Grading the Da'ud administradion, and the federal government policies toward the region-Commentary

Op-Ed by Nimco Rage kilil5 contributor.

The just concluded end of year regional budget assessment and accountability has revealed only one thing, and one thing only-nothing has changed in the Somali regional administration. The administration might have changed, but, nothing else has changed. The regions core problems: insecurity, poor governance, widespread corruption, and disregard for the law are as prevalent as ever. It appears the federal governments recycling of corrupt and incapable leaders in the Somali regional state is just not working and will not work in the future.

President Da’ud came to office last October promising to deliver on four core problems; improved security, fighting corruption, improved governance and accountability of his administration. The president has failed to deliver on any of them nine months into his administration.

The Somali regional administration has been an oasis of lawlessness ever since the ONLF insurgency found itself in the laps of the Eritrea dictator who is waging a proxy war against Ethiopia in the Somali regional administration. Since 2007, ONLF has been growing in efficiency, strength and expansion of its insurgency throughout the Somali regional administration despite the efforts of both the federal government and the regional administration to end the insurgency. The president has made improving security the top of his agenda. He promised the elimination of ONLF insurgency. Nine months into his presidency, it appears ONLF has only gotten stronger, bolder, and has expanded its reach and spheres of operation beyond its traditional areas into provinces it has never operated before. Despite the creation of a new paramilitary force to fight the ONLF insurgency and despite the huge budget spent on security, the region is still an oasis of lawlessness. Despite the enormous sacrifice shouldered by the region’s citizens in the name of improving security and fighting the ONLF, the president’s promise of improving security and ending the ONLF insurgency is for now, just a mirage in the horizon.

If you can’t blame the president entirely for not improving security and ending the ONLF insurgency in the Somali region (the federal government has also failed in its campaign against the insurgency), you can squarely blame the president for not improving governance and ending corruption in his administration. Slogans and empty promises are what define the Somali regional administration leaders, and Mr. Da’ud’s promise of improving governance and ending corruption, appears up to this point in time, nothing more than slogans. Corruption is still systemic and widespread. Regional Bureaus budget expenditure books are still cooked. State contracts are awarded to those who will give the most kickbacks, projects are not finished by private contractors, and those finished are not finished on time or finished satisfactory. A big chunk of the region's budget is annually returned back to the federal coffers inexucsebly because of the incompetence of the top leadership.Just think of this, the region returns part of its budget every year because they couldn't use the budgeted money or excute budgeted projects. How can this be forgiven given the region's huge developmental need and where 85% of the population live in an abject poverty?

Improving governance and accountability was also on top of the president agenda early in his administration. The administration has organized and held numerous professional development assemblies and conferences for the region’s civil service, bureaus, and senior employees for the past six months. However, it’s debatable whether these expensive assemblies have any value or improved the region’s governance. There are allegation that these assemblies of the region’ civil service, these so-called professional development seminars, is just another avenue of misappropriating the region’s budget. Access to government service has minimally improved in Jigjiga and a few other towns while government service is non existent in the majority of smaller towns and villages despite the bloated number of the region’s civil service. Is this as a result of insecurity, poor governance, corruption or just incompetence by the administration? We don’t have the answer but it may be a combination of all of the above.

We (intellecuals) are concerned and worried the relegation of the rule of law to an element of convenience by the president and other senior officials in his administration. To be blunt, the president has become the law, and above the law. The president and top officials in his administration continue to disregard the law and without any restraint overstep the instrument of the law- the judiciary. Citizens of the region are jailed on a daily basis in the name of fighting the ONLF insurgency without due process, and more than 3000 individuals are sitting in jails without being brought to the courts and proven guilty in a court of law, in direct violation of both regional and federal constitutions. The president and his security minister are the judges and the courts, condemning whoever they wish to jail and sparing those they deem repentant. Fighting the ONLF insurgency shouldn’t and can’t be used as tool to violate both the regional and federal constitutions. Both levels of government can effectively fight the insurgency while upholding the supremacy of the law and without violating the citizens’ constitutional rights.

How to Fight the ONLF Insurgency.

The government’s response to the insurgent group has been predictably militarily but the government military response has been a failure no matter what angle you look at. The regional government has also tried different measures from arming and deploying clan militias to creating the paramilitary police and none of these measures have proven effective. The reason the military option has not been effective and will not work in the future is because of the dire socio-economics of the region’s population. To undermine the legitimacy of the ONLF insurgency the federal government needs to deploy a number of measures and sustain it religiously until these measure bear fruit. These measures should be deployed simultaneously in a sustained manner or they will not be effective. What are these measures?

1-The government with the help of international NGOs and Donor countries must invest in the economic improvement of the region’s population. The economic investment must include increased rationing of Food Aid, and ensuring that food Aid is not diverted and reaches the targeted recipients ,establishment of new irrigation centers and resettling pastoralist in these centers, increased emphasis in agriculture and food production in the region. In order to ease trade from and to the region while also denying entry points to the insurgency, the government must establish dry ports in Jigjiga and Godey. The dry ports will promote trade and export/import to and from the region which can significantly increase the per capita income of the region’s population. Restriction of trade within the region during government operation against the insurgent group is counter-productive, hurts the population and creates resentment which only helps the insurgent group and provides it with propaganda tools. The government should help the pastoralist form cooperatives to market their animals and fetch better prices in outside markets. The cooperatives can also provide loans and other member benefits to the pastoralist and potentially become launching pads for other economic advancements and investment tools. Improving the economic well-being of the region’s population will be the most effective tool of both denying recruits and undermining the viability of the insurgency group long term.

2- The lack of good governance and the regional governments’ chronic incompetence to provide service to the region’s population has created a significant dissatisfaction with the region’s political elites and provided the insurgency an environment of anger it has easily exploited and allows itself to present as the champion of their rights. I’m sure the region has decent, capable, well educated leaders that can solve the region’s problems but the federal government must first stop its bad habit of appointing and recycling incompetent leaders who often are perceived as loyalist to the ruling party. The region’s entire system of government requires revision and fundamental change. It’s a failed system. It’s the source of the region’s problems and it has failed the entire region. It encourages tribalism, tribal competition, encourages incompetence, discourages emergence of strong, independent minded leaders, and creates a culture of loyalist, nepotism and lawlessness. Without fixing the region’s political structure and system of government, an environment of resentment and anger will exist which will be exploited not only by the ONLF insurgent group but future potential Islamist groups that will emerge and exploit the anger and frustration of the region’s population. The new system of government must encourage and enable the emergency of capable leaders with the talent and education to lead. It must be merit based rather than clan based and should limit the influence of the federal government and the country’s ruling party to pick, a candidate of their choice, instead of region’s choice.

3-Ethiopia must learn from Kenya on how to integrate the region’s population fully into the fold and fabric of the country. Kenya was having difficulty in North Eastern Kenya which is inhabited by ethnic Somalis until 1980s when Kenya made a fundamental change to integrate the province to the rest of the country. Since then, Kenya has never looked back. North Eastern Kenya is now fully integrated into the country; the province’s ethnic Somalis now fully see themselves as Kenyans instead of Somalis. Kenya’s integration of its ethnic Somalis was possible only when the Kenya government changed its policies toward the province which treated the province’s population as half-citizens. It can be argued that Ethiopia’s policies and attitude toward the Somali regional State is similar to Kenya’s pre-1980 policies and attitude in North Eastern province. Even though Ethiopia is a federal State and the Somali region has its own autonomy, the federal government still wields enormous powers and influence in the region and some of its policies are discriminative and unhealthy. The methods employed by the federal government to fight the insurgent group are harsh, indiscriminate, and carries the second class treatment and half-citizen message to the population.

Finally, it’s too early to declare a failure the Da’ud administration, but, if this administration early going and poor execution of policy is an indication of their future success rate, I'm convinced that Da'ud's administration will not be different than the past administrations. This president lacks vision, lacks deep policy knowledge and skills to marshal resources, is overwhelmed by events easily, gets easily distracted and lacks the organization skills to solve the region’s long standing systemic problems. I'm now convinced that without federal intervention, the Somali regional administration is hopeless at best. I'm convinced that the time has come to dissolve the region’s current structure of incompetence and the invasive corruption, and start a new. This region will not move forward with its current foundation and system of governance. Changing the administration will not solve anything. The system needs to be changed. I believe the interest of the region will be best served if the federal government takes over for a period of time. The federal constitutional allows it and it’s in the best interest of the Somali regional state. Without fundamental reform to the regions institution structures, and political system, without significantly improvement to the socio-economic conditions of the population, without change of federal attitude and policies toward the region, the Somali regional State will disintegrate further into lawlessness and will be a hub for instability in the foreseeable future.

Nimco Rage works for the United Nation and is periodic contributor to kilil5 Online. I can be reached at Nimcorage1@hotmail.com