The Obstacles threatening Somalia’s 2021 Upcoming Elections.

With all the political stakeholders and international partners expressing their satisfaction in May 27 election Implementation deal and welcoming the idea coming at the backdrop of a consensus reached following protracted political confrontations, the mistrust over what might happen when the practical work of parliamentary elections begin poses a threat on the  elections because the  nature and the variety of opposing sides that is directly and indirectly involved in the election processes, the elections Committees, the regional leaders, the electoral security agents,  all these sensitively  jointly work in the same event.

Playing a more appealing role to all players and more of a middle man, the Prime minister’s office must give this its weight of responsibility by taking a coordinating role to avoid any iota of mistrust and even differences that could set off the elections or cause flagrant incidents as previous.

Election committees are technical, and to fill gabs posed by political challenges, the federal office In charge of elections have to establish strategies to settle and cope with all grievances including pressures faced by state level committees from regional leaders, this strengthens trust and confidence in the federal government’s election management.

Seemingly, key election stake holders who have been  part of last electoral implementation consensus will likely make efforts, or even hit or miss attempts to influence the parliamentary elections to have influence in the upcoming parliament.

It could be argued that these candidate’s access and influence to the forthcoming MPs will shape who is going to be next president.

Thus the federal office in charge of election has to firmly and fairly balance in managing this by professionally trying to block all attempts violating and denting the elections reputation and credibility and even take into account the  challenges fronted by various circumstances.

Any gap in communication give a chance to overwhelmed social media posts to capitalize on such gaps. This could lead to casting doubt on the image of election processes.

An effort has recently been made on this by state run media where they recently developed policy by largely covering last election talks including  dissent views.

when actual work of electing MPs starts , a communication strategy is needed before to inform the masses of the actuals process , the lack of proper communications result distrust and  throw solutions far beyond, like the case of  opposing press conferences and political statements through media that flared up the election standoffs in the past.

The Challenges

The President

There is a doubt that the outgoing President with some state machinery and the incumbency advantage, being Presidential candidate seems to be doing everything he can  to influence in the Parliamentary elections in favor of his own political agenda in an attempt to be reelected.

This could happen in varying degrees in polling stations particularly in Garbahaarrey city one of the two election stations in Jubbaland Region.

At one point, this eases the Gedo’s concerns of lack of confidence in Jubbaland elections’ management but meanwhile consolidates president’s influence in the elections.

Unlike the regional level ministries appointed by The prime minister’s office to hasten  reconciliations in Gedo, the Jubba land electoral committee will likely face tough challenge in balancing Jubbaland leader’s pressure on them and president’s overwhelming influence in Gedo, the long term sticking point and barrier in reaching election implementation consensus.

The president’s influence would possibly appear  in the parliamentary election sites in the Capital and the States of Galmudug, Hirshabelle and Southwest whose leaders have come to power through federal government’s support and since then they have been a close ally with it.

This influence could even be bigger in parliamentary election sites in Mogadishu, the seat of the federal government and southwest state whose leader has amicable relationship with President Farmaajo.

Regional leaders

The regional leaders have broader share than any other in interfering with election’s fairness process.

First  the most of parliamentary seats will be held in their regions, and second more than two third of state level Committees who are responsible for the actual work of the delegates management and Parliamentary election were appointed by them.

Based on the previous lessons of 2016 indirect Parliamentary elections held in the country, the regional leaders negatively influenced and as the matter of fact they will likely interfere elections particularly delegates selection, disabling the work of state level electoral committees.

This makes hard to hold a free and fair elections in this country with overwhelming multiple challenges surrounding it.

Their extraordinary authority in elections management as host state  will likely make possible for them to play down the planned management process of the election.

This makes the hosting federal member state leadership getting  involved in the election in a push to tilt outcome favor of their political fate by establishing close friends in the upcoming Federal Parliament that will help them in return establish close relationship with the incoming federal administration to avoid a scenario similar to the outgoing Federal government’s policy which had previously pursued a continuing  pressure on Member states to force regional leaders to be loyal to it and took measures that included the change of Regional leaders who failed to obey it.

The pressure by the federal member states to the plant their favourite MPs in parliament does a huge challenge to the credibility.

Council of Presidential Candidates(CPC)

Council of Presidential Candidates have expressed confidence in the PM, but when practical work of electing MPs begin everything will change swiftly and they will be trying to great extent but indirectly influence the elections thought pressuring Prime minister and some regional leaders, even some of Council are not only running for the president but also for MP.

CPC are group of presidential candidates with deferent political agendas and have diverse influences, but united by areas of common interest. This is how they could accumulate more burden on the election challenges apparently jeopardizing the process being on track.

The security challenge

Elections stations like Jowhar and Dhuusamareeb on the limit of influence in the parliamentary elections could be counterproductive as some of parliamentary candidates could have heavily armed security guards of their own negatively impacting the elections overall security.

Soldiers that were opposed to the president’s extention of term pulled out from frontline positions around Jowhar,  so they could pose risk to elections processes in the city by consolidating some candidates’ potential dissatisfaction calls in the process.

Areas in the east of  Baladwayne is  both a polling station and there’s a strong presence of armed forces led by general Huud, and have been operating of his own in defiance of regional administrations’ command, this can only be settled a peaceful way that prior the election’s start, because  The SPF and AMISOM police are prepared only to secure election sites but any tensions, clashes and even incidents around the election site or restricting the city movement could automatically hinder elections going forward or create security uncertainty in polling areas which could result farther delay.

All these could cause potential incidents of security nightmares which if not immediately solved could develop into clashes as the result. The federal offices in charge holding fair and acceptable elections have to peacefully start solving all these challenges with wisdom and by employing proper mechanisms.

Few weeks ago, Somalia’s terrorist group Al-Shabaab has vowed to disrupt Somalia elections terming it as an illegal exercise.

Conclusion

It’s the responsibilities of the prime minster to reconcile all opposing sides in the elections by cooperating closely with regional leaders in the first place to have full access in paving the way for the state level electoral committees and to get relief from regional leaders’ potential extraordinary pressure so as to work based on the plan, these tactics contribute to acceptable elections.

The Prime Minister Will likely face pressures on daily bases, but he has to in a wise way reject any measures undermining the transparency and the fairness of election processes. This includes listening to all stakeholders trying to boost confidence  with the process.

Recommendations

The PM must lead electoral process with win win techniques investing compromise and a daily basis close cooperation with not only regional leaders but also presidential candidates and other influential persons representing Somaliland.

He has to balance the nature of cooperation between regional leaders and state level electoral Committees to avoid any systematic mismanagement that could result deliberate election fraud and even undermine the work of the Committee in charge on the election security.

The PM’s office has to appoint a short term reconciliation committee ahead of election to settle General Huud’s defiance of Hishabelle’s election implementation efforts.

The strategy of putting the electoral security personals into operation must be practically fit with the given state  or electrol constituents to fulfill the 2016 elections security gabs to avoid everything rekindling what happened as the result of security gabs

The prime minster office has to avoid any unilateral actions.

To organize and activate daily Pubic briefing of elections developments to avert any misinformation as fake news and rumors being circulated in social media recently become widespread in the country.

End

By Dhakade Osman

Peace Activist and hold master’s degree in International relations and Diplomacy.

He can be reached via:     dhakade17@gmail.com