villa Somalia's orbit. But amid the government's months-long campaign to destabilise Gedo, including seizing Garbahaarey and Luuq from control of Jubaland to carve out Darood tents for its rigged elections, Addis has remained silent-- until now.
To much fanfare, Oromia's regional President Shimelis Abdisa and a breakaway faction of the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) agreed upon a 'peace deal' in early December 2024. At the time, Addis hailed the agreement as further proof of itself as a peacemaker, both nationally and for the Oromo people, no matter that fighting continued to rage across much of western and southern Oromia. But with its abysmal track record of adhering to domestic peace agreements, optimism was low that the accord marked a genuine turning point in the enduring conflict in Oromia rather than being another cynical attempt to splinter the Oromo political and armed opposition. Six months on, all evidence would suggest the latter, with the disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration (DDR) of surrendered OLA fighters in particular having been reneged upon.
The factionalism that has defined Tigray's regional politics in recent months shows no sign of easing. With Getachew Reda having been ousted as Tigray Interim Administration (TIA) president in March, his replacement—Lt. Gen. Tadesse Werede—has inherited a hornet's nest of competing interests, with Addis and Asmara both dangerously seeking to ingratiate themselves amidst the looming threat of conflict. While the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) has successfully re-established its monopoly on the politics of Ethiopia's northernmost region, questions regarding the return of displaced persons, the resolution of the occupation of Western Tigray, and the party's participation in future elections remain unresolved-- and intensifying.
On 28 May, Kenyan author and academic titan Professor Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o passed away in the United States at the age of 87. A fierce critic of colonialism and post-independence authoritarianism, Ngũgĩ redefined the role of literature in the fight for liberation and the broader intellectual struggle for decolonisation. Regarded as one of the greats of 20th-century African literature, his death has been mourned widely and comes at a moment when the topics he grappled with, including police brutality, corruption and state overreach, are prominent in the public eye once again.
Much of the federal government's electoral agenda hinges on South West State President Abdiaziz Laftagareen. The regional leader, inserted into his position in Baidoa in December 2018, is the only remaining senior 'elected' non-Hawiye politician still aligned with the federal government. For much of 2024, Laftagareen played a careful balancing act between Addis-- upon which his security depends-- and Mogadishu-- the distributors of his political budget. Where he aligns himself in the coming months regarding the model for South West's long-overdue regional presidential elections could prove the final domino for the growing opposition against Villa Somalia's constitutional and electoral rewrites.
On 9 February, during a press briefing in Addis, the International Monetary Fund's (IMF) Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva called on Ethiopia to unite behind the government's economic reform agenda. Buoyed by the progress made by Addis, she said that the "reform Ethiopia has embraced is tough and takes time, but it will yield tremendous results." So far, these reforms– including the rapid liberalisation of the economy– have caused significant financial reverberations amid a period of widespread internal conflicts and rapid state contraction.