Had the national government and Tigray state government attempted to engage in intergovernmental dialogue, things might have turned out differently.
Cyril Ramaphosa handled COVID-19 well, but more could have been done on governance, security and violent extremism.
The Ethiopian premier is manipulating ethnic rivalries to shift the agenda from democratic reform to authoritarianism.
The tensions that had been simmering between the Tigray People's Liberation Front and the Abiy administration eventually boiled over.
The country must urgently address the politics of ethnicity before it can move towards a workable democracy.
