Ethiopia: 'Landslide' poll win

2005-05-16 23:17

Addis Ababa - Ethiopia's ruling party declared late on Monday it had won a "landslide victory" in hotly contested weekend general elections and would shortly form a new government.

"We have won the necessary seats to form a federal government; we accept the verdict of the people," the electoral committee of Prime Minister Meles Zenawi's Ethiopian Peoples Revolutionary Front (EPRDF) said in a statement.

"We will continue to work diligently (for) the development of the people's economic, social life in the four regional states where we have won and at the federal level," said the statement.

"We will evaluate our mistakes and policies as to what we have lost in the places that are won by the opposition," it said.

The statement was released after Ethiopia's two main opposition groups claimed to have won as many as 61 parliamentary posts, including 20 of Addis Ababa's 23 seats.

- AFP