Ethiopia’s ruling party has secured a sweeping electoral victory, but the result has triggered alarm among Western allies, including the UK, who fear the country may be on the brink of a renewed civil conflict. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s Prosperity Party won 410 of the 436 parliamentary seats, a mandate that critics argue was achieved through voter suppression and intimidation in regions like Tigray, where the June election was marred by violence and low turnout.
The spectre of another war is not hypothetical. The Tigray conflict, which ended in 2022 after a devastating two-year war, left hundreds of thousands dead and displaced millions. The peace deal, signed in Pretoria, has been fragile. Now, with the opposition virtually annihilated from parliament, the risk of Tigrayan forces returning to armed resistance is real. UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy has issued a cautious statement, urging “inclusive dialogue” but stopping short of condemning the election. This diplomatic tightrope reflects London’s deeper anxiety: a destabilised Ethiopia would send shockwaves across the Horn of Africa, affecting migration, trade routes, and counter-terrorism efforts.
For the UK, Ethiopia is a linchpin. It hosts the African Union headquarters, contributes troops to peacekeeping missions, and controls the Blue Nile dam, a source of tension with Egypt and Sudan. A new civil war would create a power vacuum that extremist groups like al-Shabaab could exploit. Moreover, the humanitarian cost would be immense, straining the already overstretched aid budgets of the UK and its allies.
The election results are a classic case of tech-enabled control. The state’s digital surveillance systems, built with help from Chinese firms, allowed the government to monitor dissent and suppress opposition media. Social media platforms like Facebook were flooded with propaganda, while independent journalists were targeted with cyber attacks. This is the dark side of digital sovereignty: a government using technology to entrench its power at the expense of democracy.
Yet the West is complicit. The UK and US have continued to provide military aid and training to Ethiopia, prioritising stability over human rights. The implicit message is that a stable authoritarian regime is better than a chaotic, contested transition. But this calculus ignores the long-term cost: when repression inevitably fails, the resulting explosion is far more destructive.
Ethiopia’s future now hinges on whether Abiy Ahmed, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate turned warlord, can resist the temptation to crush dissent. The UK must use its leverage, including the threat of sanctions, to ensure the peace deal holds. Otherwise, the world will witness another chapter of African tragedy, one that the West helped script.