Birtukan was scheduled to leave for the US on Saturday, March 19, 2011, accompanied by her daughter. She is expected to arrive first in San Francisco, California, where she has relatives, sources told Fortune.

These same sources tell Fortune that, Birtukan will head off for Maryland after spending three weeks in San Francisco, where she is expected to spend the next two to three years pursuing higher education there. In a statement she released on Friday, Birtukan asserted that she is not bowing out of politics.

“To believe that Birtukan would abandon her struggle towards building a free democracy is unthinkable,” the statement read.

It was also learnt that Yilma Yifru would be mediating between the two factions that emerged within the party during her 21 months in jail