Those hoping for daybreak after 14 years of chaos in Somalia realised this week they were experiencing a false dawn. The slow move homewards of the new government of Abdullahi Yusuf was to have started next week. Now it appears to be facing further delays.
Somali warlords have made their point: the country is still too dangerous for the government to work in.
Transitional Prime Minister Mohamed Ali Gedi said they needed to hear reports from at least three more Cabinet-level fact-finding missions that would be going to Somalia this week. These missions would not be able to report in time for the February 21 target date for the homecoming process to start.
Two previous probes by the transitional government were met with contrasting responses: cheering crowds desperate for any government in Somalia; and the murder of Kate Peyton, a Johannesburg-based BBC journalist assigned to cover the event.
Another demonstration in Mogadishu saw thousands of people tell an advance party of African peacekeepers that they are very selective about whose help they will accept.
The African Union had directed the Inter Governmental Authority on Development (Igad) to take up midwife duties in Somalia.
Igad — consisting of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda — laboured for more than two years to knit Somalia’s clans into a transitional government.
Igad military experts arrived in Mogadishu this week to assess security ahead of a larger deployment.
The demonstrators made two points: they will not accept non-Muslim military supervisors and they don’t want troops from Djibouti, Ethiopia or Kenya.