A Bleeding Roadmap…?

Abdirahman A. Ilmi (Keydmedia) - The TFG establishment is in dare crises and lacks the confidence and credibility of the people. One of the major setbacks that high jacks the good governance of a democratic parliamentary system is none other than the speaker of the house himself. It is unfortunate that the speaker does not know his place and functions in the parliament.

Editorial Keydmedia Online
25 December 2011

To get his way, Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden destabilizes the viability of the scanty TFG achievement either by blackmailing the executive branch of the government or resorting through systematic political assassination.

It is equally unfortunate that the IGAD countries’ head of states and the Special Envoy of the Secretary General of the UN to Somalia to endorse Sharif Hassan as a parallel authority at bar with the president of the TFG and allowing him to lead a prominent institution responsible for laying the foundation of a nascent government.

Sharif Ahmed, the President of the TFG is responsible of promoting the house speaker to emerge as one of all time political spoilers, sometimes out of dual necessity or in short of other means of getting rid of him.

To get his whimsy ways, the house speaker has changed the procedural culture of the parliament and replaced it with arbitrary, corruptive system of inaction by bribing legislators that question his biased role of keeping the parliament closed as long as he wishes.

The speaker uses all parochial tools to discredit the genuine efforts of the legislators unless they tow his line. By derailing the responsibility of the parliament, the speaker turned the function of the legislative branch into a litigation venue.

The villain who disregards the rule of the law of the country enjoys the impunity of his position on the expenses of the aspiration of the nation. Who undermines the responsibility of the parliament? Sharif Hassan does. Who disrupts the faction of the parliament? Sharif Hassan does. Who derails the proper conduct of the parliamentarian duties? Sharif Hassan does. Who corrupts the machinery of the TFG establishment in order to have his way? Sharif Hassan does.

As dictates in the Roadmap guidelines, step one of attaining good governance was to replace the house speaker who turned to be the biggest liability that hampers the success of the Roadmap achievement. Why it has taken so long to sack a mafia boss who undermines the functions of the TFG?

The Roadmap lays down the foundation of a democratic system for good governance. No matter of the expectation of the world community, the Roadmap is bleeding in the hands of the TFG because the Somali masses question about the validity of its outcome where a corrupt TFG establishment is hoodwinking a distrustful general public asking whether to endorse the policy or reject it from the onset.

Although it is much politicized in the circles of the executive branch and the Special Envoy to Somalia, the general  public do not trust underpinning of the Roadmap, and do not see the policy guidelines a document that address the fundamental aspirations of the people even after transition. Why?

So far, all crucial the benchmarks of the Roadmap guidelines are either thinly scratched on the surface or remain on preliminary stages. Here are a few of them:

Bureau of Anticorruption: The current TFG establishment is one of the most corrupt institutions on the planet earth. As you read this paper, notorious corrupt officials handle the day to day government business, and are free at large without impunity, which makes harder for a weak government to establish an anticorruption committee as underlined in the Roadmap policy guidelines.

Benchmark: 1- Security. Over 12,000 AMISOM & TFG security staff is stationed in Mogadishu, yet the Government has a long way to boasting security control of the Capital of the nation, let alone the rest of the country. Why? There is no on- site government accountability culture where suspected criminals are set free from jail on broad daylight time by high ranking government officials. Who is kidding who…?

Benchmark: 2- Draft constitution. The draft constitution, parliamentary reform, elections process and constitutional referendum are on preliminary stage. Why? To wrap up all the legal machineries in place, the Ministry of constitution and legal reforms needs more timeline than the Roadmap can afford.

Benchmark: 3- Outreach and Reconciliation. As underlined in the Roadmap guidelines, a high level committee earmarked for undertaking implementation of reconciliation on regional and inter-regional levels is not yet formed. Why? It is all due to the negligence of TFG leadership to promote reconciliation process instead of touring on world-wide trips and lining up their pockets.

Benchmark: 4- Good governance. The will and the mechanism of attaining good governance system is absent in the TFG establishment. Most of the decision-making authorities of the TFG establishment are on the wrong side of the law of the land. Why?

Just to mention a few of them: There are no legal tools for accountability, transparence, and good government ethics in place. A stark case in point is the intransigency of TFP supporting to the speaker who stormed inside the legislative chamber twice in the last two weeks and disrupted the normal procedure of the parliament in session and escalating uncalled scuffle, just to discredit the agenda of the day.

The masses believe that the handlers of Roadmap guidelines are not time honored honest brokers working for the interest of the Somali people. In fact, the general public question that, “If the Roadmap has anything good to safeguarding the sovereignty of the nation and enhancing the well-being of its people, then it should have had a day in legislative body to review, debate, amend and update the shadowy plan since its inception.

Instead of taking an active role of promoting the Roadmap policy, the legislators maintain that they were kept in the darkness, because they believe that there are underlying factors that do not evolve within the framework of the TFG working, and to that end, it cannot address the aspiration of the people.  

As its current status quo reflects, the legislative branch has to resurrect itself and lend a helping hand to the success of the Roadmap before it lapses into forgotten history. Now the legislators conceive the Roadmap scenario in different light and admit that the leaders of the TFG and the Special Envoy of the UN to Somalia play a cat and mouse game on the expenses of the expectations of nation’s fate.

Conspiracy of Roadmap Club

The traditional procedure of the legislative body is in place, but it has been high jacked by the former speaker of the house, and brought the ordinary management of the legislative body to stand still for months. The obstinate speaker is not the door holder of the parliament who has the God given rights of keeping the legislators to his whims, while putting the legislative body inoperative.

For six months, all motions put forward by the executive branch or introduced by members of the legislators for adoption pile up on a scaffold of the speaker’s backyard. To move forward a motion for adoption is an open invitation for the speaker to bargain a tradeoff. Approving the vote of confidence for a new prime minister offered him the best chance of hand twisting the President of the TFG and squaring off with a number of cabinet minister positions of his liking.

A Misguided House Speaker

The speaker of the house has no authority to abuse and obstruct the normal procedure of the legislative body, while putting the functions of the TFG business on its knees. For the sake of good governance, the president of the TFG has the responsibility to line up the three branches of the govt to function properly in accordance with the laws of the land. Even a common sense leadership is a viable asset at times.

The legislators came short of their responsibilities by succumbing to the whims of the speaker of the house. In the merit of encouraging the process of democracy to take roots in the country, the Special Envoy of UN to Somalia does not advice the transgressing speaker to fall back where he belongs, rather than condoning his uncalled failures, or using him as a handy tool to keep the legislative body to his hostage.

The IGAD head of states that supervise Somalia should not use the speaker as a formidable joker fitting for their ambitions about Somalia, but directing him to remain faithful to his responsibilities. And finally, the Somali masses should have had relinquished the speaker years ago as they saw him that he is the sole problem that undercuts their aspirations.

Keydmedia Editorial Desk