Tag Archives: AMISOM

Weekend Reading

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“How Africa’s most threatening terrorist group lost control of Somalia” in The Atlantic.

Kenya signs deal with China to build standard gauge railroad from Mombasa that would complete with lagging Rift Valley Railroad concession. The East African

Around the Bend

Kenya teachers strike to enter its fourth week Monday.Business Daily

“For Ethiopia’s new premier, a tightrope act” Africa Review.

Hailemariam, Meles Zenawi’s deputy, was last week finally elected chairman of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) after a furious behind-the-scenes battle for control of the powerful ruling party.

He was consequently due to be sworn in on September 21 as prime minister in what is the first peaceful and constitutional power transition in Ethiopia’s recent history.

The new premier would be in place until the next general election set for 2015, a tenure probably too short to consolidate any meaningful political base and influence, suggesting an authoritarian Meles-like approach to matters of government would leave him vulnerable.

His appointment is also a major milestone in Ethiopian politics as it marks the first time a minority ethnic group has ascended to power in the country’s modern history.

All Ethiopian leaders have tended to emerge from the north, particularly the Amhara and Tigray ethnic groups. Hailemariam is from the marginalised Wolyta ethnic group of the South. He is also a Pentecostal Protestant adherent, unlike his predecessors who have all been Coptic (Orthodox ) Christians.
. . . .

Hailemariam would be less impressive on the international stage such as the G8 or UN climate summits where his predecessor excelled as he spoke on behalf of the continent, but western allies mainly the US have reaffirmed their cooperation with Ethiopia.

President Barack Obama spoke with Hailemariam early this month.

But at home, the new man at the helm faces an uneasy two years ahead, with ruling party confrontations and government power squabbles, already simmering under the surface, prone to erupting into the public domain.

Political and economic competition between the old guard and the new leadership could deepen existing fault lines, and for many Ethiopia watchers, it is only a matter of time.

Any divisions in the authoritarian ruling party tends to greatly affect Ethiopia’s political sphere, and Hailemariam will need to be adept at putting together smart compromises, unlike Meles who is remembered for running a one-man show, and with an iron fist.

“In Uganda, mixed reactions to Africa’s youngest MP” VOA

“War, Guns and Votes”? What will be the impact of Kenya’s war with Al Shabaab on the 2012/13 election?

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AfriCommons, on FlickrGoing For Water

After three months it is now quite clear, if it wasn’t always, that Kenya’s military offensive against Al Shabaab across the border and into the Jubbaland region will be of indefinite duration rather than any type of quick strike. The fact that Kenya has sought and obtained UN approval for its forces to be added into the AMISOM “peacekeeping” mandate makes it clear that the Kenyan government does not have intentions to achieve any predetermined goals, declare victory and withdraw.

This creates an important dynamic in regard to the Kenyan election that doesn’t seem to be getting the discussion it deserves. A number of questions: will the heightened security requirements associated with the threat of terrorism from Al Shabaab also help secure the country against election violence? Or will security forces be used to intervene in the campaign instead, as in 2007? Will donors and international institutions supporting the election process be that much more unwilling to challenge electoral misconduct for the sake of perceived “stability”? Will Al Shabaab attempt to disrupt the elections or the campaign, or international support efforts? Will his role in the process enhance the campaign prospects for George Saitoti? What will be the impact on other candidates? What will be the impact on the presidential campaigns’ appeals to Muslim voters and organizations and will there be efforts by candidates to mobilize votes on the basis of religious tensions as well as ethnicity? I could go on and will try to explore this in coming posts.

Here is the latest summary on the war from the African Conflict Prevention Program from the Institute of Security Studies in Pretoria:

Somalia: Kenya’s Military Offensive in Somalia

Kenya’s defence minister, Yusuf Haji, has called on the international community to provide logistical and financial support for his country’s on-going military offensive against Al-Shabaab in Somalia, particularly to enable the operation to take over the port-town of Kismayo. In justifying his call, the minister argued that even though Kenya’s Operation Linda Nchi was in response to a provocation by Al-Shabaab, Kenya is acting broadly in the collective interest of advancing international peace and security and fighting terror. It therefore requires the support of the international community in order to meet its objectives. Haji stated that the prime aim of the operation is to create a buffer on the Somali side of the border which should prevent the incursion of armed groups into Kenya. The debates and expectations of taking over Kismayo, in his view, are only imaginary.

The call for resources comes in the wake of developments regarding the United States’ withdrawal from Iraq and the recent United Nations endorsement of the merging of the Kenyan Defence Forces into the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM). Within this context, there are good chances of Haji’s call being heeded by international actors and stakeholders. The uncertainty concerning the taking of Kismayo, however, raises two key issues. Firstly, in the event that the strategically important town remains untaken it would ensure that Al-Shabaab would remain a strong threat. Furthermore, the group can continually access the necessary resources needed to resist Kenya’s incursion. Secondly, given the expectations that have been built among the public about the taking of Kismayo, any delay or a change in strategy needs to be clearly communicated to Kenyans so as to help sustain public support for Operation Linda Nchi. This will help allay the perception that operational challenges and Kenyan fatalities have prevented the taking of Kismayo.

In a related development, Al-Shabaab is reported to have elevated Sheikh Ahmad Iman Ali, a leader of the Muslim Youth Center in Kenya, to the position of supreme leader (Emir) for the Al-Shabaab cell in Kenya. Sheikh Ali and his organisation have in the past been blamed for supporting Al-Shabaab through fundraising and the recruitment of fighters. He is known to have been operating in Somalia since 2009. His elevation appears to be a move by the group to organise its activities in Kenya more robustly in order to be able to take the battle into Kenya. Moreover, this comes in the wake of security alerts by western embassies in Nairobi that a terror plot seems to be underway. Sheikh Ali, has also created propaganda videos and called upon jihadists in and outside Kenya to join his cause. In a recent video produced by Al-Kataib Media Foundation, the official video wing of Al-Shabaab, Sheikh Ali appealed to the group’s loyalists to join the battle, declaring Kenya a war zone and Somalia a land of jihad.

Here is the link to a new policy paper from Ken Menkhaus for the Enough Project: “After the Kenyan Intervention in Somalia”.

Are we watching the early stages of a broader conflict in the Greater Horn of Africa?

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Now that Kenya has initiated a full-fledged ground war in Southern Somalia, the obvious and necessary question becomes “what are the near term unintended consequences?”. It is hard to be too clear about what is “unintended” because Kenya’s intentions, on either the military or the political side, are not altogether clear in the first place, but here is one possibility that few would desire:

Simon Allison posits in South Africa’s Daily Maverick: “Kenya’s Somali raid threatens to explode into regional conflict”, noting Kenya’s confrontation with Eritrea regarding alleged arms flights to supply Al Shabaab:

. . . This begs the question: what does Eritrea have to gain by funding a Somali Islamic fundamentalist militia?

The answer lies neither in Somalia nor Eritrea, but in the country that looms large between them: Ethiopia. Ethiopia is Eritrea’s nemesis, having occupied Eritrea for decades until Eritrea achieved its modern independence with a hard-fought and vicious civil war. But Eritrea can’t relax, ever, because it has the one thing that land-locked Ethiopia wants more than anything else in this world: a port. And rapprochement is not the style of Eritrea’s slightly mad President Isaias Afwerki, whose militaristic foreign policy has left Eritrea in the international wilderness.

Instead, Afwerki has fomented instability in Somalia, hoping the chaos next door will keep Ethiopia and its military occupied. Ethiopia is deeply involved in the Somali conflict itself, and its troops make frequent cross-border raids to chase rebels who are agitating against the Ethiopian government in the ethnically Somali province of the Ogaden. As International Crisis Group’s Somalia expert Rashid Abdi explains: “Eritrea definitely has been supportive of Al Shabaab for a long time and this support is not ideological. It’s essentially meant to counter Ethiopia’s influence in Somalia.”

So while we don’t know if it really was Eritrea sending planeloads of weapons to Al Shabaab during the current conflict with Kenya, this nonetheless represents the first step in turning what is a domestic conflict into a larger, regional issue. In a way, it doesn’t really matter if Eritrea was involved or not, as long as Kenya thinks they were, they will be implicated.

Kenya has said it will pursue its claims against Eritrea, saying that it has a “series of options” to deal with them. It’s unclear what these options are, but it’s unlikely that any of them will ease tensions in the Horn of Africa. And whenever Eritrea gets involved in something, it’s not long before Ethiopia follows suit – on the opposite side, of course. So what started out as a Somali issue might just turn into something much, much bigger, not forgetting that Uganda and Burundi are already involved as they are the only countries to have contributed troops to the African Union mission in Somalia.

Kenya hoped its Somali incursion would be quick and easy. But its troops are getting bogged down in the mud and are struggling to even find the enemy. And on the diplomatic front, as the incursion starts looking more and more like an invasion, other countries are inevitably getting involved, making it even less likely that Kenya can extricate itself from Somalia quickly or easily.

Related articles

Somalia Policy Update

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At The Sahel Blog, Alex Thurston discusses Assistant Secretary Carson’s recent comments on Somalia in an interview with allAfrica.com.  In summary:

Stepping back, Washington is clearly happy to see AMISOM make headway against al Shabab, but it seems that Washington’s disappointment with the TFG outweighs that happiness. The parliament’s reach for more time alienated the US, and it appears that going forward Washington will decentralize its political contacts in Somalia even more. What that says for the TFG’s future I can’t say, but August is not far off, and from the TFG’s standpoint it’s a bad time to have run afoul of Washington.

I’ve added a link to a good site from the “Movement for an Independent Somaliland” to the Organization roll at right.  As Washington’s “two track” policy seems to be becoming more established and bearing at least some fruit, perhaps the next evolution is a “three track” policy that moves closer to “the facts of the ground” in acknowledging Somaliland’s functional independence.  At some point, it seems to me there needs to be some type of grand bargain among Somaliland and Puntland and the local groups to establish a relatively understood and stable border between Somaliland and Puntland.

In the meantime, Burundi is sending 1000 more troops to the AMISOM mission.

For an interesting look at a policy challenge in Somaliland, an article from IRIN discusses a recent run-up in the price of charcoal, which is the dominant fuel source for urban residents (and of course helps drive deforestation which impacts the rest of the population which is primarily pastoralist).

Friday Reading

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Texas in Africa has the run down on today’s release of the UN human rights mapping report on the DRC.

Of special interest for East Africa is how this plays out in regard to Museveni now, aside from Rwanda and Burundi. Museveni has recently spoken of withdrawing from support of AMISOM in reaction to the criticism–while his offer to of tens of thousands of additional troops has remained outstanding. Kenya has been calling for more troops for AMISOM for months, and has made noise about changing the arrangements to send its own forces. Kenya’s Foreign Minister Wetangula has said that the international community should stop wasting vast amounts on the anti-piracy maritime efforts and spend the money for "national building" with the TFG, which includes the ramping up of AMISOM. Kenya watchers will remember that Wetangula was one of Kibaki’s core appointments of the key ministries following the 2007 elections prior to the Kofi Annan-led mediation between PNU and ODM. PNU has had some ties with Museveni’s NRM.

In Kenya, the human rights community is deeply offended by the renditions of alleged terrorism suspects to Uganda without due process, while the government has leaked a report showing planned attacks in Nairobi in conjunction with the Kampala bombing during the World Cup. At a time when Kenya needs to focus on the hard work of implementation of the new constitution, the neighborhood keeps getting messier.

On a lighter note, check out the backpackers guide to Somaliland on the Medeshivalley.com blog.

Sec. Clinton Keynote at National Prayer Breakfast and Museveni

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I like the speech.  Interesting that she has gotten to know Museveni through this event. I hope that this somehow means she could be a positive influence, rather than meaning that he is more likely to get away with more in Uganda. Certainly having Moi campaigning for him is not encouraging.

The deteriorating situation in Somalia will likely give him that much more standing with those in Washington who value his troops in AMISOM to the point that they are willing to overlook other issues.

Somalia and Kenya in 2010

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HT to texasinafrica for this on Somalia.

And then read this about countries wanting get in on the financial action of supporting the AMISOM.

I’m sure with the situation in Yemen and the attempted Christmas Day airline bombing, Somalia will continue to distract the US from the unfinished and “overripe” situation in Kenya. I think that it is a shame that we focus on the places that we really can’t fix or do a lot about to the detriment of more realistic opportunities. Nairobi is in some ways unfortunate to be the diplomatic base for the US and others addressing Somalia–as well as the “back office” for aid organizations for NGOs, QGOs, etc. for both Somalia and Sudan. Not only does it mean that Kenya doesn’t always get the attention it deserves, or adequate funding for a country its size for a lot of programs to operate effectively outside Nairobi in a country of 40M people–it also gives a lot of direct and indirect leverage to “the powers that be” in Kenya.

I will say that it is good to see Hussein Ali, now Kenya’s postmaster after being moved out of his position as head of Kenya’s police, denied a US visa. Small thing, but at least a start in a direction that we haven’t followed through on in the past.