FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF SOMALIA

• Official name: Jamhuriada Federalka Somalia (Federal Republic of Somalia)
• Location: East Africa
• International organisations: African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States, African Union, Arab League, Non-Aligned Movement, Organisation of Islamic Conference, United Nations
• Borders: Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya
• Coastline: Gulf of Aden, Indian Ocean
• Land area: 637,657 Km2
• Population: 9,100,000 (estimate)
• Annual GDP (PPP) per capita: US$600 (2009 CIA estimate). World ranking: 190
• Ethnicity: Somali 85%, Bantu and other non-Somalis 15%.
• Languages: Somali and Arabic are official languages, although Somali is the language of almost the whole population.
• Religion: Almost the entire population are Sunni Moslems.
• Form of government: In theory, presidential republic. In practice there is no functioning national government. Somalia is divided into 18 regions.
• Capital: Mogadishu (Muqdisho)
• Constitution: The Constitution of the Somali Democratic Republic has been inoperative since 1991.
• Head of state: Since 2004 the head of the Transitional Federal Government has been recognised as President of Somalia, although the TFG has little authority in most of the country.
• Head of government: The head of the TFG appoints a Prime Minister who in theory runs the government.
• Legislature: An unelected 275-member Transitional Federal Assembly (TFA) was created in 2004.
• Electoral authority: None
• Freedom House 2011 rating: Political Rights 7, Civil Liberties 7
• Transparency International Corruption Index: 11% (178 of 178 countries rated)
• Reporters Without Borders Press Freedom 2010 Index: 34% (161 of 178 countries rated)
• Heritage Foundation Economic Freedom 2010 Index: no rating

Political history

The Somali-speaking lands were divided between the Emperor of Ethiopia, the Imam of Muscat and the Sultan of Zanzibar until the 19th century. In the 1887 Britain established a protectorate over the Gulf of Aden coast. The Italians acquired the southern coastal part of the country from Zanzibar between 1889 and 1905. The inland areas were never fully subdued. Italy seized British Somaliland in 1940, but in 1941 Britain retook it and occupied Italian Somaliland as well.

After the war Somalia was made a United Nations Trust Territory and in 1950 it was placed under Italian administration, with independence following in 1960. A democratic constitution was enacted, but in 1970 a military coup brought General Mohammed Siad Barre to power. Barre established a one-party socialist regime of the familiar African type, which had the usual consequences of bankrupting the country and destroying what civil society it possessed. Barre also led Somalia into a disastrous war with Ethiopia in 1977-78.

In 1991 Barre was overthrown, but it proved impossible to establish a stable government, and the country dissolved into clan-based civil war and banditry. A US-led international intervention in 1992 was a costly failure. The former British territory in the north seceded and now calls itself the Republic of Somaliland. Puntland, another northern region, has also set up a regional government, although it does not claim to be an independent state.

In August 2000 a meeting of Somali clan leaders in Djibouti agreed to create a Transitional Federal Government. This body was given a three-year mandate to establish a permanent national Somali government, but little progress was made. Another meeting in Kenya in 2004 restarted the process, but in 2006 the Islamist Courts Union (ICU), a coalition of Islamists backed by Eritrea, took control of Mogadishu, forcing the TFG to flee to Baidoa. The intervention of Ethiopian troops defeated the ICU and to some extent restored the authority of the TFG, but it still has little effective control in most of the country. Sharif Ahmed has been president of the TFG since January 2009. Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed has been Prime Minister since October 2010.

Freedom House's 2010 report on Somalia says (with considerable understatement): "Somalia is not an electoral democracy. The state has in many respects ceased to exist, and there is no governing authority with the ability to protect political rights and civil liberties. The TFG is recognised internationally, but its actual territorial control is minimal... Because of the breakdown of the state, corruption in Somalia is rampant and grew worse following the overthrow of the ICU in 2006... Although Somalia's Transitional Federal Charter (TFC) calls for freedoms of speech and the press, these rights are minimal in practice... Freedom of assembly is not respected amid the ongoing violence, and the largely informal economy is inhospitable to organised labor... There is no judicial system functioning effectively at the national level. The TFA passed a law to implement Sharia (Islamic law) in May 2009, but the government was unable to carry out the legislation in practice."

Updated November 2011