October 18, 2016 | Daily Monitoring Report
Prime Minister Applauds HiirShabelle’s Newly Elected President
18 October – Source: Goobjoog News – 205 Words
Somali Prime Minister, Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke has congratulated Ali Abdulahi Osoble for his election as President of the newly formed regional state. “I am very pleased to congratulate Ali Abdulahi Osoble on his election as President of Hir-Shabelle State and also his Deputy Ali Abdullahi Hussein (Guudlawe). The victory indicates the confidence of people of Hirshabelle in you,” said Sharmarke. The Premier urged both the president and his deputy to serve people of the two regions and lead the young state to a long period of peace and prosperity. On Monday afternoon, over 90 state parliamentarians casted their votes for the presidential candidates contesting in the election. The newly elected president garnered 61 votes to secure the presidency with his opponent got 36 votes. Osoble who served as education minister in the government led by Ali Mohamed Ghedi in 2005 will have the immediate task of unifying and seeking common ground with the opposition which stood strongly against his candidature. Analysts say Osoble can only appease critics by forming an inclusive government that mirrors the wishes of the people of both regions. Jowhar town, which hosted the state formation process for Hir-Shabelle was designated to be the administrative capital of the newly formed regional State.
Key Headlines
- Prime Minister Applauds HiirShabelle’s Newly Elected President (Goobjoog News)
- No other administration other than Hirshabelle is allowed in the region – Hiiraan Governor (Radio Kulmiye)
- Residents Flee Southern Somalia Village As Fighting Intensifies (Goobjoog News)
- Somali-Americans Accuse Trump Of ’empowering’ Isis Recruiters (The Independent UK)
- Somali Pirates Holding Five Kenyans 39 Seafarers For Ransom UN Chief Says (Daily Nation)
- Has Shabaab Been Weakened For Good? The Answer Is ‘Yes’ And ‘No’ (The Conversation)
NATIONAL MEDIA
No other administration other than Hirshabelle is allowed in the region – Hiiraan Governor
18 October 2016 – Source:Radio Kulmiye – 140 Words
Hiiraan Governor Yusuf Ahmed Hagar (Dabageed) has hailed the completion of Hirshabelle regional administration, terming the latest electoral process in Jowhar as an important milestone towards formulating a fully-fledged federal state for Hiiraan and Middle Shabelle regions. Reacting to Monday’s presidential election in Jowhar, where Ali Abdullahi Osoble was elected in a highly contested secret ballot box, Mr. Dabageed lauded the Hirshabelle parliament for their ‘shrewd political maturity’ towards completion of the overdue state-building process.Mr Dabageed has pledged his allegiance to the new administration underscoring that no other administration other than Hirshabelle is allowed in the region, ruling out any chance of a parallel in state formation in Hiiraan.The Hiiraan Governor was reacting to the landmark election of Ali Abdullahi Osobleh as the new president of Hirshabelle state, putting the prolonged Hiiraan and Middle Shabelle regional conflation deadlock to an end.
Residents Flee Southern Somalia Village As Fighting Intensifies
18 October – Source: Goobjoog News – 218 Words
Hundreds of people have fled their homes in and around Muuri village, only 13 kilometers south of Afgooye as fighting intensified. The exodus follows outbreak of fighting in the last two days between Somali government forces and Al-Shabaab fighters. Muuri residents said the fighting is intense, with Al-Shabaab fighters firing continuously from pick-up trucks mounted with heavy weaponry in the outskirt of the village. Families were leaving the village and the surrounding areas to K50 area. The families were moving in response to reports of renewed fighting and a fear that “the fighting will go on for some time”. “Many families are taking advantage of today’s lull in the fighting to reach safety,” a resident by the name Farah Abdullahi, said. “I have just taken my children to K50 locality which lies south of Mogadishu.” K50 chief, Ali Noor Ali said hundreds reached the village. “people came here and they are struggling to get the basics including food, water and shelter. There are no aid agencies operating in the area to help displaced people,” said Ali. Somali forces on Monday afternoon recaptured Muuri village barely a day after they lost it to Al-Shabaab fighters. Al-Shabaab have recently increased attacks against AU and Somali forces in the Lower Shabelle region, which has seen a surge of attacks.
INTERNATIONAL MEDIA
Somali-Americans Accuse Trump Of ’empowering’ Isis Recruiters
18 October – Source: The Independent, UK- 800 Words
Members of the struggling Somali-American community say they are losing the battle to stop Isis recruiting their sons thanks to an inept response to the problem by the US federal government and rhetoric from Donald Trump that, they say, makes the recruiter’s’ job easier. Nowhere is the frustration greater than in the drab Cedar-Riverside neighborhood of Minneapolis, where thousands of Somali-Americans who originally fled to the US after the collapse of the Somali government in 1991 now live. It was traumatised last year when the government arrested nine young Somali-Americans on charges of plotting to join Isis in Syria.
“With all this depression, with all this poverty, with the few resources that we have, we always fail to the recruiters and with the powerful behind them, like countries like Saudi Arabia that finance them,” declared Yusuf Abdurahman, whose son Zacharia, is among the nine now awaiting sentencing in the much-watched case. “We will never match.” Numbering more than 25,000 in the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and St Paul in Minnesota, the Somali-American community is far from unified on the best way forward.
Mr Abdurahman was a speaker at a meeting inside the Somali-owned Capitol Cafe in Cedar-Riverside one evening last week called in part to help distribute pamphlets advertising an anti-radicalisation programme devised by the FBI entitled ‘Don’t be a Puppet – Pull Back the Curtain on Violent Extremism’.
But the very sparse attendance at the meeting was a reflection of deeply-felt suspicion within the community of any initiative that has the FBI or any set of government initials attached to it. However, most are agreed on the need to repel outside voices seen as demonizing American Muslims generally and Somali-Americans in Minnesota in particular. That has included HBO, the cable channel, which last month announced plans to begin filming the pilot of a new drama series precisely examining the lives of young Somalis disenchanted with home and feeling lured by Isis. Created in association with Kathryn Bigelow, director of the controversial films Zero Dark Thirty and Hurt Locker. it has been tentatively – and perhaps insensitively – entitled, Mogadishu, Minnesota.
Somali Pirates Holding Five Kenyans, 39 Seafarers For Ransom, UN Chief Says
18 October – Source: Daily Nation – 318 Words
Pirate gangs in Somalia are believed to be holding five Kenyans for ransom, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said in a report issued on Monday.The brief reference to the Kenyan captives is included in an 18-page update on Somali piracy presented to the UN Security Council. Mr Ban does not, however, name the Kenyan hostages, nor does he explain the circumstances of their abduction. The report notes that a Kenyan is the only Somali pirate hostage to have been freed so far in 2016.That reference is to James Gachamba Kuria who was seized in November 2014, along with his partner Lois Njoki Weru, while delivering medicine in Somalia. Mr Kuria was freed as a result of a raid by Somali security forces last February on a village where the two Kenyans were being held. Sadly, Mr Ban’s report states: “The Kenyan woman is still being held hostage.Dhows and foreign fishing vessels have become the main targets of Somali pirates in the past year, the report notes. The Pirates are holding 39 seafarers from foreign-registered vessels as captives, including 26 from an Omani ship, 10 from an Iranian ship and three from a Yemeni vessel.No seafarers from large commercial ships are currently being held by Somali pirates, says the UN leader’s report which covers the period ending September 30, this year.“More than three years have passed since Somali pirates successfully hijacked and held a large commercial vessel for ransom,” Mr Ban told the Security Council.
OPINION, ANALYSIS, AND CULTURE
“Under pressure on many fronts: The Somali national army is increasingly taking on a larger role in combat operations, becoming both a target for offensives and launching them.”
Has Shabaab Been Weakened For Good? The Answer Is ‘Yes’ And ‘No’
17 October – Source: The Conversation – 934 Words
Several analysts have highlighted the supposed weakening of Al-Shabaab, the violent Somali Islamist militant group. The Somali foreign minister Abdisalam Hadliye Omer claimed recently for example that the Al-Qaeda allied terrorist outfit controls less than 10% of Somali territories. Omer could also point to Mogadishu’s hosting of the regional heads of state of Intergovernmental Authority on Development for an extraordinary summit in September. This was the first high-level diplomatic meeting in the Somali capital for over 35 years. Al-Shabaab has been battling the Somali government for at least a decade and is responsible for devastating attacks in Kenya and Uganda. As such the regional summit presented the group with an opportunity to attack the top leadership. But the organisation failed to launch any attack and the summit passed off peacefully. Under pressure on many fronts: The Somali national army is increasingly taking on a larger role in combat operations, becoming both a target for offensives and launching them. The regional states, a crucial part of the new federal structures of Somalia often based around local clans, have also increasingly become more involved in the fighting.
The federal arrangement was created to address the distrust between regional – often clan-based – factions and Mogadishu. Several of these have launched relatively successful attacks against Al-Shabaab in areas where the Somali army lacks local support. For example, in recent months the interim southwestern administration has launched at least three sizeable, and successful, attacks against Al-Shabaab. Additionally, an American airstrike in September confirmed that the US remains involved and committed to strike at Al Shabaab. Added to these are rumours about low scale clashes between Al-Shabaab fighters loyal to the Islamic State and those loyal to Al Qaeda continued in the more central areas. Finally, another reason for the new optimism is that the Somali capital is booming. Although there are terror attacks, small hit and run attacks, assassinations and improvised explosives, investors have not been deterred. All of these developments signal that Al-Shabaab is facing stress under increased pressure from the government and the regional states. But it should also be noted that predictions of Al-Shabaab’s collapse have come and gone since 2007. So far, the group has remained potent.
TOP TWEETS
@ActForSomalia: Useful resources for Somalis to know their elected representatives check @wakiilorg searchable database to find your MP https://www.wakiil.org/#!/
@DEMASomalia: Meet the Courageous #Women of #SomaliaFighting Terrorism in #Africa http://tak.pt/i/sqDvBXJw @TheSomaliPolice @ZakiaHussen #SomaliaRising.
@abdisalamisma1: Popular Somali Newspaper Remains Closed and its editor in detention for a second day in the capital, Mogadishu.
@ADirshe: #Somalia Tough dialogue in Kismayo regarding returnees from Kenya. Without host absorptive capacity, returnees will face dire consequences.
@Vatescorp: # Somalia: Puntland announces revised Upper House candidates list, women representation in Mudug and Sool regionshttp://ow.ly/
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IMAGE OF THE DAY
Somali Women Police officer stand guard at a recent function in Mogadishu
Photo: Ashley Hamer