Introduction
Ethiopia’s Federal Supreme Court Cassation Division released its latest volume of decisions (28) recently. One of the compiled decisions concerns whether a court may decline jurisdiction on the basis of an arbitration agreement even when the defendant has not invoked the arbitration agreement to object to the jurisdiction of the court. While the court, in accordance with the repealed provisions of the Civil Code and Civil Procedure Code, decided that the courts may invoke an arbitration clause on their own motion, the reasoning and outcome would likely differ under the new law i.e. the Arbitration and Conciliation Working Procedure Proclamation No. 1237/2021 (Arbitration Proclamation).