When citizens cannot move freely, the state loses its most basic measure of legitimacy. Ethiopia today is a country divided by mobility, where the rulers travel above, and the ruled are trapped below.
In recent weeks, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and senior Prosperity Party (PP) officials and long-time confidants have embarked on a series of high-profile tours to luxury resorts and heritage sites scattered across Ethiopia’s far corners and built under the Prime Minister’s Gebeta Lehager (Dine for Ethiopia) initiative. The initiative incorporates these complementary luxury resorts like the Halala Kella resort, Gorgora Eco Resort, and the latest, Sof Omar Luxury Lodge and Cave Project, among others. They are not only there to transform the country’s natural and historical treasures into world-class destinations, but are telegraphed as the greatest opportunity for Ethiopians to “discover” their own country.
In principle, these projects aim to blend eco-tourism with community empowerment. In practice, however, they have become the stage for what many see as performative nationalism, a carefully choreographed display of “unity” and “prosperity” that contrasts sharply with the lived experiences of millions of Ethiopians who cannot move freely across their own country.
During his latest address to the House of Peoples’ Representatives on 28 October, Prime Minister Abiy offered a revealing metaphor: “we lead not as a taxi driver but as a bus driver,” he said, describing Ethiopia as a bus under the direct control of his government. But for countless Ethiopians – truckers, traders, students, and patients – this metaphor rings painfully hollow. Under this “driving,” large stretches of Ethiopia’s transport network have become zones of fear, extortion, and paralysis.
Just a month earlier, in September 2025, the Prime Minister himself had convened national security chiefs to discuss the worsening situation of “robberies and kidnappings” on the country’s roads. “The movement of people and goods is crucial for Ethiopia’s prosperity,” the statement he released after the meeting warned, promising for better coordination between security forces and the public to “systematically control robberies, kidnappings, and obstacles that occur in various places”. The acknowledgment was welcome, but the crisis has only deepened since.Across Ethiopia’s main commercial and passenger routes, particularly in Oromia region attacks, abductions, and road closures have become routine. In May 2025 alone, drivers’ associations reported more than 30 truck drivers were abducted in just two weeks on different routes in Amhara region, with dozens more incidents recorded elsewhere. Many roads remain closed for days or even weeks at a time.
According to recent findings by the state-appointed Ethiopian Human Rights Commission (EHRC), road closures, curfews, and widespread insecurity have severely restricted movement across multiple regions, a systemic collapse of safe passage that has fractured trade, family connections, and daily life. Earlier, officials from the Ministry of Revenues and the Customs Commission admitted before Parliament that hundreds of illegal checkpoints are now operated by regional authorities and other groups, especially in Oromia, using them for informal toll collection. It is a striking confession, but safe to say the federal government has effectively lost control over movement on its own highways.
A joint study released in July this year by the Ministry of Trade and Regional Integrationand the Ministry of Transport and Logistics has revealed the existence of a staggering 237 illegal checkpoints across Ethiopia, many established by regional police, militia structures, and local administrations under the pretext of creating “youth employment.”The Prime Minister’s metaphor of the bus driver may be meant to symbolize his ability to galvanize “unity” and laser-focused direction, but the lived reality for those who actually drive the roads in Ethiopia tells a different story. There is no better place to comprehended this contradiction than a regular visit to a poplar social media channel known as Ye Shoferoch Dimts (the voice of drivers). It is a channel where the stories of curtailed hours, ransom demands ranging from tens of thousands to millions of birr, detentions, beatings, and constant interruptions truckers come to light. For them, each journey is a gamble with violence and extortion.
While the ruling elite pose for photo opportunities at Sof Omar Caves or inaugurate new eco-lodges amid armed escorts and helicopters flights, those who move the country’s goods and people are stranded, endangered, or extorted. The narrative of “unity” and “nation-discovery” collapses into contradiction: a government celebrating mobility, while millions are immobilized. The Prosperity Party’s heritage tours and tourism campaigns are choreographed expressions of performative nationalism; a spectacle of “rediscovering Ethiopia” that assumes a secure and accessible country is a dissonance between elite tourism and basic immobility.But freedom of movement is not a privilege; it is the foundation upon which all other civic and economic rights depend. The EHRC’s findings and endless reports by this publication and other media outlets make clear that road travel across large parts ofthe country is increasingly unsafe and restricted by state and non-state armed actors and illegal levies. When the state cannot ensure safe circulation (when movement itself becomes hostage to violence) citizenship becomes a form of containment.
Simply put, a government’s legitimacy is not measured by the luxury of its lodges or the pageantry of its “nation-discovery” tours. It is measured by whether its citizens can move freely and safely within their own borders.
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