Author’s Note: In this commentary, I argue that Ethiopia did not enter BRICS merely to ask what BRICS could do for Ethiopia. Ethiopia entered BRICS to show the world what Ethiopia can do for BRICS—and what BRICS and Ethiopia can do together for Africa and the Global South. PM Abiy Ahmed’s message at the 2026 BRICS Summit was simple, practical and powerful. BRICS has capital, technology and enormous markets. Ethiopia has resources, land, agricultural potential, renewable energy, minerals, a large population, an expanding industrial base and a strategic location connecting Africa, the Middle East and Asia. He has put a clear question before the BRICS partners: How do we bring these assets together to create synergistic va

lue not just to benefit Ethiopia but the Global South as a whole.

What a Difference Eight Years Makes

In barely eight years, Ethiopia has moved from being largely a recipient of negative international attention to becoming an increasingly consequential participant in the emerging global order.

I remember the days when Ethiopian leaders would attend international forums and pound the table demanding the West do more for Africa—fight climate change, finance development, forgive debts, compensate developing countries and provide billions of dollars in assistance. The demand was often framed in a semi-defiant, semi-plaintive language of grievance: Africa had been exploited and rendered perpetually dependent; the international system is unfair and designed to keep Africa trapped in debt and aid; and the industrialized, and especially the Western former colonial masters, countries owed Africa a whole lot.

There was truth in many of those complaints.

But there is a profound difference between demanding others solve your problems and positioning yourself to help solve your own and others similarly situated.

That is why I found Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s message at the 2026 BRICS Summit in New Delhi so significant, fascinating and inspiring.

To me, PM Abiy’s message at the 2026 BRICS Summit was essentially this: Ethiopia today is not asking what the world can do for Ethiopia. Ethiopia is confidently asking what she can contribute to a rapidly changing world.

It is a remarkable transformation that makes me proud!

And it is precisely the kind of outcome the philosophy of Medemer (synergy, addition and cooperation) predicts when applied beyond Ethiopia’s borders.

From Complainer to Contributor

As I listened to Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed address the BRICS Summit, I was filled with supreme pride.

I heard him speaking not as the leader of a country waiting for the West/Global North to rescue it, but as as a confident and can-do leader of a country seeking and mobilizing partnerships through which countries of the Global South, with the help and leadership of the Emerging Economies, can create value collectively.

PM Abiy’s message was simple, practical and powerful. BRICS has capital, technology and enormous markets.

Ethiopia has resources, land, agricultural potential, renewable energy, minerals, a large population, an expanding industrial base and a strategic location connecting Africa, the Middle East and Asia.So, how do we bring these assets together to create synergistic value to benefit Ethiopia and the Global South.

As PM Abiy put it, the opportunity is now available to combine BRICS capital, technology and markets so that more value is created where resources are found. He specifically highlighted Ethiopia’s readiness to expand partnerships in minerals, renewable energy and industry.

That is a fundamentally different proposition from traditional aid and loan politics. For me, PM Abiy’s speech articulated a clear contrast between dependency and partnership; consumption and production and begging and contributing.

And that is where I believe the real significance of Ethiopia’s BRICS membership lies.

What Is BRICS?

The BRICS story itself is extraordinary. The term BRIC was coined by an American economist  to describe Brazil, Russia, India and China as major emerging economies whose growth could reshape the global economy. The concept subsequently acquired political significance. Foreign ministers of the four countries met on the margins of the United Nations General Assembly in New York in 2006, and the first leaders’ summit followed in 2009.

The global financial crisis of 2008–09 accelerated the political significance of BRIC. Emerging powers increasingly questioned whether institutions designed largely in an earlier era adequately represented the economic realities of the twenty-first century.

South Africa joined in 2010, turning BRIC into BRICS. As it became institutionalized, regular leaders’ summits, ministerial meetings, financial cooperation, business councils, academic exchanges, cultural programs and sectoral cooperation became commonplace. BRICS New Development Bank was headquartered in Shanghai, China in an effort to provide financing infrastructure for BRICS members and others.

That is how BRICS evolved from a Wall Street economic concept into an important platform for economic, political and diplomatic cooperation among major countries of the Global South. And its evolution is continuing.

How Ethiopia Joined BRICS—The Quiet Tactical Diplomacy of Abiy Ahmed

How Ethiopia became a BRICS member is a fascinating story in itself. Ethiopia formally announced its request to join BRICS on June 29, 2023. Less than two months later, at the August 2023 BRICS Summit in Johannesburg, the existing members agreed to invite Ethiopia, along with Egypt, Iran, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to become full members beginning January 1, 2024.

 

That was remarkably fast. At the time, dozens of countries were interested in joining BRICS, including Algeria, Turkey and Pakistan. Yet only a handful were selected in the first major expansion.

Why was Ethiopia successful in its bid to join BRICS?

The answer, in my view, is diplomacy. Not loud diplomacy. Not theatrical diplomacy. Not blame game or in-your-face confrontational diplomacy. Rather, it was a combination of strategic positioning, relationships, timing and quiet bilateral engagement.

PM Abiy Ahmed understood that Ethiopia had to make a case to several very different governments simultaneously. He had to demonstrate not merely that Ethiopia wanted BRICS, but that BRICS could benefit from having Ethiopia inside it. He put before before the BRICS governments the question was not what BRICS can do for Ethiopia but what Ethiopia could do for BRICS. Ethiopia had a strong diplomatic case and PM Abiy moved like greased lightning to get into BRICS!

To me, Ethiopia was not just another developing country seeking financing from BRICS. It possesses diplomatic assets that far exceed the size of its economy. As PM Abiy indicated in his speech, Ethiopia is the seat of the African Union. Addis Ababa hosts the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa. Ethiopia has one of Africa’s longest diplomatic traditions from the League of Nations to the African Union. Ethiopia was central to the creation of the Organization of African Unity and remains a major center of continental diplomacy.

Ethiopia has also historically maintained relationships with countries across ideological, political and geographic divides. It occupies an exceptionally strategic position in the Horn of Africa, close to the Red Sea and at the intersection of African, Middle Eastern and Asian interests. And Ethiopia has consistently presented itself as an advocate of African sovereignty, multilateralism and South-South cooperation.

As BRICS was expanding, Ethiopia’s diplomatic assets mattered for greater African representation. And Ethiopia could offer something that few other applicants could offer: a direct institutional bridge between BRICS and the African Union.

The Johannesburg Summit in 2023 was held under South African chairmanship. That was decisive. South Africa had both the institutional position and the political interest to make Africa’s representation central to the BRICS expansion discussion. Ethiopia also had longstanding relations with South Africa and a deep history of African solidarity.

The relationship between the two countries goes back decades. Ethiopia played an important role in the anti-apartheid struggle, and Nelson Mandela was issued an Ethiopian passport in 1962 that facilitated his travel in Africa while he worked clandestinely against apartheid.

The Johannesburg Summit created an unusually favorable diplomatic environment for Ethiopia. But membership still required consensus among the existing BRICS members. Ethiopia had to persuade Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa that Ethiopian membership served their collective interests.

That is where PM Abiy’s genius for bilateral diplomacy shined and became vitally important!

China, Russia and India Had Different Reasons to Welcome Ethiopia

China had obvious strategic reasons to support stronger Ethiopian engagement. China has extensive economic and diplomatic relations with Ethiopia and has been involved in major Ethiopian infrastructure and development projects. China understands the unique advantages it can gain given Ethiopia’s role as a key diplomatic player on the African continent.

Russia has maintained longstanding diplomatic relations with Ethiopia. For Russia, a broader BRICS presence in Africa strengthens the geographic reach and diplomatic weight of the organization. At the Summit, President Putin said Ethiopia remains a long-standing and reliable partner of Russia on the African continent. PM Abiy told President Putin, “Without your support, Ethiopia cannot be a member of the BRICS. We are always grateful for that, we know what you have done, and we’ll pay back when the time comes.”

But Ethiopian membership in BRICS should not be misinterpreted as Ethiopia becoming a Russian ally or Chinese client. Ethiopia has demonstrated time and again that it can cooperate with major powers without becoming the possession of any one of them.

India had its own reasons to welcome Ethiopia. India has longstanding relations with Ethiopia and sees Ethiopia as an important African partner. India also has a strategic interest in deepening its relationship with Africa and ensuring that BRICS does not become simply an extension of one major power’s influence. PM Modi at the Summit said, “India and Ethiopia are taking an old friendship into new frontiers! Today we are elevating India-Ethiopia relations to the level of a Strategic Partnership. This step will provide new energy, new momentum, and new depth to our relations.”

The Timing Was Impeccable

The timing of Ethiopia’s accession to BRICS is a stroke genius. In June 2023, Ethiopia announced its application to join BRICS. In August , she was invited to join and six months later by January 1, 2024, Ethiopia becomes a BRICS member.

That is extraordinarily rapid movement in international diplomacy, which is notoriously slow due to the need for complex negotiations among multiple stakeholders, the necessity of building trust and support, and rigid procedural requirements.

Manifestly, Ethiopia did not simply submit an application and wait. It positioned itself at precisely the moment when BRICS was reconsidering its geographic and strategic identity. That is adept diplomacy. To paraphrase the old song, you gotta know when to enter the room, gotta know what to say when you get there, gotta know whom to speak to, and gotta know what you can offer. PM Abiy went to Johannesburg ready, willing, and able to join BRICS—running on all eight cylinders and fully prepared to seize the moment.

Truth be told, no one, including myself expected, Ethiopia’s accession to BRICS in less than 6 months.

So, how did Ethiopia join BRICS at the speed of light?

The Diplomatic Genius of Abiy Ahmed Positioning Ethiopia as a BRICS Bridge

PM Abiy’s BRICS diplomatic strategy can be reduced to three words: Relevance. Relationships. Timing.

At the Johannesburg summit in 2023 (and as he repeated in his 2026 Summit speech), he presented Ethiopia as an African diplomatic center, the seat of the African Union, a strategically located Horn of Africa state, a country with a long history of multilateral diplomacy, a large and rapidly developing economy, a country with enormous agricultural and energy potential, a country with significant infrastructure and industrial ambitions and a country with meaningful bilateral relationships with China, India, Russia and South Africa.

But there was something even more important. Ethiopia could join BRICS without requiring BRICS to choose sides in a great-power confrontation.

This is why the transformation of Ethiopia’s international posture over the past eight years is so striking and fascinating.

The old bunk was often: “What will the international community do for Ethiopia?”

Since the start of the PM Abiy’s reform government, the new posture increasingly asks: “What can Ethiopia bring to the regional, continental and global political, economic and diplomatic table?”

I heard the answer to that question in PM Abiy’s 2026 BRICS address.

For decades, Ethiopia was often viewed primarily through the lens of its development needs—as a country seeking aid, investment, debt relief, infrastructure financing and technical assistance. Today, that picture is changing rapidly. Ethiopia increasingly brings assets, capabilities, markets, institutions and ideas to international partnerships—not simply needs.

He highlighted Ethiopia’s progress toward food security and made an especially important point about the proposed BRICS grain exchange: Ethiopia increasingly approaches the issue not merely as a consumer but as a producer and potential supplier.

He emphasized resilience, innovation, cooperation and sustainability. He argued that shocks rarely come alone and that resilience therefore has to be built into national systems before crises arrive.

PM Abiy made profound statements about Ethiopia and the importance of its accelerating economic growth to the BRICS partners.

He told them Ethiopia is transforming from aid recipient to investment and trade partner, developing industrial parks, expanding manufacturing, pursuing a cotton-to-clothing value chain, and building industries such as pharmaceuticals.

He told them Ethiopia is moving from agricultural producer to agricultural exporter, using advances in agricultural productivity to strengthen both food security and export potential.

Ethiopia is moving from energy-poor to renewable-energy contributor, harnessing its vast hydropower potential alongside solar, wind and geothermal resources to support domestic development and regional energy cooperation.

Ethiopia is moving from a struggling isolated economy to a regional economic connector, leveraging its strategic position linking the Horn of Africa, the Red Sea and wider African markets.

And most importantly, Ethiopia is moving from diplomatic observer to diplomatic bridge-builder. With Addis Ababa serving as the headquarters of the African Union, he told them Ethiopia is uniquely positioned to connect BRICS with Africa’s priorities and strengthen the continent’s voice in Global South diplomacy.

He argued Ethiopia is moving from being seen primarily as part of Africa’s development challenge to becoming part of Africa’s development solution.

PM Abiy subtly told the Summit that the question is not simply, “What can BRICS do for Ethiopia?” but more importantly, “What can Ethiopia contribute to BRICS, and what can Ethiopia and BRICS together do for Africa and the Global South?”

Ethiopia’s Renewable-Energy Advantage

Ethiopia has many concrete things to offer BRICS. Ethiopia possesses enormous renewable-energy potential, particularly in hydropower, but also in solar, wind and geothermal resources. Ethiopia has a deal with Russia to build a nuclear power plant.

PM Abiy said, “Across BRICS, we have capital, technology and markets. The opportunity is to bring them together, create more value, and ensure that value is generated where resources are found.” He specifically highlighted minerals, renewable energy and Ethiopia’s expanding industrial base as areas for stronger BRICS partnerships.

Ethiopia can become a practical laboratory for BRICS-supported African energy development covering hydropower, solar, electricity transmission, regional power trading, etc.

Ethiopia does not have to ask BRICS to finance its energy projects. Ethiopia can propose itself as a platform for demonstrating how BRICS technology, finance and expertise can accelerate Africa’s clean-energy transformation. That is a proposition with continental significance.

Agriculture: From Market to Partner

Agriculture may be even more important. Ethiopia is demonstrating increasing capacity in agricultural production, including wheat production and exports. At the Summit, PM Abiy emphasized Ethiopia’s progress toward food self-sufficiency and its potential role as a producer and supplier in BRICS agricultural cooperation. He highlighted Ethiopia’s readiness to contribute to practical cooperation, outlining Ethiopia’s focus on resilient agriculture and food production as key pillars of national and regional economic transformation.

Imagine what could happen if BRICS cooperation connected: Indian agricultural technology with Chinese manufacturing capacity with Brazilian agricultural expertise with Ethiopian farmers, land and production potential and African markets. That would be a game changer! That would be the beginning of South-South economic integration. Indeed, Medemer at a global scale.

Minerals, Industry and the African Market

Ethiopia can also offer BRICS something every major emerging economy needs: a growing African market and a potential production platform. Its geography places it between the African interior, the Red Sea and the wider Middle East. Its population creates a substantial domestic market. Its industrial base is expanding. Its agricultural economy provides opportunities for agro-processing. Its mineral resources create opportunities for investment and value addition.

At New Delhi, India and Ethiopia discussed expanding cooperation in areas including critical minerals, clean energy, healthcare and other strategic sectors. PM Modi said, “Today’s talks covered: Defence. Capacity building. Investment linkages. Critical minerals. Clean energy. Healthcare. Together, we will also strengthen India-Africa ties and amplify the voice of the Global South.”

The strategic objective should be clear: Do not simply export Ethiopia’s resources. Add value to them in Ethiopia. Build factories, transfer technology, provide training, create jobs and African value chains from production to consumption.

Ethiopia’s Most Valuable BRICS Asset: Diplomacy

I believe Ethiopia has something that cannot be measured in tons, dollars or megawatts. It is diplomacy. Ethiopia has a long diplomatic tradition. It was central to the creation of the OAU. It remains the home of the African Union. It has historically resolutely opposed colonialism and vigorously defended African sovereignty. Addis Ababa has long been a meeting place for African and international diplomacy.

All of that gives Ethiopia credibility when BRICS discusses reform of global governance, UN Security Council reform, sovereignty, equitable representation, development finance, African peace and security and the role of developing countries in international decision-making. Ethiopia can contribute something much larger than its economic weight. It can contribute African diplomatic power and legitimacy.

Abbay (“Nile”): From Dispute to Development

Ethiopia and Egypt who are at the center of one of Africa’s most consequential riparian disputes entered BRICS together. Could their membership in BRICS open new opportunities to address their longstanding issues? BRICS could create a renewed opportunity to look at the dispute in a fresh framework. BRICS could  become another room in which Ethiopia and Egypt can learn to work together. The two countries can use their BRICS membership as an effective forum to broaden the conversation from confrontation over water toward cooperation over water-powered development.

I can imagine a BRICS-Africa framework around hydropower, electricity trade, agricultural productivity, irrigation efficiency, climate adaptation, drought resilience, food security, infrastructure development and scientific water management.

Such a framework could be a game changer.  The question of “Who gets how much Nile water?” becomes irrelevant. The critical question will be, “How can the Nile basin generate greater prosperity, electricity, food security and climate resilience for everyone?”

As I have argued recently, that is a much more productive diplomatic question. And it is precisely why personal diplomacy between Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi matters. Sometimes leaders can accomplish in a private conversation what bureaucracies struggle to accomplish in years of formal negotiation. BRICS literally puts them in the same room. The opportunity is there. Carpe Diem!

Ethiopia Can Help Bring Africa Into BRICS

Ethiopia has already demonstrated its desire to engage BRICS sectorally—in science, agriculture, technology, energy, health, education and climate cooperation.

The next step is to think bigger. Ethiopia could be pivotal in dynamically connecting BRICS initiatives to African priorities. The dynamic permutations are limitless: BRICS capital + African priorities; BRICS technology + African markets; BRICS expertise + African resources; BRICS investment + African industrialization; BRICS diplomacy + African peace

And Ethiopia has an institutional mechanism for doing so. The African Union. Ethiopia can become a bridge between BRICS and the AU and turn geography and diplomacy into strategic influence.

Ask Not What BRICS Can Do for Ethiopia

This brings me back to the title. The question is not: What can BRICS do for Ethiopia? Of course BRICS can help Ethiopia. Ethiopia needs capital, technology, investment, trade, etc. But that cannot be the entire Ethiopian BRICS strategy.

The larger question is: What can Ethiopia do for BRICS?

Ethiopia can help BRICS connect with Africa. Ethiopia can help connect BRICS with the African Union. Ethiopia can contribute to African energy transformation, African food security,  offer an emerging market and production platform and contribute diplomatic credibility. Ethiopia can champion peaceful cooperation and help turn South-South cooperation from rhetoric into practical projects. And Ethiopia can demonstrate that development need not be a zero-sum competition.

Ethiopia brings to BRICS something few, if any, other countries can replicate: an unmistakable African voice, forged in history and grounded in principle.

Ethiopia gave voice to Africa’s moral outrage against colonialism when much of the continent was still under the yoke of European rule—and when Ethiopia itself stood against the invasion and occupation of Fascist Italy. Ethiopia’s struggle became Africa’s struggle. Its victory at Adwa had already demonstrated that African sovereignty could prevail against European imperial ambition.

When the postwar international order was being created, Ethiopia was again present, speaking for a continent whose voice was too often marginalized. Today, that historic role is taking on a new dimension.

Ethiopia is no longer speaking only for Africa. It is increasingly becoming a voice for the Global South—a bridge between Africa and the wider developing world, carrying the continent’s history, aspirations, dignity and determination to secure an equal place at the global table. Ethiopia is becoming the voice of the planet in its much imitated Green Legacy Initiative planting upwards of 50 billion tress.

Ethiopia is one of Africa’s BRICS members, but it possesses a unique institutional advantage that gives its membership an importance extending well beyond its national borders: Addis Ababa is the headquarters of the African Union.

That creates an extraordinary strategic triangle: BRICS ↔ ETHIOPIA ↔ AFRICAN UNION

As the host of the African Union, Ethiopia can help create an institutional bridge between BRICS and the 55-member African Union, ensuring that Africa is not merely a participant in the expanding BRICS framework but an active shaper of its agenda.

From Beggar Nation to Great Benefactor Nation — MAKING ETHIOPIA GREAT AGAIN!

This is ultimately what I find most compelling about PM Abiy Ahmed’s BRICS diplomacy. His message at the 2026 BRICS Summit was not that Ethiopia has suddenly become rich or that all of Ethiopia’s problems have disappeared. They have not. Ethiopia still faces enormous challenges.

He has made a convincing argument that a country can change its international posture before it completely changes its economic circumstances. And that is what I believe Ethiopia is beginning to do. It is moving from recipient to partner; complainer to contributor; consumer to producer; aid seeker to investment destination; spectator to participant; participant to bridge-builder.

That is Medemer beyond Ethiopia. It is the philosophy of finding strength not by standing alone, but by bringing complementary strengths together.

Ethiopia’s BRICS Moment

At the 2026 New Delhi summit, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Ethiopia’s participation helped reinforce the collective voice of the Global South. That is not merely a diplomatic compliment. It is an invitation. An invitation for Ethiopia to demonstrate what its presence means. I am sure Ethiopia will respond to that invitation boldly. Not by becoming anybody’s client or ideologically treating BRICS as an anti-Western alliance but by becoming what Ethiopia has historically been at its best: a bridge. A bridge between Africa and Asia. A bridge between the African Union and the Global South, between development and diplomacy, resources and technology and products and markets.

The Real BRICS Opportunity- Let’s Medemer and Get the Job Done!

Ethiopia’s greatest BRICS opportunity is therefore not simply economic. It is strategic. Ethiopia can help shape what BRICS becomes.

BRICS is becoming larger and more diverse. Its members have different political systems, economic interests and foreign-policy priorities. The 2026 Summit has demonstrated that the expanded grouping can still find common ground on cooperation, development, multilateralism and global governance.

Ethiopia should use that diversity to its advantage. It should become the African voice that says: Let us cooperate (Medemer) where we can. Let us disagree without becoming enemies. Let us trade rather than fight. Let us develop rather than destroy. Let us create value rather than merely distribute scarcity.

And above all: Let us together build a global system in which Africa is not merely discussed—but represented, respected and heard.

That is the Ethiopia I want to see. That is the Ethiopia I believe can emerge. And that is why, eight years after the reform government took over in Ethiopia I look at Ethiopia’s place in BRICS and say: What a difference eight years makes.

Ethiopia did not enter BRICS merely to ask what BRICS could do for Ethiopia.

Ethiopia entered BRICS with the opportunity to show the world what Ethiopia can do for BRICS—and what BRICS and Ethiopia can do together for Africa and the Global South.

Let’s MAKE EHTIOPIA GREAT AGAIN by ensuring Ethiopia will continue to play a pivotal role in the growth, expansion and development of BRICS.