The Constitutionality of Election Postponement in Ethiopia amidst COVID-19 Pandemic

  • Marew Abebe Salemot
  • Mequanent Dube
Keywords: Constitutional Interpretation, Covid-19, Election deferral, Ethiopia, Second Chamber

Abstract

Election postponement in Ethiopia, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, has raised critical constitutional questions that have never been really thought before in the country’s constitutional law jurisprudence. This was because the state of emergency measure in Ethiopia, to contain the spread of COVID-19, was in conflict with constitutional deadlines for elections. The constitutional lacuna was complicated by the absence of explicit constitutional provisions that indisputably govern election postponement. In response to this constitutional dilemma the four possible ‘options’: dissolving the parliament, declaring state of emergency, constitutional interpretation and amendment of the Constitution were suggested. This paper investigates the constitutionality of each of the four alternatives. Given the risks of unconstitutionality in the first three options mentioned above, the constitutionally correct approach, although not ideal during state of emergency, was to amend the Constitution. But the House of Federation, the Ethiopian Upper House entrusted to interpret the constitution, decided and postponed the election indefinitely. The HoF provided superficial analysis and fallacious reasoning and failed to meaningfully grapple with the serious constitutional issues.

Published
2020-12-20
How to Cite
Salemot, M. A., & Dube, M. (2020). The Constitutionality of Election Postponement in Ethiopia amidst COVID-19 Pandemic. Jimma University Journal of Law, 12, 27. https://doi.org/10.46404/jlaw.v12i0.2667

DB Error: Unknown column 'Array' in 'where clause'

Stack Trace:

File: /var/www/html/journals/classes/article/AuthorDAO.inc.php line 100
Function: DAO->retrieve("SELECT DISTINCT a.submission_id FROM authors a LEFT J...", Array(4))

File: /var/www/html/journals/plugins/generic/recommendByAuthor/RecommendByAuthorPlugin.inc.php line 77
Function: AuthorDAO->getPublishedArticlesForAuthor(Null, "Marew Abebe", "Salemot", Array(1), "ET")

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/plugins/HookRegistry.inc.php line 107
Function: RecommendByAuthorPlugin->callbackTemplateArticlePageFooter("Templates::Article::Footer::PageFooter", Array(3))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/template/PKPTemplateManager.inc.php line 1116
Function: HookRegistry::call("Templates::Article::Footer::PageFooter", Array(3))

File: /var/www/html/journals/cache/t_compile/a4fc84a2d9d2a85c011fcc528f09577e88e2fcff^1c372c95cd85572e0fbc9a53d0323a0b229cfc78_0.app.frontendpagesarticle.tpl.php line 43
Function: PKPTemplateManager->smartyCallHook(Array(1), Object(Smarty_Internal_Template))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/lib/vendor/smarty/smarty/libs/sysplugins/smarty_template_resource_base.php line 123
Function: content_6594f5fcc064a9_87793309(Object(Smarty_Internal_Template))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/lib/vendor/smarty/smarty/libs/sysplugins/smarty_template_compiled.php line 114
Function: Smarty_Template_Resource_Base->getRenderedTemplateCode(Object(Smarty_Internal_Template))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/lib/vendor/smarty/smarty/libs/sysplugins/smarty_internal_template.php line 216
Function: Smarty_Template_Compiled->render(Object(Smarty_Internal_Template))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/lib/vendor/smarty/smarty/libs/sysplugins/smarty_internal_templatebase.php line 232
Function: Smarty_Internal_Template->render(False, 1)

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/lib/vendor/smarty/smarty/libs/sysplugins/smarty_internal_templatebase.php line 134
Function: Smarty_Internal_TemplateBase->_execute(Object(Smarty_Internal_Template), Null, "a4fc84a2d9d2a85c011fcc528f09577e88e2fcff", Null, 1)

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/template/PKPTemplateManager.inc.php line 843
Function: Smarty_Internal_TemplateBase->display("frontend/pages/article.tpl", Null, "a4fc84a2d9d2a85c011fcc528f09577e88e2fcff", Null)

File: /var/www/html/journals/pages/article/ArticleHandler.inc.php line 209
Function: PKPTemplateManager->display("frontend/pages/article.tpl")

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/core/PKPRouter.inc.php line 390
Function: ArticleHandler->view(Array(0), Object(Request))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/core/PKPPageRouter.inc.php line 231
Function: PKPRouter->_authorizeInitializeAndCallRequest(Array(2), Object(Request), Array(1), False)

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/core/Dispatcher.inc.php line 134
Function: PKPPageRouter->route(Object(Request))

File: /var/www/html/journals/lib/pkp/classes/core/PKPApplication.inc.php line 252
Function: Dispatcher->dispatch(Object(Request))

File: /var/www/html/journals/index.php line 68
Function: PKPApplication->execute()