The government officially disclosed today that Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is on sick leave.
The Premier has had for a mild health problem and is now in good shape after medical treatments, said today Minister Bereket Simon, a long time friend and ally of Meles Zenawi.
The Premier was instructed by physicians to take a full vacation as his illness was due to years of work load, Bereket indicated. Noting that the Premier was overstretched with several landmark development projects as well as international engagements.
Bereket told the journalists that they will see him soon in their your own eyes, yet declined to set a specific date.
However, he refused to disclose the type of illness in the interest of the Premier’s privacy and saying that that is an issue of doctor-patient relationship.
None of the local journalist inquired the whereabouts of the Premier, nor did Bereket gave a hint. However, some state-owned outlets claimed, citing Bereket, that the Premier is currently in a foreign country.
Bereket underlined that Meles Zenawi is still the Prime Minister.
This is the first time in recent history that the Ethiopian public was told the head of government is off-duty. Though the a statement to Bloomberg and VOA radio on Monday, nothing is deemed official, in Ethiopia, until and unless it is aired on the national television and radio services.
No Ethiopian leader dared to take a vacation officially in at least the last few hundred years.
The parliament recessed last Tuesday after ratifying the next budget years budget.
Congress of EPRDF, the ruling party, will convene in January 2013, Bereket disclosed, underlining that he is not a spokesperson of the party.
The last Congress meeting was held on August 2010.
Bereket indicated that the party’s bylaws prescribe for the Congress to meet every two to two and half years.Thus, he claimed, the time of the next congress meeting was picked as it would enable conducting a mid-term evaluation of the Growth and Transformation Plan.
It was expected that the second-phase of the five-years Metekakat (leadership replacement) plan will take place in this meeting of Congress. Though it is not clear how the Premier’s illness would upset the plan. Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is among the leaders who are to step down in the third phase of the plan in 2015.
Minister Bereket seemed to hint that he personally visited the Premier, when he sais, in the press conference, that “we, on our part, have ascertained that the Premier is in good condition and will return soon”.
It is believed that Bereket visited the Premier in the first week of July, when the Premier’s condition was more critical. It is to be recalled that The Ethiopian Reporter claimed on Wednesday that the Premier had been visited, in unspecified date, by Abadula Gemeda, spokesperson of the parliament, Seyoum Mesfin, Ethiopia’s Ambassador in China, and Girma Beru, Ethiopia’s Ambassador in US. All the four are senior members and deemed highly influential in the ruling party.
Bereket is the third of the Premier’s friends to speak on the matter this week. Dep. PM Hailemariam Desalegne and veteran ruling member of the ruling party Sebhat Nega made similar statements on VOA on Monday and Wednesday respectively. While the Premier’s friendship with Hailemariam is perhaps about a decade long and his about four decades relation with Sebhat Nega is said to be tainted in recent years, there has never been such rumor regarding his relation with Bereket.
Meles Zenawi’s acquaintance with Bereket stretches back to 1980, when both were part of the insurgency that overthrew the Military Junta in 1980. Bereket is perceived as a heavy-weight and right hand of the Premier.
In reply to repeated questions by journalists on the prudence and appropriateness of letting the public rife with rumors for so long, Bereket went to great length to explain that is related to the decades long organizational culture of the ruling party.
However, he was unapologetic and indicated that it is also partly related to the government’s ‘communication philosophy’. He underlined it would a problem to go after each speculation and do not intend to do so in the future either.
Bereket declined to answer a question, by this blogger, during the press conference, inquiring if he deems it proper, in principle, that Ethiopians learn about their leader from foreigner dignitaries and foreign media. Note that the Premier’s illness was confirmed after the Senegalese President wished Meles to get well soon last weekend and by government officials’ statement to foreign news outlets.
It should be noted, however, secrecy and equivocation is deeply ingrained in the Ethiopian culture, while openness is deemed a symptom of insanity. Yet, EPRDF takes it to the extreme and considers it as a useful weapon and a measure of its organizational strength.
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[Photo on the top shows Saint Luc University Hospital in Brussels, Belgium, where Prime Minister Meles Zenawi is rumored to be staying.]
Check the Meles Zenawi archive and the Cabinet Ministers archive for previous and forthcoming news and analyses.
VNZHD.COM Thanks for that awesome posting. It saved MUCH time 🙂
You are not dinsho.
An Oromo doesn’t worry about Abyssinia.
@ Dinsho, All your comments sound that you are in deep hate and desperation! May this be coz you knew that you are powerless other that barking a dog?
Shame
God has struck him down.
The guys is only 57 and he has all the money in the world for check up and health maintenance, but God must have recalled him for judgement. That’s the only thing I could say.
TPLF waged war on Ethiopia for 17 years, fought along side EPLF causing hundreds of thousands of Ethiopians to die senselessly in war TO SEPARATE TIGRAI FROM ETHIOPIA. We shall never forget this simple fact. The children of those hundreds of thousands that died trying to fight off these thieves and terrorists are still alive, made to feel like children of monsters by TPLF propaganda.
No.
Meles fought to break Ethiopia up, then sold off Eritrea and its two ports. All those that stood with TPLF and EPLF are children of Bandas and Ascaris. They took support from Egypt, Syria, Iraq et al, robbed banks, planted bombs, massacred villages (dressed as Ethiopian troops) for miserly propaganda gains, bombed bridges, burned factories, destroyed generators and cut down electric pylons. It is endless. All this fact is stifled by TPLF, sealed hoping we would buy into their propaganda, forgetting reality.
WRONG.
All those that stood to keep Ethiopia’s integrity despite the tyranny, mismanagement, gross negligence and stupidity of the murderous DERG rule.
The story of these heroes will be told once TPLF is removed from power and all this venom spilled about ethnicity and the Golden People is wiped off.
Props to the writer of this blog though for opening the comments for free expression. I believe you have good intentions but you’ve drank TPLF’s koolaid man. The true Tigrians (and Eritreans for that matter) died fighting TPLF and EPLF, the cancers of the horn.
Peace
“Off duty” my ass. If he isn’t dead by now he’ll sure be out joining the diaspora because his own rats are gnawing through his power. haha.
Meles Zenawi has never been my leader or Prime Minster. This is the case for many Ethiopians. He is a terrorist that waged war on Ethiopia for 17 years then took power under pretense and through the barrel of the gun to terrorize and rob the country for 21 yrs further.
MELES ZENAWI: REJECTED.
quarantined not guaranteed.
Good to know your are a Nazi who should be guaranteed from society far far away from any power to decide who Ethiopia’s leaders should be.
You stupid koshasha, why don`t u go to hell and burn urself outthere??? Go Dani, u r really a dedicated person. Great boy!
Daniel Berhane, the subhuman agame. Your tyrant is dying. Fuck Tigray and your shitty dictator. I hope he dies and I hope you get a face transplant, you ugly motherfucker.