‘UNSOM Remains a Mission Losing its Credibility as a Neutral and Impartial Arbiter in the Perception of Somalis’ – AMISOM Draft Paper

A leaked AMISOM Political Affairs draft paper for Post-2021 on UNSOM’s future in ‘Somalia’, paints a bleak picture of the United Nations’ credibility, functionality, supposed impartiality and future status. The paper borrows surmise from how the office has presently become indistinguishable from the Somali entities and their political, economic and social issues it was supposed to be neutral to.

AMISOM concludes that, in order to restore its credibility, clarify its purpose, and ensure its positive impact in Somalia post-2021, the UN had to consider the following options:

• Status Quo: This will see the UN will continue to be marginalized. Worse, it may suffer a catastrophic event. At the minimum, this should entail a lighter footprint in Mogadishu.
• De-Integration: This could entail a UN Country Team as the centre of gravity, without a UN political role or the transfer of this role to other actors.
• Redesign: This could entail the ending of the UNSOM mandate, the undertaking of a well-organized assessment of needs of the UN in Somalia (including political), and the formulation of a more flexible and responsive mission to the rapid changes in Somalia, with the aim of initiating a long-term and self-sustaining trajectory of political and security stability and economic development.

READ THE COMPLETE DRAFT BELOW.

AMISOM Political Affairs Draft for Post-2021 Brainstorming

UNSOM’S FUTURE IN SOMALIA

Non – Paper for Discussion

I. Background

1. The year 2021 will represent a crucial year for Somalia, as it is expected to have concluded its first direct elections on the basis of one person, one vote (OPOV) since 1969. For Somalia’s international partners, it will represent a year in which the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) will adopt a resolution setting out the post-2021 future framework for international engagement in Somalia. It is within this context that the African Union Peace and Security Council (AUPSC) has requested the Commission to prepare an analysis on the future of AMISOM in Somalia, and that the Security Council has called on the Secretary-General to conduct an independent assessment on international partners future engagement in Somalia.
2. In preparation for international partners future engagement in Somalia post-2021, a series of non-papers have been prepared for discussion and potential inputs into the Secretary-General’s independent assessment, following wider consultations beginning from June 2020 through to January 2021. The non-papers that are in “circulation” have shifted the debate for Somalia post-2021 to one of a future vision for AMISOM while ignoring a future role of key actors such the UN in Somalia.¹
3. This paper starts from the position that, as the AU’s most successful peace support operation, AMISOM is due for reform.² The paper also takes note of the prevailing debates surrounding AMISOM’s funding, troop size, need to reconfigure, ability of Somali security forces (SSF) to take lead on security in 2021, and re-defining an end-state for AMISOM. However, a future AMISOM that will be fit-for-purpose post-2021 must be complemented by a UN whose fitness-for-purpose is no longer questioned in Somalia and beyond. In this context, this paper sets out areas where several UN iterations have failed to remain suitable for Somalia’s evolving dynamics.

II. UN Presence in Somalia: ‘Muddling through’

UNOSOM I and II (1992-1995)

4. The UN was first drawn into Somalia during conditions of civil war and famine following the disintegration of the Mogadishu government in 1991. Its response was a traditional peacekeeping mission, United Nations Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM I), which was met with serious challenges, restricting the mission to Mogadishu. UNOSOM’s ineffectiveness resulted in its handover to the United States-led Unified Task Force (UNITAF) to attempt state-building but this also failed, leading to the UN’s second intervention in Somalia, United Nations Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM II). However, this attempt of military enforcement and state-building under an “assistance” mandate in the absence of a government resulted in repeated failure for the UN.

UNPOS and the UN Country Team (1995-2013)

5. In the aftermath of two failed interventions in Somalia, the United Nations Political Office for Somalia (UNPOS) was established in 1995, with a duty station in Mogadishu and with a mandate of fostering peace and reconciliation in Somalia. But in reality, UNPOS was based in Nairobi, remotely monitoring the situation in Somalia. This lasted for the better part of a decade, with UNPOS only playing a symbolic role in Somalia.
6. Meanwhile, UN activity in Somalia continued to evolve with the UN Country Team (UNCT), also based in Nairobi, comprising the humanitarian and development agencies being instituted. Both agencies had effectively inherited the ground situation vacated by the withdrawal of international forces in 1995. This was also a time considered as international donors abdicating on Somalia to the UN, allowing the UN to contain Somalia through humanitarian aid.³
7. In September 2007, a new UN Special Representative of the Secretary-General (SRSG), Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, was appointed. While the new SRSG re-defined a more active and political position for UNPOS, this was followed with conflicts and competition with the UN Country Team. This apparent paralysis of UNPOS and its incoherence in supporting Somalia, resulted in UN Headquarters (UNHQ) undertaking its first ever Strategic Assessment of Somalia in 2008.
8. The result of the Strategic Assessment albeit contentious recommended a UN integrated structure, approved by both the Secretary-General and the Security Council under resolution 1814 (2008). Despite the Security Council’s approval, internal UN divisions took five years to establish an integrated mission in Somalia.

Integrated UNSOM (2013 – present)

9. With its diminishing and activist role, particularly since the popular election of President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed “Farmaajo and the appointment of his Prime Minister, Hassan Ali Khaire, UNSOM’s engagement in Somalia at times has been viewed as opposition-like.⁶ The perception of UNSOM’s activism was a departure from what was required from the mission: a strategic partner able play a convening and coordinating role.

10. Progressively, since UNSOM’s arrival in Somalia, the mission has continued to demonstrate a need for a review of its mandate priorities. Strong evidence of this came to light in 2019,⁴ when an internal and independent UNHQ document called for a “radical reassessment” of UNSOM, stressing the need to prioritise and sequence its mandated tasks due to its political weaknesses.⁵Finally, in July 2013, UNSOM was mandated and a new SRSG took office. The mission’s arrival was met with a permanent Somali Government, a New Deal Compact for aid, considerable donor pledges, and steps towards relief of upwards of US$5 billion in external debt. With this, the expectation was the situation in Somalia would turn to a positive development trajectory. Instead, as the UN became integrated institutionally, donor funding to Somalia edged towards being less integrated, reflecting the independent pursuit of national interest. Again, at an early stage casting doubt on the UN’s (particularly) utility in Somalia ⁵.
    11. With its diminishing and activist role, particularly since the popular election of President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed “Farmaajo and the appointment of his Prime Minister, Hassan Ali Khaire, UNSOM’s engagement in Somalia at times has been viewed as opposition-like.⁶ The perception of UNSOM’s activism was a departure from what was required from the mission: a strategic partner able play a convening and coordinating role.

     

    12. Compounding UNSOM’s perception of irrelevance, unlike AMISOM and IGAD that routinely ventured beyond Mogadishu Base Camp, UN’s strict security procedures limited its effectiveness to inside the camp. Such a self-imposed limitation repeatedly creates negative perceptions of UNSOM.⁷ In many cases, as observed by the 2019 independent review, this creates a lack of general understanding of UNSOM’s role and work across Somalia.

     

    13. Despite UNSOM being an integrated mission having to operate in partnership with development and humanitarian agencies (“Agencies”, “Funds”, and “Programmes”), the UN in Somalia appears to struggle to achieve a “one UN” appearance. The result of this disjointedness, is that Somalia interlocutors continue to prefer the “Agencies”, “Funds”, and “Programmes”, an observation also made in the independent review.⁸

     

    14. In May 2017, the UN Senior Management Group (SMG), observed that the UN would benefit from shorter terms goals against which it could measure its progress.⁹ Achieving this would require coherence from the UN’s senior leadership in Somalia. But since the departure of the former SRSG, Michael Keating there has been an increasing deficit in senior leadership guidance, which continues to impact on the internal functioning of UNSOM.¹⁰

     

15. Challenges in senior leadership guidance has been evident in UNSOM’s support and coordination role of the Comprehensive Approach to Security (CAS), with the CAS Secretariat struggling to function as originally intended.¹¹ A critical consequence of this has been the slow and poor progress under the supporting activities pillar of the Transition Plan, that would complement both AMISOM and SSF operational activities.

III. A Way Forward

16. The nature of the UN presence in Somalia is changing and international partners have also signalled a permanent presence in Somalia, regardless of its incoherence. The impact is now a shrinking space for the UN, irrespective of its integration and relocation to Mogadishu. This is also coupled with the UN’s separation from the donor community and now Somali authorities, both politically and financially.
17. Transformed from a one-time leadership role in the international architecture in Somalia, UNSOM has become reactive to events with little ability to influence outcomes, and it appears purposeless in terms of the meaning of an “assistance” mandate. With large staff in excess of 400 in Mogadishu without much access beyond the Base Camp perimeter, this is now the hallmark of UNSOM’s image
18. While many UN missions have been able to ‘muddle through’ with many of UN in Somalia’s flaws, UNSOM remains a mission losing its credibility as a neutral and impartial arbiter in the perception of Somalis, this questions how tenable the future of UNSOM is in its current form.
19. Precisely because of escalation in donor and Somali contestation, the UN’s comparative advantage can ultimately only be impartiality. The reality of donor national interests in Somalia and Somali political and economic competition is an overwhelming reality currently. In order to restore its credibility, clarify its purpose, and ensure its positive impact in Somalia post-2021, AMISOM should call for the UN to consider the following options:

• Status Quo: This will see the UN will continue to be marginalized. Worse, it may suffer a catastrophic event. At the minimum, this should entail a lighter footprint in Mogadishu.
• De-Integration: This could entail a UN Country Team as the centre of gravity, without a UN political role or the transfer of this role to other actors.
• Redesign: This could entail the ending of the UNSOM mandate, the undertaking of a well-organized assessment of needs of the UN in Somalia (including political), and the formulation of a more flexible and responsive mission to the rapid changes in Somalia, with the aim of initiating a long-term and self-sustaining trajectory of political and security stability and economic development.

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Footnotes:

¹“Public” non-papers currently “circulating” include the EU’s and UN’s. Also “circulating”, are fragments of the Federal Government of Somalia’s vision for a post-2021.

² See AMISOM discussion paper, “The future of AMISOM – with Al-Shabaab or without, dated 4 March 2020.

³ During this period, humanitarian operations, particularly the transportation of food aid became Somalia’s dominant business, skewing the development and security sectors. This pattern has continued to shape and influence the political economy of politics, aid and security in Somalia today, with key vested interests making profits.

⁴ In January 2019, UNSOM’s SRSG, Nicholas Haysom “Fink” was expelled from Somalia.

⁵ In May 2019, the UN’s former Special Representative of the Secretary-General and Head of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya (from 2015 to 2018), Ian Martin conducted an internal review of UNSOM.

⁶ There is an increasing view that UNSOM like a number of international partners struggles to understand the current FGS’s political philosophy.

⁷ During the AU – UN joint review on AMISOM in 2018, this was frequently and contentiously discussed. ⁸ Confidential briefing by an official in the office of DSRSG, February 2019.

⁹ SMG Semi-annual targets paper, October 2017.

¹⁰ Multiple reporting by several UNSOM officials also corroborated by the independent review report.

¹¹ UNSOM CAS Secretariat has suffered serious staffing issues, with staff and consultants opting to leave.