Somalia lies in the region of Horn of Africa. Its border countries are Kenya and Ethiopia. It has the longest coastline on Africa’s mainland. Somalia in comparison with its neighboring countries has not achieved much.
The country is unstable economically, politically, and socially. For a very long time, there have been several cases of civil wars as insecurity increases every day destroying the social lives of people. Due to these wars, Somalia has no stable healthcare system and amid this coronavirus pandemic, it is going to face a hard time.
Economically, it is one of the poorest nations in the world as there is no basis for measuring its financial performance. The country has little developments such as a good road and rail network. Politically, it was not until 2012 that the state had a permanent central government that ruled the region.
Recently, there has been an issue with the electoral process which forced regional leaders to come together and discuss the matter. Most countries around the continent such as Tanzania, are preparing their general elections later this year. Democracy in Africa is a right that every single person values highly.
The Politics in Somalia
Somalia’s politics is under the structure of the federal parliamentary representative democratic republic. Its Constitution says that the President is the head of state and the Prime Minister is the head of government. The country consists of the Senate and the National Assembly which is the lower house.
Somalia is a federal republic comprising of 6 states. They are Puntland, Galmudug, Juba land, South West State, Hirshabelle, and Somaliland. Somalia’s divisions are more than 15 known as gobollada which in turn has subdivisions. Historically, Somaliland is a self-declared country and international officials consider it being a semi-autonomous area.
The Federal Member States Meeting
Leaders from the Somalia FMS met in Dhusamareb to discuss on the issue of electoral procedure and associations with fed administration. There were reports of fear of unease between regional heads and the fed administration in the capital.
June Updates
Halima Ismail told the fed policymakers that it was not possible to conduct general elections amid current affairs. She is the elections commission head. The earliest the election authorities could conduct the exercise was in March next year. Halima gave 2 options to the low house parliament.
First, the election based on biometric registration would be possible in August the following year (2021). Second, if the registration is under a manual basis, authorities will conduct the elections in the 3rd month of 2021.
The Opposition Leaders’ Views
The leaders are completely against prolonging terms for the existing administration. Last month, Sheikh Sharif, Sheikh Ahmed, and Sheikh Mohamud warned President Mohamed Abdullahi against rescheduling the general elections.
Sheikh Ahmed said:
“What we have heard is that Abdullahi met Abiy Ahmed and Muse Bihi in Ethiopia but what they have talked about is something that can lead to division.”
As the coronavirus ravages the rest of the world, we hope that the leaders in Somali will come to a clear and fair conclusion.
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