Somalia Federal States Gang against Somaliland Criticizing Donors’ Stand on Special Aid Arrangement

Following up on the response which Aid Partners gave of a letter the FGS Minister for Planning sent off to donors on June 9, in which he argued that the Special Aid Arrangement accorded the Republic of Somaliland be not renewed and must be viewed, and accordingly treated, same as the Somalia federal states, Somalia’s Council of Inter-State Cooperation – an FGS body that brought together the five Somalia federal states outside Mogadishu, called the donors’ support ‘biased’ in favor of Somaliland.

The CiC members, comprising of the heads of the federal states of Puntland, Galmudug, Hirshabelle, Southwest and Jubbaland, expressed ‘reservations on the interventions by some of the members of the Somalia Donor Group.“We disagree with the biased interventions, voiced through the nonstop lobbying for special arrangements to one state/region and not considering the unique situation of the neediest states/regions of Somalia”, they sai, again, placing Somaliland at par with themselves as if it was another member of the Somalia federal states, which it had never been since it restored its 1960 independence in 1991 from Italian Somalia with which it was United for a tumultuous 30 years.

“We strongly support,” they continued to add ” the position of the Federal Government of Somalia as communicated by H.E. Amb. Gamal Hassan in the letter of 9th June, 2018, on the subject of an expired special arrangement, which at the 2013 New Deal Compact, was agreed for only a set period (2013-2016)”, they stated, meaning a separate arrangement the donors arrived at to make sure that Somaliland received its allotted fair share which  ould not have been possible if it was left to Somalia leaders with whom it shared no government or partnership of any kind.

The heads of the Somalia Federal States do not stop there but directly accuse members of the Somalia Development and Reconciliation Facility (SDRF) in an ill-concealed attempt to divide the SDRF and Somalia Donors Group, forgetting they were, in fact, at the receiving end of donors’ magnanimity and benevolence and not the other way around.

It is noteworthy to mention that Somaliland accuses Somalia FG and its states of openly waging a military, political and economic war against a peaceful, democratic Republic of Somaliland, thus putting the stability and balance of an already vulnerable region in peril.

Puntland, a member of the CiC and one of the signatories of this latest retort, is currently waging a military offensive against Somaliland on the pretext that it wishes to ‘liberate Sool, Sanaag and Buuhoodle regions because land and people belonged to Puntland’ meaning people in these regions were ethnically related to people in Puntland.

Addressing the Puntland parliament which put him in power on 32-member vote, Abdiweli Gass, Head of that State, said on Saturday that he had no respect for colonial or international borders but only for clan-based ones. He vowed that he will not rest until he brought all clans ethnically related to him under the Puntland fold – however costly or protracted it proved to be.

Puntland is a signatory of the Somalia Federal Constitution and a full member of the FGS, and as such, has the full backing and support of the central FGS, leadership as well as that of other members states – military, political or otherwise as part of a larger plan to diplomatically and economically isolate Somaliland which has no intention of reuniting with Somalia again.

What the donors make of this latest Somalia diplomatic folly remains to be to be seen.

The CiC response was signed by:

1. Dr Abdiweli Mohamed Ali “Gaas”, Head of Puntland State
2. Mohamed Abdi Waare, Head of Hirshabelle State
3. Ahmed Mohamed Islaan, Head of Jubbaland State
4. Sheriff Hassan Sheikh Adan, Head of Southwest State
5. Ahmed Duale Gheelle – Haaf, Head of Galmudug State