If Somalia is to have peace, the citizens must be given their freedom of expression and assembly according to James Swan, the United National Secretary General’s special representative to the war-trodden country.
Swan said once space for expression as well as media freedom is gaged, the country cannot have peace which has evaded it for over three decades. “We stressed the importance of ensuring that people are accorded the space to express themselves freely, including freedom of assembly, organization, and media, as the people of South West State debate key issues on the public agenda,” Swan said.
The remarks were made on Tuesday at the Presidential Palace in Baidoa, the largest city in South West State during a high-level group representing some of Somalia’s main international partners’ leaders to discuss a range of topics related to political, humanitarian, and security developments in both the Federal Member State and Somalia as a whole, as well as how they can best provide support.
Somalia has been on the battlefield with Al-Shabaab militants since the early 1990s. in 2007, African Mission in Somalia was launched and countries such as Uganda have kept their soldiers to protect the governments that have been coming into power. Nevertheless, this has provided relative peace in some areas while in many areas, security threats are still high and terrorism explosions are the order of the day.
Swan added that that solid and productive working relations between Somalia’s Federal Government and the authorities in the country’s Federal Member States are crucial to the long-term stability and well-being of all Somalis.
“We renewed our call for a collaborative relationship between South West State and the Federal Government, and welcome the President’s attendance at the recently-concluded meeting of the National Consultative Council in Mogadishu,” Swan said.
Swan was accompanied by the Acting Special Representative of the Chairperson of the African Union Commission and Head of the African Union Transition Mission to Somalia (ATMIS), Fiona Lortan; Ethiopia’s Ambassador to Somalia, Abdulfatah Hassan; Sweden’s Ambassador to Somalia, Per Lindgarde; the US Ambassador to Somalia, Larry Andre; the European Union Delegation to Somalia’s Team Leader, Jens Hoegel; Germany’s Deputy Ambassador to Somalia, Sascha Kienzle; and, from the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the Head of Mission in Somalia, Abdi Ibrahim.
Other issues that were emphasized in the meeting were the chronic famine that has left many Somalis in dire need of aid due to drought, and that South West State was no exception to this. Statistics show that more than 1.4 million out of the estimated 2.9 million people living in the Federal Member State are reportedly affected by the drought, including 454,600 people in the Baidoa district. This place especially in the South West State has one of the biggest caseloads of internal displacement, food insecurity, and malnutrition in Somalia.