Dimensions of the Somali Drama that Leave Sheikh Sharif Indifferent

Continuing the revelation of the tragic situation that has befallen on the Somalis but still leaves the cynical TFG president Sheikh Sharif indifferent, I herewith republish several recent IRIN reports.

Despite the present tragic situation, which is extensively described within these reports, the appointed pseudo-president Sheikh Sharif continues his divisive policies, engaging his forces in battle against Somali patriots.

His immoral standpoint opposes all previous paradigms of patriotic and caring Somali rulers; this consists in an additional reason for Sheikh Sharif to resign as soon as possible.

Somalia: Exodus continues despite lull in Mogadishu fighting

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84483

Nairobi, 21 May 2009 (IRIN) - Hundreds of families are still fleeing the Somali capital, Mogadishu, despite relative calm in the past week following intense fighting between insurgents and government troops.

They are joining hundreds of thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in camps on the outskirts of the city and in safer neighbourhoods inside Mogadishu.

"Even today [21 May], many families are leaving because they believe the current break in the fighting is just temporary," Ali Sheikh Yassin, the deputy chairman of the Mogadishu-based Elman Human Rights Organisation (EHRO), told IRIN. "I think many people have lost hope that this city will ever return to normal.

"Many markets and businesses have shut down because of the security situation." He said Suuq Ba´ad in the north, the second-largest open-air market in Mogadishu, was closed.

"There is not a single store or shop open there," Yassin said. "This market did not close at the height of the conflict in 2007-2008."

People´s livelihoods have been destroyed, "so anyone who can leave is doing so", he added.

The impact of the current displacement is also being felt in neighbourhoods that had escaped much of the recent violence in the city, such as Madina in the southwest, and Huriwa in the north.

"Almost every family in these neighbourhoods is hosting one or more families," Yassin said.

Relying on relatives

Mogadishu resident Abdiwali Nur returned to the city with his family from an IDP camp in April, hoping the situation would improve. However, he is staying with a relative in Madina, with his wife and three children.

"We could not afford to go the IDP camps again so my relative has given us a small place in his house," Nur said. "All the neighbours are hosting people."

Another returnee, Halima Warsame, mother of five, fled her home in Towfiq, north Mogadishu, last week to Arbiska area near Afgoye, 30km south of Mogadishu, where she was previously an IDP.

"I left a month ago thinking this was the end of our ordeal but I was wrong," Warsame said. "I thought with the Ethiopian troops gone and the new government [in place] everything would be alright, only it got worse.

"I don´t see any hope that our situation will ever improve."

Warsame's husband and son were killed in 2007 after a shell landed on their shop. She told IRIN their situation in the camp was desperate: "We have no shelter from the constant rain."

Sporadic shelling has been continuing between government forces and insurgents since major clashes ended on 17 May.

According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the number of people displaced since 8 May has reached 45,000.

In a briefing note on 20 May, the agency said the deteriorating security situation was hampering aid delivery.

"Even local agencies that have often provided a lifeline to the IDPs are encountering new risks as they try to help out the needy," UNHCR said.

It said the most urgent needs were shelter and non-food items, "which humanitarian agencies led by UNHCR plan to provide first to over 100,000 people in the Afgoye corridor and neighbourhoods in northwest Mogadishu, and afterwards to others in other affected areas of the city as soon as the security permits".

ah/mw

Somalia: Nasteeho Osman, "All I want is a safe place to raise my children"

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84556

Mogadishu, 26 May 2009 (IRIN) - Nasteeho Osman, 29, returned to her home in Wardhigley district, south Mogadishu, in April after nearly two years in a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs). She first fled the fighting between Ethiopian-backed government troops and insurgents in Mogadishu in 2007 to seek shelter in an IDP camp in Arbiska area, 30km south of the city.

After recent intense fighting in the Somali capital, Osman is back at the IDP camp she left a month ago, with her four children - aged between four and 10 years. Osman's husband was taken by soldiers days before she first fled in 2007 and she has not seen him since. She spoke to IRIN on 26 May:

"We lived in Wardhigley. Both my husband and I worked in Bakara market; he worked in a store and I sold food and vegetables in my stall.

"My children never went hungry and I thank God that we always managed to provide food for them.

"However, all this changed in 2007 as soon as the Ethiopian troops arrived [to help oust the Union of Islamic Courts] and the fighting began; Wardhigley and the nearby Bakara area became one of the most contested in the city.

"Wardhigley was shelled on a daily basis and almost every home in our neighbourhood was hit once, sometimes more than once.

"We could not go out to work or do anything. That is when we decided to go the camps. However, before we left, troops came to our neighbourhood and took some men, including my husband. That was the last time I saw him. I don´t know if he is dead or alive. I don´t know what to tell my children.

"I returned to our home in April because life in the camp was bad and I was hoping that peace would return but instead things got worse.

"After only four weeks, we were forced to run for our lives and return to the camp we had left.

"I am now sharing a small place with another family who were kind enough to let us stay; they share what little they have.

"Life is very hard. We don´t have enough to eat. We don´t have a place to sleep. Previously, we survived on my daily earning from the market; now I am all alone, trying to raise four children and cannot even explain to them what happened to their father because I don´t know.

"I don´t know when our suffering will end. All I want is a safe place to raise my children."

ah/mw

In Brief: High malnutrition levels in Somalia

http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=84496

Nairobi, 22 May 2009 (IRIN) - Nutrition assessments have revealed high global acute malnutrition (GAM) and severe acute malnutrition (SAM) levels averaging 25.5 and 8.1 percent, respectively, in children under five in parts of the south-central Somalia region of Hiran.

The rates are attributable to poor rainfall performance in the past two years, which has led to low crop and livestock production, according to a nutrition update by the Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit.

A hike in food commodity prices coupled with poor childcare and sanitation practices had further contributed to morbidity, it stated.

The Hiran region has also witnessed armed confrontation and intermittent localised civil conflicts, which have hindered humanitarian access and severely affected people's livelihoods.

Poor nutrition levels have also been recorded in Beletwyne and among internally displaced persons (IDPs) in the Berbera, Burao and Hargeisa areas of the self-declared republic of Somaliland, where limited job opportunities are compelling IDPs to depend on cash gifts.

Note

Picture: Somali IDPs departing from Mogadishu

Source: IRIN