Somalia’s newly elected president said on Monday his administration will not remain in exile, but will return to the war-ravaged country before security is completely restored.
President Abdullahi Yusuf said once his Cabinet is selected it will return — although it will initially establish itself outside the capital, Mogadishu.
He rejected calls for the new government to return only when security is restored.
”The first thing this new government should tackle is security,” he told journalists at a joint press conference with Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi. ”Somalia has been destroyed.”
Yusuf has asked the African Union for between 15 000 and 20 000 peacekeepers to help restore order in Somalia, which has been devastated by 14 years of civil war.
”For the past 14 years that destruction has been going on, all the infrastructure including the military and security forces has been destroyed,” he said. ”We need forces from Africa to help us in peacemaking. At the same time, it is essential we start building new Somali forces comprising military police and military.”
He also pledged to begin as soon as possible the difficult task of disarming the 55 000 militias in Somalia.
”The government, as soon as the Cabinet is formed, will … move inside the country and do what is possible in terms of restoring security and peace,” he said. ”What we need is for the government to go inside and start work. We are not going to be a government of refugees. We are not going to be a government of exiles.
”The government needs to prepare the grounds for having some security forces,” he added. ”We need to prepare on the reconciliation side — the government will make sure that when it’s moving into Mogadishu, Mogadishu is ready in terms of accommodating the government.”
Yusuf — sworn in on October 14 after a 275-member transitional Parliament elected him in Nairobi, Kenya — also played down difficulties with the self-declared republic of Somaliland, which has said it will not recognise him.
”We want to solve the problems in Somalia peacefully — including Somaliland,” he said. ”We would never resolve matters through force. Dialogue and discussion is much better than resorting to violence.”
Prime Minister Meles Zenawi also stressed that the government should move to Somalia at the earliest opportunity and move to Mogadishu when security permits.
”I think Somalia has got a very rare opportunity,” Meles said. ”The Somalis have taken a risk in establishing a new government and the international community should take a similar risk in making sure this opportunity is not squandered.
”The international community should not wait for stability to be established in Somalia before it can send a stabilising force because that is a contradiction in terms.”
The Horn of Africa country has been divided into fiefdoms ruled by rival warlords since 1991, when long-time president Mohamed Siad Barre was ousted. There have been 14 other peace efforts and two previous governments were formed, but they never managed to take effective control over most of the country.
However, the Ethiopian prime minister said this initiative and election are different. He said the Somali president has been elected by a Parliament in ”fair, transparent elections” and that there has been ”immediate international support”.
Meles also said while Ethiopia is ”a bit stretched” in terms of peacekeeping forces, it will act if asked. Ethiopia has already sent peacekeepers to Liberia and Burundi.
”If it is the opinion of the AU that we send troops, and it is the wish of the Somali people and the Somali government that we help them out by sending peacekeeping troops, that is something we shall consider positively,” he added.
Said Djinnit, an AU commissioner for peace and security, said it is ”too early” to say when an African peacekeeping force will arrive in Somalia. An AU delegation will travel to Somalia next month as a part of ongoing efforts to draw up a concrete peacekeeping plan. — Irin