KILITI, Ethiopia — Ethiopian prosecutors on Monday opened their case against jailed opposition figures accused in an alleged coup plot with evidence that they said proved that the group tried to subvert the constitution.
In a courtroom outside Addis Ababa where the trial of the 111 defendants has been moved, prosecutors said that the accused fomented deadly post-election violence last year by trying to undermine the credibility of the polls.
The prosecution presented videotapes of news conferences in which leaders of the opposition Coalition for Unity and Democracy (CUD) allegedly sought to impugn the integrity of the May 15 vote and set the stage for a revolt.
“With these clips we will show to the court how the accused tried to defy constitutional rule and institutions, including the national election board, even before the elections were set in motion,” said prosecutor Shimeles Kemal.
“We will also prove the accused were trying to agitate the public to rise against the constitutional rule by citing the examples of public uprisings in Ukraine and Georgia,” he said, before playing the videotapes.
“They used the elections as a means to overthrow the constitution,” Shimeles said, maintaining that the accused had stirred up violence by insisting that flawed polls were inevitable.
Under Ethiopian law, journalists are barred from publishing specific details of evidence presented in court but the content of the tapes was widely reported before, during and after the elections and the violence that ensued.
CUD leaders, nearly all of whom are charged in the case, had long complained of deficiencies in the election process, accusing the electoral officials of bias and then claiming that the vote was marred by massive ruling party fraud.
After the results were certified, they called for mass nationwide protests during which at least 84 people were killed – many by police – in violence that erupted at demonstrations in June and November.
The government responded with a huge crackdown on the opposition, arresting its leaders and journalists and civil society members perceived to be sympathetic to the CUD and accusing them of fomenting a coup.
The 111 defendants – 101 individuals, four political parties and six newspapers accused – now on trial face various charges ranging from conspiracy to committing outrage against the constitution, high treason and genocide.
Twenty-five of them are being tried in absentia and the evidence presented on Monday referred to the charge of “outrage against the constitution or the constitutional order” that all defendants face.
Nearly all of the accused have refused to enter pleas but reject the charges against them, maintaining that they are political.
The trial, which began last week and is to resume on Tuesday, was moved from the capital to Kaliti, about 25 kilometers (15 miles) south of Addis Ababa so the venue is closer to the prison in which the defendants are being held.
