By MALKHADIR M. MUHUMED AND MOHAMED OLAD HASSAN
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
The militant al-Shabab group even warned teachers nearby not to hold class on Thursday. Parliament wound up cancelling the session for the second time this week. Parliament speaker Sheik Aden Mohamed Nur insisted it was not because of the threats but because the meeting hall "needed loudspeakers and some other adjustments."
The legislature -- 550 members handpicked by their clans -- has many more problems than missing audio equipment.
Parliamentarians are fleeing Mogadishu, Somalia's bleak, shattered capital, in droves and resettling in neighbouring countries. Militants have killed nine parliamentarians over the last few years for being part of a Western-backed government.
One former parliamentarian has even joined al-Shabab while another quit last month, opting to be jobless. Parliament now has trouble forming a quorum.
"Apart from the title of a parliamentarian, they are nothing," said Said Hassan Shire, the member who resigned. "I regret the useless years I was part of a failed parliament. I curse every day of those years."
Like ordinary Somalis, parliamentarians face insecurity and a low standard of living. They have been arrested in se-c urity crackdowns in Kenya and Ethiopia, and some have sought asylum in Europe. They have seen their stipend cut by two-thirds to $600 a month.
"The situation of Somali MPs is deplorable," said Rashid Abdi, a Somali expert at the International Crisis Group. "Their future is bleak and the blame lies with the international community that urged the parliament to increase its number to 550 members and failed to assist. Now the members have run out of options. They are targeted by armed groups in Somalia and by neighbouring countries."
A decade ago, Shire gave up his business exporting livestock in hopes he would become part of a functioning government that could restore security to his anarchic country. When the current government signed a power-sharing agreement in 2008 with moderate Islamists, the aim, Shire said, was to reconcile with the remaining opposition groups and restore peace to the country.
"But all those things have failed. So my conscience simply won't allow me to be part of a failed parliament," he said. "Members can't operate freely. They don't have the security to move around, nor the money to survive."
When parliament does meet it passes laws -- albeit ones that can be enforced only in the small area the government controls -- and approves Cabinet appointments. Members last met in December.
Source: AP