Hiiraan Online

by Mahdi Haile
Saturday, March 07, 2009

President Sharif and PM Sharmarke should make bold decision to dismiss the entire staff of the Embassies. Any political appointments made during The Yusuf Government must be dismissed too. The reason is the
majority of those appointments don’t meet any professional requirement. As a result most of them are unqualified.

Many unprofessional appointments were made involving unqualified elements in the Foreign Service which is supposed to be responsible for projecting the good image of the government and the nation abroad, as well as the integrity of the Government.

Somali Embassies/Missions affected by this corruption are the Somali Embassies in Egypt, the Embassy in Saudi Arabia, the Embassies in UAE, The EU Embassies, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Tokyo Japan, Kenya,
Libya and many other important Somali missions abroad.

Everyone saw such unprofessional attitudes on the part of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs during both Abdiqasim Salad Hassan and Abdullahi Yusuf's government which tarnished the good image of Somalia abroad, especially in the Middle East and EU which is one of the most important partners to Somalia. We witnessed and heard the unprofessional and corrupt activities at the Somali Embassy in Egypt, Libya, Saudi Arabia and Dubai. More than that took place in other Somali Embassies especially the Middle East.

Some of those officers pose serious national Security threat to the country. For example, exactly what is being said in the media is the Like the Nigerian corruption style. It is similar to things that Somali Diplomats were doing in Those countries..

They are in the business of giving safe passage to transnational criminals including black money dealers under diplomatic cover. They drive these criminals to airports to leave the country after succeeding in robbing innocent businessmen of big cash. They aid them in evading security checks in exchange of cash.

According to media during Yusuf’s governments some of the Libyan and Egyptian Embassy and other Middle Eastern Embassies employees were taking bribes to release Somalis who have been arrested in those countries. Though the Embassy has denied such allegations, the fact remains that such behaviors post serious security threats to the Somali government and it image.

The image of Somalia is equally very important, and the government has to strongly intervene in cleaning up the Foreign Service by getting rid of those unprofessional officers from some of our most important missions who are bent on destroying the good image of Somalia. Beside the problem lack of qualification of most of our Foreign Service officers, there is also the issue of anti-government attitudes.

The government of Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Malaysia, Egypt, for example has been very much patient with the administration of the Somali Embassy in that country. Their record of forgery and smuggling has become quite common place.

In Egypt, and Saudi Arabia recently a Cameroonian black money dealer was arrested by police and found  with a Somali Diplomatic passport with attachment in Riyadh Saudi Arabia. Also A Somali man was arrested
trying to get visa for a Somali diplomatic passport from Mugamac the Egyptian Immigration and nationality  office.

Beside the problems of their inability to effectively run the missions is also their anti-government sentiment.

 Most of these Foreign Service Officers, as unqualified as they are, were simply given appointment in the Foreign Service as a result of Mr. Tribalism who is taking bribes from them. MR. Mukhalas has built
an empire of unqualified Foreign Service officers who he calls his "SPECIAL INTEREST".  Some examples are the many Honorary Consuls, Consul Generals and Special Envoys appointed in the Gulf States and
other Asian Countries by the president or PM and the Former Foreign Minister in the Interim Government Mr. Bubaa and others.

"THE ROLE OF THIS GOVERNMENT, OF SHARIF AND THE MEDIA IN FIGHTING
CURRUPRION AND UNPROFESSIONAL ETHICHCS IN THE FOREIGN SERVICE MUST BE GIVEN A HIGH PRIORATY.

As is usually the case, the ruling groups of the country have a greater role to play in formulating some of the policy agenda about the country's future. Somalia Interest is of the view that the government will do different business at this time; different from the kind of corruption that were perpetrated in the past government and
mainly encouraged by top members of the ruling groups. We feel that the party must be an instrument of the government to weed out corrupt practices.

HOW THE GOVERNMENT CAN DO THAT?
It is being heard now in Mogadishu that recommendations on the decision of appointment in the government will be coming from the half from the President closest allies and some from the Prime Minster and the Foreign Minster. This is an encouraging thing. However, are the ARS elites going to abuse this power by simply recommending people without merit system that is being preached by the His Excellency the President?

Disturbing information are reaching us that unqualified elements from the Foreign Service who were appointed without any regards to merit system, but simply based on what they could give in bride to the former Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs and the former president close families.

It was a bidding system based on "who is my closest sub clan and the highest bribe". That was exactly how elements from the Middle East and other parts of the world in the Somali Foreign Service got their appointments. Everyone saw without any doubt how most of these officers peril the image of the Somalia abroad. Most of these people are now heading to Mogadishu and Nairobi to re-secure their positions,
now from the ARS  with the hope giving the highest bribes to anyone in the party since in fact their qualification can not give them these jobs.

The Somali Interest is calling on the ARS circles and the Government of Sharif top aides strongly review the characters and qualifications of officers from the following Somali Missions and their impact on theimage of our country:

What is most alarming and risky is that the majority of these people are complete enemies to the ARS Government under the dynamic leadership of President Shikh Sharif Most of them will be instruments
of destructions for the image of the government if they stay in the mission.

This information is intended to protect Somali's national interests abroad. We hope the ARS group and the former TGS will take it seriously and make sure that the Foreign Service is clean up.

Investigations into all of this information are welcome. This information is also meant for the attention of His Excellency the President.

The Foreign Service needs to be cleaned up.

Let the Somali Government act now, otherwise it will be late.