Category: social amenities

PUNTLAND’S ACHEELS HEELS

Yes, an imperative reform in Puntland Administration is obvious to all and urgently needed. But, where do we start?

The sectors that had become the Achilles Heels of the State of Puntland are:
  1. Finance sector
  2. Security sector
Fix the two sectors, and Puntland would leap foward fast. These two sectors constitute half of Puntland’s entire problems.
Take first, Puntland Ministry of Finance where the management and personnel are on the same jobs for twenty years with 19th century rudimentary knowledge of financial management and that compoundedly streghtened by their chronic resistance to change, upgrading and reform. It is not an exaggeration – I worked with them as Puntland Chief of Staff at State Presidency during the first three years of Puntland foundation. How did they stay that long each one on the same job? That is their most guarded secret. What is it? The Ministry’s Top Management Team had developed and fine-tuned special skills to make sure that every incoming Puntland President and the new Minister of Finance are happy by providing them with unchecked and unaccounted for access to personal funds. But, if that is an open secret, why didn’t Puntland successive regimes do something about it? Good question! Have you heard the Somali word “Madax-ka-nool referring to Puntland governance?” Yes, you guessed – the President is everything in Puntland. He is the country’s minister of finance and cashier-general at same time. He can buy everybody, including the members of the House of Representatives (the Parliament). Then who would check the powers of the President? You tell me. With the financial muscle of the Ministry of Finance he owns the country and its people. You would say that is an exaggeration. You are free to carry out your own enquiries and independent investigations. But, don’t forget to share your findings with me.
But, that is not all. The top management of Puntland Ministry of Finance is the main obstacle and reason why international agencies and world financial institutions are unable to assist Puntland due to Ministry’s lack of transparency and financial accountability. The Ministry keeps secret even Puntland real revenue and expenses. This has created a situation where world community doesn’t know not only how to help Puntland in development projects, budget supplements and personnel capacity-building, but also how to work with the authorities. Puntland books are closed and they are Ministry’s Top Secrets.
Reform immediately that Ministry, and people of Puntland are half free.
Take Security Sector second, and you would discover the hard facts that nobody knows, even approximately, the number of men and women working in or attached to that sector, forget about their training, quality, incapacitation, mortality or even whether the names in ghost lists exist, or ever existed. How do you allocate resources, wages, pay etc? How do organizations in the security sector could assist Puntland improve its security needs? Yes, it is easy to blame others for your failures? But abive all, how do you defend your country when your lists of forces are ghost soldiers? That is why you hear calls for clan militia support whenever Puntland security is threatened.

These are the two critical sectors that require an urgent and radical reform, but the problems described above extend to other sectors and state departments as well.

ismailwarsame.blog

(Image credit: Dabaraani Media)

RETURNEES DIASPORA KIDS AND SOMALI CULTURE

GAROWE, MAY 23, 2019

It is never easy for kids born overseas in exile with no Somali language skills, cultural experience or imagination of how operating in Somali setting look like as a result of parental failure in raising kids in a foreign environment or refuge camps in Western countries. Most diaspora parents, who themselves were not schooled before they found themselves there, and experiencing language barriers and deep cultural shock, suddenly became the students of their own kids, who pick up foreign languages quicker. Kids become interpreters and translators of the host foreign languages for their own parents. In other words, parental power, while in overseas, shifted to the kids. Parents, therefore, had lost parental influence over kids. Who is going to teach the kids about Somali culture and heritage in host countries then? Hence one often hears the Somali term “Dhaqan Celis” (cultural rehabilitation) in the country.

Diaspora parents seek help for their kids, and their only resort is to send kids back home. The problem back home is that there are no meaningful formal services to provide help in the rehabilitation of these youth to re-orient themselves into the Somali culture and ways of life.

What happens next is that, in the absence of specialized cultural help, kid are re-introduced to their extended family members to help cultivate these diaspora kids along their parents’ cultural heritage. The diaspora kids have no life connections with these people, and the names and extended families have no meaning at all to them. But, where to start to rehabilitate them? Of course, family trees (ancestry) comes first in mind, which means teaching these innocent youth about tribalism and clannism. What is making things even worse is that there are no social amenities or youth programs to get them engaged and make them busy. Double cultural shock and boredom set in in the lives of these young men and girls back home.

Once beaten, twice shy. Diaspora youth wouldn’t opt for another chance to re-visit Somalia, at least, in their early years.

Funny stories about the experience of these young returnees are abundant in Puntland. One such story tells about young female intern in one of the local NGOs, who was informed one morning that they were pleased let her know that she would receive “Mushaar” (salary). To that intern, the the local term Mushaar meant “Mooshaali” (Porridge or oatmeal). After a while, later in that morning, the young woman became impatient waiting for the porridge offerred and asked what had happened to the delivery of the food, to everybody’s laughter.

This story also vainly sheds light on the socio-economic frictions between the “Qorax Joog” (locals) and “Qurba Joog” (diaspora returnees). The locals believe that, with their super job skills, experience and education, the Qurba Joog have better job, political and business opportunities in the country than the Qorax Joog. Hence, a cold war is now slowly brewing, but still at its early stages of debating the issue in the social media and in public/private meetings. If the concerns are not carefully managed in advance, I am affraid of open public confrontations in the foreseeable future as it had happened between Liberian indigenous and diaspora returnees from USA in mid 19th Century.

RECOMMENDATION

ismailwarsame.blog proposes to Puntland/Somalia for setting up formal local NGO services in partnership with international organizations, under State supervision, to provide badly needed help to the Somali Diaspora youth returnees for “dhaqan celis” purposes. Those young men and girls mostly return from Norh America, Western Europe and Arab countries, who may extend help to any sound projects for such kids.

ismailwarsame.blog

(image credit: pewresearch.org)