Ismail Osman ⚖️🕊️

After being wrongfully fired by @washingtonpost in the aftermath of the Charlie Kirk killing, an arbitrator ruled that the Post reinstate me with full back pay. But I have decided not to return to what the Washington Post has become. More here: karenattiah.substack.com/p/m…

The great danger that Somalia faces today is that problems of political nature which are essentially manageable are allowed to spiral out of control leading to an escalation, confrontation and polarization. It is our collective responsibility to prevent this from happening but mainly is the FGS responsibility to come up with a sober analysis and a genuine solution to the situation at hand before political grievances and local conflicts submerge within the wider conflict with the terror groups

@AFP Regional forces capture key towns in southern #Somalia arabnews.com/world/regional-…

Having reported on flawed elections in some countries, what is unfolding in Somalia is completely beyond words. It can only be described as the prank of the century. Non-Somali journalists have reached out to me asking about what is happening, and I have genuinely struggled to explain this bizarre situation. After what happened in South West and Banaadir, the same political theatre is now being repeated in Galmudug and parts of Hirshabelle. Despite the reality on the ground, @HassanSMohamud's JSP party continues trying to fool the Somali public and the international community that this is “one person, one vote.” I hardly reason why so many resources and so much effort are being invested in maintaining this narrative. Ultimately, they are only fooling themselves. A stage-managed process cannot become democratic simply because it is repeatedly presented as such. True democracy requires transparency, credibility and public trust, not political theatre and illusions. Or am I missing the point?

Deni’s letter to the UN raises a fundamental question: Who gave him the mandate to speak in the name of all Puntland and threaten Somalia’s territorial integrity? Political grievances are legitimate; manufacturing a mandate for separation is not.

Southwest Somalia: A Political Crisis Becoming a Civil War Four things need to be said about the Dolow drone attack and what is happening in Southwest. First, political competition is drifting towards a man-made civil war. Second, successive federal leaders, by manipulating Southwest for short-term ends, have weakened the state and the federation itself. Third, Dolow marks a dangerous threshold: military firepower, possibly borrowed from an external partner, brought into an internal political contest. And fourth, responsible people in Southwest must see what is happening — their communities are being divided, armed and turned into pawns in other people’s battles. Southwest was vulnerable before this crisis. Al-Shabaab controls or contests much of its countryside and, without independent revenues, the state depends heavily on Mogadishu. Successive federal presidents exploited that vulnerability rather than build institutions to hold the state together. In 2018, President Farmaajo’s government pushed Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden aside, arrested presidential candidate Mukhtar Robow and, with Ethiopian military support, effectively installed Abdiaziz Laftagareen. Seven years later, history is repeating itself with the alliances reversed. President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud first kept Laftagareen beyond his term, then turned against him. Former speaker Aden Madobe, who helped deliver Mohamud’s term extension and constitutional changes, has emerged as Mogadishu’s preferred man. Laftagareen is not leaving without a fight; forces associated with his camp have attacked Baidoa and clans are being dragged in. This is where federal political games stop being games: they tear apart a federal state and weaken the federation itself. Then came Dolow. A drone struck the residence of Laftagareen ally Gen. Mahad Abdirahman Aden, Gen. Shub, injuring him. Shub, Laftagareen’s father-in-law, had vowed to prevent Madobe from ruling Southwest. Who operated the drone and, more importantly, who asked for and authorized it must be established. Somalia, Türkiye and the United States operate armed drones in Somalia. Laftagareen’s supporters and opposition figures accuse Türkiye of being used to eliminate HSM’s political rival; Türkiye has not spoken publicly. The federal government says explosives were being made there. The debris will tell us more. Even if the government believed Shub was directing an armed insurgency, it could have indicted him and sought his arrest. Sending a drone as it seems into a residence means willing to kill whoever happens to be around the target — family, guards, neighbours or bystanders. That disregard for other lives is what we what Al-Shabaab does when they indiscriminately bombs a place because someone it wants to kill may be there. Whoever was behind Dolow attack must be identified and held accountable. And this is where Southwest must think straight, particularly its responsible politicians, elders, academics, businesspeople and civil society. The Digil and Mirifle, historically among Somalia’s more cohesive clan families, are being torn into armed camps that will leave them weaker whoever wins. No sub-clan can overpower the others and no politician will build a durable Southwest by asking externals to send money, troops or drones against his neighbours. Bay and Bakool have already paid too much through famine, displacement and Al-Shabaab. Their people need to be held together and their disputes returned to politics before this takes on a life of its own. Somalia knows where such shortcuts lead. In 1991, power struggle became civil war; outside help was summoned and consequently Somalia was left without a functioning government for more than a decade, and the state remains fragile more than three decades later. The myopic politicians reaching for shortcuts should remember those who open the door to civil war rarely decide how far it goes — or the price they, and everyone else, will pay for it.

Exactly three months after the end of the HSM’s mandate, data confirms a sharp decline in national economic growth, household purchasing power, and business profitability. Conversely, there has been a dramatic rise in unemployment, inflation, poverty, and the number of IDPs, all while members of the former Presidents’ regime have enriched themselves through the exploitation of public assets and the land grabbing of public property.

Somalia is about to coronate as Speaker of Parliament Abdulkadir Mohammed Nur aka Jama Tiktok. Long-serving cabinet minister in strategic dockets (defence, ports), educated in Turkey and fluent in Turkish, a self-confessed admirer of Turkish imperial Ottoman history, widely regarded as "Turkey's man" in Somalia. Three points: 1. If Jama Tiktok takes over the No.2 most powerful post in the country, he will most certainly serve and advance two powerful converging consolidation imperatives - that of the Turkish state in Somalia and that of President Hassan Sheikh and his contested one-year term extension. 2. But more importantly, this will mark another progression in the strategic institutionalisation of Turkish clout and influence in Somalia. 3. The meteoric rise of Jama Tiktok and the appointment of a young Turkish-trained officer as Somali army commander are also all signals Ankara planning a post-HSM, playing the long game and placing its allies in key positions of power and influence. Jama in this pic posing in front of a painting of the Ottoman navy.