Making Mogadishu Safe by Alice Hills

Author:Alice Hills [Hills, Alice]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Military, General, Political Science, International Relations, World, Russian & Former Soviet Union, Security (National & International)
ISBN: 9780429559280
Google: aMyxDwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2019-09-25T01:37:27+00:00

Mogadishu's Policing Providers

Low-level security provision presents a complex picture. Officially, the main providers of everyday street-level policing are the SPF, backed by AMISOM and district commissioners' militia; although militiamen may sometimes also be police.

The SPF is more effective and professional than it used to be. Members of the SPF now wear police uniforms, the SPF is reputed by the international community to have integrated several clans into its ranks and its officers are theoretically vetted, registered, trained and paid by the international community. In addition, the SPF was relatively effective in the run-up to the presidential elections, managing to maintain order at polling stations, whereas SNA troops used militia to influence voters in favour of parliamentary candidates close to then-President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud.18 Despite this, the SPF has been infiltrated by clan paramilitaries and Al-Shabaab sympathisers, and its role is more flexible than international models advocate. SPF officers may be present in markets and near significant buildings, but their approach is defensive, with patrolling considered undesirable or incomprehensible, if not suicidal. This is not unusual: AMISOM's heavily armed police units may patrol parts of Mogadishu, but many officers in more volatile or violent societies are reluctant to leave their stations. NISA's security interests ensure that it has a presence in the districts, although its agents do not address everyday crime and community safety issues. Consequently, when residents need help they look first to the various militias of the different district commissioners or they seek protection from their clan.19

18 Indian Ocean Newsletter, 'Army Under Pressure', Issue 1441, 23 December 2016.

19 Menkhaus, 'Non-State Security Providers and Political Formation in Somalia', pp. 23-25.

From an international perspective, the overall picture is fluid and untidy, yet the various elements form a coherent and locally acceptable whole, offering a range of options that suits, rather than undermines, the position - and legitimacy - of the government and regional authorities; it is not as unacceptable to Somalis as is sometimes thought.20 Nevertheless, many people regard all security forces as a threat, rather than a source of potential security. Men in police or national army uniforms are feared, while AMISOM is perceived to be responsible for a number of deaths. When, during his research, Adam Yusuf Egal asked his Mogadishu respondents about AMISOM's record, several referred to a Daily Nation Kenya YouTube video entitled 'Amisom Kills More Civilians than Al-Shabaab: UN', which said that the Somali police and army killed 55 civilians during the last four months of 2016, while AMISOM killed 37.21 The video concludes that AMISOM and the Somali army together killed 92 civilians, whereas Al-Shabaab killed 91.

20 Ibid., p. 6. See also Alex de Waal, The Real Politics of the Horn of Africa: Money, War and the Business of Power (Cambridge: Polity, 2015), pp. 110-11, 124-26, 128-29.

21 Daily Nation, 'Amisom Kills more Civilians than Al-Shabaab - UN', 18 January 2017, <http://www.nation.co.ke/video/195l480-3522110-3md90xz/_green>, accessed 18 January 2017.

In theory, AMISOM's police units and individual officers play a positive role in influencing both the SPF's local security practices and the community's response to them.

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