The enemy within: Why Somalia faces credibility test
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan poses with Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud (right) and Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed following a press conference in Ankara, Turkey, on December 11, 2024.
In late 2010, as the dispute between Somalia’s President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke slid into paralysis, the African Union appointed Jerry John Rawlings as High Representative for Somalia. Addis Ababa had become a marketplace of competing briefings, each claiming legitimacy. To regain perspective, Rawlings, Kipruto Arap Kirwa—then facilitator for regional bloc, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad) peace and reconciliation efforts in Somalia—and I travelled to Lake Langano, 200km south of Addis Ababa. At the time I was a senior researcher on the Horn of Africa, asked to provide analytical context. The aim was to step away from diplomatic theatre and examine Somalia’s structural impasse with clarity.
Two voices kept ringing through our discussions. Col Gabre Alemseged, Kirwa’s deputy, called repeatedly. He was a senior Ethiopian military intelligence officer seconded to Igad. Augustine P Mahiga, then the UN Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Somalia and head of UNPOS, also remained in close contact. Somalia’s crisis had already become regional and multilateral. That level of engagement followed naturally.
