Less than a month after the death of Ghanaian president, John Atta Mills, the prime minister of Ethiopia, Meles Zenawi has been confirmed dead.
The late Prime Minister died at the age of 57 on Monday, August 20, 2012, after reportedly contracting an infection.
Questions arose concerning his health when he did not attend African Union summit meetings in the Ethiopian capital Addis Ababa in July 2012.
Opposition groups claimed that he may have already died as of July 16 while undergoing treatment in Belgium, while other reports said he was in Germany.
He dominated Ethiopian public life since
the 1990s, as president and then prime minister, when he took power as
the leader of rebels who ousted communist leader Mengistu Haile Mariam in 1991.
Ethiopia became a staunch US ally,
receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in aid over the years, and
hosting the US military drones that patrolled East Africa.
He was austere, hardworking and with a discipline acquired from years spent in the guerrilla movement, he almost never smiled.
Meles Zenawi was awarded the Good
Governance Award of the Global Coalition for Africa for leading Ethiopia
along a democratic path during the challenging period of transition.
His Deputy Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn will become the acting head of Ethiopia’s government.
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