Ethiopia's parliament has approved allowing Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed to stay in office beyond his mandate after elections planned for August were postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The vote on Wednesday - 114 in favour, four against and one abstention - came two days after a leading opposition politician resigned as speaker in an apparent protest against the decision to delay the election.
Ethiopia's election board announced in March that it would be impossible to organise the vote on time because of the pandemic, in which 2,506 infections have been confirmed in the country with 35 deaths.
Some opposition leaders have called for a caretaker or transitional government to guide the country to elections, a suggestion Abiy dismissed as unworkable during a question-and-answer session on Monday with legislators.
On Wednesday night, two major opposition parties with power bases in Abiy's home Oromia region issued a joint statement rejecting Wednesday's vote as "an illegal and illegitimate act".
