Two weeks before (from May 31- June 3, 2023) Ethiopian Cities Association (ECA) in collaboration with the Ministry of Urban and Infrastructure were organized a four-day training workshop in Mekelle city so as to resume public services that had been interrupted in the cities of Tigray Region.

Accordingly Regional, Zonal and City leaders and Mayors, who are recently appointed by the Interim Administration of Tigray Region, as well as experts, were participated in this sensitizing training workshop.

Besides at the opening ceremony of this sensitizing training workshop, the Honorable Mrs. Almaz Gebre Tsadiq, Head of the Tigray Region Interim Administration, Urban and Construction Office, and the Head of the Region’s Infrastructure Sector, the Honorable Mrs. Alem Tsegai, Honorable Mr. Fenta Dejen, State Minister of the Ministry of Urban and Infrastructure, and as well as Ethiopian Cities Association General Director, Mr. Andualem Tenaw, were attended.

In her speech as the guest of honor, Mrs. Alem Tsegai said that the infrastructure of most of the cities of Tigray had been destroyed during the 3-year war. She said that the leadership and the people should come out of in this psychological damage and try to take advantage of the peace that has been achieved to bring our cities to a better level.

The other guest of honor was Mrs. Almaz G/Tzadiq who said in her speech that we are fortunate to be able to discuss urban development agendas after that terrible war. The Pretoria’s peace agreement has made a big contribution for putting aside our differences and agreeing to discuss on various urban development agendas.

The State Minister, Honorable Mr. Fenta Dejen, who gave the opening speech on the day, said that this motivational training workshop is one of the beginnings of the elimination of the terrible war that happened in the country for the past three years and led us to discuss on our urban development agendas. Therefore, he announced that the ministry will help the cities of Tigray Region to resume their work.

The Director General of the Ethiopian Cities Association, Mr. Andualem Tenaw, while speaking about the general aspect of ECA, said that he was happy to have organized the workshop in cooperation with the ministry in Mekele City and to meet with the mayors of the cities that were members of the Association before the war. He also said that he is ready to work with non-member cities in order to have them the new member cities of ECA.

He promised that ECA will provide the necessary assistance to make the cities of Tigray region beautiful and clean and convenient for the residents. In addition he emphasized that ECA is always with cities to support them in resuming the municipal provisions service.

More than 300 regional, zonal, and city leaders and experts attended the four-day training workshop, and 15 of them were mayors from different cities of Tigray region and in this valuable event, documents were presented and discussed on the nature and Application of Municipal Service Standards, Urban Land Management Procedures, City Plan Preparation and Implementation Procedures and similar agendas.

As can be understood from the comments of the participants, they recalled that the war was terrible and caused extensive damage to people and property. They said that the peace agreement that was made allowed them to breathe the air of peace and that the training workshop helped them a lot to restart the closed public services and brought them out of their psychological trauma.