Photo/Somali Times
The two houses of the Somali parliament will hold a joint meeting today to discuss the approval of amendments to the Provisional Procedure for the Elections of the Speaker of the two Houses and the President.
The organizing committee of the presidential election held its first meeting yesterday to discuss the election law of the two chambers and the president. The committees have decided to approve the bill in a joint sitting of both houses of parliament on Monday.
Meanwhile, lawmakers say the Somali presidency is planning to postpone the parliamentary speaker election, until the unelected lawmakers are completed.
What has Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo done for Somalia?
1. Since Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo administration has paid the salaries of all government workers, from politicians, civil servants, and the armed forces on time and every time.
2. In efforts to reform and weed out corruption in the armed services, the Mohamed Farmajo administration instituted every soldier rank and file to undergo biometric scanning, which as a result identified 2000 ghost payrolls. The Somalia National Army had the highest pay increases under the Mohamed Farmajo administration, which amount to more than $ 200 depend on the rank.
3. Under the president, Somalia’s economy and government budget had improved significantly. According to the World Bank, Somalia’s economy is projected to grow to 3.2%-the highest in Mohamed Farmajo’s years in office. The government budget jumped from $148 million in 2017 to an approved budget of whopping $460 million in 2020.
4. For the first time, world major financial institutions have opened their doors to Somalia, due to the successful reforms this Mohamed Farmajo government.
5. Under Farmajo, Somalia had, ahead of time, fulfilled all the conditions for poorer nations’ debt forgiveness, which means any day now, Somalia will be free from about $5 billion debt.
6. Gebre, an Ethiopian general, had an office in Villa Somalia, from which he had dictated to Somalia’s leaders. Somalia leaders, from the national president to regional presidents used to compete for Ethiopia’s approval of them. Thus, as it was, the frequent pilgrimages to Addis Ababa then, which were all stopped when Mohamed Farmajo reclaimed Somalia’s pride, free from Gebre and Ethiopia colony. Ethiopia now deals with Somalia as neighbors with common destiny.
7. Under Mohamed Farmajo, the Somali National Army is professionalized, rebuilt, and equipped with solid command and control officer corp nobody knows exactly how many soldiers in Somalia’s defense forces, but it is certain that credit under Farmajo’s four years plus, tens of thousands were added Turkey brotherhood and Qatar financial support rebuilding Somalia army.
9. Thousands of Somalis who were languishing in foreign jails and detention centers have been repatriated by the Mohamed Farmajo government. That is a fact.
10. Al-Shabab is on its crash and is no longer a match for Somalia’s well-trained and well-paid professional soldiers! Shortly after president Mohamed Farmajo was sworn in in 2017, Al-Shabab carried out the biggest single bombing in Mogadishu, which killed 5 hundred of innocent Somalis! 4 years later, however, Al-Shabab has had more bombing operations prevented from carried out by Somalia’s security services in Mogadishu than succeeding.
11. Hundreds of thousands of Somali children now go to schools free of charge, with government hired thousands of teachers and trained under this president.
12. In foreign policy, Somalia has once again taken its rightful seats in world organizations and Somalia’s diplomats are now contesting for positions in prestigious international bodies, such as the UN Security Council and AU Peace and Security Council. Also Somalia has reactivated more Somali embassies since the military regime.
Somalia’s airspace control is fully reclaimed from the UN and its operations repatriated from Nairobi to Mogadishu.