Yacob Haile-Mariam

Who is Yacob Haile-Mariam?

Dr. Yacob Hailemariam is a retired professor of business law at Norfolk State University; former Senior Prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda; and an elected member of the Ethiopian parliament who had been held as a "prisoner of conscience" in Ethiopia.

When the May 2005 Ethiopian election was promoted as the first democratic election in the country's history, Haile-Mariam, affectionately called "Dr. Yacob" by his former students, took an early retirement from NSU to run for a parliamentary seat in his home district. Haile-Mariam became a member of the Coalition for Unity and Democracy, the main opposition party in Ethiopia, which gained strong and widespread support from the public. Despite the threats to his life and various forms of harassment, Hailemariam won his race by a landslide against the incumbent member of the ruling party. On October 31, 2005, the government arrested Hailemariam and other CUD party leaders, following electoral disputes, all of whom faced possible execution. In an effort to raise awareness and promote government action and about the former professor, various NSU student organizations hosted a candlelight vigil at Norfolk State University on Tuesday, April 18, 2006.