The Mogadishu-based Somalia administration’s General, Auditor Nur Jimale Farah, voices his government’s opposition to the approved UAE Berbera military base the joint houses of Somaliland parliament passed on Sunday.
The Auditor General reasons lamely that (a) if established, the base will make the whole of the Berbera area a ‘military zone’, barring civilians from earning livelihoods from other occupations; (b) the base will compromise regional security; (c) agreement with UAE is not transparent and excludes Somalia government involvement; (d) UAE violates its friendship with Somalia government of Mogadishu; (e) the grant of the military base did not go through a ‘procurement process’ as he put it with no bids or tenders offered or received.
The Auditor goes on to threaten legal action against the UAE for its deals with the Republic of Somaliland, notably, the multi-million Dollar extension and management of Berbera seaport by DP World and the newly-granted naval base in the same city.
The Auditor General, however, conveniently skips to mention that Somalia had no legal jurisdiction over the Republic of Somaliland which, since it restored its internationally recognized sovereignty of 1960 in 1991, had established better functioning state organs for over 25 years contrasting the make-believe administrations and mayhem prevailing in the internationally-propped Somalia he represents.
All it takes is for one country to – again – Somaliland’s fully matured restoration of an independence lost and found.
Incidentally, the man cited the same reasons the leader of Waddani party who is also the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullai “Irro”, and some of his clos3eset associates had been drumming up to stir dissent against the critical interventions of the UAE deals. Of 147 MPs present at Sunday’s joint session of the Somaliland parliament, only 1 dissented, 1 abstained, the Chairman did not vote and 144 passed it, including a good number from the Speaker’s own camp.
This latest percussive outburst from Mogadishu only hardens Somaliland’s resolve to severe all ties – if any – that still held it to its younger but more domineering partner of the long-defunct, ill-fated union in the Somali Republic: Somalia.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jnpwrAok6dw
