Friday, March 29, 2024
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President Farmajo and PM Kheyre’s Government: The Graft Continues

By Ahmed Ibrahim, Ph.D

The consensus is that the new cabinet unveiled by Prime Minister Hassan Ali Kheyre on March 21, 2017, is not a government of scope that can move Somalia forward to address the challenges the country is facing such as the looming famine, security, economic recovery and building state institutions.

When President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed “Farmajo” took power last month, he was celebrated at home and by the International Community as the new kind of Somali leader: He was not Hassan Sheikh and he rose above clan politics. However, President Farmajo’s recent decisions have began to diminish his status at home and raised concern among supporters who fear that he is surrounded and poorly advised by political novices and opportunists.

PM Kheyre and his new ministers

Faisal Roble articulated in his recent article on Wardheernews, the blunders made by the new President to change the status quo stating “President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo may have strayed for good and embarked on a familiar road of incompetency that leads Somali politicians to the inevitable hell hole of do-nothing icons occupying the historic Villa Somalia for a useless period for four years.”

President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo has missed an opportunity to shape the future of Somalia by selecting Kheyre, a political novice and former oil executive, who was under investigation by the UN monitoring group, the UK and Norwegian governments for corruption and possibly links with Al shabaab, although he was later cleared of the allegation.  Mr. Kheyre delivered the long waited list of ministers in a hastily organized press conference in Mogadishu. The overblown list of the new ministers includes many members of the federal parliament, former ministers, and many political allies of former President Hassan Sheikh.

Case in point, the list includes Yusuf Garaad Omar, the former head of the Somali Service, British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and a close ally of the former President Hassan Sheikh.  Mr Garaad was awarded to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. Many Somalis accuse him of incompetence, and poor performance, calling his selection to lead the ministry a disaster for Somalia.

Garaad was stripped of his duties as the head of the Somali service over allegations of widespread mismanagement, clannism, nepotism and cropping up warlords. He used the BBC Somali service as a vehicle to plant discord and hate among Somali clans. Log time and experienced staffers of the Somali service took him to court after it became evident that he was projecting clannism by sidelining those who are not from his tribe from the BBC Somalia staff. He destroyed the reputation of the BBC Somali service, which ultimately caused him his employment. Thus, imagine having such a character at the helm of Somalia’s ministry of Foreign Affairs!  Some of the other nominated ministers were accused of playing a major role in the vote-buying scheme in the 2012 and 2017 elections.

Many have expressed frustration with President Farmajo’s failure to take lead and overall political naivety, suggesting that allies of former president Hassan Sheikh supported by the Ethiopia and Qatar are playing critical, backroom role in undermining push for a competent government. Ethiopia is still pulling the strings behind playing the scenes in a bid to return allies of President Hassan Sheikh to positions of influence to carryout Addis Ababa agenda.

Despite promising change, President Farmajo selected many old guards who has contributed to the poor affairs of the nation. The president seems to have crumbled under the pressure from the allies of the former government as well as Ethiopian and Qatar that want to maintain the status quo.

Some of the president’s close supporters have started to question whether Farmajo can address the graft issues and doubt the new government will bring change. They fear that perception of corrupt and incompetent government will weaken support for the president and bolster support for anti-government forces.

It remains unclear whether all of Kheyre’s nominees will be formally be confirmed by the legislature in the coming days. However, Parliamentary lawmakers and political pundits have speculated that the new cabinet represents a political compromise designed to maintain factional support from key powerbrokers in Mogadishu, Doha, and Addis Ababa.

In conclusion, President Farmajo’s selection of Prime Minister Kheyre and the nomination of a corrupt and incompetent cabinet is a bad first sign for his leadership, and commitment to change. The selections of old guard cabinet signal that Somalia is back to the usual, after euphoria of the 2017 election.

Therefore the parliament should reject the new cabinet, and send the prime minister back to the drawing board to come up with a competent cabinet that will bring change and move the country forward. The Somali people cannot afford to waste another four years with the same corrupt and incompetent political leaders. The nation needs a break from the past and move to new generation of leaders who will advance the interests of Somalia.

Ahmed Ibrahim, Ph.D
Email:[email protected]

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Dr. Ibrahim is a former Political and Development Adviser to the United Nations. 


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