The list of Nobel peace prize winners encompasses the good and great, but also a few more curious nominees. Some were controversial from the first. Barack Obama was honoured before he had a chance to do anything significant with his office. Henry Kissinger was given the prize when he had already done far too much; the award, said one observer, made political satire obsolete. In other cases, history has proved unkind. Aung San Suu Kyi was recognised in 1991, as a dissident who had long campaigned for democracy and freedom. But she became head of Myanmar’s government and, though she has no power over the military, her silence as it carried out mass killings of Rohingya Muslims led many to call – unsuccessfully – for her prize to be revoked.
So handing this year’s prize to a leader who has been in power for just 18 months, and was little known before that, is a bold move. Yet the Ethiopian prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, has an astonishing amount to show for his time in office. The award is primarily to recognise his work to secure peace and international cooperation, and in particular the deal he signed with Eritrea last summer, which ended a nearly 20-year military stalemate following a long border war. The domestic changes he has effected in a highly repressive country are equally impressive. Half his cabinet is female, as is his chief justice – and the head of the election board, a former exiled dissident. Bans on opposition parties have been lifted, thousands of political prisoners have been freed, and senior officials have been arrested for corruption and human rights abuses. It is all the more astonishing given that he was appointed by the instinctively autocratic Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front. His remarkable record, however brief, has turned scepticism about his promises into “Abiymania”.
Such rapid and radical change, however, has come at a cost. The sweeping reforms have inevitably made enemies as well as inspiring support; in June, the prime minister said that the government had seen off a coup. His dismantling of complex institutions has had some unforeseen repercussions. The overhaul and reining in of a brutal security apparatus in part accounts for the upsurge in ethnic conflicts around the country. And the changes have yet to be institutionalised. While he has promised free and fair elections next year, some worry that there is still not a clear enough roadmap for political progress. If Ethiopia’s census has had to be indefinitely postponed, ask critics, how can polls go ahead?
Supporters hope that the aura of the Nobel peace prize will give him further leverage at home to push through deeper-rooted changes. The risk is that it may feed the temptation to focus on individual charisma and ability rather than the substantive issues that Ethiopia must address. The Nobel prize committee has recognised the hope that Abiy Ahmed has brought to Africa. The question is whether he will be able to live up to those expectations.
