July 12, 2018 | Daily Monitoring Report
U.S. Appoints New Ambassador To Somalia
12 July – Source: Halbeeg News – 154 Words
A career diplomat with extensive experience in the Horn of Africa has been appointed new United States. ambassador to Somalia. News website, thehill.com, reported Wednesday that Donald Yamamoto, a former US ambassador to Ethiopia and Djibouti was nominated to take the office. He will replace Mr. Stephen Michael Schwartz who has been serving since July 2016. The US maintains a non-resident diplomatic mission in Nairobi for Somalia.
Mr Yamamoto, 64, previously served as the senior US diplomat for Somalia and Eritrea. He also worked in an acting capacity as head of the State Department’s Africa bureau during the first Barrack Obama administration. The administration of President Donald Trump this year stepped up ongoing American military intervention in Somalia. The move follows violent clashes between the Somali government and Al Shabaab. The US restored its diplomatic mission in Somalia in 2014 for the first time since the “Black Hawk Down” incident 25 years ago.
Key Headlines
- U.S. Appoints New Ambassador To Somalia (Halbeeg News)
- Finance Minister Threatens Not To Pay Absentee Government Employees (Jowhar.com)
- IDP Camp Leaders Dispute Denies Food To Hungry Families In Sool (Radio Ergo)
- Kenyan Police Hunt For Al-Shabaab Militants After Camp Raid (Xinhua)
- Foreign Accountability Can’t Be Remedy For Lack Of Domestic Accountability In Somalia (Hiiraan Online)
NATIONAL MEDIA
Finance Minister Threatens Not To Pay Absentee Government Employees
12 July – Source: Jowhar.com – 136 Words
Finance Minister Abdirahman Duale Beyle has issued a warning letter to the government officials who fail to report on duty. Beyle said the government will not pay staffers who did not attend to their work. He pointed out that only workers who reportedly on duty daily were entitled to government salary. “Those who do not show up at work, or who do not report and leave workstations as per stipulated times, will not get paid,” Beyle said.
The minister said days when government employees stayed at their homes and only showed up to draw salaries were over. The government of Somalia has been conducting a series of reforms and undertaking headcount of government employees for the past few months. Ideally, the government has managed to pay the salary for its civil servants regularly and without fail.
IDP Camp Leaders Dispute Denies Food To Hungry Families In Sool
10 July – Source: Radio Ergo – 474 Words
Around 1,800 impoverished internally displaced families living in four camps in Ari-adeye, 32 km north of Lasanod in the northern Somali region of Sool, have not received any food aid in the last six months because of a power struggle among the camp leaders. On four occasions, aid agencies tried to bring assistance to the struggling families but they were barred from delivery by the 12 camp leaders, representing competing clans, who could not reach a consensus among themselves on how to distribute the aid among the four camps.
The Ari-adeye administration convened a meeting with the camp leaders to seek a solution. According to the commissioner of Ari-adeye, Abdirisaq Abdikadir Abdirahman, they agreed to share the aid based on the clan system. As a result of the agreement, a small number of 250 families judged to be in the worst situation received some food supplies on 4 July. Fadumo Ali Ismail, a mother of 12, said she received 60 kg of food including flour, rice, sugar, and cooking oil. She said it would end the hunger they have faced for the last six months, during which time they were sharing food with neighbours, who were fortunate to receive remittances from relatives abroad. Fadumo told Radio Ergo she has been living in the camp for a year and half after their entire herd of 180 goats died in the drought in Dhiir-goobo village, 20 km east of Ari-adeye. Her husband is unemployed and has no skills to find a job.
Amina Jama Dirir, 25, lives in the camps with her 75-year-old blind father, who is also suffering from mental ill health. Amina said he became ill when the drought killed all his 300 goats and 13 camels. The livestock were the family’s lifeline. “I don’t know how to help him, I can’t go to work since he needs continuous care. He even needs monitoring to protect him from injuring himself on sharp spiky fence around the house,” Amina said. Amina also received 60 kg of food on 4 July that is enough for a month. They have been relying on gifts of food from relatives in town.
The IDP families blame the committee of camp leaders for serving their own interests at the expense of the community members. They say the camp leaders’ priority is holding on to power and using it to try to negotiation for more aid, even whilst the people suffer. Camp leaders are self-appointed officials who wield enormous power across Somalia and normally dictate the terms of distribution of relief supplies. Baashe Mohamed Canshur, one of the 12 camp leaders overseeing Sihowle camp, told Radio Ergo the last time aid reached them was on 28 May. He said that leaders on the committee could not agree on how to distribute it so it did not reach the needy families.
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA
Kenyan Police Hunt For Al-Shabaab Militants After Camp Raid
12 July – Source: Xinhua – 194 Words
Kenyan security officers have launched a manhunt for Al-Shabaab militants who attacked a police camp in northeast Garissa county near the Somalia border on Tuesday, injuring three police officers. Northeastern regional coordinator Mohamud Saleh said on Wednesday that the attackers believed to have crossed from neighboring Somalia first destroyed the town’s Safaricom communication mast by hurling explosives and later proceeded to attack Hamey police patrol base. “Police officers engaged them with a heavy firefight and got overwhelmed. The militia injured three officers who were flown to Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) Dhobley base for medication,” Saleh said.
He said the militants made away with a support weapon, police vehicle, flags, solar batteries and VHF radio including food rations. Saleh said a contingent of police officers have been mobilized to pursue the attackers after leaving the residents with no communication network. The administrator said security forces have intensified patrols along the border with Somalia in the wake of terror attacks in the border region.
This is the latest such incident in the area and no arrests have been made so far. Since the Kenyan soldiers crossed into Somalia in 2011, several attacks believed to have been carried out by Al-Shabaab have occurred in Mandera, Wajir, and Garissa in northern Kenya.
OPINION, ANALYSIS & CULTURE
“State fragility stems from governments that provide extreme privilege and impunity to elites at the expense of other citizens. This governance style, which requires the politicization of security agencies, is a hallmark of fragile states……The United States cannot reform countries that do not wish to change.”
Foreign Accountability Can’t Be Remedy For Lack Of Domestic Accountability In Somalia
11 July – Source: Hiiraan Online – 1526 Words
After the unprecedented ouster of former parliament Speaker by President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo and Prime Minister Hassan Kheire in last April, the Federal Parliament of Somalia (FPS -House of the People and Upper House), the lead-institution for domestic accountability, ceased to exercise its mandated oversight over the executive branch of the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS).
Under the double-edge slogan of political stability, leaders of both houses of the FPS have frozen the parliamentary activities to free the executive branch from domestic accountability and transparency. Pro-executive parliamentarians are receiving special treatments and emoluments for parliament’s paralysis. Lack of domestic accountability and transparency is deepening state failure.
As a last resort, under the Mutual Accountability Framework, the executive branch of the FGS faces foreign (donor) accountability to account for its performance in the past 6 months in the upcoming meeting of the High Level Partnership Forum (HLPF) planned to take place on July 16-17, 2018 at Brussels, Belgium.
Large delegation from the federal government (FGS), probably including President Farmajo, the federal member states (FMS), the civil society, the media, and the business community will attend the Brussels meeting. On July 16, the international partners will meet with Somali senior officials, while the following day they will meet with the ministers for past performance review and action plan for the next 6-12 months. However, the consensus is that foreign accountability can’t be remedy for the lack of domestic accountability and transparency.
The meeting will focus on the progress made in inclusive politics, security reform, economic recovery; and resilience, recovery, and humanitarian assistance. Justice and security reform along with the political roadmap for 2020 elections, the transition plan (euphemism for AMISOM Restructuring), and the level of aid needed will get special attention.
While the review and finalization of the Provisional Constitution is mired into chaotic process expected to continue beyond 2019, the acceptance of 2014 census is in limbo, the separation of jurisdiction between FGS and Benadir Administrations is on hold, the boundaries between FMS and districts within FMS are not demarcated, there is a push for resource and power sharing between FGS and FMS and the transition from 4.5 clan formula to universal suffrage for political representation.
TOP TWEETS
@mocisom: The Minister of Commerce and Industries has today officially opened a 2 days Business Summit between Italian & Somali companies in Mogadishu, aiming to discuss business and investment opportunities in the sectors of Agriculture, Livestock, Fisheries, Industry, Transportation,
@RadioErgo: Somali families fleeing conflict between Al-Shabab and residents in Galmudug sleeping under trees and in school#Somalia https://www.radioergo.org/
@JackDetsch_ALM: New: President Trump taps Donald Yamamoto as US ambassador to Somalia and Kevin Sullivan to be US ambassador to Nicaragua, putting two foreign service veterans in countries facing civil conflict
@STN_KE: Qatar Charity (QC) has implemented a number of health projects in Somalia during the first half of 2018. The implementation has come as part of its development intervention in the field of health, QC said.
@taakulosom: There is a growing concern that drought & famine pose significant threat to many lives http://worlwide.In Somalia alone,starvation & deaths face a large number of the marginalized group.Humanitarian partners play a vital role to solve this issues despite limited resources.
@RAbdiCG: Uhuru, top US commander renew commitment to peace in Somalia, S.Sudan https://www.capitalfm.co.ke/
@JimHaggertyOBE: Training of Trainers on Conflict Related Sexual Violence for Somali National Security Forces. Congratulations on completing your training with the assistance of #AMISOM #UN #CSSF #Somalia
IMAGE OF THE DAY
Somali Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Amb. Ahmed Isse Awad during a meeting with Chinese State Councilor and Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Beijing.
Photo: @MofaSomalia