Viewpoint

Getachew Reda

Adviser Minister to the Ethiopian Prime Minister on Eastern African Affairs. Former President of the Tigray Regional Interim Administration.

opinion

Ethiopia: Tigray is being led back to the brink

A chain of events unleashed by the pro-Debretsion faction of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) is pushing Tigray toward yet another calamitous war.

Published on May 08, 2026 at 12:32 pm (GMT +1)Share

On 19 April, the Tigray Central Committee pronounced the Pretoria Agreement dead arguing the federal government had failed to fulfil its obligations. But this rationale was a facade.

In reality, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) opposed the federal government’s extension of General Tadesse Werede’s term as president of the interim administration by another year.

This was despite Tadesse largely doing the TPLF’s bidding in his first year in office: sacking officials deemed disloyal and staffing the administration with party stalwarts.

For an organisation accustomed to total control, these concessions fell short.

Contravening the Pretoria Agreement

The central committee also rejected the legitimacy of the interim administration in Mekelle and Tadesse’s presidency. It said the pre-war regional council would be reconstituted to elect a new regional president — placing the region on a collision course with the federal government.

This contravened the Pretoria Agreement: that administrative and political arrangements made just before the war and after the 2020 regional elections be undone.

Then the TPLF convened its Council and ‘elected’ Debretsion Gebremichael as president on 5 May. Within the TPLF’s alternative universe, Debretsion’s return is being peddled as a restoration of legitimate political order.

READ MOREEthiopia: 10 things to know about TPLF’s Debretsion Gebremichael

This farcical development exposes the TPLF leadership’s inability to reckon with one of the most consequential political and military failures in Tigray’s modern history.

Debretsion has functioned less as a leader than as a conductor of Tigray’s misfortunes. For two years before the catastrophic 2020–2022 war, Debretsion led Tigray through intensifying tensions with the federal government. That moment demanded diplomatic finesse and restraint.

Instead, the public heard bravado. Tigray was told that it possessed the capacity to withstand a confrontation with Addis Ababa. Enamoured of his own performance and public support, Debretsion helped trigger events that resulted in a showdown with the federal government.

A deliberate calculation

Navigating the constitutional impasse triggered by the postponement of the 2020 elections required creativity.

Proceeding with regional elections and defying the federal government was a deliberate calculation, that accelerated confrontation.

The consequences were catastrophic. Hundreds of thousands were killed. Over a million were displaced. Tigray lost its constitutionally recognised territories. Its institutions were degraded, its socio-economic base decimated, with millions relying on humanitarian aid.

The Pretoria Agreement was signed under duress, when Tigray faced the prospect of decisive military defeat

Yet, there has been no soul-searching by those who led Tigray into that disaster. No acknowledgment of strategic miscalculation. No acceptance of responsibility. Just business as usual. The TPLF is better at surviving its catastrophic failures than governance. 

So it casts itself as the only force capable of saving Tigray from annihilation.

READ MOREFresh Ethiopia-Tigray friction as leaked audio suggests shift in regional loyalty

This twisted logic requires keeping the flames of crisis burning. The TPLF only thrive in a state of crisis which generates incentives for the militarisation of politics. This is trapping the people of Tigray within the TPLF’s destructive logic. It has returned to the patterns that produced the catastrophe.

The Pretoria Agreement was signed under duress, when Tigray faced the prospect of decisive military defeat due mainly to a monumental failure of the TPLF leadership.

It was Debretsion who was adamant that a ceasefire be signed without delay, making his current denunciation of Pretoria as a betrayal all the more remarkable.

A path away from destruction

The resulting peace accord was imperfect, unevenly implemented, and frustrating. But it offered a path away from further destruction. Ensuring its success required discipline and a willingness to prioritise public interest over political control. That went against the TPLF’s instinct for self-preservation.

For nearly two years, elements within the TPLF worked to undermine the interim administration that I led:  not over policy disagreements but to reclaim control over governance in Tigray.

Backed by the coercive leverage provided by elements of the Tigray Defence Force, they harassed appointees and blocked newly designated zonal administrators.

That eroded the interim administration’s legitimacy, weakened a fragile negotiating position, and  squandered what little leverage remained after the war.

The pattern was clear. The TPLF requested and obtained the appointment of General Tadesse, then dismissed the extension of his mandate. The Pretoria framework was declared effectively void.

Sharing responsibility

And now, through a party-dominated ‘council’, resuscitated to lend a veneer of legitimacy, the TPLF has reinstated Debretsion as president.

This is the naked pursuit of power for its own sake. As someone who served as a senior TPLF official and as interim president, I share responsibility [for] what has brought Tigray to this point.

The pro-Debretsion faction of TPLF leadership is leading the people of Tigray into the abyss. The current course is a reckless gambit, pointing toward renewed confrontation with the federal government.

In its latest campaign of miscalculation, the TPLF is being emboldened by tactical alliances with domestic and foreign actors, including the Eritrean regime.

READ MOREEthiopia: Pretoria stopped the war. Politics is imperilling the peace

That brazen disregard for political prudence will only bring death and destruction.

The TPLF leadership calculates that its assumption can engineer a managed escalation to extract what it wants. This is a dangerous fantasy that Tigray cannot afford.

Return of dangerous political logic

The most alarming aspect of the current moment is not the return of Debretsion, or of any particular leader. It is the return of a dangerous political logic: one that conflates narrow organisational survival with the public interest, substitutes rhetoric for strategy, and treats grave risks as something to be managed after the fact rather than prevented before it.

Tigray does not need another cycle of overconfidence followed by utter devastation. It does not need leadership that asks its people to bear the costs of decisions made without accountability.

READ MOREThe Four Horsemen of the TPLF: Meet the hardliners seeking to dominate northern Ethiopia

It needs leaders who understand that power is not an end in itself, but a responsibility to prevent further harm. The people of Tigray have paid the price of one catastrophic miscalculation: they should not pay for another.

If the current trajectory continues, there will be devastating repercussions, with immediate consequences measured in lives lost, opportunities destroyed, communities shattered, and a future deferred.

That outcome is not inevitable. But it is becoming more likely by the day.