Mortars landed at the United Nations offices inside the heavily guarded Halane Compound coinciding with a letter from the Federal Government of Somalia declaring Mr. Nicholas Haysom, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General of the United Nations (SRSG) persona non grata.

About seven shells were reported to have landed at the UN office premises injuring two employees and a contractor, none of them seriously.

Following the attack, UNSOM, which Mr. Haysom headed, made its reaction to the shells singling its office out known in the following statement.

PRESS STATEMENT 01/2019

The Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General on Somalia, Nicholas Haysom, condemned in the strongest possible terms today’s indirect fire attack on the main United Nations compound in the Somali capital.

Seven mortars landed inside the compound this afternoon, injuring two UN staff members and one contractor. None of the injuries is life-threatening.

Al-Shabaab has reportedly claimed responsibility for the attack.

“Today’s indirect fire attack on the main UN compound in Mogadishu may amount to a violation of international humanitarian law, and I deplore this unwarranted act of aggression against our personnel,” said Mr. Haysom. “No political agenda can be served through violence that deliberately targets staff members of international organizations who are supporting the consolidation of peace and the strengthening of governing institutions in Somalia. I wish our wounded colleagues a full recovery from their injuries.”

Al Shabaab claimed responsibility but that, to many, does not absolve the Federal government and its security agencies from implication in the action especially within hours of another attack on Mr Haysom and the UN – this time diplomatic – from the government itself.

The Somalia Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a press statement barely two hours later, Tuesday, announcing that the SRSG was no longer a welcome guest and partner in development in Somalia. The statement accused Mr. Haysom of transgressing accepted, ethical diplomacy.

“This decision is based when he so clearly breached protocols and culture commensurate with the office of the United Nations in Somalia following a blatant interference he made on the internal affairs  and sovereignty of the country”, the statement said.

https://twitter.com/MofaSomalia/status/1080166054800883714

https://twitter.com/MofaSomalia/status/1080166054800883714

“If action has not yet taken been place, I urge that the matter be thoroughly and promptly investigated and that appropriate action is taken to hold any perpetrators, including commanding officers responsible,” read part of Mr. Haysom’s letter to the Internal Security ministry.

In fact, both communications were kind too to the government, observers noted, in light of the magnitude of its role in openly steering the election to its favor using force and everyother trick in the book.

“What happened in Baidoa was, in itself, a most heinous violation of the federal constitution and the democratic process the international partners started and funded,” they said. “Partners should have clearly stated that the so-called election in the Southwest was null and void since it was no secret that Villa Somalia installed a puppet figure-head in the State as ‘President'”

The Mogadishu government, reports show, was never happy with Mr. Haysom’s appointment as envoy to Somalia suspecting that he was there to steer an eventual Somalia-Somaliland separation since a reunion between the erstwhile partners seemed improbable in the circumstances. South Africa's Nicholas Haysom Appointed UN Envoy For Sudan And South Sudan

The world was quick to denounce the rash move on the part of Somalia’s spoiled, inexperienced leaders, with rumors of a covert, tacit involvement of the US in the expulsion.

Enlightened Somalis, too, Tweeted showed their disbelief in how the Farmajo government treated Mr. Haysom showing total disregard for diplomacy.

Here is a cross-section.

The first two, one in Somali, correlates the mortar attack on the UN compound and Mr. Haysom’s expulsion linking both directly to Villa Somalia:

In his earlier career, Mr. Haysom served in the Government of South Africa, including as Chief Legal and Constitutional Adviser in the Office of the President from 1994 to 1999.  He was involved in the Burundi Peace Talks as Chair of the committee negotiating constitutional issues from 1999 to 2002 under the facilitation of the late former President Nelson Mandela.  He was the principal adviser to the Mediator in the Sudanese Peace Process from 2002 to 2005.

Mr Haysom, a South African lawyer and diplomat, was appointed the UN Special Envoy for Sudan and South Sudan in March of 2016.

He assumed his current assignment to Somalia/Somaliland in September 2018.

READ ALSO: Somalia Declares UN Special Representative Persona Non Grata

 

 

 

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