Despite Ethiopia has been an icon of independence for many colonized African nations, the Ethiopian media sector has been under the ruling class’s monopoly for more than a century. However, the 2018 reformative government is trying to liberalize the media landscape of Ethiopia. Thus, this study intended to examine the extent of journalists’ job autonomy in deciding which aspects of news stories should be emphasized and identify factors associated with the “hierarchy-of-influences” theory that most influence journalists’ when making news-selection decisions after the nationwide political reform. Both quantitative and qualitative research methods are employed. Purposive sampling technique is employed to select the in-depth interview respondents by using a quota scheme, and stratified random sampling is used to select respondents of the survey in a representative manner. Thus, 152 media practitioners (reporters, program producers, editors, and team coordinators) participated by filling out the questionnaire and seven senior journalists participated in the in-depth interview session. The finding of the quantitative data indicates that the extent of professional autonomy at AMC is still limited; journalists are enjoying it to some extent. The data gathered through in-depth interviews revealed that the level of AMC journalists’ professional autonomy is contingent on the goodwill of assigned managers and the political wave of the country. As a result, professional autonomy at AMC is situational. Furthermore, procedural, professional, organizational, and political influences are found with the most decisive influence, respectively. On the contrary, economic, individual, and reference group influences have less impact on AMC journalists’ independence