Also known as: Arbegnoch Day · Liberation Day
Patriots' Victory Day honors the arbegnoch (አርበኞች) — "the patriots" — who fought on through the Italian occupation of 1936–1941, and marks May 5, 1941, the day Emperor Haile Selassie re-entered Addis Ababa at the head of the liberation. The date carries a symmetry chosen by history itself: it was five years to the day after Italian forces occupied the capital on May 5, 1936.
Invasion and occupation
Fascist Italy invaded Ethiopia in October 1935, using a border clash at Walwal the previous year as pretext, and waged a war remembered for its brutality — including the use of poison gas, documented and condemned internationally at the time. Addis Ababa fell on May 5, 1936, and Mussolini proclaimed an Italian empire in East Africa.
Ethiopia never surrendered. Emperor Haile Selassie carried the country's case to the League of Nations in Geneva in June 1936 — a speech that became one of the century's prophetic warnings about collective security — while at home the resistance began. Italy occupied the towns and roads; it never pacified the country.
The arbegnoch: five years of resistance
The arbegnoch fought a guerrilla war from the mountains and countryside for five years — ambushing garrisons, cutting supply lines, and denying the occupation any normality. Women fought and organized among them, and an underground network in the towns, remembered as the yewist arbegnoch ("inner patriots"), passed intelligence and supplies to the fighters. The occupation answered with reprisals — most infamously the massacre that followed the 1937 attempt on the life of Viceroy Graziani — which only hardened the resistance.
In 1940 Italy entered the Second World War, and Ethiopia's struggle merged with the Allied East African campaign. Fighting alongside British and Commonwealth forces — and with the emperor's own Gideon Force column advancing from Sudan — the patriots drove the occupation out. On May 5, 1941, Haile Selassie entered Addis Ababa, restoring Ethiopian sovereignty exactly five years after it had been seized.
How the day is kept
Patriots' Victory Day is observed with wreath-layings and ceremonies honoring the veterans and their descendants, centered in Addis Ababa on Miyazia 27 Square — the square named for the Ethiopian date of the liberation. Surviving patriots and their families attend in traditional dress and decorations, and the day stands with Adwa Victory Day as one of the two great patriotic anniversaries of the Ethiopian calendar.
Frequently asked questions
- When is Patriots' Victory Day in 2027?
- Wednesday, May 5, 2027 — Miyazia 27, 2019 in the Ethiopian calendar.
- Who were the arbegnoch?
- "The patriots" — the Ethiopian resistance fighters who waged a guerrilla war against the Italian occupation from 1936 to 1941, supported by an underground network in the towns known as the inner patriots.
- Why is Patriots' Victory Day on May 5?
- Emperor Haile Selassie re-entered Addis Ababa on May 5, 1941 — five years to the day after Italian forces occupied the capital on May 5, 1936.
- Was Ethiopia colonized by Italy?
- Ethiopia was occupied from 1936 to 1941 but never effectively colonized: the state never surrendered, resistance continued throughout, and sovereignty was restored in 1941. Together with the 1896 victory at Adwa, this is why Ethiopia is counted as never having been colonized.
- How is the day different from Adwa Victory Day?
- Adwa (March 2) commemorates the 1896 battle that defeated Italy's first invasion; Patriots' Victory Day (May 5) honors the resistance to the 1936–1941 occupation and the liberation of Addis Ababa.