This article is part of the Analytical Reporting to Improve the Federation (ARIF) project.
The government’s denial of constitutionally protected autonomy rights is creating chaos in Ethiopia’s largest region.
On the morning of 2 November 2022, the sound of weeping and grieving could be heard as local residents gathered around a small house in Burayu, an Oromia town located on the western outskirts of Ethiopia’s capital.
News of his brother’s killing had just reached Temesgen, the owner of the house who is employed in one of the federal institutions in Addis Ababa. When asked why they were weeping, one responded, “those in the government killed Mr. Temesgen’s brother!”
The brother’s name was Dereje Yadeta and he was killed on 30 October by government security forces in Shambu town, Horo Guduru Wollega Zone’s capital, where he had been living with his sister.
Dereje was a Grade 12 student awaiting the announcement of the date of a national exam, given to students in other areas in October, that was postponed in their area due to continued attacks on civilians by Amhara militants and the war between Oromo Liberation Army (OLA) and government forces.1Since late August 2022, civilians targeted in attacks by militants have intensified in East Wollega and Horo Guduru Wollega zones in western Oromia. A particularly brutal attack started in Agamsa Kebele of Amuru wereda on 30 August 2022, a day after OLA forces allegedly controlled Obora town of the kebele, collected weapons from residents, and left. Amhara militants from surrounding Kiremu Wereda and neighboring Amhara region reportedly stormed the town and attacked Oromo civilians, accusing them of cooperating with the OLA. As is often the case, the raid followed the sudden departure of security forces from the area. Both sides blamed militants from the other group. Amhara lobby groups, like the Amhara Association of America (AAA), admitted Amhara militants’ involvement, though they claimed Fano were not involved and produced a counter-narrative for the Agamsa massacre. The Oromia Support Group accused AAA of presenting a bogus report. According to the Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), Amhara militants attacked a day after three Amhara residents were allegedly killed by OLA militants. The EHRC has been blaming militants from Amhara region and nearby Oromia weredas for attacks against Oromo civilians since 2021, though it often claims attacks by Amhara militants against Oromo civilians are in retaliation for OLA attacks against Amhara people.
The deceased was a preacher at one of the Protestant churches in Horo Guduru Wollega, an administrative zone in Oromia that has been a hotspot for recurring ethnic-based massacres of Oromo and Amhara civilians.
According to Temesgen, Dereje was shot dead in broad daylight on a street filled with people. He claims his brother had no involvement in politics. He was too busy with his studies and church service.
A week after his murder, a youth claiming to be an eyewitness said that a group of Oromia Special Forces standing on the side of the road in Shambu town stopped and started questioning Dereje, who was on his way back home from church.
“Within a few minutes, the government forces started firing their guns at him,” he told Ethiopia Insight.
A month prior to Dereje’s murder, Amhara militants raided his family’s village in Wolkite Kebele of Amuru Wereda. “Fano killed 16 people including three elderly people and burnt many houses in our parent’s village,” Temesgen said.
In Oromia, killings of civilians by both state and non-state actors have become the new normal. Extrajudicial executions by security forces and ethnic-based killings by armed groups have resulted in the death of thousands of civilians over the last four years.
Multiple armed groups operate in Oromia, and all are accused of such killings.2The armed groups involved in the government’s operation against the OLA and stationed throughout Oromia include the Ethiopian National Defence Forces, federal police, Oromia special forces and police, Amhara special forces, Fano and local militants, anti-terrorist forces, Oromia militia forces, and the Gachana Sirna, which translates to the ‘shield’ or ‘guardians’ of the system. Gachana Sirna is a local security structure formally established by the Oromia Regional Council in March 2022 to enable residents to protect their local community from threats. It is accountable to the kebele administrator, and is monitored, supervised, and supported by the local militia office, one of the newly established security structures, and the local security council. Members get selected from the local community by the kebele administrators and are provided with armaments by the militia office. One of Gachana Sirna’s stated duties is to track down and verify the identity of individuals who are not residents of the neighborhood and inform the concerned parties. Local government reports suggest their active involvement in fighting against the OLA in several parts of Oromia since August 2021. Additionally, federal Republican Guard forces are active in central Oromia, especially in areas surrounding the capital, and Amhara special forces and militias are active in areas bordering the Amhara region, especially in East Shewa Zone. The OLA, government forces, an alleged regime-allied OLA clone, Amhara Fano and local militias, and other unidentified armed groups have an active presence in Oromia, especially in Wollega.3The government also stands accused of organizing and deploying parallel armed groups similar to the OLA and the anti-regime assassin group known as Abbaa Torbee. Abbaa Torbee is a semi-legendary assassin, who, after issuing warnings, is said to have executed rogue officials that were standing in the way of the 2014 to 2018 Oromo protests. Some Oromia residents believe these parallel armed forces commit crimes in an attempt to decimate the OLA’s credibility and turn the Oromo public against its insurgency.
As part of the continually evolving situation, the federal government and Fano, former allies in the wars against the TPLF and OLA, have been battling since last August as part of the protracted fallout from the November 2022 peace deal that ended the Tigray war.4Research for this article took place in 2022. The article has been updated to ensure factual accuracy but does not include all of the evolutions in the political situation during 2023.
While the Oromo opposition is somewhat divided on whether to support the armed insurgency and what exactly self-determination should entail, they agree the crisis in Oromia is driven by successive Ethiopian regimes violently suppressing Oromo autonomy.
After the “fake” federalism of the Ethiopian Peoples’ Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) era, when a ruling coalition controlled by the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) made all the decisions from the center, Oromo nationalists believe self-rule has deteriorated further under Abiy Ahmed and his Prosperity Party, the EPRDF’s successor.
To add to the woes, after the EPRDF system began to disintegrate in 2018, the clash between Amhara nationalists, who view imperial Ethiopia as a relatively benign, modernizing construct, and Oromo nationalists, who want to deconstruct that empire-state, has heated up, complicating the Oromia conflict, and exacerbating civilian suffering.
History Repeating
From 2014 to 2018, many Oromos, particularly among the youth, protested against the authoritarianism of the EPRDF, and the dominance of the TPLF within it.5The protest movement resisted the economic, political, and cultural exploitation of the Oromo people by the TPLF-led EPRDF government. The more fundamental root cause was demands for the recognition of their rights to autonomy and self-determination. But the immediate triggering factor was the “Master Plan” in which the Addis Ababa city administration sought to expand the capital, which is a charter city situated within Oromia, by 1.1 million hectares. This plan, first announced in April 2014, was ultimately abandoned. Youth from Amhara known as Fano, Sidama youth known as Ejjetto, and youth from Gurage–Zerma joined the protests in late 2016, which was then joined by a group of OPDO officials known as Team Lemma. This allowed the Oromo and Amhara member parties of the EPRDF coalition, the OPDO and ANDM, to distance themselves from the TPLF, and consequently increase their influence.
As throughout its almost three-decade rule, the EPRDF’s response included a brutal crackdown on protesters that led to hundreds of deaths, the arrest of tens of thousands of civilians in Oromia, and the declaration of a State of Emergency in October 2016, which facilitated an even more authoritarian approach by suspending elements of due process.6The State of Emergency (SoE) was declared on 9 October 2016 following months of protests in Oromia calling for political inclusion and change. The SoE was enacted after tensions were inflamed by the tragic events during the 2016 Irreechaa cultural festival in Bishoftu. Statements of protest on stage at the festival were met with teargas and, according to varying reports, either live or rubber bullets—or both. This caused a stampede in which, according to the government, 55 people—but likely hundreds—died. The SOE allowed the military a wider reach of activities to further crack down on protesters, imposed restrictions on freedom of speech and access to information, and precipitated the arrest of perhaps tens of thousands of Oromos. The SoE was only lifted in early June 2018.
Team Lemma, a faction within the EPRDF’s Oromo People’s Democratic Organization (OPDO), of which Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed was a member, began listening to Oromo protesters and talking on behalf of them. The team was later joined by a group in the EPRDF’s Amhara National Democratic Movement (ANDM).7ANDM, the EPRDF’s regional party in Amhara, was later renamed the Amhara Democratic Party (ADP) before merging into the Prosperity Party upon its creation in 2019.
By speaking the language of the protesters in the streets, Team Lemma and the ANDM presented themselves as revolutionaries from within the EPRDF.8As an example of their manipulative tactics, the council of ministers drafted a bill to finally implement the special interest of Oromia over Addis Ababa promised in the 1995 constitution and presented it to the House of People’s Representatives for approval. However, the draft bill was never approved nor discussed, though it did help legitimize Team Lemma and its allies. In late 2017, under heavy pressure, the EPRDF pledged to reform itself and respect the rights of the people.
In the first quarter of 2018, the EPRDF Executive Committee announced the decision to release political prisoners and open up the political landscape, and handed the position of EPRDF chairman to Abiy, a rising star in the OPDO. He was then inaugurated as Prime Minister in April 2018.
For some time, Abiy followed the reforms agreed on by the Executive Committee, such as releasing political prisoners. He also made peace with Eritrea, a long-time adversary of the TPLF and Ethiopia, and allowed the return of several armed rebel groups classified as terrorists by the federal government.9This included the OLF, Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF), and Ginbot 7.
But, in order to consolidate his power, Abiy’s government employed a strategy used by the EPRDF to suppress any meaningful opposition in Oromia: arresting suspected supporters and members of the two most popular Oromo nationalist parties, the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) and Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC).10Federal authorities intensified their crackdown on OFC officials, members, and supporters following the 29 June 2020 murder of influential musician and activist Hachalu Hundessa, which exacerbated the crisis in Oromia. Top OFC officials, including Bekele Gerba and Jawar Mohammed, were arrested a day after the murder and were only released in January 2022. Jawar was a central figure during the Qeerroo protest movement that raged from 2014 to 2018 and precipitated the EPRDF’s eventual downfall. At least hundreds of civilians, if not thousands, have been killed by federal and regional security forces in Oromia over the past four years on suspicion of supporting the OLA, including OLF and OFC supporters who are viewed as OLA supporters by default.
As Abiy distanced himself from the demands of the Oromo protesters, he aligned himself with Amhara elites, praising Ethiopian emperors who subjugated and oppressed Ethiopia’s nations and nationalities.11The Prosperity Party focuses on Ethiopian unity, pushing the self-determination of nations aside. Its ‘Medemer’ ideology claims that different, even contrary, views can be brought together and a compromise found. Prosperity Party officials adopted “Unity and Brotherhood”—the slogan used in an attempt to create a supranational Yugoslav identity by Josip Broz Tito when he was the president of Yugoslavia—and continued using Tito’s style of suppressing ethnic nationalism that had, in practice, characterized the EPRDF despite its nominal commitment to the principles of multinational federalism. The Prosperity Party failed to address Oromo peoples’ demands and unleashed a campaign against Oromo nationalism, Oromummaa, by Amhara nationalists and Ethiopian nationalists.
Additionally—in what Oromo and other ethno-nationalists view as an attempt to centralize power but supporters cast as an attempt to narrow the splits between Ethiopia’s communities—he merged almost all of the EPRDF parties and their allies into the Prosperity Party in 2019, despite opposition from within his party, the rebranded Oromo Democracy Party (ODP). The TPLF was the only one to reject the consolidation outright.
The merger was considered by a swath of Oromos, especially activists and intellectuals, as Abiy’s attempt to establish a unitary system. Even Lemma Megersa, the de facto leader of Team Lemma, resisted it, leading to Abiy sidelining him.
For these former allies, Abiy’s formation of the Prosperity Party enabled the reappearance of Amhara-centric Ethiopian nationalism, with its security structures engaged in surveilling, arbitrarily arresting, beating, and killing civilians, especially youth in Oromia.12The government uses its established security structure to surveil Oromia. The Prosperity Party added three new regional security structures to Oromia’s existing structure and expanded its presence in all towns. Currently, the region has two police institutions, including the existing regional police and the newly established Oromia Special Force. At the local level, there are three security structures, two of them armed and one intelligence structure. The militia structure that had been under the Administration and Security bureau was established as an independent government institution, and expanded its structure from remote weredas to towns and cities in Oromia. It currently operates at the lowest administrative ‘kebele’ level. The government has also formed a new security structure, called Gachana Sirna, which is an informal government structure below the kebele level. Similarly, local intelligence agents and security advisors are part of another newly created security and intelligence-gathering structure that, similar to the EPRDF’s one-to-five surveillance network, clusters ten households together.
Building on an acute sense of marginalization that has grown as a political force since the 1960s, these are the contemporary dynamics that mushroomed into today’s conflict raging across much of the region.
Triumphant Return
The failure of the transition is best viewed through the failure to successfully reintegrate the OLF, the standard bearer of Oromo nationalism, into competitive politics.
Rather than allow the OLF and the OFC to compete fairly in elections, Abiy’s government shut them out of power after nominally inviting them back to compete. An armed wing of the OLF, the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), then went its own way and pursued military resistance.
Despite initial hopes that the EPRDF’s implosion would trigger electoral pluralism and competitive, peaceful federal politics, the country has collapsed along with its iron-fisted ruling coalition into an orgy of violence, much of it between political factions, the TPLF and the Prosperity Party and the OLA and the ruling party, as well as between groups from the country’s two most populous communities, the Oromo and the Amhara.13The conflict between the two competing nationalisms, Ethiopiawinet and Oromummaa, can be traced back to the 1960s student movement against emperor Haile Selassie, but the current conflict appears to be due to the Prosperity Party’s attempt to align itself with Ethiopian nationalists. Ethiopiawinet, the Ethiopian national identity based on Amhara identity, was an ideology used by the Ethiopian imperial era rulers to support their assimilationist system of state building. Currently, this concept is employed by Amhara nationalists and most political groups that are against the ethnic-based federal system. Growing ethnic consciousness in Amhara has more recently introduced fissures between Ethiopian and Amhara nationalism, particularly since Abiy’s crackdown in Amhara before and after the Tigray peace deal. Oromummaa is the concept of Oromo common bonds and outlooks in addition to their common history, culture, and language. This concept of Oromummaa as an Oromo cultural identity and oppressed nationalism is diametrically opposed to the Ethiopiawinet project.
Until these violent political disputes are over, the focus of most Oromo nationalists remains securing the self-rule they believe the community is still denied.
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The September 2018 return of the OLF leadership from exile should have marked a new more positive chapter in Ethiopian politics.14Discussion between the federal government and OLF followed the 2018 peace agreement between Ethiopia and Eritrea. The Abiy regime subsequently announced its willingness to implement the Algiers agreement signed to end the 1998-2000 Ethio-Eritrean war. This implies Ethiopia handing over areas determined by an international commission to belong to Eritrea that Addis Ababa kept under its control for the past two decades. In exchange for returning contested areas around the border between Ethiopia and Eritrea, it forbade Ethiopian insurgent groups from maintaining bases in Eritrea. After reaching an informal agreement with the Ethiopian government, the OLF returned to Ethiopia in 2018. Many Oromos were overjoyed, while opponents of Oromo nationalism, including the incumbent party and Ethiopian nationalists, expressed concern at the OLF’s return and the party’s support.15To counter the influence of formerly exiled ethnic nationalist political parties invited by the government to return and participate in the country’s politics, Amhara nationalists formed the Fano militias and established the National Movement of Amhara (NaMA), an ethno-nationalist party, to struggle for Amhara people in and outside the Amhara region.
Yet, presumably due to the electoral threat it represented, the OLF wasn’t allowed to participate freely in the country’s politics.16The OLF claims it was pressured by the Eritrean government to return to Ethiopia without any formal agreement. It accuses Isaias Afwerki of forcing OLF leadership to leave Eritrea, despite OLF’s demand for an agreement in the presence of a third party mediator. Before his arrest in 2020, OLF official Mikael Boran told Ethiopia Insight, “Isaias called our leadership and said that the OLF should leave Eritrea as soon as possible because Eritrea is now at peace with Ethiopia and it can no longer host your forces and your leaders.” He said they were left with no option but to return to Ethiopia without preconditions or assurance that they were not being played. The government proceeded to launch a campaign of accusations against the OLF, and ‘welcomed’ the OLF leadership with a wave of repression against its members and supporters.17For instance, government officials blamed the OLF for an attack against Benishangul-Gumuz officials in the weeks after its return. Within three weeks of its arrival, the OLF reported the arrest of its members and supporters that had been detained since the eve of its arrival.
The government scaled up its crackdown in January 2019 by arresting several top OLF officials, including Gemechu Ayana and Jabessa Gabbissa. In March 2022, OLF spokesperson Bate Urgessa, OLF chairman Dawud Ibsa, and Gemechu Ayana, another senior OLF official, were freed.
However, now years later, most top OLF officials remain in Ethiopian prison or face constant harassment by the legal system.18OLF officials like Mikael Boran, Kenesa Ayana, Lemi Begna, Dawit Abdata, Gada Gabissa, and others are still in prison though the court ordered their release. Filed cases were closed over a year ago, yet they remain imprisoned. Several OLF senior officials, such as Abdi Regassa, are going through unending extensions of court appointments, while others, including Gada Gabissa, have been in prison for over a year without charges being filed against them. Families of opposition groups have also been targets of state repression.19For instance, on 12 October 2022, a Central Committee member of OLF, Moibon Bekele, was killed by militants in Burayu town, months after his release from Burayu police station, where he had been detained. Also, on 17 March 2021, the OLF accused government security forces of killing relatives of OLF chairman Dawud, and other senior officials. In its 17 March press release, the OLF said four family members of its chairman, Dawud, were killed and four others were abducted by security forces in Horo Guduru Wollega Zone. In another incident, security forces killed Hunda’ol Begna, a younger brother of Lemi Begna, a senior OLF Official, in Nekemte town on 16 June. It happened three months after his family reported they couldn’t contact him at the prison he was arrested in. In its 17 March press statement, the OLF reported on targeted attacks by government forces against Lemi Begna’s family members. According to the statement, his parents and three siblings, including Hunda’ol, had been imprisoned for over two years and his parents’ house in western Oromia was set ablaze the previous day, simply because of his position in the party. These accusations were echoed by Fraol Begna, another of Lemi’s siblings. Additionally, Fraol said they were told by the detention center Hunda’ol was in that he was released, but nobody heard from him and his whereabouts were unknown. Three months after his disappearance was reported, Hunda’ol was killed by security forces in Nekemte town. An image showing Hunda’ols’ body lying on a road with blood covering his chest circulated on social media. Notably, several of Dawud’s close relatives were killed or abducted.20Dawud was under house arrest for over a year. The OLF’s report on 17 March about the killing and abduction of Dawud’s close relatives followed the party chairman’s discussion with the National Electoral Board (NEBE) about his release from house arrest, and the release of other political prisoners. The press statement listed the names of Dawud’s relatives who were abducted or killed. This discussion followed the NEBE’s letter to federal police saying that holding him under house arrest was illegal and that he should be released. Amnesty International expressed concern and demanded Dawud’s release in June 2021.
Divided Front
The OLA was the OLF’s armed wing until it formally split from the OLF in April 2019.21The OLA pursued armed resistance and split from the OLF months after OLF announced in January 2019 that it had transferred the command of OLA to the Oromo people and the Abbaa Gadaa leaders. This deal occurred after the OLF returned to Ethiopia after many years in exile and became a registered political party.
Government forces began battling OLA insurgents in 2018 after conflict broke out around the border between Benishangul-Gumuz and Oromia, which was triggered by the killing of Benishangul-Gumuz officials by unidentified assailants.
After months of clashes between government forces and the OLA, Oromo traditional leaders, known as the Abbaa Gadaa, pressured the government and OLF to solve the crisis peacefully, and integrate OLA fighters into Oromia’s security apparatus.
As part of the agreement, OLF handed the command of the OLA over to the Abbaa Gadaa and agreed to cooperate. A committee formed to oversee the integration process dispatched its members to the areas where OLA operates and welcomed some OLA members that had decided to reintegrate.
However, the agreement failed owing to the government’s unwillingness to abide by it and the OLA’s distrust in the committee that was overseeing the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration process.22Despite the agreed decision in January 2019 on cessation of hostilities and that government forces would remain in their camps until the disarmament process ended, government forces intensified killings and arrests of civilians, especially the youth, traders, and teachers. For example, despite the agreement, government forces killed five people including a newly wedded couple along with bridesmaids and groomsmen in the Borena zone and, in Guji Zone, government forces killed seven, including a pregnant woman, and injured six people. Similarly, government forces killed two brothers in their house in the East Wollega Zone. Additionally, Dadhi Galan, a prominent Oromo nationalist musician who is known for his resistance songs, was assassinated on stage by unidentified gunmen while performing at a hotel inauguration ceremony in East Shewa during the disarmament process. OLA leaders’ expressed distrust in the technical committee that was entrusted with overseeing the disarmament process. Both the western and southern OLA leaders accused the committee of not being willing to meet them and of surrounding themselves with government soldiers. The then western OLA Commander, Kumsa Dirriba, known as Jaal Marroo, blamed mediators for attempting to dismantle his forces by searching for his subordinates and contacting them individually. He claimed that the government was not respecting the agreement and that government forces were still hunting OLA down. Goollicha Dheengee, the then southern OLA commander, claimed that he was not able to meet the committee because of the soldiers’ presence. He stipulated eleven preconditions to the committee, including demands to end military attacks and the release of captured OLF members and supporters. The committee was criticized for contacting low level OLA members in an attempt to encamp them, further triggering mistrust among OLA leaders in the integration process.
The government continued to confront OLA forces while cracking down on OLF leadership, members, and supporters. OLA leaders responded by splitting from the OLF and announced the formation of their own command structure to continue the armed struggle for Oromo self-determination.23OLA claims to strictly adhere to the political program the OLF enacted in 1976 in its struggle to liberate Oromia from contemporary vestiges of the Ethiopian empire-state.
In an interview with OLA-affiliated Oromo National Media on 30 August 2022, the OLA’s high commander, Kumsa Dirriba—who also goes by the name Jaal Marroo—stated that armed struggle is the only solution to the crisis Oromo people are facing.
Federal authorities continued deploying national defense and Federal Police forces in Oromia, and strengthening the region’s security structures.24New security institutions were established, namely the (now dissolved) Oromia Special Force and Oromia Militia, which operate under the Oromia administration and Security Bureau, the Gachana Sirna unit, and local intelligence groups. All government forces operating in Oromia are implicated in committing extrajudicial killings and other atrocities in an attempt to silence and scare civilians from supporting the opposition and OLA forces. The government has also armed local Amhara militants and allowed Amhara Fano militants to cross over into Oromia as reinforcements in its fight against the OLA.
The government launched several operations against the OLA before finally designating it, along with the TPLF, as a terrorist organization in May 2021. This was used to further legitimize the government’s offensive against the OLA and intensified repression against civilians suspected of supporting its armed insurgency.
In response to increased popular support for the OLA’s resistance, since 2019 the government has intensified extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, and torture of suspected OLA supporters and their families.25In 2019, OLA forces were only active in western and southern Oromia. Despite the repeated operation and coordinated attacks against its forces by the government, OLA managed to expand its activities in almost all areas of Oromia. The OLA’s support among Oromos, particularly in western Oromia, has facilitated its capacity to withstand the years of coordinated attacks by the joint Oromia and federal security forces, and even allowed it to capture significant areas in Oromia throughout the years. On 22 February, Abiy responded to questions raised by members of parliament regarding why the OLA grew in strength and why it expanded its activities under the watch of his government. He suggested that the government needs to examine its relationship with the public and that it should question itself about why the public supports and gives refuge to the OLA, and why the public feeds it. Last October, as federal authorities were preparing to negotiate an end to the Tigray war, they launched a deadly campaign of drone warfare in Oromia.
Despite the intensified counterinsurgency operations by government forces, the OLA has continued growing in strength and is currently active throughout much of Oromia.26Despite the government’s intensified offensive, the OLA has continued to expand its reach since 2019 by recruiting new members and controlling towns and weredas in Oromia. Over the past few years, the OLA graduated thousands of newly trained recruits, airing the ceremonies online.
The two sides finally agreed to sit for peace talks in Zanzibar from 25 April to 3 May 2023, but little was accomplished and the OLA soon accused the government of launching another offensive.
Ethnic Attacks
In addition to the deadly war, which has escalated in recent months, ethnic-based attacks by militants have intensified in Oromia since 2021, claiming the lives of thousands of Amhara and Oromo civilians.27For example, the government and people claiming to be eyewitnesses have accused the OLA of committing numerous massacres of Amhara civilians, charges that the insurgent group denies.
Militants on both sides have been accused of being responsible for a horrific slew of massacres. Incidents remain underreported due to the communications blackout, confusing narratives and the security situation on the ground.
The government has not been shy to condemn “OLF-Shene”, as it calls the OLA, and has justified or neglected ethnic-based attacks by Amhara militants against Oromo civilians, regional security forces, and local government officials.28The attacks have primarily targeted four Oromia zones on the border with Amhara, namely East Wollega, Horo Guduru Wollega, West Shewa, and East Shewa Zones, and the Oromo Special Zone in Amhara. On 28 November, Amhara militants killed eleven members of Oromia police forces and the chief judge of the wereda. Earlier that month, Amhara militants attacked and displaced Oromo residents out of the villages and kebeles of the entire Kiremu Wereda of East Wollega Zone. The attack resulted in the deaths of hundreds and displacement of tens of thousands. According to an Amhara lobby group, Amhara residents clashed with Oromia security forces after a decision was rendered for Amhara detainees who were accused of participating in violence to be tried at the zonal level, and Oromia security forces tried to move them from Kiremu town to the East Wollega Zone capital, Nekemte town.
Amhara civilians in Oromia have also been slaughtered in a string of ethnic-based attacks. Over the past two years, hundreds if not thousands of Amhara civilians were killed by militants, especially in western Oromia.29Most notable were the November 2020, March 2021, and June 2022 attacks in West Wollega Zone and the July 2022 attack in Kelem Wollega Zone. While the incidents have not been independently investigated, the government and Amhara lobby groups have blamed the OLA. The OLA dismissed all accusations, accusing the government of organizing a group that impersonates it to ruin its reputation.
In one notable incident, Oromo militants were accused by federal authorities and Amhara activists of killing hundreds of Amhara civilians in a village called Tole in June 2022.
After each ethnic-based attack, Oromo and Amhara residents tell opposing sides of the story.30At the time of the incidents, only some victims and perpetrators are identified. From the Oromo perspective, the violence is caused by the Amhara Fano and local Amhara militants attacking Oromo civilians. Amharas, for their part, accuse the OLA and Oromia regional forces of attacking Amhara civilians. The government and EHRC tend to blame either OLA forces, Amhara militants, or both for attacking civilians from the Oromo, Amhara, and sometimes both communities. The government and Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC) typically accuse both the OLA and Amhara militants of being responsible, while Amhara activists accuse OLA and Oromia government forces. The OLA, for its part, denies any responsibility and accuses government-affiliated militants and Fano militants.
Narratives and counter-narratives are used to misinform or confuse Ethiopian and international audiences. Despite the claims and counterclaims, the mass killings of civilians in western Oromia have never been independently investigated.31Ezekiel Gebisa, a prominent Oromo activist and academic, accused the government of organizing an “OLA clone” by using artificial hair on militants to mimic and discredit the OLA by carrying out crimes in its name. This account of the government forcing youth to wear artificial hair to resemble OLA was also reported by the state run human rights commission. Recently, Milkessa Midega, a former top ODP official who was actively campaigning against OLF and OLA but left the party after disagreeing with the merger of EPRDF into the Prosperity Party, alleged that the government organized an armed assassin group parallel to the Abbaa Torbee assassins. According to Milkessa, the government replicated Abbaa Torbee to assassinate individuals and government officials that stand in its way. He claims he has a witness account for the formation of the imitation Abbaa Torbee, because he was a top ODP official at the time. The Washington Post also reported on Fekade Abdisa’s rebel group, which is accused of a series of massacres against Amharas that triggered reprisal attacks against Oromos, and his potential ties to the government despite claiming to be aligned with the OLA.
Expansionist Ambitions
From the perspective of Oromo nationalists, the violence is mainly caused by threats and moves to annex parts of Oromia into Amhara, as has been the case in Benishangul-Gumuz and Tigray as well.
Over the past 30 years, census reports show that Oromia has progressively shrunk in size mostly owing to informal annexations by other regions.32Based on the figures in the census reports, Oromia has lost 68,468.97 to 78,837.16 square kilometers of land area over the past thirty years. From 2005 to 2011, specifically, the area of Oromia decreased from 353,006.81 square kilometers to 284,537.84. Apart from the referendum held in 2001 to deliberate the administration of 13 kebeles, when Wondo Genet Wereda decided their administration to be under the Southern Nations, no legal procedure of annexing land within the territory of Oromia to other regions was undertaken. On the contrary, a referendum held in 2004, to deliberate on the administration of 463 kebeles around the border of Oromia and Somali regions, decided that over 80 percent of more than 420 kebeles belong in Oromia. Similarly, the size of the Oromia Zone in Amhara has decreased significantly, from 4,434.53 to 3,470.04 square kilometers in the 2005 and 2011 reports. This all indicates that a process of informal annexation is taking place. On 6 January 2020, the Oromia Land Administration Bureau said that illegal settlement in Horo Guduru Wollega, East Wollega, and West Shewa zones has intensified in recent years.33Milkessa Midega, the then head of Oromia’s Land Administration Bureau, claimed the illegal settlements are intended to change the demography of the area with the intention to connect the boundary of the capital with the Amhara region. In March 2022, Kumbibit Wereda of West Shoa Zone reported the illegal annexation of Oromia land into Amhara. According to the report, 280 hectares of land was annexed to Amhara territory. Similarly, the Oromia government accused Amhara of annexing land in East Shewa.
Following the split between OLA and OLF in April 2019, Amhara “Fano” militias armed themselves. Since then, attacks against Oromo civilians have intensified in parts of Oromia bounded by the Blue Nile and areas in East Shewa Zone around the A1 highway that connects Ethiopia to Djibouti, Somalia, and Somaliland.
Fano leaders and Amhara activists, claiming ownership of these areas that include the entire Wollega and Shewa zones, called for Amhara people to arm themselves and “reclaim their ancestral lands.”34On 6 March, a Fano leader, accompanied by Orthodox church leaders, gave a statement in Mota trying to justify why they should be in Wollega. He said Wollega is the Amhara people’s land and claimed they were in Wollega before it was taken by the Oromo. He also listed Adama and Bishoftu as lands that were taken from them. Alleging an Amhara genocide taking place in Oromia, Tewodros Tirfe, chairman of the Amhara Association of America (AAA) and president of the Federation of Amhara in North America (FANA), a coalition of ten Amhara organizations in the U.S., claimed on 17 December that annexing areas such as East Wollega, Horo Guduru Wollega, and Dera into the Amhara region or ending “ethnic apartheid” is the only solution to end attacks against Amharas.
Amhara Fano militia
Until 2021, the government had denied the presence of Fano militants, putting the blame solely on OLA contingents for the attacks on civilians. In April 2021, East Wollega Zone government reported the presence of Amhara militants in Oromia for the first time, referring to them as “Amhara extremist forces” after they attacked Oromo civilians and destroyed government offices in East Wollega Zone.
Attacks by Amhara militants have intensified in Oromia since 2021, with many Oromo civilians killed and hundreds of thousands displaced, mostly in Oromia weredas bordering Amhara.35In April 2022, Belay Desale, Kiremu Wereda Administrator, said that Amhara extremist groups that use names such as Fano and ‘Dirijit’, which means organization, have established structures in Haro, Chaffe Gudina, Sombo, and Bajin kebeles of the wereda that borders Amhara and carry out attacks targeting Oromo civilians. According to the Wereda Administrator, the group instructs the local Amhara residents to consider all Oromos as “Shene”, meaning OLA members. He said that the wereda has recorded 115 Oromo civilian casualties due to an attack by Fano militants. Since September, hundreds of Oromo civilians were reportedly killed by Amhara militants in Amuru, Agamsa, and Jardega Jarte weredas of Horro Guduru Wollega zone. The EHRC has reported on some of these attacks. For instance, though it justified the killings and shied away from mentioning Fano, the EHRC confirmed the attacks on 29 and 30 August by militants from Amhara region that targeted Oromo residents in nine kebeles of Amuru Wereda, resulting in the killing of over 60 Oromo civilians.
Amhara Fano militants have since intensified their attacks, advancing into areas of eastern and western Oromia bordering Amhara, in what Oromo nationalists see as an attempt at annexation under the guise of protecting Amhara civilians in Oromia.36In September 2021, an attack and massacre in Haro town of Kiremu Wereda caused residents to flee from the town, which subsequently remained a stronghold of the Amhara militants. Amhara militants based in Haro town have reportedly crossed over to the surrounding weredas and villages. In August, Amhara militants from Haro town and the bordering weredas of the Amhara region crossed over to Amuru Wereda of Horo Guduru Wollega Zone and attacked the Oromo civilians in several villages, killing over 60 civilians. On 12 October 2021, two days after the Haro massacre, a pro-Amhara media outlet referred to the presence of Amhara militias trained by the government and the activities of Fano militants in Kiremu Wereda and reported the detention of a group of Amhara militias from Haro who organized themselves and headed to Kiremu town to allegedly fight against the OLA.
On 5 December, a graphic video circulated on social media of Fano militants parading the severed heads of Oromo individuals on pikes as proof of their victory in Jardega Jarte Wereda. The horrific act echoed historical accounts of nineteenth century massacres of Oromos by Emperor Menelik II.
Following these atrocities by Amhara militants, protests erupted throughout Oromia, exacerbating tensions between segments of the Oromo and Amhara people.
Communal Grievances
Oromo nationalists say that the threats and attacks against them, the hostility towards Oromo nationalism by successive regimes, and unaddressed demands since the 1960s to respect the autonomy and self-determination of the Oromo people are the root causes of the current crisis.
Though the Addis Ababa Master Plan triggered the Oromo protests in 2014, protesters’ more fundamental demands related to issues of self-rule, democracy, and the rule of law, and an end to state repression of Oromos on the basis of their ethnicity.
Oromo people demanded respect for their right to self-determination, in which they fully exercise their regional autonomy and have a fair share in the federal administration, the creation of a constitutional and democratic order, and the release of political prisoners.
They also called for the regional and federal constitutions to be respected, including the implementation of Article 49(5) of the federal constitution, which relates to the special interest of Oromia in Addis Ababa.
A key demand by Oromo protesters involved the full recognition of Oromo people’s ownership of Addis Ababa, and halting the land grab scheme, eviction of farmers, and expropriation through illegal investments, trade, and construction in Oromia.
Another demand was for linguistic justice, in which Afaan Oromo is used as a federal working language, and the ‘Qubee script’, an alphabetic script adopted for the Oromo language, is respected and the sequence of its alphabets remain unaltered.
Under Abiy, none of these demands have been met.
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The government’s response has instead been extrajudicial killings, persecution of opposition officials, members, suspected supporters, and their families, and the destruction of property by government forces to pacify Oromo opposition.37Following the crackdown on OLF members, the government extended its crackdown on the OFC in the wake of Hachalu’s murder in June 2020, which further provoked OFC supporters to begin endorsing the OLA. Thereafter, many Oromo elites and activists previously lobbying for the democratization of Oromia within Ethiopia started lobbying for its independence, which they believe can be achieved by strengthening the OLA.
The way Abiy’s government ignored Oromo demands for the implementation of rights promised by the constitution, and then violently suppressed those who opposed him, exacerbated the crisis in Oromia, and fueled support for the OLA.38In one recent example, a decision by a school in Addis Ababa to allow hoisting the Oromia flag and singing the Oromia national anthem by students who chose to study in Afaan Oromo faced opposition from other students, leading to clashes.
Oromo activists were alarmed by the government’s alliance with Ethiopian nationalists who pledge to continue the legacies of the Ethiopian emperors by cracking down on ethnic-based nationalism.39Oromo nationalists accuse Ethiopian nationalists of attacking ethnic-based nationalism to restore the neftegna system of the emperors that left historical scars on Oromo people and their identity. Ethiopian nationalists claim the Oromo nationalists’ campaign against “neftegna” is a coded campaign against the Amhara people, and present it as a threat against them, especially the ones living in Oromia. They allege that Abiy’s plan to centralize power has involved promoting the Ethiopiawinet ideology, one widely supported by Amhara nationalists and urban elites.40One example of the campaign against Oromos is the hate speech and defamation by Dawit Wolde Giorgis, Executive Director of the Africa Institute for Strategic and Security Studies. Dawit has called for Amharas to organize themselves and define territories of their own. In his statements, Dawit presents the Oromo people as cruel expansionists and the Gadaa system of indigenous democracy as a monstrosity. This campaign against Oromummaa extended to Ethiopian diaspora institutions. For example, Vision Ethiopia, a supposedly non-partisan association of Ethiopian scholars and professionals based in the US, issued a statement on 22 April 2021 presenting Oromummaa as an ideology tantamount to “Oromo supremacy” or “Oromo first”. It labeled Oromummaa as a regressive and selfish line of thinking rooted in the Gadaa system, with its primary tenet being the “Oromization” of the mainland through a multifaceted, well-planned, and choreographed strategy consisting of genocidal violence, on one hand, and military, political, and economic domination, on the other.
Anti-Oromo sentiments, insults, narratives, and threats against Oromo identity, especially by Ethiopian and Amhara nationalists, became widespread due to the government’s complicity.41Ethiopian nationalists’ calls for the eradication of Oromummaa heightened pre-existing tensions between the Oromo and Amhara people. A notable example for such a campaign is the 2021 protest rally in Amhara, where protesters went onto the streets carrying a poster that read, “Ethiopia should be first, Oromummaa should be destroyed.” Oromo nationalists accuse the government of favoring Ethiopian nationalists, especially Amhara nationalists, allowing them to attack the Oromo people and Oromummaa in public. Amhara nationalists, for their part, are increasingly critical of Abiy as he cracks down on opposition to the Tigray peace deal since November 2022. A common sentiment is that Abiy’s administration is run by and for Oromos at the expense of Amharas.
As a result, ethnic tensions worsened and incidents of ethnic-based attacks targeting civilians, both Amhara and Oromo, and destruction of properties, became widespread.
Competing Visions
While the OLA, OLF, and OFC all support multinational federalism and share a common goal of securing Oromia’s autonomy, they have differences about what this means and how it should be achieved, either through armed resistance or electoral politics.
According to the OLF, its objective is to exercise the Oromos’ inalienable right to national self-determination, to terminate over a century of oppression and exploitation, and to form, where possible, a political union with other nations on the basis of equality, democracy, respect for mutual interests, and the principle of voluntary association.
The OFC’s version of self-determination is for the Oromo people to have their rights respected, to determine their own affairs, and administer their land. Its leaders aim to do so by democratizing and retaining the current structure of the Ethiopian federation.42The OFC, the other main opposition party after the OLF, is headed by Merera Gudina. According to its political program, the OFC aims to struggle in a peaceful and lawful manner for the respect of the human, political, and democratic rights of the Oromo people; to struggle for the respect of the Oromo peoples’ economic and social rights; and to struggle to bring about a genuine democratic system in the country.
OFC leaders believe in peaceful struggle and maintain a firm conviction that, if political power can be obtained democratically, there will be no armed conflict. According to a statement by the OFC, it has been doing its level best to defend and expand democracy and true multinational federalism in Ethiopia all along.
The OLA claims to fight for the Oromo people’s right to self-determination, with the aim to free the Oromo people from political exclusion, economic exploitation, and socio-cultural marginalization.
According to its manifesto, the OLA resorted to armed struggle because it is the sole means left to free the Oromo people from “the ravages of tyranny” and rebuild their humanity and identity that it claims have been pulverized by over a century of cultural degradation and dehumanization.
Oromo Nation
The debate over whether to try and form an independent Oromia nation-state or democratize the current Ethiopian federation has been at the heart of Oromo politics.
In recent years, given the current state of affairs, the idea of Oromia’s exit from Ethiopia’s federation has been gaining wider support among Oromo elites and political activists.
Many, especially Ethiopianists and western leaders, are vehemently opposed to secession and the current constitution.43Under Article 39 of the Ethiopian Constitution, the nations, nationalities, and people of Ethiopia have the right to self-determination, including secession. Ethiopian nationalists blame the conflicts in Ethiopia on the country’s ethno-territorial federal structure and ethnic nationalism.44Scholars like Kasahun Mellese accuse Ethiopia’s ethnic-based federation of creating intense ethnic rivalries for resources. He criticizes the current constitution, claiming that grievances that can be resolved administratively become questions that involve identity, due to its provisions. Mahmood Mamdani is also highly critical of Ethiopia’s federal system and has recommended the country adopt a form of federalism in which regional boundaries and groups rights are not tied to ethno-territorial settlement patterns. Critics of Ethiopia’s federal system typically avoid mentioning the underlying cause for the adoption of this kind of federalism. Another perspective holds that conflicts resulting from the lack of autonomy and self-determination can be blamed on the failure to implement the constitution’s provisions.
However, even before the adoption of ethnic-based federalism in the early 1990s, when the country was ruled by a succession of unitary systems, nationalism among Ethiopia’s constituent nations was the driving force behind popular uprisings that brought about regime changes in Ethiopia.
Despite its perceived drawbacks and limitations, it’s too early to criticize or praise Ethiopia’s federal structure and the constitution, due to the EPRDF’s failure to properly implement its provisions.
Though the right to self-determination, especially the right to secede under Article 39, are criticized by opponents of ethnic-based federalism, both the transitional charter and the current Ethiopian constitution grant nations, nationalities, and people of Ethiopia these rights to self-determination.
The government’s continued attempts to use force to contain the situation in Oromia is likely to only lead to more bloodshed, increase support for armed opposition groups, and push the country towards disintegration.
Additionally, ethnically-targeted attacks by militants against Oromo and Amhara people could ultimately lead to a full-fledged genocidal war between Ethiopia’s two largest communities.
For Oromo nationalists, creating an enabling environment for the Oromo people to exercise their rights stipulated in the constitution is necessary to end the violence, because the crisis in Oromia is primarily caused by these denied demands.
As one Burayu resident explained, “the withdrawal of the Amhara militants, both regular and irregular forces, from Oromia, is the first step to ending the crisis in Oromia.” Thereafter, he said, the situation can only be solved by giving the Oromo people the opportunity to determine their own fate.
Another Burayu resident added, “instead of looking elsewhere for a solution to the crisis in Oromia, allowing us to exercise our constitutional rights needs to come first.”
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Main photo: Celebrating the return of the Oromo Liberation Front in Addis Ababa; September 15, 2018; Petterik Wiggers.
Published under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International licence. You may not use the material for commercial purposes.
You censoring legitimate comments is a prime example of reasons why there is going to be a disastrous civil war between Oromos and Amharas. You add to the brainwashed Oromo generation by pushing twisted narrative of today over twisted narrative of the past. By censoring, you eliminate the voices that are pointing out issues that need to be addressed. None of this bode well for Tigray, and you will be responsible for your part for the devastation Oromos will taste like they’ve never tasted before.
I wrote the above comment in a moment of anxiety. The reason was, despite the many critical and dangerous assertions the article makes, I saw no dissenting comments. In retrospect I should have factored in the possibility that the back-end admin workload may make it difficult to moderate spam while at the same time allow legitimate albeit critical comments to come through in short order. Seeing the comments populated with diverse opinions as such tells me I rushed to judgement. My sincere apologies, and thank you for the good work you are doing. Keep it up.
One point I would like to clarify is, people-to-people war vis-à-vis Amharas vs. Oromos will be supremely destructive to not only both peoples but also the entire horn of Africa. It’ll be generational. Amharas and Tigray have experienced this and the resulting gaping distance between the peoples is self-evident. The damage is real, and even generations of work for peace may not fix this. The devastation I warn about Oromos tasting is the sort Amharas and Tigray have experienced and will continue to experience, at a minimum to that level. And no, Oromos/Oromia has not tasted this level of loss and another such lateral conflict is potentially irrecoverable for all parties involved. Oromia/Oromos have decisions to make, and any major change or compromise will have to come from Oromia, because Amharas for one are done getting mass murdered and displaced. This article not only fails to address facts, but also manages to further rhetoric towards war.
Thank you for this space and cheers.
Is the author a Cadre of one of Oromo nationalist party? The regional borders created by TPLF and OLF in the transitional period is not acceptable to Amhara and Ethiopian Nationalists so how would the Oromo people determine self administration. The only logical step is to form Transitional Government as we are still under EPRDF2. Change the constitution and Organizational structure of the Country. The biggest 3 regions need to be downsized. Separation will not be a solution since there will not be peace in the region that comes out of disintegration.
Ethnic tensions aren’t due to competing views of Ethipia or Ethiopianism, at least as far as Amharas are concerned. The thousands of civilians murdered, as you put it, since 2021, do include Oromos, but it would be an intentional and malicious action to portray it as if Oromos were part of the statistics as were Amharas. Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International and other organizations have confirmed that attacks such as Gimbi massacre were targeting Amharas.
It’s not only that. In the Gimbi example, 400+ Amharas, mostly women and children, were slaughtered. Innocents were shot, slaughtered with machetes and also burned alive in this massacre. That’s 5 villages, and hundreds of homes burned. This is an example of massacres where the perpetrators included Oromia police/special forces, militia, and locals. This massacre went on the whole day.
From my point of view there is no difference between PP and any Oromo nationalism you are talking about, be it OLA, OLF, OFC. All these entities share their core premise, and that premise is what is motivating these massacres and forced displacements of Amharas. We see these massacres again and again with the same vitriol from all the above entities.
In your long, you have not only dodged the above facts, but unfortunately chosen to play the blame game.
The fact is, Asafa Jalata has provided the definition of Oromummaa (labels Ethiopia as its ideological enemy by the way) as has numerous other notable scholars of Oromo nationalism. Therein is the fact that genocide of Amharas (and Tigrayans) is implied by logic, and not only ethnic cleansing. It’s what we’re seeing playing out still.
For mental exercise, I invite you to answer which of the following quotes from Abiy and Shimelis you think are at odds with the ideological premises of the OLA, OLF, OFC etc, and the follower:
1. “… Let me tell you Amharas are dying we are killing them and will continue to die…this cannot leave this room”
2. “…The Neftegnas [code word for Amharas] nation building failed 100 years ago… Now we are re-creating Ethiopia in the image of the Oromo. We are Oromizing Ethiopia in the way we want by cleansing the Neftegnas…”
3. “..To ensure Oromos own Addis Abeba there are multiple solutions. One is to illegally change the demography of the city as we are currently doing. The other way is to make Addis Abeba an irrelevant city. We will destroy the economy of the city, We can also create 3 or 4 other federal cities and weaken the city…”
4. “…Do you think we chose 5 languages to be the Federal languages because we give a damn about those other ethnic groups… We added those other languages to defeat and bring the downfall of the Amhara and Tigreans. We are doing it for Oromos.”
5. “Whether you believe it or not all the other regions except for Oromo region are declining, they are diminishing. Oromo region is growing more than you know.”
6. “…Whether you like it or not we [Oromo People’s Democratic Organization (OPDO) now Oromo Prosperity Party] created Qerro and transformed them into a paramilitary group which we control now. You can call them Shene, OLA, OLF, Oromo special forces they are all the same. We direct them …Now we order them to attack the Amharas so that we have plausible deniability”
I would wager the truthful answer is, none. All the Oromo nationalist entities you have mentioned are in support of all those sentiments, and that includes their followers.
Thus peace in Oromia will only come if you invest all your time and energy to make these facts known and to rally the population to stop what’s now thousands of Amharas casually slaughtered, and ~2mil displaced. Once this is stopped, then there needs to be peaceful dialogue to restore the properties of the victims as well as restitution for their loss.
No amount of deflecting and ignoring it is helpful. For anyone tempted to dodge these abysmal and consequential facts by mentioning what Tigray has experienced after illegally annexing parts of Amhara land, the irony is that it should serve as a lesson (not to mention the only similar massacre we saw in Tigray is the 700+ Amhara cut down 6 days after the start of war, and that’s until TDF went into Amhara, where 20+ incidents of mass murder of Amhara civilians followed).
Nothing informative but simply recycling accusation mostly on fed gov based on wrong assertions & over looks core issues why Oromia is in mess, @ least some are the following.
1. Oromo nationalism is built on excessive sense of victimization & lacks internal
cohesion as Oromos are heterogeneous society, speaking same language doesn’t
necessarily means ONE nation.
2. On 2018 TPLF didn’t gave up power for good but made tactical retreat, without
support from Amhara elite + Eritrea, OPDO could’ve been dethroned, Tplf/Tigray nationalist never accepted the current power structure, holding 38 seats out of 547, they’ll end up being permanently disenfranchised/marginalized political community.
3. Allowing OLF/OFC & others to freely participate in elections would’ve ended in disaster as the maximum they could get was 180 seats in parliament but Prosperity got about 280 as it won in Amhara/Addis Ababa/South, the Amhara wing of PP would weed out ALL oromo’s (as they lost in their constituency) & fed gov + Addis gov power would’ve been firmly on Amhara elites, who knows OLF/OFC supporters might start crying “naft**a out 4kilo”.
It’s a shame that in this long and informative article the author doesn’t address a central question. There is still a lack of in-depth analysis of the division within the Oromo elite between those who form the opposition (OLA, OFC, OLF) and the part of the Oromo elite, mainly from Shoa, which constitutes the pillar of Abiy’s power.