For any casual observer of the latest public appearance by the Prime Minister in front of Addis Abebans on Friday, December 21, 2007, at the Millennium Hall, the event gave the overwhelming impression of a town hall meeting held between residents and their elected mayor.

Indeed, Mayor Brehane Deressa was seated in the front row, accompanied by some of his top lieutenants, and observed the discussion while nodding his head - affirmatively and repeatedly - when Prime Minister Meles Zenawi spoke in defence of the mayor's rather frail administration.

Defended he was by Meles, who described Mayor Brehane's Caretaker Administration as a "government of crises". The Prime Minister, to the delight of the Mayor and his supporters, argued that the mandate of such administration is very limited as its organisational capacity is almost non-existent; it is after all an administration without the backing of any political party apparatus. Fair enough, the two-year administration has to contend with the vices of a 100-year-old city bureaucracy, though the Prime Minister also asserted his view that the source of much of the trouble in Addis Abeba is the administration's dismal capacity to implement policy.

The increasingly evident impotence of the city government, however, did not deter delegates from the 10-district women's forum and members of advisory councils from the 99 kebeles from raising issues of mainly municipal nature.

The women's forum was one of two such entities - the other being the youth forum - formed in Addis Abeba after the electoral blow the Revolutionary Democrats suffered at the hands of their rivals, the CUD, which ironically is now in a shamble. As Rude a awakening as it was to the ruling party, its gurus belatedly discovered that there has just been too much resentment and grudges held by many in the capital against them due to their neglect of urban issues during their first decade in power.

The urban population, particularly in the capital and particularly among youth and women, has suffered from unemployment, estimated to reach 21pc according to data compiled in 2005 by the Ethiopian Statistics Authority. The figure is even higher - 30pc - when it involves the youth. 

Lack of sufficient housing has debilitated the capital for decades now; an estimate made in the early 2000 places the demand at 400,000, a figure that appeared for many at the time to be conservative. What's more, residents have suffered from poor municipal and kebele services to such an extent that demanding one's own right to be served in return for taxes paid now draws an appalled and surprised expression from people. The Revolutionary Democrats finally coined an interesting euphemism for the problem: "Lack of good governance".

Unlike its partner-in-dialogue last Friday, the Advisory Council was established much earlier, even before the advent of the May 2005 national election. Mayor Brehane's predecessor, Arkebe Oqubay, who also was chief of a provisional administration replacing the unpopular Ali Abdo, had tried to jolt an end to the lethargy. He created the advisory council in each kebele after he reorganised the woredas into 10 districts and widdled down the kebeles under them to 99.

He was not alone. By then, the Revolutionary Democrats were awake from their long policy slumber when it comes to urban management, and designed a new policy package of investing hundreds of millions of Birr in condominium construction. It was a good policy: It provides housing to residents; it gives employment opportunities to tens of thousands in the city, focusing on women and youth; and it creates unprecedented business opportunities for suppliers and contractors.

The benefits of this policy package, however, came too late to convince the reluctant public to reward the Revolutionary Democrats with electoral votes. The problem was not so much about evictions and displacement, as the Prime Minister has argued on Friday. Many were in fact pleased to see the city being renovated, and didn't mind seeing old squatter settlements giving way to new and high-rising edifices.

Instead, it was the manner in which such measures were taken and the reluctance by city officials to respect the rule of law in implementing the policy - if not their provocative arbitrariness - that aggravated the urban movement against his party.

Alas, not many of the delegates at the Millennium Hall - estimated to have reached 6,000 by the accounts of state media - seemed to have been interested to raise such critical issues. Indeed, the first two questions were the only exceptional ones. Delegates opened the meeting by asking about the HR 2003 Bill recently passed by the United States' Congress and about the delicate relationship with the regime in Eritrea - issues that proved challenging to the Prime Minister when explaining his administration's position on them to Parliament. With these exceptions, delegates were primarily interested in topics of concern to the city administration such as the leasing of plots in Addis Abeba and the sticky matters of displacement, compensation and corruption involved in the process.

In form true to good public relations strategy, Meles that evening made a particularly audacious promise that his administration would not rest until getting to the bottom of the corruption scandal and prosecuting the guilty parties. The comment reverberated when state TV and radio reported on the meeting, which had also been broadcast live on Friday morning.

Many of the other issues raised at the meeting were related to the cost of living, migration from rural areas, the cost of utilities and quality of municipal services, housing development and allocations, lack of supports for youth and women, and alleged abuses committed against the latter group. Meles was hardly challenged on his party's policy positions or the manner that these policies are being implemented by his administration. Neither did delegates broach issues of democratic space or the government's record on human rights and rule of law.

With the level of discourse, perhaps it would have been more appropriate to merely conduct the meeting between members of the public and the mayor.

Alas, the Mayor himself has not been elected to office, but appointed by the Prime Minister, thus his accountability is more to the latter than to any constituency. And Addis Abeba is one of the two chartered cities in the country expected to report to the Prime Minister.

For Meles and his party though, what happened in the Millennium Hall demonstrated the climax of their public relations onslaught against their political opponents ahead of national elections to kebele and woreda administrations. These are key administrative units in this country, where political battles are won or lost.

Although many of the issues raised on Friday were more mundane than paramount, and perhaps better left to the city mayor, the Prime Minister was nonetheless observed to be very careful to balance his responses, and cautious not to provoke any group.

This is indeed a different Meles from the person the nation grew accustomed to prior to the rude awakening in May 2005, though perhaps it is a natural result of age, as he once alluded to during a press conference. Whatever the cause, he was modest, watchful of his words and never dismissive or disregarding.

It was, of course, not his first encounter with members of the public. There was the youth both from the capital and from all the regions; women forum members; the Diaspora visited the country during the New Year; the academic community; and now residents of the capital. The more he talked to people, the less vocal people have come in their grievances and protest against the ruling party.

It is reasonable to think that the Prime Minister and his army of cadres organising such meetings are disarming the public of the grievances held for many years - for reasons however real or imagined. Suffice that increasing numbers of people are walking the streets of Addis wearing T-shirts bearing his photo, or the new trend of selling postcards for two Birr featuring his portrait. Of course there are those in his party who are not comfortable with these developments and are concerned that this may lead to a cult of personality.

Strategy disputes aside, it is clear that the Revolutionary Democrats are rolling up their sleeves and determined to play the electoral game with a vengeance. Ironically, their opponents are nowhere to be seen countering this public relations onslaught; instead, they are busy with their own intra or inter-party squabbles, and for now simply along for the ride. They no longer seem to be dealing with an overconfident incumbent that had underestimated the extent of public discontent with its behaviour.

It will be interesting to see how the public behaves come the next local elections, and most enlightening, maybe, for the opposition.