Meles Zenawi - Background

Background

Zenawi was born in Adwa, Tigray, in northern Ethiopia, to an Ethiopian father from Adwa and a mother from Adi Quala, Eritrea. He graduated from the General Wingate High school in Addis Ababa, then studied medicine at Addis Ababa University (at the time known as Haile Selassie University) for two years before interrupting his studies in 1975 to join the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front (TPLF). Aregawi Berhe, a former member of the TPLF, notes that in their histories of the TPLF both John young and Jenny Hammond "vaguely indicate" that Meles was one of the founders of the TPLF. Aregawi insists that both he and Sibhat Nega joined the Front "months" after it was founded. While a member of the TPLF, Zenawi founded the Marxist-Leninist League of Tigray. His first name at birth was "Legesse" (thus Legesse Zenawi, Ge'ez: ለገሰ ዜናዊ legesse zēnāwī). However, he eventually became better known by his nom de guerre Meles, which he later adopted in honour of university student and fellow Tigray Meles Tekle who was executed by Mengistu's government in 1975.

The TPLF was one of many armed groups struggling against Lieutenant Colonel Mengistu Hailemariam and the Derg, the junta which governed Ethiopia. Zenawi was elected Leader of the Leadership Committee in 1979 and Leader of the Executive Committee in 1983. He was the chairperson of both the TPLF and the EPRDF after the EPRDF assumed power at the end of the Ethiopian Civil War in 1991. He was president of the Transitional Government of Ethiopia (TGE), during which Eritrea seceded from the country and the experiment of ethnic federalism started.