The Quest for Eternal Clauses in the Ethiopian Constitutional and Democratic Reforms

Abstract

For continuity of states, some constitutions have eternal clauses, which are
immune from amendments forever. However, the concept of eternity has
never been recognized in any of Ethiopian constitutions despite long history
of constitution-making processes. Ethiopians have been tackling to establish
a viable, constitutional, and democratic government through making and
remaking many constitutions in their political history. Among the
constitutional reforms in Ethiopia are the 1931 and 1955 Monarchical
Constitutions, the 1987 Socialist Oriented Constitution and the 1995 Federal
Oriented Constitution. The chief challenge in the Ethiopian constitutional
and democratic reforms is that the previous reforms have never been utilized
as steppingstones for the new reforms. To this date, Ethiopians have neither
developed their common constitutional culture nor recognized the eternal
clauses on important political and constitutional matters. There is no
consensus on the issue of national identity, state structure, the form of
government, language policy, regional state formation and others.
Currently, Ethiopia has also been facing multiple challenges, including
ethnic tensions, sporadic border conflicts, massive internal displacement,
drought, poverty, and gross human rights violations. For this reason, this
Article argues that Ethiopia must introduce ‘eternal constitutional clauses’
on issues of common national interests