Somalia: Ex-president cautions NISA over VOA journalist's tribulations

MOGADISHU, Somalia - The Security agencies in Somalia should be mindful about freedoms of expression and media, former President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has said, poking holes at the recent attack targeting VOA reporter Harun Maruf.

In a jibe against Maruf, intelligence agency NISA termed him a "danger" to national security in Somalia and vowed to take "legal" action against him, although it did not reveal specific crimes he'd committed.

And in a tweet on Monday, the former president, who is the immediate predecessor of President Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo, dismissed NISA' actions as "unethical" adding that they manifest "dictatorial" tendencies of the current regime

“Security agencies that threaten the journalists and leaders who mislead the public through fake news and investing heavily unethical social media propaganda is a recipe to the dictatorial tendency which is the demise of any nascent democracy like ours in Somalia," he said.

NISA, a strong government agency under former Al-Jazeera journalist Fahad Yasin, further claimed that Maruf had committed "acts outside the jurisdictions of media discipline" which informed their ongoing investigations against him.

Hassan is the latest high profile individual to come into the defense of Maruf, a popular US-based Somali journalist who often commentates on the country's social-economic and geopolitical ventures, a move which might have rattled the agency.

The US and other high profile politicians, ordinary citizens and top organizations have also expressed their "disappointment" in the manner at which NISA targeted Mr. Maruf, who is also an award-winning reporter.

He is credited for co-authoring Inside Al-Shabaab: The Secret History of Al-Qaeda's ally. Recently, he launched Investigative Dossier, a program which has badly exposed the Somali government as a sympathizer of Al-Shabaab.

In some of the program's episodes, Maruf interviews Al-Shabaab defectors and current leaders, giving thousands of people around the globe the insight of the group's sophisticated operations. Al-Shabaab has been pushing for the toppling of the Somalia government for over a decade now.

But threats, harassment, and execution of journalists in Somalia isn't an extraordinary phenomenon. The East Africa nation is considered as one of the most difficult environments for journalists globally, with the administration imposing draconian restrictions against them.

And now the situation is getting even worse, Amnesty International said, in a report titled “We live in perpetual fear”, detailing what it called a “dramatic deterioration” in press freedom in Somalia.

“A surge in violent attacks, threats, harassment, and intimidation of media workers is entrenching Somalia as one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist,” the report said.

Incidentally, some of the Somali journalists now in asylum pointed fingers at NISA as one of the most "dangerous" agency which has been muzzling press freedoms. The agency, one of them added, usually executes those who fail to toe to the line.

Apart from government censorship and operations, journalists in Somalia often face harassment, intimidations and at times assassinations by the Al-Shabaab militants, who control large swathes of rural southern and central Somalia, the report added.

However, Somalia’s government rejected the report, calling it a “fabrication” and “ludicrous allegations”, and accusing journalists who had fled the country of making up stories to secure asylum abroad.

“We find no concrete evidence worthy of accusing the Federal Government of Somalia of abuses against journalists,” the Ministry of Information said in a statement. "At least eight journalists have been killed since 2017, and at least eight more fled the country fearing for their lives."

Hassan Sheikh Mohamud is one of the founders of Forum for National Parties [FNP], a conglomerate of six opposition parties. The coalition is set to dissolve into a single party and field a formidable presidential candidate in December polls.

GAROWE ONLINE