I believe all changes must come from within Ethiopia. It is the people of Ethiopia who should have the chance to have the ultimate say to make decisions on its fate. However, realities on ground give foreign powers disproportionate opportunity to interfere in internal affairs; and often times they use it to consolidate powers of authoritarians. World conventions, pacts, partnership values and etc. are lip services to let the hopeless mass hope for a promise that will never be fulfilled, letting citizens settle down while diplomats continue empowering authoritarians to consolidate power through their support.
In post election 2005, foreign powers supported EPRDF financially to rise up after a wave of public protests. Similarly, today too, foreign powers and most of their diplomats in Ethiopia are in favor of the status quo with EPRDF (which is dominated by TPLF) because of mainly the following reasons:
1. Fear of the Unknown
Horn of Africa is capital of crises. Somalia is statess for decades, South Sudan is home of conflict, Eritrea and Sudan are disobedient to the west. Kenya has no strong force and Djibouti is a small partner. Ethiopia, with 100 of millions of population, is a place where no one wants to take the risk of destability. Besides, it hosts a lot of refugees from Eritrea, South Sudan and Somalia. No one wants her to add tens of million of immigrants to the rest of the world. (By the way, the aid to host refugees in Ethiopia goes to National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) and it is the very institution that represses the whole nation with the money it has.)
