March 8, 2017 | Morning Headlines
UN Chief: World Is Neglecting Risk Of Famine In Somalia
07 March- Source:Shabelle News- 279 Words
United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres has warned that the plight of the Somali people has been “neglected” amid an impending famine.Guterres, who was in the capital Mogadishu on his first field mission since taking up his position, said that Somalia’s crisis risks being overlooked by the world.The UN estimates that over six million people, which is more than half of Somalia’s population, is in need of humanitarian assistance.“People are so obsessed with spectacular crises like the war in Syria, that these chronic situations tend to be neglected,” Guterres said.
The UN has launched an appeal for $825 million for the first half of the year in order to conduct a pre-famine program.In addition to drought and famine, diseases, such as cholera and measles, are beginning to spread.According to the World Health Organization, more than 6,000 cases of cholera have been reported since early January. There have also been 2,500 reports of cases involving suspected measles.The International Organization for Migration has warned that if “action is not taken immediately, early warning signals point towards a growing humanitarian crisis in Somalia of potentially catastrophic proportions.”
On Saturday, Somalia’s Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire announced that 110 people had died from starvation and drought-related illness.Khaire made the announcement while speaking to the drought committee in Mogadishu, four days after President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo declared the drought a national disaster.The death toll covers those who died in the rural areas of Somalia’s southwestern Bay region where the drought is more severe than other parts of the country. It was not immediately clear how many others have died in the rest of the country.
Key Headlines
- UN Chief: World Is Neglecting Risk Of Famine In Somalia (Shabelle News)
- Mogadishu Fire Department Chief Resigns Over Bakara Inferno (Radio Dalsan)
- Woman Arrested In Adaado For Killing Daughter (Goobjoog News)
- ‘A Nightmare:’ UN Chief Urges Help For Somalia Hunger Crisis (Associated Press)
- 18 Somali Nationals Charged For Being Illegally In Kenya (Daily Nation)
- Somalia’s New President Now Faces 3 Big Challenges (Washington Post)
NATIONAL MEDIA
Mogadishu Fire Department Chief Resigns Over Bakara Inferno
07 March – Source: Radio Dalsan – 120 Words
Abdullahi Mohamed Abdullahi the Head of Fire Department in Banaadir region has resigned over delayed salaries for employees and controversy over the recent fire that gutted down a section of Mogadishu’s largest market Bakaara.Firefighters in Mogadishu have reportedly not been paid for the last five months. This comes after an internal report said the department failed in dealing with the Bakara fire where only 3 vehicles and 20 firefighters were available.Traders lost millions of dollars worth of goods in the fire that occurred a week ago.The Mogadishu Mayor forced the fire chief to resign over what is said was failure to execute his duties. Mogadishu has only five fire fighting vehicles donated by the city of London.
Woman Arrested In Adaado For Killing Daughter
07 March-Source: Goobjoog News- 130 Words
Police in Adaado town of central Somalia are holding a woman accused of killing her daughter.Nesteho Ahmed Ali, a resident of Adaado town is wanted for allegedly killing 4-year-old Ridwaan Ali, chopping her body and hiding the parts in a sack.Hussein Omar Mumin, Adaado police commissioner has confirmed the arrest of Ali.Mumin said police have been trailing the suspect since the killing was reported.“The woman hacked her daughter to death, the reason why she killed the girls is yet unclear but the police launched investigations,” said Mumin.The police also arrested the husband of the woman in connection with the murder.“Interim investigations led to the arrest of the husband of the lady, after the investigation both will be arraigned in court,” said the police commissioner.
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA
‘A Nightmare:’ UN Chief Urges Help For Somalia Hunger Crisis
07 March- Source:Associated Press – 613 Words
Visibly shocked by the suffering of malnourished Somalis and cholera victims during an emergency visit, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Tuesday urged international support to alleviate Somalia’s worsening hunger crisis.”Every single person we have seen is a personal story of tremendous suffering. There is no way to describe it,” Guterres said after seeing skeletal men, women and children in a cholera ward in Baidoa, 243 kilometers (151 miles) northwest of the capital, Mogadishu.
Somalia’s prolonged drought has caused widespread hunger, and the shortage of clean water has resulted in cholera.On his first field trip since becoming the U.N. chief,
Guterres said Somalia’s famine crisis requires a massive response. He said 6 million people, or almost half of the country’s population, need assistance.”People are dying. The world must act now to stop this,” he tweeted on his arrival in this Horn of Africa nation.”We need to make as much noise as possible,” Guterres said. “Conflict, drought, climate change, disease, cholera. The combination is a nightmare.”In Baidoa’s cholera wards, adults and children had sunken eyes and protruding ribs. Because of the cholera-induced diarrhea, medical workers sprayed the wards with chlorine to disinfect the areas.
Guterres also visited a camp with hundreds of families displaced by the drought and Somalia’s battle against the Islamic extremists of al-Shabab. He saw hungry families seeking shelter under flimsy plastic.”I have nothing. This is not a shelter, we barely get any food here and we have no protection. It’s not safe, I am suffering,” said 34-year-old Deira Mohamed Nor, with her 10-month-old baby girl Dahiro Ishaak Hussein, who is sick with malaria. Nor said she recently lost one of her children to diarrhea.
18 Somali Nationals Charged For Being Illegally In Kenya
07 March – Source:Daily Nation – 185 Words
Eighteen Somali nationals including three minors were on Monday charged with being in the country illegally.The accused, majority of whom are women, appeared before Mombasa resident magistrate G Kiage and denied the charges.The court directed the accused to be remanded to await a report from the Refugees Affairs Secretariat on their status which is expected to include details from where they come from.
However, the three minors will be held in custody at Likoni children’s remand home.Lawyer Nyange Sharia — representing the accused — had wanted the court to have them handed over to department of refugees’ affairs.Mr Sharia said the department will investigate the accused and determine where they come from in addition to preparing a report.“The report will help us to know how to proceed thereafter,” said Mr Sharia.The court heard that on March 4, this year at about 5pm at Mwembe Tayari in Mombasa, being Somali citizens, the 18 were found unlawfully present in the country without any valid documents from the immigration department.The case has been fixed for mention on Wednesday for further directions.
http://www.nation.co.ke/
OPINION, CULTURE & ANALYSIS
“Thus far, the AU-sponsored AMISOM forces have been working with the Somali government to push al-Shabab into remote parts of the country in southern Somalia. However, as a long-term solution, a strong central government is necessary if Somalia is to defeat Al-Shabaab,”
Somalia’s New President Now Faces 3 Big Challenges
07 March – Source: Washington Post/Hiiraan Online- 1157 Words
After a lengthy electoral process, Somalia got a new president last month, former prime minister Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed. Incumbent President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud conceded defeat in the Feb. 8 election when he failed to get the plurality of votes needed to win the second round of voting.This was only the second smooth transfer of power since Somalia’s first direct elections in 1960 — incumbent President Aden Abdulle Osman graciously ceded the 1967 election to Abdirashid Ali Shermarke.Somalia’s democratic trailblazing in Africa came to a halt in 1969, however, when General Mohamed Siad Barre seized power in a coup. Siad Barre ruled the country until his ouster in 1991, when a civil war ensued.
A Transitional Federal Government (TFG) created in 2004 made several attempts to hold elections, but these efforts failed due to security concerns. Once the TFG’s mandate expired in 2012, Somalia embarked on the roadmap laid out by the United Nations, which included drafting a provisional constitution and selecting a new parliament that would then elect a president. This process guided Mohamud’s election in 2012.Like the 2012 elections, the 2017 elections were indirect — parliament, not citizens, elected the president. The main reason for holding indirect elections was concern in the central government and the international community about the terrorist group al-Shabab, which had controlled large swaths of Somalia since 2007.
Aided by African Union (AU) forces, the central government regained control over much of the insurgent-held territory. But Mohamud’s administration failed to create voter districts or establish an electoral commission, as stipulated by the provisional constitution. This groundwork was necessary for direct elections — one person, one vote.
Now that the 2017 elections have taken place, here are three challenges the new government will face:1) Ethnic power-sharing is an ongoing process.The method for filling seats in Somalia’s parliament was hotly debated. In the 2012 election, parliament seats relied on a “4.5 Formula” — a power-sharing agreement among Somalia’s major clans. The formula allocates one in four seats to each of the major clans in Somalia, and half of one seat to minority clans.The clan-based quota was used to appoint the 275 seats of the Lower House of parliament: 61 seats for the four major clans, and the minority clans shared the remaining 31. In 2012, 135 Somali elders, nominated by the main clan families, elected parliament.This same formula applied in 2017, however, the number of delegates was expanded to thwart vote buying, which tainted the 2012 election.