Title: Comparative Study of Ethiopian Election 2020 Postponement due to COVID-19 with Wisconsin Election in USA

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has affected the socio-economic, health, and political process across the globe. Millions of dead, life disrupted, economic crises, and the democratic system were affected. The World Health Organization (WHO) report shows about 140 million new cases, 3 million death reports, and 80 million recovered. COVID-19 pandemic has also caused challenges to political activity in many countries. The conflict between the right to vote and public health, the globalization process, uncertainties in the people’s democratic rights such as the right to movement, right to vote, the election process, and the whole democratic processes have been disrupted in many countries. Its vaccine was only developed recently. The undemocratic practices have been exposed during the pandemic. The authoritarian regimes caused a severe violation of human rights, marginalization of minority rights, suspending of various social activities. The study shows about half of the elections scheduled for 2020 were suspended. States with fewer resources, technologically less equipped, and with no alternative voting systems were affected most during the pandemic. The COVID-19 pandemic has also created a favorable condition for authoritarian regimes where they extend their term in offices by using the health and safety of the public as a pretext. The challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic have affected both democratic, undemocratic, and underdeveloped countries similarly, but with different ranges. It has also been a challenge to the democratization process in many countries. This is tough especially for countries that took them decades to change their political landscape. The negative impacts of COVID-19 and why the ruling party was interested primarily and has pushed for election postponement, why it was unanimously opposed by the ruling parties, human rights activists, and human rights institutions will be analyzed. The statutory provisions regarding the election and how the ruling party had interpreted them on the pretext of public health and the human rights crisis followed and the take by both federal and regional state are also detailed. The paper also analyzes the Wisconsin vote extension process, legal challenges encountered are spelled out. The paper mainly focuses to reflect on how the democratic election process has been tested in Wisconsin and the efforts made to overcome those challenges. I also explored how the election was illegitimately postponed and the legal and political challenges that followed it, in Ethiopia. The current massive human rights violation and the civil war as the outcome of election-related disputes in Ethiopia. The leadership failures and the mistake made was exposed. The paper also contains a comparison of how the state agencies managed to restore the democratic election process in the USA and the hurdles caused by the political party. Some of the recommendations and critical arguments are also forwarded. Thus, legislators should be aware of an unprecedented incident like COVID-19 and provide remedies to easily overcome the challenge. I will discuss the major pitfalls focusing on whether the election 2020 was postponed based on constitutional term limit or not, whether the COVID-19 was a real threat or used as political means, what would have been a better option when the constitution is silent, and the procedure followed by parliament in postponing the election and why other opposition political parties criticized the election postponement. Finally, I would compare the problems related to COVID-19 in extending legally provided mandates and decisions thereafter. Lastly, I will forward the best alternative recommendation regarding the Ethiopian election 2020.