Abay Tsehaye to be named ambassador to U.S

The Prime Minister Meles administration is busy slotting Ethiopian ambassadors for key assignments across the globe. Abay Tsehaye, National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister and Executive Committee member of the Tigrayan Peoples’ Liberation Front.
(TPLF), is expected to be named Ethiopian ambassador to U.S, sources told Zethiopia.

Abay Tsehaye who wrote the infamous manifesto of TPLF, supporting the independence of Eritrea, Born at Axum, he attended high school in Mek’ele. Abay had been a student activist during his years at Haile Selassie University (now Addis Ababa University) in the early 1970s, being a member of the Tigrayan University Students’ Association. According to Aregawi Berhe, he was one of seven students who met on 14 September 1974 at an inconspicuous cafe in the Piazza district to create the Tigrayan Peoples’ Liberation Front.Abay was selected to be one of the first group to be given military training by the Eritrean People’s Liberation Front, arriving in Asmara, January 1975. With Meles Zenawi and Sibhat Nega, Abay was one of founders of the Marxist-Leninist League of Tigray in July, 1985.Following the end of the Ethiopian Civil War, Abay became Minister of Federal Affairs in 2001. Tsehaye is also an executive member of the Central Committee of the Tigrayan Peoples’ Liberation Front.

As written in the webblogEthiopia, After the war with Eritrea from 1998 to 2000 Abay Tsehaye had a common cause with the TPLF dissidents who then defended an ultra-nationalist position, opposing Meles Zenawi. Consequently, he found himself put into the sidelines. Nevertheless, whereas the other dissidents were sacked from their functions and also excluded from the TPLF, Abay Tsehaye made honourable amends with Meles Zenawi and rallied behind him. This led to his being readmitted to the central committee of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, and subsequently being given the portfolio of Minister for Federal Affairs and National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister. Since then, he has not ceased to rise in importance in the circles of the Ethiopian executive.