The vexed question of Ethiopian identity-driven politics and the discourse of political communication in the digital media sphere

Abstract

This study aims to examine the interplay between political communication and discursive practices in the emerging new media landscape after the recent political reform in Ethiopia. The study employs interpretative textual analysis in qualitative research approach to analyze political communication texts posted by political party leaders and activists’ official pages through Critical Discourse Analysis. By using this method, the study critically examines the recent political developments with a specific focus on: EPRDF fragmentation, disintegration of TPLF from the central government, de-facto state formation, the integration of PP into political scene, inter-party political dialogues, and election scenarios among purposely selected ethno-nationalist and unionist political party leaders and activists’ official pages. The finding of the study reveals that political actors used social media as a political communication backchannel and a counter-hegemonic space to construct their political identities and ideologies. The result further shows ethnic identity has overwhelmingly become the source of power over pan-Ethiopian nationalism identity. The politics of ethnic belongingness is found to be an emerging political communication discourse in the study. Ethnic divisions and polarized political views have been recurrently propounded among political actor’s posts in their digital media. Accordingly, accommodative discursive strategies appear to be the dominant discursive strategies utilized by unionist political actors, while ethno-nationalists employ divisive rhetorical strategies in their political communication. In this continuum, polarized political views along with ethnic-based political formations put the issue of identity in a vexed condition and the existing Ethiopian politics in a state of interregnum.

Keywords:

• Political communication
• digital sphere
• ethnic-identity
• discourse-analysis
• political-ideology

Reviewing Editor:

• Lincoln Geraghty, School of Media and Performing Arts, University of Portsmouth, UK

Subjects:

• Persuasion
• Political Communication
• Rhetoric
• Media Communication

Introduction

In a functioning democracy, there is a burgeoning relationship between media and politics, where media plays a crucial role in shaping political discourse, influencing public opinion, and holding political actors accountable. In this continuum, Blumler et al. (2013, p.139) in his prominent discourse of ‘mediatization of politics’, highlights the dynamic influence of media over the political power structure and ideological hegemony. Despite media and politics are the two being discrete and complex fields, they share a symbiotic correlation. Political actors and opinion leaders use mass media to reach out to and communicate with large numbers of people, and they turn to the public to drive their actions, campaign for their ideas, and gain people’s trust in political communication discourse (Blumler et al., 2013). Conversely, the media have the power to inform the public about politics and exercise control over politicians (Strömbäck & Esser, 2014).

Conceptualizing how political power is wielded through communication is central to understanding the socio-political world around us. Political communication is one of the subfields of communication and political science which focuses on how the spread of information and dissemination influences political structure, policy makers and the public in the overall political phenomena (Jamieson & Kenski, 2017; Perloff, 1998). Modern politics is increasingly shaped by the dynamics of public and political communication (McNair, 2009a). Furthermore, political communication is a purposeful communication in which different ideas and views of political actors, public opinion and media workers have a right to publicly speak about divergent political agendas since modern politics is increasingly shaped by the dynamics of public and political communication (McNair, 2009a). Accordingly, the discourse of political communication encompasses the constructions, deconstructions, and the transmission of information that could have a substantial impact on politics (Denton & Woodward, 1998; Murambadoro, 2015, and Offodile, 2016; Perloff, 1998 & Hahn, 2003).

Furthermore, political communication is a purposeful communication in which different ideas and views of political actors, public opinion and media workers have a right to publicly speak about divergent political agendas since modern politics is increasingly shaped by the dynamics of public and political communication (McNair, 2009). In this regard, the main focus area of this study is new media platforms, especially social media. The emergence of digital media platforms in the late 1980s has had a profound impact on political communication for both political and opinion leaders (Asuman & Beyekent, 2018; Cunningham, 1998; Jebril et al., 2013).

The developments of new information technologies, particularly Internet have fundamentally transformed the landscape of democracy and the way people engage in political discourse (Wallsten, 2010; Wei & Xu, 2019). Furthermore, using social media for political communication is nothing new in modern politics since it is a participatory digital public realm. It is evident that Ethiopian politics has undergone a substantial transformation as a result of social media. The number of people who utilize social media for political purpose is growing all the time. According to the Internet World Status and Global Digital Insights Report of January, 2022, Ethiopia has 29.83 million Internet users from an estimated 119.3 million total populations, and it has an Internet penetration rate of 25.0% (Internet World Status and Global Digital Insight Report, 2022).

In terms of political power, the country has been led by different leaders with divergent political philosophies. Since Ethiopian People Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) took power in 1991, ethnic cluster of communities has become the source of power, the foundation for the country’s federal structure, and resources. Prior to Ethiopia’s recent political reform (before April, 2018), both mainstream and digital public sphere were used to promulgate policies, strategies and dominant ideologies of the ruling government. Accordingly, the discourse of online political communication was restricted and limited. However, after April, 2018 the new political reform opens up possible avenues for political parties and activists. Congruent to a palpable decline in self-and online censorship, citizens have flocked to social media platforms. Blocked websites became accessible, hundreds of political prisoners, journalists, online digital activists, and opposition bloggers were released, opposition politicians were invited to return home after terrorism charges and heavy prison sentences were withdrawn (Biniam, 2016, International Media Support Assessment, 2018 & FOJO Media Institute, 2019).

Using the wider political spectrum, political leaders and activists have made their political communication rhetoric’s both in the mainstream and digital media sphere (Biniam , 2016; Abiy, 2011; Tadeg, 2016 & Eneyew, 2019). They largely use social media platforms for sharing their political viewpoints in their political communication discourses. Though there are competing polarized arguments of pro and against ethno-nationalism, political actors have been using the landscape as an alternative platform for dissemination of political ideologies. Thus, the main objective of this study is to examine how political party leaders and activists discursively used the digital public sphere to publicize their ideologies and political positions and the practice of political communication rhetoric in social media. The study also tries to critically scrutinize how power, ideology, hegemony, and divergent political power manipulation are discursively manifested in their political communication texts and tries to see the nexus between the vexed question of Ethiopian identity-driven politics and its discourse following the recent reform process in Ethiopia.

A historical overview of Ethiopian political power structure and political dynamism

Ethiopia is a country which has a long history and is an unconquered nation located in the horn of Africa. The country has been ruled by different political regimes and has experienced different political and ideological paths and trajectories. Starting from the mid-20^th century, Ethiopia has passed through divergent ethnic, identity and political trajectories. According to Abbink (2011) and Taye (2017), the Imperial rule of the Solomonic Dynasty came to an end in 1974 when a socialist and military junta cup was overthrown and replaced by a revolutionary Derg regime. Following the Derg’s military rule, the country was faced with a massive opposition from the ‘intelligentsia’ and had triggered guerilla fighting between the Derg and ethnically organized rebel groups such as Oromo Liberation Front, Tigray People’s Liberation Front, Eritrean People’s Liberation Front, and the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Party later named Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (Henze, 1985).

In the meantime, the late 1980s were a period of violent conflict and fierce struggle between several secessionist rebel factions. Following a massive war in 1991, the rebels overthrew the Derg government and took power forming a new political front comprised of four ethnic-based regional parties namely, Tigry People Liberation Front, Amhara National Democratic Moment, Oromo People Democratic Organization, and South Peoples and Nations, Nationalities Organization (Henze, 1985; Tadesse & Young, 2003). The Ethnic federalist front EPRDF administration had continued to rule the country with ethnic based politics for nearly three decades until it was deposed in 2018 following violent mass-protests that were backfired in the social media. Consequently, ethnicity and identity discourse became a central tool for controlling the country’s power structure and access to resources (Abbink, 2011; Taye, 2017; Semir, 2019). Basing revolutionary democracy ideological doctrine, majority of opposition political parties followed ethnic-line of structural system for political party formation (Skjerdal & Moges, 2021).

Hagmann and Abbink (2011), Aalen (2011), Tronvoll (2011), and Skjerdal (2012) noted that the exercise of political authority in Ethiopia was becoming increasingly authoritarian that was primarily demonstrated by their limitless leadership systems. Despite holding five consecutive national elections since 1995 (every five years), the country faces a variety of political issues and political trajectories. In this regard, both legacy and new media environments lacked transparent, free, and fair inter-party political dialogues and conversations (Merera, 2011).

Although revolutionary democracy allows multi-party politics, and regular elections, the party is hesitant to share power, rejects political pluralism, and disregards civil and political liberties in the country. The cumulative effect of these and other related factors prompted the public to participate in new political protests against the ruling EPRDF from 2015 to 2018. This leads to the disintegration of EPRDF from the central power. Accordingly, the new Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came into accession, on April 2, 2018. Following his ascension to power, ethnic tensions in disparate regional states began to dissipate, and national harmony appeared to triumph over conflict and violence. As a result, various media outlets, including the digital public realm, have issued unison messages. Nonetheless, ethnicity, identity, and the thirst for power and other regional independence issues have resulted in a fresh political backlash in several regions in just a few months.

A new political puzzle and power contestation in Ethiopia: social media as a new political backchannel

Though the FDRE constitution guarantees freedom of opinion and speech, the government has devised many regulatory systems, repressive legislations, and the most restrictive system for the regulation of the country’s media ecology (Ethiopian Human Rights Council &Universal Human Rights Declaration Report, 2017; Mulatu, 2017). So far, the FDRE’s relationship with the media was contentious and adversarial (Solomon, 2014; Gagliardone, 2014; Gagliardon et al., 2015; Taye, 2017). Subsequently, there was a restricted avenue for online political debates and exchanges between divergent political actors and opinion leaders. Nevertheless, since April 2018 political actors and opinion leaders have had a relatively better opportunity to discuss and disseminate political beliefs and ideological discourses in the digital media sphere.

One of the most triggering factors for the current political transition and discourse of political rhetoric in Ethiopia was the 2014–2016 public protests and grievances based on the ‘new official announced master plan of Addis Ababa’, to expand the capital city in response to its industrial and human growth. Apparently, the social movement, known as Oromo Protests erupted in the capital city and throughout the area (Ethiopian Human Rights Council Report, 2017). Similarly, public protests developed in Amhara region in response to the prosecution and imprisonment of outspoken members of the committee advocating for the reintegration of the Wolqaite and Raya areas into Amhara and other identity issues. Following these violent mass protests and uprisings, public strikes and protests continued to rock the country and disrupted the social and political order. Meanwhile, social media platforms have played a crucial role in the new reform process. Evident to this, the 2015–2018 public dissent brought a turning point in Ethiopian wider political landscape. Diverse political actors, opinion leaders, interest groups, youth groups, armed groups, the Diaspora media and the Ethiopian Diaspora community have all contributed for the popular mobilization to the demise of the regime. After former Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn submitted his letter of resignation, higher-ranking EPRDF officials and representatives of the opposition political parties from OPDO and APDP had a 17-day closed meeting in February 2018 to address these issues.

The nexus between protest-transition-reform is rooted in a large frame of historical narratives and academic debates and is located within a larger context of Ethiopia’s political dynamics. Due to unable to curb the dissent through the unrelenting use of violence, the regime eventually gave up and Prime Minister Hailemariam Dessalegn resigned from his power by official resignation letter in mid-February 2018.

Following Hailemariam Dessalegn’s stepping down from his role due to increasingly heavy national level popular protests and a loss in unity of the ruling EPRDF, Abiy Ahmed’s accession to the position represented major political departure. This political development in Ethiopia during the transition of prime ministers temporarily gave rise to an uneasy sense of political optimism and brings a major power shift. After Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s power accession, the old TPLF incumbents fled to Mekele and began the process of organizing EPRDF through establishing federalist factions opposed to the new political party.

His administration initiated significant political reforms and made rapid changes in the existing government structure and political system. For instance, the increment of number of women in the cabin, relative freedom of the media, release of political prisoners, inviting armed groups to come to Ethiopia and operate from home freely and opening new political rapprochement with the Eritrean government can be mentioned as cases in point. In addition, unbanning terrorist organizations, expanding political space, freeing journalists, unblocking 264 websites, revising repressive media and civil society organizations, laws and making significant political changes within the ruling party can also mentioned (Dugda, 2021).

Astonishingly, the new administration renounced the EPRDF’s oldest philosophy and promotes relatively a less coherent and accommodating concept dubbed ‘Medemer’/(which literally means, synergy) and EPRDF was replaced by Prosperity Party (PP). The process of inauguration of EPRDF into (PP) sidelined one of the founding members of TPLF.

Comparatively, the discourse of political communication has been changed through organizing different events and inviting opposition political parties for open political discussion. In the meantime, several political actors and party members have participated and debated on the country’s political environment and the national election of 2021. Though there are relative shifts, ethnic tensions have been backfiring between Somalia and Oromia regions, Oromia and Amhara ethnic groups, Oromia and Southern regions, Wolaita and Sidama ethnic groups, Amhara and Benshangual regions, Oromia and Benshangul regions, cross-border antagonisms of Amhara and Tigray regions (Wolkait and Raya issues), Amhara and Qemant ethnic groups and Amhara etc (Meester & Ezzeddine, 2021). On the contrary, opposition political parties come into being and participate in formal discussions and debates over constitutional amendments and other core national issues. To be evident, National Movement of Amhara, Salisawi Woyane Political Party, Bayitona Political Party, Ethiopian Citizens for Social Justice and Democracy, Ethiopian Democratic Party, and Balderas for Real Democracy and Justice are just a few of the many opposition political parties that have formally organized and came into the front political line. While there have been several changes and discourse in Ethiopian politics, little have been studied on the current online political communication practices and its discourse narratives pertinent to political party leaders and activists.

Previous studies on online political communication and discourse

Though online political communication and discourse are barely studied in the context of Ethiopia, few studies have addressed the issue in the digital media sphere. In this regard, Worku (2017) conducts a study on ‘the discursive construction of political identity on Facebook and its democratization potential in Ethiopia’, and asserts that social media can be used for the construction of political identities. However, the study fails to address taking adequate samples from interviewees. Similarly, Gagliardone and Pohjonen (2016) conduct a study on ‘engaging in polarized society: social media and political discourse in Ethiopia’ and confirmed the tensions, paradoxes, and broader contradictions underpinning digital activism in Africa. In their survey studies, Sileshie (2014), Mulisa and Asrat (2018), and Weldehana (2018) evidently stated social media as an alternative medium for political communication.

Even though a few studies in Ethiopia addressed the issue of social media, political communication, digital activism and political discourses in different ways, they did not trace the case to the actual situation on the ground. Though they have recurrently tried to focus on the themes like the impacts, opportunities and coverage of social media in their studies, they have missed the core issues of the practice, and barely discussed the emerging trends in political communication, and discursive strategies used in social media.

Realizing the underlying assumptions, this study aims to examine the interplay between political communication and discursive practices in the emerging new media landscape following the recent political reform in Ethiopia. Accordingly, the main intention of this study is to scrutinize how political power, ideology, hegemony, and power manipulations are manifested, represented, and discursively communicated in the digital public sphere in response to major political trajectories and discursive political communication shifts in Ethiopia. Apparently, the study attempts to critically analyze the texts that raise the issue of state fragmentation, the disintegration of EPRDF and de-facto state formation, the formation of Prosperity Party, inter-party political dialogues and discussions, and the 2020/2021 election scenarios posted on the official pages of selected political party leaders and activists.

Theoretical framework

In order to comprehend the nature and existing discourse of online political communication narratives among selected political party and opinion leaders in the digital public sphere in Ethiopia, the study is guided by political identity, digital public sphere and instrumentalist nationalism theories. Political actors and opinion leaders can socially construct their own political identities and ideological beliefs to influence and reshape voters and followers (Calhoun, 2011). As can be reflected in Wodak et al. (2013) studies, political identity theory basically posits the salience of politics to an individual’s sense of self rather than partisanship (Wodak et al., 2013). Based on the underlying basic assumptions, this study uses political identity theory as one of a theoretical lens to examine how the role of narrative political discourse of political party leaders and activists shape and construct an individual’s identity.

Besides political identity, this study employs instrumentalist nationalism theory in which ethnic and national identities become convenient tools in the hands of competing political elites and opinion leaders for generating mass support in the universal struggle for resource, power and prestige (O’Leary, 2001; Smith, 1986). In stark contrast to primordialists who treat ethnicity as a ‘given’ of the human condition, they argue that ethnic and national attachments are continually redefined and reconstructed in response to changing conditions and the machination of political elites. According to Brass (1979), instrumentalism theory of nationalism is the process by which elites and counter-elites within ethnic groups select aspects of the group’s culture, attach new value and meaning to them, and use them as symbols to mobilize the group, to create a political ideology and to defend their interests, and to compete with other groups. Among nationalism theories, this study therefore, utilizes an instrumentalism approach to critically analyze multi-layered social and political fabrics that are constructed, manipulated, represented and manifested in the social media political communication texts of political actors.

This study also employs digital public sphere theory to critically examine how political actors discursively communicated in a digital media world. Contemporarily, there are growing interests of academic debates in digital public sphere pertinent to the discourse of online political communication. It has been argued that digital technology questions the public sphere generated by conventional media and it can be used as an alternative media in fostering self-organization, self-communication, open participation and a counter-hegemonic potential in the elite dominated political arena (Atton, 2004; Couldry & Curran, 2003).

As to Iosifidis and Wheeler (2015) noted that in the 21^st century, the ideal of an enlightened citizen connected to the digital networks has been conceived as an autonomous citizen actor debating issues of collective interest. Since the digital media sphere is a recently emerged an alternative and interactive media space, it can be used to openly communicate and share diversified socio-political issues especially those who were marginalized individuals in the mainstream media (Bennett & Segerberg, 2012). Thus, the study utilizes digital public sphere theory in order to examine how political party leaders and activists discursively communicated in making sense of meanings portrayed through social media texts.

Methods

This study employs a qualitative method to address the research objectives relevant to the selected texts that are published on the official Facebook pages of political parties and opinion leaders. Texts were selected and filtered from a purposively selected 10 political party leaders and 9 activist’s official pages from three ethnically-based and politically contesting regions of Amhara, Oromia, and Tigray. Texts were selected based on their different views of ethnic/identity-based political communication rhetoric’s, and inclusive ideological viewpoints. Subsequent to this, one of the most important inclusion criteria was ideological and political perspectives towards the existing narratives of state formation and nation building paradigm. In light of this, texts that were primarily concerned with two politically polarized: ethno-nationalist & civic-nationalist/Pan-Ethiopianist orientations were considered in the study.

Therefore, the study critically comprises and examines texts that raise grand themes on the recent political developments, namely EPRDF state fragmentation, TPLF’s disintegration from the central government and de-facto state formation, PP (Prosperity Party) integration, inter-party political dialogues, polarized political viewpoints, the change and continuities of the new reform, and the 2020/2021 election scenarios, among purposely selected political party leaders and activists’ official pages representing both ethno-nationalist and unionist perspectives. Accordingly, texts that were outside the scope of the above- mentioned broad thematic categories were not included in this study. In terms of scope and time frame, this study focuses on the online political intercourses/communications/and its discourse narratives since April, 2018 up to the 2020/2021 (6^th) national election in Ethiopia.

Based on the Ethno-nationalist line of political orientation, the official pages of contesting political party leaders namely, Tigray People Liberation Front (TPLF)¹, National Movement of Amhara (NaMA)², Amhara Democratic Forces Movement (ADFM) ³, Oromo Federalist Congress (OFC) ⁴, Oromo Liberation Front (OLF^{) 5}, and Arena Political Party (APP) ⁶ were selected for the subjects of this study. While Prosperity Party (PP) ⁷, Ethiopian Citizens for Social Justice and Democracy (ECSJD) ⁸, Ethiopian Democratic Party later named Hibir Party (EDP) ⁹, and Balderas For Real Democracy and Justice (BRDJ) ¹⁰ were purposively selected subjects based on their civic nationalist political communication views. Besides, official pages of well-known activists from three regions namely: Political Activist Amhara (1.3) PAA1, PAA2, PAA3, Political Activist Oromia (1.3) PAO1, PAO2, PAO3, Political Activist Tigry (1.3) PAT1, PAT2, and PAT3 were included based on their political affiliation and large number of followers irrespective of their official Facebook pages. Accordingly, their practices of online political communication were observed in the social media through Digital Ethnography Research Design. Central to our argument, Boellstorff et al. (2013) suggest that digital ethnography is a method situated under the paradigm of interpretivism which is used to address questions of the social experience on digitalized spaces. It basically encompasses ethnography of virtual spaces, cyberspace ethnography, ethnography of new media, online ethnography, and social media ethnography. In this continuum, conducting ethnographic work on a digital medium can entail studying specific chat rooms, discussion groups, or observing virtual realities.

Relying on the above assumptions, the researchers conduct digital ethnography (online text observation) in order to select and collect the most important media contents (texts) that are posted by the purposively selected political party leaders and activists in the study. From digital ethnography, the researchers employ netnography research design in this study to understand and conceptualize how political actors and opinion leaders utilize and practice social media discursively. After a meticulous online observation, tracking and selection of media contents (texts) from the social media, the researchers establish unique categorized themes for further analysis by using open code software to code distinct multiple cases from purposively selected samples.

Based on the above underlying assumptions, 68 of the 115 news stories (online media texts) written both in Amharic and English language were selected and prioritized considering the study time frame and the possibility of elimination from the pages. Owing to this, the selected texts were analyzed meticulously and critically by employing Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) method. Critical theory is an approach that studies society in a dialectical way by analyzing political economy, domination, exploitation, and ideologies. Among critical theories, this study therefore, utilizes a Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis to analyze a multi-layered approach of media contents such as media texts and speeches (Fuchs, 2016; Horkheimer & Adorno, 1972; Ledin & Machin, 2016). Central to our argument, we analyze selected texts using an integrated approach of Fairclough’s (2003) three-dimensional frameworks of the linguistic description of the text, the interpretation, and the discourse and the socio-cultural context, Ruth Wodak’s (1997) four sociological macro-levels, namely constructive, perpetuating, transformational, and destructive discursive strategies; and Van Dijk (1998) three-dimensional discourse analysis method, which includes text analysis, social cognition analysis, and social analysis to conceptualize the way how power abuse, manipulation, and dominance are enacted, reproduced, and discursively represented in the texts pertinent to the existing Ethiopian political context.

Findings and discussions

The politics of ethnic discourse: belongingness as a major contesting political terrain

In Ethiopia, the discourse of online political communication has been extremely challenging in the recent past few years. The ruling system heavily relies on power control and domination. The system also embarrasses, intimidates, and detains opposition political actors and activists because of their political views, and ethnic orientations. The working culture of both mainstream and digital media sphere was in a flux. Regarding power division and the right to political participation, the selected political party leader from BRDSJ put his point view in his social media text that:

In principle, the Ethiopian government constitutionally guarantees the functioning of the right to freedom of expressions, thoughts, opinions and unrestricted political participation and engagement. In light of this, the division of power at different levels of government can be made more equitable and fair in the country with competitive opposition political party system. However, a powerful and centralized ruling party controls the entire sources of power (BRDSJ).

Strengthening the above ideas, political party leaders from ECSJD, EDP, & OFC share their point of arguments in the way that ‘the ruling system lacks a clear line between party and state that ensures effective participation of political parties. Furthermore, the system lacks legitimacy, and it is not inclusive instead it is a system that is firmly founded on political power structures based on ethnicity and identity’. Based on Fairclough’s (2003) discursive contexts, the above texts literally seem to suggest that citizens and political party leaders have full rights to participate and engage in divergent political issues. However, the participation is not genuine enough to allow citizens and opposition political parties to be politically involved. The country’s socio-cultural and political context is constitutionally abused and highly exposed to political power bias, political power fluidity, and unhealthy political power contestations.

Though the written constitution guarantees freedom of thought and expression, the government has enacted various regulatory mechanisms, repressive legislations, and the most restrictive media policies in the country. Since the federal structure has been established based on ethnic-driven political lines, free and fair political views, inter-party political debates, political elections, political participation, and engagement were under a dire situation.

However, right after the new reform dynamism in April 2018, the country has been providing relatively a better space of political debates and inter-party political discussions on divergent issues. Among other things, the discourse of political communication has been shifted, particularly allowing political freedom for free expression of thoughts, and opinions in different media landscapes. The finding of the study from the selected texts reveals unprecedented practice of online political involvement, and digital activism has resulted in the recognition of the new political dynamism.

The new digital public sphere was seen to be the driving factor for the major structural, political shifts, and ongoing political viabilities in the counter-discourse of EPRDF fragmentation versus the establishment of federalist forces, the dissolution of Prosperity Party (PP), the formation of opposition political parties, and inter-party political discussions of election scenarios, which have been the grand theme of this study. Accordingly, the results from the extracted texts evidently confirm the politics of ethnic belongingness. The politics of belonging/belongingness is a term which is adapted from Benequista (2016), to signify the media environment under a dynamic relationship of forces: notions of ethnic identity and competitive regional politics. Thus, the discourse of ethnicity and identity are overarchingly becoming an emerging contentious political terrain in contemporary Ethiopian political juncture. In the digital public sphere political communication grand narratives, clear political radicalizations were observed in light of ethnicity and nationalism political tenets. Strengthening the underlying assumption, Calhoun (2011) argued that political party leaders and activists can utilize ethnicity and identity as an instrument to construct their own political identities and to influence voters and followers views.

Competing nationalist ideologies and discursive strategies used in online political communication

Political party leaders and activists utilize social media as a dominant political communication backchannel to disseminate their sentimental political views and ideological perspectives. In Ethiopia, the digital media sphere fueled the discourse of political communication and the competition among political party leaders and activists. Since the culture of Ethiopian politics is not developed, opposition political parties are astoundingly ignored from using mainstream media freely. Poor political civility was observed in their political communication dialogues. As a result, narrowing the communication gap between the ruling government and the opposition political parties has been challenging since the nature of federal state structure and party formation are based on ethnic lines. The mainstream media platforms have been predominantly controlled and used by the ruling government. For these reasons, opposition political parties and activists are inclined to use the digital public sphere, especially social media platforms for their political communication. In light of this, studies conducted by Gagliardone et al. (2015); Taye (2017); and Skjerdal and Moges (2021) support the findings of this study.

Literally, the discourse of this online communication ignites the fabrics of competing nationalist ideologies between ethno-nationalists and unionists political dichotomy. Regarding ethnic-based federal state structure, the proponents of civic nationalist political leaders assert and agreed on a political argument in their texts that:

Organizing the state based on ethnic or identity lines of power structure would threaten the unity of the country and bring a division among us. Nation building is more than any kind of political party interests, affiliations and political concessions. We believe in oneness or togetherness, and Pan-Ethiopianism thinking, to unify our people, and to collaborate in building one strong nation instead of developing animosity among another (EDP¹, ECSJD²).

Supporting the aforementioned basic underpinnings, one of the advocators of unionist political ideology activist apparently appears to affirm in the text that:

Our divisions based on ethnicity, race and identity costs a lot of things including death causalities and even will even leave us in a great deal of trouble unless we are getting unified. Ethnic politicians and activists are divisive forces who are pragmatically working on political conspiracies that highly emphasizes on differences, hatred, and the disintegration of the people’s and nation’s strong harmony. As a result, we have to avoid ethnic polarization, and work towards on a rational philosophy of national unity (PAO1³).

On the contrary, in the Ethiopian political landscape, the contending powers of civic nationalists and ethno-nationalist thinking political party leaders and activists have developed an alternative political discourse. In their communication discourse, they strongly argue that the idea of belongingness to a specific ethnicity, identity, or race is supposed to be indispensable in the contemporary Ethiopian political power structure. Ethnic based federal arrangement profoundly focuses on the discourse of the question of nationalities as well as self-determination issues. This ideological foundation has resulted in a never-ending cycle of regional conflicts, extreme violence, mass atrocities and big political chaos in the country (Cohen, 2006, p.169 and Kymlicka, 2006, p.55). Political parties who support ethnic/identity-based federal power structures have propounded and agreed to share an idea in their social media texts that:

Since Ethiopia is a multilingual nation, it requires an ethno- linguistic federal state arrangement. The federal government ensures that power is represented based on regional entities. In this arrangement, the federal constitution is a covenant between nations, nationalities, granting each nation and nationality the right to self-administration and the right to use their constitutional rights, as well as the responsibility to uphold other constitutional mandates (TPLF⁴, OLF⁵).

The provocateurs of ethno-nationalist selected social media activists discursively describe the relevance of ethnic based political power composition over unionist ideological views in their texts. They argue and show a clear stance that ‘all Ethiopian nations, nationalities, and people should stand together to keep the agreed-upon covenant of the EPRDF from disintegration, since the ruling system and its political ideology guarantees freedom of self-administration, the right to self- determination, and the people’s right to secede (PAT1⁶, & PAT2⁷). Supporting this ideological view and hegemonic power structure, some activists and political leaders in their online political communication texts contend that since Ethiopia is a failed state, a transitional government and a transitional justice has to be established (PAT2, EDP⁸, OLF⁹).

When we critically examine competing nationalist ideological views from the aforementioned excerpts in critical discourse perspectives, we have found the discourse of divergence and polarized political parallelism across political actors. There is an empirical difference of viewpoints in line with their respective ideological and political convictions. Unionist political ideology viewers follow an accommodating (inclusion) discursive strategy of nation building through using reconciliation, negotiation, inclusive identity, and inclusive national dialogue. This finding is supported by Wodak’s (1997) analytical framework of constructive discursive strategies. In this regard, civic nationalist political parties and activists profoundly utilize constructive discourse strategies such as reconciliation, promotion of peace, and togetherness to foster nation building and national unity. Conversely, some selected ethno-nationalist political leaders use a divisive and deceptive rhetorical discursive strategy to divide the national state structure and power relations based on regional ethnic and identity lines.

After a meticulous conceptualization and critical examination of the sampled excerpts, three dominant discursive strategies have been inductively identified. These are constructive/accommodative, Ethnocentric/divisive, and genericizing discursive strategies. Constructive/accommodative discursive strategy emphasizes on rationalizing the instrumental accounts of the widely accepted practices within a particular sociopolitical context and promotes unity, solidarity and capitalizes on constructing national identity (Richardson & Wodak, 2009). When we critically comprehend the aforementioned excerpts used by Pan-Ethiopians provocateurs of political actors, they discursively emphasize on nation building, reconciliation, togetherness, inclusive identity, national dialogue, negotiation, and uniting attributes among others.

However, ethno-nationalist thinkers use ethnocentric/divisive discursive strategies to reproduce and transform the established national identity towards other forms of identity using ethnicity as a major political instrument. Through using annihilation and othering discursive categorization of ‘us & them’ (in-group favoritism and out-group-derogation), ethno-nationalist political actors intensify divisions and fragmentations by ethnicizing politics, tensions, controversies and disputes based on identity lines. Van Dijk (2001, 2004) four-ideological theory of analysis supports the findings of this study, which focuses primarily on emphasizing the positive things about ‘us’ and the negative things about ‘them’ in group discourse categories. In this continuum, ethno-nationalist political party leaders and activists discursively propagate the discourse of group categorizations by positively emphasizing about the importance of ethnicity and identity while de-emphasizing the positive aspects of civic nationalist/unionist views of unity, nation building and togetherness.

Furthermore, selected ethno-nationalist political actors follow an instrumentalist nationalism approaches for constructing political identities and ideologies. Similarly, genericizing discursive strategies have been dominantly used in online political communication texts of ethno-nationalist political actors. They exclusively enable oneself to think beyond being swamped by trivial, superficial things and focus on the root causes. Thus, ethno-nationalist political party leaders and activists stress on the root causes of historical narratives and tries to conspire on bringing political reverse through ethnic and identity deixis. Strengthening the findings of this study, Connor (1994), Huddy (2011), Kenny (2014), and Nandi and Platt (2016) argue that political identity is used and constituted in political discourse communication to reconstruct, represent, and shape people’s sense of relevance to their identities.

Regarding national identity formation and political structure, Ruth Wodak (2009) distinguishes four sociological macro-levels of discursive strategies; namely constructive, perpetuating, transformational, and destructive. Contextualizing to the Ethiopian context, through discursive strategies, political party leaders and activists can construct, reproduce, represent, deconstruct, and transform their own political identity in order to shape voters and followers. In spite of the fact that political identity is a socially constructed phenomenon, Pan-Ethiopianism identity thinkers focuses on a growing nationalist sense of nation building by narrowing down the erroneous historical narratives articulated by politicians.

However, some selected ethno-nationalist political leaders and activists discursively promote the vexed question of identity, and the politics of belongingness. Regarding the aforementioned ideas, Van Dijk (1998, & 2006) identified dichotomous categorization of people as a strategy for constructing political identity in his ideological square of discourse system. In line with this study, ethno-nationalist political party leaders and extremist activists utilize genericizing discursive strategies for their political communication which dominantly emphasized on labeling or blurring others.

When we examine based on van Leuween’s (2008) critical discourse frameworks, exclusionist and inclusionist political discourse strategies have been evidently observed in Ethiopian online political communication among political actors through the use of a constitutive component of positive self-presentation and pursues negative others presentation. In line with this point of political thinking, a selected ethno-nationalist political party member in his social media texts highlights his claims that ‘Ethiopia government adopted ethnic federalism and redesigned the country along ethnic lines since it took political power in 1991’ (NaMA). Owing to this:

Organizing the federal and the regional states based on ethnocentric and identity lines leads to the competing claims of ‘for and against’ the system as well as ethnic clientelism where different groups fights to place their own representatives in key political and economic positions. This division later developed in to a generic categorization of ‘us and them’ narrative discourses (EDP¹⁰).

As a result of such genericizing categorization, the politics of belongingness becomes the most dominantly emerged political communication discourse in the selected social media texts. The following Figure 1 shows clear thematic categorizations of political polarizations.

Figure 1. The result of thematic categorization of polarized views among political actors.

The above figue evidently describes how polarized political views and ethno-centric categorization between ‘us and them’ leads to fragmentation and later emerge in to the co-construction of the discourse of politics of belongingness in contemporary Ethiopian context. In view of this, ethnicity and identity can be discursively seen as the major contested political terrain in the current Ethiopian political realm.

State fragmentation vs the discourse of political interregnum

The de-facto Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) conceived Ethiopian history from 1991 onwards in a very different way than previous regimes, based on its nationalist discourse in terms of ‘national operation thesis’ which is derived from the Stalinist theory of nationalities, as opposed to other competing interpretations of Ethiopia’s imperial period of ‘nation building thesis’ and ‘colonial thesis’ as well. In light of this, John Young (1997) wrote a book titled ‘Peasant Revolution in Ethiopia the Tigray People’s Liberation Front 1975-1991’. The central thesis of the book was the role played by TPLF was crucial to the success of Tigrayan peasant revolution and he focused on state centralization by Amhara elites from the central Ethiopia province of Shoa between the late 19^th century and the 1974 collapse of the old regime, Tigray had become a peripheralised underdeveloped region (p.20). Despite the fact that John Young wrote and stated Amhara’s state centralization, it was completely far from the real truth and it was a political conspiracy that Amhara elites did not controlled the whole central power. In the meantime Amhara region in general and the people of Amhara in particular were ignored and underdeveloped like other regions mentioned above.

Apparently, EPRDF constitution recognized the ‘rights of nations, nationalities and peoples, and supported decentralization policies from which autonomous (NNPs) should benefit from the regime (Clapham, 2002a). Although EPRDF has shown a sign of diverging from its predecessors, the regime has been facing internal ideological division and widespread political dysfunction among opposition political parties. Supporting the above mentioned assumptions, selected political parties and activists in their social media texts discursively assert and share their view points that:

The year 2015–2018 ushered in strange and a new emerging ideological and political paradigm in Ethiopia. The country was propelled by internal and external political tensions leading to unprecedented popular uprisings, social violence, and revolt were witnessed and escalated in many regional corners over time. These movements were highly sparked by the use of social media as a political campaign tool by both opposition political actors and political activists (EDP¹⁰; BRDJ¹¹; ADFM¹²; PAO1¹³& PAO2¹⁴).

Following a wider political and ideological crisis and the disintegration of the EPRDF from the central power structure, the old guards of TPLF fled to Mekele and establish a de-facto state by forming a new political alliance with federalist forces (extreme ethno nationalist forces from South, Oromia, Gambela and Benishangul Regions). Due to political power and other vested interests, the group comes up with the intransigent discourse of the idea of transitional government in Ethiopia. Comprehending this political scenario, TPLF and other radical ethno-nationalist allies brilliantly demonstrate divergent ideological views in their social media texts as follows:

In the contemporary Ethiopian circumstances, establishing a provisional government is essential in order to escape from the existential national threat and restore national peace, unity, and political stability. We should prioritize national consensus and reconciliation in order to build a solid nation and a peaceful democratic transition process. As a nation, we must to struggle against political conspiracies, and psychological crisis in order to bring sustainable socio-political and economic stability (EDP¹⁵, OFC¹⁶, and TPLF¹⁷).

Strengthening the above underlying ideas, federalist political allies argue that ‘the joint federalist forces constitute a national guarantee for securing both the people and the government from fragmentation. They also keep constitutional covenants in the existed political environment by arguing that the current government abuses power, and his suspension of election 2021 due to Covid-19 was not fair and not supported by constitutional laws’ (TPLF¹⁸; OFC¹⁹). Though their argument focuses on nation building thesis, creating peace and bringing political stability in the country, pragmatically they were found weak on working in the way they discursively communicated in their online texts. When we critically examine the above text using Wodak’s (1997) analytical framework, we found out that the text is mainly confined with destructive discourse strategies. Therefore, we can understood that the federalist group movement rather dismantles the country by kindling ethnic and identity based violence among various regional entities. They manifested their power hegemonies in fragmenting the nation and creating political appeasement with the current ruling system.

Nevertheless, the newly emerged government has brought considerably a better breakthrough in the discourse of political communication. The 2018 new reform ushered in a political discourse of shifting hegemonies from arrogancy to decency. In view of this, the discourse of high ideological polarization of political arrogancy and a relative decency was clearly seen in the online political communication texts. Though relative shifts have seen in online political communication and discursive political participation practices, Ethiopia’s existing political reform has been hampered by both internal and external pressures from the ruling party and political actors. As a result of this prolonged scenario, the country entered into a period of political instability and hegemonial confusion which is literally connoted as political interregnum. The above underlying assumptions have been supported with Antonio Gramsci’s concept of ‘interregnum’, which departs from the model of ‘punctured equilibrium’ to analyze the specific political dynamics of non-hegemonic periods between the breakdown of one ideological order and the emergence of a new political upheaval. In such a fluctuating landscape, the existing government must still react (Gramsci & Buttigieg, 1992; Meng, 2019).

When we discursively contextualize to the Ethiopian case, though Medemer (መደመር), which is synergy has emerged as a dominant political philosophy in post reform, contemporarily Ethiopia has been experiencing almost the old political fabrics and found in a state of political confusion which is regime survival. Despite a wider political space in the digital media sphere, a burgeoning elite and political extremism, as well as polarized ideological camps have been evidently witnessed. Consistent to the underlying arguments, the discourse of competing narratives of state fragmentation versus nation building thesis have been noticed among ethno-nationalist and unionists respectively. Realizing this fact, the current fabric of political interregnum in Ethiopia shows this era as one of a sustained political crisis and period of confusion, with the old political hegemonic equilibrium shattered without a clear sign of a new emerging hegemonic project capable of taking over.

The paradox of political communication during Ethiopian and Tigray election

Digital public sphere plays a critical role in the discursive trend of political communication. The rapid development of online political communication via social media sparked the current Ethiopian political discourse. Regarding both elections, social media can be utilized as a driving force for major structural and political reforms in pre, during, and post-election periods. Though there were distinct political paradoxes in the political discourse of Tigray and Ethiopia elections which took place on September 4, 2020 and June 22, 2021 respectively, social media platform plays a crucial role in mobilization, participation, political campaign, and political engagement among citizens.

Accordingly, a sense of political marginalization has emerged among ethno-nationalist groups and Pan-Ethiopianism with violent outbreaks raising questions on the need for power competition and maintaining the status-quo. Political contestations over access, use and control of resources are central to the development of debates among federalist political allies and unionists. This power competition discourse in Ethiopia becomes intense during election periods. Using ethnicity as a major contesting terrain, ethno-nationalist political party leaders and their respective allies tried to establish a de-facto state. Applying Fairclough’s (2003) dimensional frameworks of discourse and socio- cultural context, as well as Van Dijk (1998) discursive analysis of the text, we found that the online political communication texts of ethno-nationalist proponents evidently demonstrate the ethnicization of politics. More important to this, they declare official war or intra-state conflict between reformist wings through downgrading national origin in favor of ethnic belongingness.

Supporting the above underpinning issues, divergent political reforms have taken place at a staggering pace in the course of the past three years. Among other things, the Tigray election and Ethiopian national election were the major overarching political departures. Regarding the election, selected ethno-nationalist political allies from TPLF state that:

In order to build a new and historical de-facto Tigray state, we formally began the election campaign. In light of this, 5 Tigrian political parties and 11 individual political candidates were participated for 152 seats of political power. Accordingly, the people of Tigray show their strong moral support though the period was hard in accordance with Covid-19. This regional election was the election in which we determine our opportunities by ourselves and it was a right to self-determination and a solid manifestation of constitutional rights (TPLF²⁰).

In the above excerpt, we can critically understand the discourse of polarized power contestation and power rivalry among ethno-nationalists and reformist political wings. In a wider political spectrum, reshaping the political landscape in the discourse of ethnic belongingness is an overarching political divide in contemporary Ethiopian politics. The following excerpt is a clear indication and a defining feature of political extremism and warmongering as a threat to the national state. To this end:

All Tigrians should join hands, reinforce solidarity and strengthen their resistance against impositions. The federal government exerted unreserved attempts to jeopardize the election process; we have to be prepared for all types of defenses and defend any aggressive move while conducting our regional election (TPLF²¹).

When we scrutinize the discourse of political communication of the above text using Wodak’s (1997) dimensional frameworks, we found that ethno-nationalist political party leaders and activists evidently use discursive strategies to perpetuate the ever-existing political narratives, struggling for regime survival rather than transforming the nation from ethnocentric to civic nationalist political philosophies. The text vividly shows the act of political intimidation, dominance and threat against the unionist political camp. In the counter discourse, Pan-Ethiopianist political party leaders in their social media texts share their unique perspectives that ‘our complex political crisis and political paradoxes might be reconciled by inclusive national dialogue and political negotiation’ (EDP²², ECFSJD²³). Subsequently, they illustrate their potential threats in social media texts that:

There is no politics if the nation gets fragile and dismantled; we are in a critical period where we must maintain our people and our country. Instead of competing for political power dominance, we as political party leaders need to strive to protect the people and the nation from the existential threats and better to transform into a political concessions. Though election is an option-less option, political negotiation, and reconciliation might be a better mechanism for rebuilding a prosperous and peaceful nation at large (ECFSJD²⁴, EDP²⁵).

Based on this radicalized political power alignment, some selected ethno-nationalist political party leaders discursively put their political ideologies that have been emanated from the canons of Marxist-Leninist ethnic oriented power structure. Regarding political negotiation and abusive power of the ruling party, we can argue that:

We might communicate and negotiate on divergent political issues; however, we did not negotiate and compromise on our rights particularly on the rights of self-determination; this is a red light. The election is our basic political concern. There is no any constitutional article that prohibits us from election, and we confirm that the National Election Board of Ethiopia (NEBE) is an instrument for facilitating the election process not a substantive institute to decide and grant the right to make and the authority to hold an election (TPLF²⁶).

In the lens of critical discourse analysis, the above excerpt vividly denounces the political ideology of coming together through aspiring the leftist ideological threads and the prompted notion of ‘Greater Tigire’. Furthermore, they considered themselves as ‘infallible semi-gods’ that limitlessly exploit and manipulate political power through playing by ethnic/identity card. Though the Ethiopian government tried to outlaw the Tigray election by issuing different press statements, the TPLF’s vanguard leadership refused to accept the commands from the reformist wing. Conversely, they have conducted an election on September 4, 2020, and officially declared TPLF political party leaders as a de-facto state of Tigry without the recognition of NEBE.

Realizing the above underpinning political assumptions, some selected activists on the other hand reveal the discourse of election competition in their texts. Accordingly, activists who support unionist’s political ideology claim their political views that ‘how can we conduct free, fair, and democratic elections and continue as a unified nation without negotiating on the national flag, agreeing on constitutional issues, and without reaching an agreement on federal state structure and capital city issues’ (PAA1²⁷ & PAA2²⁸).

Despite the fact that Ethiopia’s national election 2021 was conducted under a critical political condition, the discourses of extreme untold political atrocities were seen in the overall political communication, notably in the social media. Abusive nature of political communication and extreme elite and political party polarizations were discursively witnessed in the digital public sphere particularly in the official Facebook pages of political party leaders and activists.

Discussion and conclusion

The analysis reveals that there was relatively a better political avenue for freedom of expression and thoughts in the digital media public sphere for exercising political communication in the last three years. Despite the fact that there was a relative political space for inter-party discussions, debates and dialogues, a growing political polarization was seen in political communication discourses. In this regard, the political communication employed by political party leaders and activists in the digital public sphere was not structured rather it was sentimental views led by populist strategies. In the recent development of social media practice, political communication often takes the form of sentiment-driven expressions, where emotions and personal opinions play a significant role instead of communicating on political ideologies. This polarized online political communication significantly influences the change and continuity of Ethiopian politics. Consistent to this finding, a study by Semir (2020) shows political polarization among political elites and activists were a major obstacle to a smooth transition to the existing system.

The findings of this study also shows polarized and radicalized thoughts were discursively communicated in the social media pages of political actors. In this continuum, the discourse of online political communication in Ethiopia has become increasingly polarized with the political fabrics of ethnicity, identity and race among the extreme ethno-nationalist and the civic nationalist political and ideological clashes. Subsequently, the finding of the study reveals that the trend of political communication in the social media platform was not genuine enough to entertain diverse political views. Though digital media platforms have provided a fertile ground for the expression of divergent views, radicalized, polarized and conflict-redden political communications have been pragmatically observed in the selected political parties and activists official Facebook pages. Confined to this study, other research findings indicate that though there was a wider political communication space in new media, unprecedented extreme political thoughts and political party enmity were observed in the recent political reform (Taye, 2017; Semir, 2019; Dugda, 2021). When we realize the existed discourse of political communication thesis of EPRDF from the selected excerpts until the recent reform dynamism, we can understand that they followed patrimonial political power structure which was based on ethnic and identity lines.

Correspondingly, the 2020 Tigray and 2021 Ethiopian elections lay a critical juncture in the existing political communication landscape. Subsequent to this, deep frustrations, intimidations, and overarching political divides based on ethnicity and identity lines put a greater challenge in the discourse of political communication in the country. Among the two competing political camps, the nation building/Ethiopianist camp advocates a more convergent set of policies aimed at maintaining national unity through dialogue and reconciliation. On the other hand, the ethno- nationalist camp prioritizes the realization of ethnic self-determination and power consolidation and perhaps emphasizes the divisive discursive strategies of ‘us vs. them’ categorizations. Similarly, a study conducted by Semir (2020) supports the underlying findings by clearly indicating the contested views of ethno-nationalist and civic nationalist ideologies in shaping the political scene of state formation and nation building.

The discourse of political communication among political actors and opinion leaders show relatively a critical increment since after the 2018 Ethiopian political reform in the digital media sphere. The trend of political engagement, participation, mobilization and making political campaign trails via social media landscapes has shown a growing indication. Furthermore, the discourse of ethnic politics/ethnic belongingness becomes a perennial question in Ethiopia and the issue of identity is contemporarily in a vexed condition.

Moreover, the dominance of identity or ethnic politics over citizen politics has been recurrently propounded in the prospective face of Ethiopian political discourse. The main triggering factors for extreme political polarization thoughts among political actors are attributed with past political narratives, ethno-centric state and political formation, uncontrolled online political communication discourse, and extreme interest for power competition. These factors lead the country in to a never ending violent ethnic conflicts, political instability, internal displacements, and mass atrocities in different regional states.

As an implication, both political party leaders and activists should manage their political communication rhetoric through narrowing their extreme and polarized thoughts. Political actors also need to look inward to ensure their political ideologies as well as political communications should be inclusive, controlled, non-discriminatory, and participatory. Most importantly, to normalize the current political landscape, the government should prioritize diversified critical actions like; allowing consistent inter-party political debates, dialogues, and discussions to better foster a more constructive and transparent political environment.

Furthermore, actively supporting and sustaining the culture and positive trends of political communication through the digital public sphere would further bridge the gap between ideologically polarized groups. Since, the digital media sphere in Ethiopia has become a breeding ground for polarized discursive thoughts and political communication rhetoric’s; it requires concerted efforts from various stakeholders, including, the ruling government, opposition political parties, activists, civil society organizations, and digital media platforms.

Therefore, this study suggests bridging the gap of polarized views and narrowing down the extreme discursive thoughts for maintaining the nation from disintegration. Overall, in both elections, mere political communication mantras of political labeling have been propounded in extreme ethno-nationalists and unionists groups. The unionist wings of political party leaders label the ethno-nationalist forces as perpetrators since ethnic based political communication orientation perpetuates clear polarizations and political radicalizations. As a result, this study can be utilized as a sprint board and baseline for future investigators for comprehensively studying both the theoretical and practical aspects of online political communication practices and its discursive strategies. Since political communication and discourse can have a wider impact in the emerging Ethiopia political agony, future studies can explore the political scene of public opinion, individual’s attitude, social identity, and voting behavior.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Dessalegn Yeshambel Wassie

Dessalegn Yeshambel Wassie is a PhD. Candidate in Media and Communication Studies at Department of Journalism and Communication, Bahir Dar University. Dessalegn has been thought journalism and communication courses at several state universities. He published more than three academic articles in a Scopus indexed journals. He had served as head department to Public Relations and Strategic Communication and Research Review Committee at Wolaita Sodo University.

Mulatu Alemayehu Moges

Mulatu Alemayehu Moges is an Associate Professor of Journalism and Communication in the Department of Journalism and Media Studies, University of Oslo, Oslo Norway. Mulatu was a media practitioner. He got his PhD from University of Oslo, Norway in 2017; and currentlyhe is a teaching staff at Oslomet University.

Biset Ayalew Nigatu

Biset Ayalew Nigatu is an Assistant Professor of Journalism and Communication at Department of Journalism and Communication, Bahir Dar University, Ethiopia. Biset had served as head of the department to Journalism and communication at Bahir Dar University.

Notes

1 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php

2 https://www.facebook.com/ETHZema/posts/928063631096954.

3 https://www.facebook.com/tayebogale.arega/posts/1322677571275766.

4 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3291869510865290.

5 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

6 https://www.facebook.com/alulasolomonk/posts/pfbid.

7 https://www.facebook.com/abraha.desta.148/posts/pfbid0xWu1uTXJELjgdrgXx39NomcVyYdzyMU5vor3u9VmMnHvYjsziNhNuiUqC53M3f3nl.

8 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

9 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

10 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

11 https://www.facebook.com/yuri86/posts/10214738872580464.

12 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

13 https://www.facebook.com/tayebogale.arega/videos/1538757909667730.

14 https://www.facebook.com/tayedendea.StateMinisteratMoP/posts/820898175193950.

15 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

16 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.ofc.

17 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3275413119177596.

18 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3275413119177596.

19 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3196736323711943.

20 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3457255184326721.

21 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3360637467321827.

22 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

23 https://www.facebook.com/ETHZema/posts/928982247671759.

24 https://www.facebook.com/ETHZema/posts/928063631096954.

25 https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php.

26 https://www.facebook.com/tplf.officia/posts/3275413119177596.

27 https://www.facebook.com/Getachew.Shiferaw.Offical/posts/4652611964767766.

28 https://www.facebook.com/belay.manaye/posts/2099114843540276.