Throughout history, Ethiopians have fought with external enemies numerous times but also frequently with each other. Even after the birth of modern Ethiopia, war, insurrection, and rebellion has continued. This infighting has drained the nation’s resources and withheld it from development and progress. Not long ago, Ethiopia hosted one of the bloodiest civil wars in history. The military spending during in the 1970s and 1980s drained the national budget and left Ethiopians to crawl into the poverty trap.

During the 5th national election held in 2015, the ruling Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) and its allies scored a landslide victory by winning all the seats in Parliament as well as in regional and city councils. A year after EPRDF achieved this clean sweep, however, a series of nonviolent protests sparked off in the nation, later turning deadly. Witnessing this in a country run by a government supposedly almost unanimously elected by voters just a year prior was surprising for Ethiopians and the international community alike.

Aiming to improve the stability of the banking industry by creating well capitalized banks that can mobilize massive financial resources that are needed to speed up economic growth, the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) recently raised the minimum paid-up capital requirement for banks ten-fold to ETB5 billion with various grace periods.

After decades of indecisiveness and partiality, the National Bank of Ethiopia (NBE) was seemingly returning to its senses as of the last two years. Close to 60 directives have been revised under reform initiatives of the current government, laxing its previous restrictive bars. Nonetheless, the last few months have proven that the central bank was only partially baptized.