'National Congress' or 'National Assembly') was the highest organ of state power of the People's Democratic Republic of Ethiopia (PDRE) from 1987 to 1991.

It acted for the legislature between sessions (in practice, for most of the year), during which it was empowered to issue "special decrees" in lieu of law.

[4] Actual power, however, rested in the WPE—and particularly with Mengistu Haile Mariam, who served as both president of the republic and general secretary of the WPE.

[4] In practice, as with other Communist legislatures, the principles of democratic centralism reduced the Shengo to merely a rubber stamp for decisions already made by Mengistu and the WPE.

In May 1991, with the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) closing in on Addis Ababa, Mengistu fled into exile.