September 17, 2015 | Morning Headlines

Main Story

AMISOM Airstrikes Diminish Capacity Of Al Shabab, Says Governor

16 September – Source: Shabelle News – 135 Words

The governor of Bay region, Abdirashid Abdullahi Mohamed says the airstrikes launched against militant-held towns in south of Somalia, which are being carried out by African Union troops, have reduced the capacity of Al Shabaab militants. Mohamed told Shabelle Media based in Mogadishu that his administration was aware of airstrikes, which bombed Al Shabaab hideouts in the region, explaining that those strikes did not cause any civilian casualties.

“We improved the overall security the region. Our soldiers have been put on high alert on Al Shabab attempts,” governor Mohamed stated. He urged local residents to work with security forces, in a bid to thwart attacks planned by Al Qaeda linked to Al Shabaab insurgents.The African Union mission for Somalia (AMISOM) fighter jets frequently launches bombing on bases suspected to be hideouts of Al Shabaab militants

Key Headlines

Amisom Air-Strikes Diminish Capacity of Al Shabab Says Governor (Shabelle News)
Consultative Conference To Take Place In Kismayu Jubbaland Insists (Goobjoog News)
Somalia President Appoints Close Aide Ambassador To Turkey (Horseed Media)
Soldiers On Strike Besiege Galmudug Parliament (Radio Dalsan)
Somalia Rules Out Revival Of Piracy (Horseed Media)
Kenya’s Wildlife Flees Al-Shabab Conflict Into Somalia (Al Jazeera English)
Twin Cities Suspect Accused Of Planning To Leave To Fight In Syria Expected To Plead Guilty (Star Tribune)
The Berbera Oil Terminal the Fuel Suppliers Lack Transparency (Hiiraan Online)

Consultative Conference To Take Place In Kismayu, Jubbaland Insists

16 September – Source: Goobjoog News – 193 Words

Interim Jubba Administration has said it will host the consultative conference next week in Kismayo to establish the roadmap for the 2016 elections despite earlier reports indicating the meeting would be held in Mogadishu.The second Vice President of IJA, Abdikadir Hajji Mohamed, said that Jubbaland will host consultative national conference, which will be attended by leaders of Somali government and federal states.“The conference to discuss the country’s future will take place from 19th to 21st this month in the administrative capital of Jubbaland, Kismayo town” said Hajji.

He called upon people of Kismayo to work closely with the security forces to maintain the security of Kismayo town:“I urge my people to collaborate with the administration and the security agencies to flush out the elements creating insecurity in our land,” he said. This comes days after the presidency announced the conference would be held in Mogadishu.The same meeting, which was scheduled to take place in Kismayu last week a day after the inauguration of Jubbaland leader Ahmed Mohamed Madoobe, was postponed after reports of disagreements between the states, with Puntland saying it was not aware of the meeting.

Somalia President Appoints Close Aide Ambassador To Turkey

16 September – Source: Horseed Media – 210 Words

Somalia President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has appointed one of his close aides as Somalia’s ambassador to Turkey. Abdullahi Mohamed Ali, who is well known as Sambalolshe, a former Chief of the Somali Intelligence agency, presented his credentials to the Turkish President, Recep Tayyib Erdogan, on Mondayfollowing a ceremony held in the Ankara Presidential Palace.

Mr Sambalolshe was sacked as the Head of Intelligence agency last year by the Federal Cabinet after he was accused of misusing his powers. He was also named as the Somali ambassador to the United Kingdom. Turkey’s rapprochement with Somalia formally began with the Istanbul Conference on Somalia during May 21-23, 2010 as part of Djibouti Agreement and long political transition process started in 2004.

The real turning point of Turkish commitment towards Somalia was the Erdogan’s visit during the holy month of Ramadan in the summer of 2011. The visit coincided with the opening of a humanitarian aid privileged channel towards Somali people hard hit by civil war and long famine crisis. Erdoğan was the first non-African leader to visit Somalia in nearly two decades. However, in the past four years, Turkey has proved that pure human capital can be a better policy instrument than lending programs, aid donations, business deals, and diplomatic summits.

Soldiers On Strike Besiege Galmudug Parliament

16 September – Source: Radio Dalsan – 102 Words

Reports coming in from Addado town, the current headquarters of the semi-autonomous state of Galmudug, say that Galmudug soldiers have on Wednesday morning besieged themselves in the Parliament building.The reason behind the strike of the soldiers is non payment of salaries for several months. “The heavily armed soldiers locked themselves in the Parliament building, but later on the officials of Galmudug succeeded in clearing them from the building after negotiating with them,” says a local businessman in Addado, who spoke to the English department of Radio Dalsan.

Somalia Rules Out Revival Of Piracy

16 September – Source: Horseed Media – 296 Words

Somalia’s Federal government has ruled out the revival of piracy on its territorial waters, after a report warned the comeback of pirates due to the increased illegal fishing activities by foreign vessels. Minister of Fisheries and Marine Resources Mohamed Omar said in an interview with the VOA that the sea gangs no longer have the ability to resurgent. “We don’t have pirate men who are organized like the group we are fighting against now [Al-Shabab], who are stationed in a particular area, who we can call pirates, that does not exist now.’’The number of attacks by Somali pirates dropped sharply since 2012, largely because of an international naval effort. One of the other major factors that led to the decline of piracy was the growing lack of support or even resistance to piracy operations by local communities. As much as many Somalis along the coast resented the international navies, they resented the effects of piracy on their communities even more.

Relative stability in Somalia in the past last three years after 20 years of chaos and war has raised hopes that it could lead to a more permanent solution to a problem that has driven up shipping insurance rates, but it has yet to solve the issue. Somalia has the longest coastline in Africa with 3,330 KM. Since the central government was overthrown in 1991, foreign fishing trawlers began illegal fishing and ships from big companies started dumping waste off the coast of the lawless country. The absence of the country’s at one time serviceable coastguard, Somali waters have become the site of an international “free for all,” with fishing fleets from around the world illegally plundering Somali stocks and freezing out the country’s own rudimentarily-equipped fishermen, says a UN report released in 2006.

INTERNATIONAL MEDIA

Kenya’s Wildlife Flees Al-Shabab Conflict Into Somalia

16 September – Source: Aljazeera – 242 Words

Wild elephants, lions, leopards, giraffe, buffalo and ostriches have been spotted in Somalia’s Lower Jubba area in the first sightings of the animals in the east African country in decades. The animals are believed to have been displaced from Kenya’s Boni forest by ongoing security operations against the armed group al-Shabab that operates in the area. Boni forest, which is a national reserve for conservation, borders Somalia.

“The animals are coming back in large numbers. Inside the town we have ostriches walking around. Leopards and elephants are just outside the town,” Farah Haybe, Badaade district commissioner, told Al Jazeera. The densely forested area used to be home to herds of wild animals and birds until the start of the Somali war in 1991 which led to unabated poaching. The animals which escaped the poachers, migrated across the border in to Kenya. But with sense of normalcy now returning to Somalia the animals’ fortunes seems to be changing.

Twin Cities Suspect Accused Of Planning To Leave To Fight In Syria Expected To Plead Guilty

16 September – Startribune – 143 Words

Zacharia Abdurahman, one of several local Somali-American men accused of plotting to join Muslim extremists fighting in the Middle East, is expected to plead guilty to federal terror charges Thursday in a hearing in downtown Minneapolis, according to court filings. In pleading guilty to conspiring to provide material to a State Department-designated terrorist organization — in this case the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) — Abdurahman would become the third defendant in the case to do so. Abdullahi Yusuf and Hanad Musse previously pleaded guilty to similar charge. Like several of the other defendants, Abdurahman has been held in Sherburne County jail while awaiting trial. Prosecutors say that the men met repeatedly, starting in spring 2014, to find ways to leave the U.S. and join jihadists fighting in Syria and Iraq.

OPINION, ANALYSIS, AND CULTURE

“Many ordinary people are suspecting there is a scheme in which Silanyo and his ministers are receiving kickbacks or bribes from these business groups in exchange for not paying taxes or tariffs on petroleum products, communications and money transfer businesses,”

The Berbera Oil Terminal, the Fuel Suppliers Lack Transparency

16 September – Source: Hiiraan Online – 842 Words

In the 2010 presidential campaign, then candidate Ahmed Mohamed Mohamud (Silanyo), promised to deliver an “accountable and transparent” administration. He vowed: to crack down on corruption and nepotism, reform judiciary, set up an independent Attorney General Office, and uphold the rule of law.

But many clueless Somalilanders bought it, including many seasoned politicians, who rallied behind Silanyo with offers of support, despite Silanyo’s history of pandering on parochial, clannish politics. Everyone came together for one purpose: to defeat the incumbent Riyaale, who was presiding over massive corruption. But at the same time, on backroom deals, Silanyo was making promises to another group of people: his cronies. This week, to keep his promises to those cronies, Silanyo is circumventing the legislature in order to complete the transfer of management of the Berbera Oil Terminal(BOT), and the distribution of petroleum products to them.

Silanyo has already neglected his fiduciary responsibility to protect the public infrastructures like the BOT; the legislature must hold him accountable, because the Somaliland people are demanding transparent and accountable government. To do that, the legislature has already passed a resolution blocking that transfer. The legislature did the right thing about this serious matter although it’s too little and too late to stop Silanyo’s wholesale auctioning of Somaliland’s resources and infrastructure.