ADDIS ABABA, Jul 19 – Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, a key regional strongman in the volatile Horn of Africa, is in “stable” health but has been told to take some leave, a government spokesman said on Thursday.

“He has been given the necessary medical treatment by his doctors, and at this point his health condition is very good and stable,” Bereket Simon told journalists. “The issue of stepping down has not been raised.”

However “doctors have advised him to take a certain leave of absence so that he could have rapid recuperation and recovery” and have advised him to “stay out of active government functions,” the spokesman added.

He was unable to say how long the leave of absence would last but said “it will be not too long” and that “we are expecting him to be back in days.”

The 57-year-old premier has not been seen in public since June and missed an African Union summit hosted in the Ethiopian capital last weekend, prompting speculation over the former Marxist rebel’s health.

Benin’s president and current AU chairman Thomas Boni Yayi said at the opening of the summit that the “unusual absence… cannot go unnoticed, because we know that Mr Meles is full of dynamism and leadership in our meetings.”

Diplomatic sources told AFP in Brussels on Wednesday that Meles was in hospital in a life-threatening condition.

“He is in a critical state, his life is in danger,” said one diplomat.

“He is in a critical state but is alive,” said another.

Earlier this week, Meles’s wife, Azeb Mesfin, herself a lawmaker, declined to talk to reporters about her husband’s health.

Bereket refused to discuss Meles’ ailment other than to say: “It’s not brain cancer, it’s not whatever the detractors say.

“It’s a recent phenomenon and we hope it will go away as soon as possible,” he said, conceding that Meles could have been suffering from the undisclosed illness “for longer than we know.”

Meles, who toppled the bloody dictatorship of Mengistu Haile Mariam in 1991, has said he will stand down at the end of his current term in 2015.

Bereket made no mention of who was running the country during Meles’ absence.

Ethiopia’s constitution does not provide any replacement procedure for the prime minister but stipulates that the deputy prime minister should “act on his behalf” if he is absent.

Hailemariam Deselgn, 47, who has been deputy prime minister and foreign minister since 2010, should therefore be running day-to-day affairs.

Bereket said the workload Meles has been shouldering was “enormous” and that the ruling party, formerly a rebel group headed by Meles, has been saying a “new batch of leaders should come so that they should receive the baton.”

The Ethiopian prime minister is either hailed as a visionary or criticized for ruling the country with an iron fist. Under Meles Ethiopia has proved a key ally of the US in its fight against Islamists in the Horn of Africa.

People..I advice you to read between the lines to what the lizard looking Bereket Simon is saying. The subliminal message the Lizard is trying to convey is...We are in transition of power.

Bereket said the workload Meles has been shouldering was “enormous” and that the ruling party, formerly a rebel group headed by Meles, has been saying a “new batch of leaders should come so that they should receive the baton.”

Another indication which confirm the death of the midget is...Watch the latest so called press release conducted by the lizard Bereket Simon...Now, Unless the midget is dead, why is there picture of the midget and not the president {The pig Weldegerious] hanging in the wall behind the Lizard Bereket Simon....I am tell you people...The frog is dead...Stone dead!

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Doctors have advised the Frog to stay out of active government functions

The title itself says a lot, in the medical language this is a red-code statement. In other words, this title suggests the man is gone and let the people know the facts he is not coming back, but we have to put an idea in the people's mind to accept the fact that he may not come back from his death bed.

Here is another white lie by the lizard looking Bereket Simon.

“It’s a recent phenomenon and we hope it will go away as soon as possible,” he said, conceding that Meles could have been suffering from the undisclosed illness “for longer than we know.”

According to western diplomats...Meles has visited the hospital in Belgium for several times and he was treated there as a private citizen and not as a head of the state...Hence why is the lizard lying to our face that the frog has suffered from this diseases longer than we know.

why is there picture of the midget and not the president {The pig Weldegerious] hanging in the wall behind the Lizard Bereket Simon....

No amount of strong nail and wall can hold study the picture of that Fat old [deleted] pig. You can't even find a wide enough frame to hang his fat as*s picture.