The central committee of the ruling party in Ethiopia, the Tigrean People’s Liberation Front (Woyanne) along with its puppet, Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), has reportedly scheduled an emergency meeting for Monday to discuss possible impacts of Tunisia, Egypt and Yemen uprisings on Ethiopia, according to Ethiopian Review Intelligence Unit sources in Addis Ababa.
The Meles dictatorship in Ethiopia has already taken steps to keep Ethiopians in the dark by imposing a news blackout of the uprisings. All independent news web sites and blogs have been blocked. The people in Ethiopia, however, are getting information through alternative sources, such as the VOA, DW, satellite TVs and emails.
Worried about similar uprisings in Ethiopia, some people have started to withdraw their saving from state owned banks. Most of the Woyanne officials have already taken the wealth they amassed over the past 20 years out of the country.
Bank withdrawals started after a recent interview by Dr Berhanu Nega and other economists with ESAT TV about the declining value of the birr for people who keep their money in banks. According to Dr Berhanu, economics professor and chairman of the opposition party Ginbot 7, the financial condition in the country is in such a deep crisis that the people are better off keeping their money under their mattress rather than in the banks.
On Sunday, Ethiopian pro-democracy activists around the world will convene a meeting to discuss and plan activities that would force the Meles regime to submit to the will of the people, according to Tamagne Beyene, spokesperson of the group.