Somalia races to deepen integration with East African Community

Despite carrying the scars of its past, Somalia is advancing toward becoming a regional hub. [AFP] Somalia's integration into the East African Community (EAC) has gathered momentum with last week's election of nine members to join the legislative arm that sits in Arusha. The nine were picked at a joint sitting of the bi-cameral federal parliament chaired by the Speaker of the House of the People. The selection of the nine MPs to join the East Africa Legislative Assembly (EALA) is one of the requirements for member states to be integrated in the regional body. The nine will join their counterparts from Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo and South Sudan. This also brings the total number of legislators in Arusha at 72. The nine Somali legislators will be part of the assembly who derive their power from Article 49 of the EAC treaty which establishes EALA as the legislative organ of the community with the mandate of legislating, oversight and representation. The assembly also liaises with the national assemblies of partner states on matters relating to the community as well as debate and approve the budget of the regional body. The nine who were picked by the House of the People include Somalia's former ambassador to Tanzania, Amb. Zahra Ali Hassan; Somalia's former foreign minister Dr. Abdisalam Hadliye Omer, the country's former foreign minister and central bank governor; Prof. Faisal Abdi Roble. Others are Abdirahman Bashir Shariff, a senior World Bank advisor, Abukar Abdi Osman, Fadumo Abdullahi Mohamud, Hussein Hassan Abdi, Fahmo Ahmed Noor and Ilham Ali Gassar, a governance and peace-building expert. The election of the nine legislators was supervised by the Interim Committee on the Selection and Election of EALA Representatives. The committee set the eligibility standards which included university education, English proficiency, and regional cooperation experience. The MPs will serve a five-year term period which is renewable. Somalia is the eighth country to join the 300 million people in East Africa who seek deeper integration on trader, infrastructure and security. Somalia formally joined the EAC in 2023 reinforcing the country's political and economic integration in the region. For the Horn of Africa nation to complete its institutional integration to the regional body, Somalia will also nominate a judge to the East African Court of Justice (EACJ). Still on matters election in Somalia, the country is preparing to hold its first one-person, one-vote local council elections in more than 50 years with Mogadishu residents getting ready for the landmark event this November. The chairman of the National Electoral and Boundaries Commission, Abdikarim Ahmed Hassan, announced this week that voting in the Banadir region (Mogadishu municipality) is scheduled for November 30, 2025. The announcement was however swiftly rejected by the Mogadishu-based opposition group, the National Salvation Forum (The Forum). The group led by former president Sharif Sheikh Ahmed termed the process "illegal". It accused Somalia president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud of manipulation using a unilaterally drafted electoral law and handpicked commission members, all based on a revised constitution. The chair of the electoral body emphasized that the November 30 vote marks a major step towards universal suffrage which was last held in Somalia in 1969. Early this year hundreds of Mogadishu residents withstood queues to register as voters. The electoral body targeted enrolling 4 million voters in the capital city. Should the elections go ahead as envisaged, Somalia will have made a major stride in restoring universal suffrage to Mogadishu residents. Somalia has not held democratic elections for more than 56 years since the democratically elected government was overthrown in 1969 and the eventual collapse of the central government in 1991 after the overthrowal of Siad Barre. Previous attempts to have Somalia hold one-person one-vote have floundered due to insecurity and clan fights. Hassan insisted political organizations are expected to finalize legal requirements for their names and emblems to establish their identity emphasizing that registered voters should prepare to choose among the registered organizations and elect their preferred candidates. Deployment of Egyptian soldiers under the African Union Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM received a major boost this week with the Monday meeting between. Egypt's Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty and his Somali counterpart Abdelsalam Abdi Ali on the sidelines of the fifth Aswan Forum for Sustainable Peace and Development.Abdelatty reiterated Cairo's support for Somalia's state-building efforts, unity, and stability, urging for enhanced regional cooperation to counter terrorism and extremism, which are the key threats to the Horn of Africa. According to a statement from Egypt's Foreign Ministry, Abdelatty welcomed progress in the deployment process and reaffirmed Cairo's commitment to supporting efforts to strengthen security and stability in Somalia and across the Horn of Africa. He expressed hope that procedures for deploying Egyptian troops would be finalized soon, stressing the importance of securing sustainable international funding to ensure the mission's effectiveness. Besides the imminent deployment of Egyptian soldiers to Somalia, the talks also touched on strengthening bilateral ties in trade, investment, development, and healthAli thanked Egypt for its continued political and developmental support and expressed his government's commitment to deepening partnership with Cairo. Both sides agreed to maintain close coordination on regional and international issues affecting the Horn of Africa, reaffirming what the statement described as "the deep-rooted historical and fraternal ties between the two peoples." AUSSOM was established by a UN Security Council resolution in December 2023 and has an initial 12-month mandate and succeeds the African Union Mission in Somalia (ATMIS), which concluded in 2024. The peace-keeping force's main objective is to assist Somali forces in combating the Al-Shabaab terror group, which has waged an insurgency for more than 15 years.The north African nation announced its participation in AUSSOM in December 2024, four months after signing a military cooperation pact with Somalia.

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