Tesfaye Gebre Kidan

Tesfaye Gebre Kidan ( . Äthiop : ተስፋዬ ገብረ ኪዳን , * 1935 ?; † 2. June 2004 ) was an Ethiopian general who for four weeks vice president and in May 1991 for a week President was from Ethiopia.

Professional military

Colonel Tesfaye Gebre Kidan had military successes in Somalia and Eritrea . He was a member of the Derg , the military committee that seized power with the overthrow of Emperor Haile Selassie , later ordered the execution of his officials and allegedly carried out the murder of the emperor himself. Nevertheless, Tesfaye was later no longer considered a communist "party soldier" in the narrower sense.

The Dergue carried out a red terror from 1977 to 1978 that reportedly executed an average of 100 people every night. Promoted to general, Tesfaye Gebre Kidan served as Minister of Defense in the 1980s , then became military governor and commander in chief of the 2nd Revolutionary Army in Eritrea and Tigray .

Defeats

After 1988, however, his Ethiopian government troops actually only ruled the Eritrean provincial capital Asmara , and in 1989 the hinterland of Tigray was lost to the rebels (except for Makale until March 1989 , after that only Maychew was in government hands).

He was unable to prevent the attempted coup against President Mengistu Haile Mariam in Addis Ababa and Asmara in May 1989 , but was called back to the capital to serve as president of the court martial, which sentenced the accused generals and officers to death. The Ethiopian military was purged of blood while the rebels advanced to Wollo , captured Aksum (only Gondar in the hands of government troops) and shortly afterwards stood 150 kilometers from the capital.

After an armistice from 1989–1990, the conquest of Massaua by the rebels (February 10, 1990) and Ethiopia's search for new allies (leasing of the Dahlak archipelago to Israel ) instead of the GDR , Cuba and the Soviet Union , Tesfaye became chief organizer of the "National Campaign" , a completely failed counter-offensive against the attacks of now allied Eritreans and Tigrinians.

Vice President and President

He became Vice President of the Republic just four weeks before May 21, 1991, when Mengistu fled to Zimbabwe with 5,000 supporters from rebel forces already 50 kilometers from the capital. A gathering of concerned “citizens”, including Vice President Tesfaye Gabre-Kidan and Prime Minister Tesfaye Dinka , had persuaded the President to “resign”.

Then General Tesfaye Gebre Kidan became president, but the rebels saw it as a continuation of the old regime. Tesfaye's proposal for an all-party government was rejected, and tightened curfews and perseverance calls to the army no longer saved the regime. On May 24, 1991, Asmara fell and on May 28, the rebels under Meles Zenawi marched into the capital. Tesfaye fled to the Italian embassy when the rebels seized power.

refugee

Until his death, the general was practically a prisoner in the embassy. He was killed on June 2, 2004 by Birhanu Bayeh . He was a former Dergue colleague, ex-foreign minister (replaced by Tesfaye Dinka in November 1989) and former vice-president (replaced by Tesfaye Gabre-Kidan in April 1991) who had accompanied him to the embassy 13 years earlier.