Abiy Ahmed

Prime Minister of Ethiopia

15 August 1976 Beshasha, Jimma, Ethiopia

-

Incumbent

Prime Minister of Ethiopia This article is about a person whose name includes a patronymic. The article properly refers to the person by their given name, Abiy, and not as Ahmed. Abiy Ahmed Ali (Oromo: Abiyi Ahmed Alii; Amharic: አብይ አሕመድ ዐሊ ; born 15 August 1976) is an Ethiopian politician serving as 4th Prime Minister of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia since 2 April 2018. He was the third chairman of the ruling Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) and first Oromo to serve in that position from the Oromo Democratic Party (ODP), which was one of the four coalition parties of the EPRDF. Abiy is also an elected member of the Ethiopian parliament, and a member of the ODP and EPRDF executive committees. He is the first Ethiopian and the first Oromo to be awarded a Nobel Prize, and to win the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for his work in ending the 20-year post-war territorial stalemate between Ethiopia and Eritrea. However, during this time, political and ethnic unrest, and ethnic discrimination also increased in Ethiopia – marked by heightened episodes of violence, and armed conflict between government forces and TPLF forces. In June 2020, Abiy, in concert with the National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE), decided to postpone scheduled parliamentary elections due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This move prompted criticism, especially from the opposition and raised questions about the delay's constitutional legitimacy. In November 2020, simmering ethnic and political tensions, as well as the attacks on the Ethiopian National Defense Force (ENDF)'s Northern Command exploded into the ongoing Tigray War between the combined forces of the ENDF and the Eritrean army against the Tigray People's Liberation Front, an ethnic party that dominated Ethiopian politics during a nearly thirty-year period marked by oppression and rampant corruption before Abiy came to power in 2018.