“Our Only Question is Development”: President Mustafe Omer’s Optimistic Take on Security, Investment, and Elections

An agricultural economist by training from the Imperial College of London and formerly worked at international organizations like the UN, Mustafe Mohammed Omer has served as president of the Somali Regional State since August 2018. A senior member of the ruling Prosperity Party today, Mustafe’s term in office has coincided with a period of relative peace in the Somali region that has seen a boom in investment and public projects.

The region of vast plain land with approximately seven million people still struggles with accessibility, droughts, and other climate-related problems, but conditions appear to have improved markedly from the insecurity and instability of previous decades. The region also hosts major natural gas and fertilizer production projects positioned to play a key role in the government’s development ambitions.

As the country prepares to head to the polls, The Reporter’s Ashenafi Endale sat down with Mustafe to get his take on the region’s progress and future plans. The wide-ranging conversation touches on development, security, investment, elections, relations with Somaliland, the region’s role in Ethiopia’s pursuit for maritime access, and other pertinent topics. EXCERPTS:

The Reporter: A large number of public projects are underway in towns, villages, and cities across the Somali Regional State. How do you evaluate the peace dividend?

President Mustafe Omer: After the 2018 political change, we primarily focused on ensuring peace and then developing infrastructure and critical public provisions, which were completely missing at the time. Because the Somali region is so vast and lowland, developing infrastructure and providing basic services is very expensive.

When we came to office eight years ago, only 20 percent of the Somali population had access to water. Since then, we have developed over 360 underground water wells. Dams, reservoirs, and pipelines that connect villages and households have been developed; for areas where there is very scarce rain and where underground water is not available.

In the health sector, there were only nine hospitals in the region. Most of them have been serving for the past 50 years. We have renovated them and expanded them. We have built 21 new hospitals since we came to power. In general, we have over 30 hospitals now.

In the education sector, we have built over 700 new schools, of which over 100 are secondary schools. We built 12 boarding schools.

Several rural and urban roads have been developed to connect not only communities but also economic value chains and business areas. These are strategically selected roads for livestock markets. But because the Somali region is so vast, the roads built so far are relatively few.

Since Somali is mostly pastoralist, the shift to farming was very minor at 350,000 hectares when the political change took place in Ethiopia. Imagine, the Somali region has over 10 million hectares of arable land. Last year, 1.6 million hectares of land was cultivated and our plan is to reach two million hectares this year.

In general, there are significant improvements in the life of the people of the region. But the pillar of all these achievements is peace and stability. The private sector, especially the service sector, is highly active now. Hospitality, trade, and agro-processing are top investment sectors now. Over the past years, over 70 billion Birr in investment has been injected into the region by the private sector.

In a nutshell, the Somali region is a national model now. In terms of human rights, the region has substantially improved the bad situation before the political change. There is no public discontent in Somali now. The public can ask, demand anything and hold the government accountable. Regarding the political space, ONLF was the leading opposition party in our region. There are some five regional parties including ONLF. Including national parties, there are 12 parties running in the Somali region for the upcoming election. With ONLF, we have resolved disagreements and geopolitical discontents peacefully. Hence, there is no conflict or instability in the region.

What can you tell us about your administration’s efforts in terms of resource mapping, attracting more private capital, and ensuring productivity and economic transformation?

The government’s role is creating an enabling environment for the private sector to come. The government cannot replace the private sector and bring the capital on its own. Peace, stability and property rights are ensured in Somali. These are key elements for private investors. Our primary work is ensuring nobody should be worried about his life’s safety, and his property. All these are guaranteed in our region.

The rest is promoting the resources and investment potential in the region. We are doing that. Over 4,000 investors have come to the region since we took office, with over 70 billion Birr. This has substantially improved the region’s GDP.

The other thing we are providing is incentive provisions. Investors are seeking to get involved mainly in agriculture, health, education and others. We are providing land and other support. In and around Jijiga, we even provide industrial zones to minimize the initial costs of investors.

Natural gas and fertilizer production projects in the region are said to be making good progress. How will the Somali region and communities in and around the gas deposits in Calub benefit from these projects? Will they receive anything more than the seven percent royalty fee dictated by law?

The Somali region will get its fair share of the profit to be generated by the projects once they are finalized. The profit proceeds are first split between the federal and the producing region. Then the federal pie is again divided to all regions. Hence, the producing region benefits in two ways.

The proclamation gives around fifty percent to the producing region. This will be very huge. In terms of injecting more capital, rebooting the region’s budget, creating jobs, innovation and technology, and infrastructure developments; the natural gas and fertilizer projects will be a big game changer for the Somali region.

Apart from the fertilizer, the natural gas will also generate 1,000MW of electricity. The benefits from these projects will radically change livelihoods in the region and spur development.

During the EPRDF era, certain regional states like Somali, were widely considered as being marginalized and underdeveloped. Do you think this still holds true?

Under the previous regime, the Somali region was not part of the federal decision making process. We were excluded. Past agriculture policies marginalized developing regions. If you go to South Omo, Benishangul, or Afar, they are no different from us. Despite the Somali region having vast resources, the past regime could not capitalize on this. Hence, marginalized states like Somali were underdeveloped.

Due to this marginalization, the sense of Ethiopian nationalism was also loose in the past. We have done a lot of work to reverse this. Now, there is huge aspiration and eagerness in the people of the Somali region. The interest of all Somali now is how to link and integrate with the rest of Ethiopia’s economy. Somali people currently ask what is our share and role in the national economy? They are also asking why there are no industrial parks in the Somali region. All public questions are now linked to development.

Before, there was an attitude that our people were marginalized based on their ethnic identity. Today, our region’s only question is development. There is no other question.

Do you believe you achieved this success as an individual leader or as a senior member of the ruling Prosperity Party? If it is the latter, why hasn’t the peace dividend we see in the Somali region been replicated in other regional states?

I believe the political change is positively impacting all regional states and city administrations. Every part of Ethiopia has benefited from the change. Be it in urban development, industry, or agriculture; all are benefiting. There are regions who are performing better than the Somali region.

But the changes and progress achieved in the Somali region in the past several years were not mine alone. The leadership, from federal to local governments, have worked in unity. The commitment is huge. I might have discharged my duties well, but this success has been realized because all federal and regional leadership have discharged their duties. They work daily. We do it collectively. But for every failure, I take responsibility.

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed is the leading contributor behind our success. The PM allowed us to work freely. For any challenge and question we raise as government and as a party, the PM provides solutions and support. The PM also provided the leadership to onboard mega projects worth USD 10 billion to the Somali region. The PM also initiated and implemented the Shebelle Resort. This is the first major tourism destination in Somali, and the PM did this to reboot tourist flow to the region. The PM took risks, and acted under the entrepreneurial state concept.

Unless the government takes initiative and starts such projects, the private sector cannot take steps. So in general, the successes have been achieved by all of us.

Recently, the exiled ONLF wing has been threatening to start an armed struggle. The recent release of the former regional president from prison, who was convicted for crimes, is also creating certain narratives. Do you think the revival of such narratives can reverse the progress in the Somali region? Do you condone the release of Abdi Illey?

I have no belief that anyone will drag back the Somali region into another chapter of conflict. No one will return the Somali region to conflict, because there is no Somali person who wants conflict. Different forces have tried in the past several years, but none of them succeeded. In the past seven and a half years, several attempts were made to mobilize the public to get involved in conflict. All of it failed, because the people well understand the value of peace.

Regarding ONLF, from the beginning, there were certain elements based in the diaspora. These diaspora-based ONLF members are very extremist. Most of the ONLF members who were on the ground are integrated into the government. They are now active in agriculture, business, and supporting government security forces. There is a good understanding with them.

I do not expect any such efforts to cause conflict in the region again.

Regarding former Somali leaders, in relation to the upcoming seventh national election, they are trying to cause some issues here and there. They completely deny all the work done in the Somali region. They intentionally paint a bad image of the peace dividends and development progress Somali has seen since the political change in the country.

In general, none of these have substantial power on the ground to threaten the current administration.

The seventh national election is less than two months away. In the meantime, the national dialogue and transitional justice processes are underway. All of them have certain overlaps. How and which initiative can effectively address the challenges the country has been facing, including conflict?

The national dialogue is hoped to bridge differences on major national topics. That will bring everyone together to a shared consensus. For instance, all thoughts and inputs from all regional states are collected. Some of them are polarized. When such a stark difference occurs on a certain agenda, it will be resolved through referendum, elections, or other alternatives. Not all Ethiopian are expected to have the same position and attitude on everything. That cannot happen in the world. But on the main national interest agendas, there is not much difference.

It is ethnic issues and political views that are dividing the elite. The elite argue Ethiopia should be led by this or that idea. The division is among the elite. The Ethiopian population is always united, it is the elite who is divided. The public in every part of Ethiopia is always one. Therefore, the national dialogue will resolve the differences among the elites and bring together everyone. Once a roadmap of the elite is drawn from that national dialogue, then it will be simple for all to come together. Any polarized view will be resolved based on that elite roadmap.

In any part of the world, there are extremists and outliers. In Ethiopia too, I don’t expect everyone to happily accept the outcomes of the national dialogue. But the critical mass will reach consensus through the national dialogue. We don’t have a very deep national division in Ethiopia, for that matter. Political sabotage, extremism, and power interest are being used as instruments for people to kill each other. Except for these, the country is in a very stable, progressive scenario.

The necessity of transitional justice is never questionable in Ethiopia. It is crucial to cleanse any misdeeds. Commissions will be established to lead the transitional justice process.

How do you see the growing presence of Turkiye and Egypt in neighboring Somalia affecting Ethiopia? What are the opportunities and advantages for Ethiopia’s national interests in this scenario of shifting geopolitical alliances?

Foreign powers are competing in our region of the Horn. The primary impact of these foreign forces is disrupting the peace and stability of the Horn region. This is the disadvantage. These foreign forces work to weaken Ethiopia, not to strengthen Ethiopia. It could be deploying proxy armed forces or disrupting trade routes and ports. These foreign forces are working to affect Ethiopia’s national interest, they also lobby other forces to affect Ethiopia. There are no major impacts on the Somali region so far but they are making efforts. At different times, these foreign forces are coming in the form of Al-Shabaab, ISIS and other terrorist forces to affect Somali and the national interest of Ethiopia. But they are neutralized while trying to enter the Somali region. There are still efforts to create ethnic and religious clashes in Somali. The extremists also use media campaigns.

Ethiopia is intent on gaining sea access. What is your take on this?

Having sea access is a huge benefit for Ethiopia. It will be a big pillar, a big legacy of this generation. Ethiopia already has a huge population and economy in the region. With sea access, it will be very influential. We already have a strong state and low corruption compared to other African countries. Having sea access on top of all this will make Ethiopia a very strong economy. As a region, we are ready to provide any support to the sea access pursuit.

What is your take on Somaliland efforts to secure statehood recognition? How will it affect the Somali region?

Our region has a good relationship with Somaliland. Most of our trade goes via Somaliland. The northern part of the Somali region has especially strong relations with Somaliland via trade in livestock and other goods.

Any good thing that comes Somaliland’s way will be good for the Somali region too. However, if other forces who oppose Somaliland recognition resort to conflict, they will try to expand the conflict to the Somali region as well. We already have seen these signs. Two years ago, there were cross border conflicts and clashes. Since it is Foreign Ministry that works on Ethiopia’s foreign policy, our role is providing information to the Ministry. Our main role as a region is preventing cross-border conflicts from happening. We are doing that.

Many still question the ideology of the Prosperity Party, and some argue it is unclear what its plans are for the next term if it wins a majority in June’s elections. What can you tell us about this?

The Prosperity Party has published its manifesto for the upcoming election. Regarding politics, PP aims to bridge the extremist ideologies in Ethiopia’s politics. Our way is the middle road. There are political forces in Ethiopia who run on extremist ethnic politics. On the other end sit political forces who consider ethnic politics as a danger. PP aims to close that extremism.

Our primary and ultimate goal is strengthening national unity. PP has done a lot on this so far. For instance, before, the Adwa Victory was seen as a source of conflict. Today, Adwa is celebrated together by all Ethiopians. It is seen as a victory of all Ethiopians.

PP has done a lot on ethnic politics, to close the differences. But now, we are focusing on strengthening national unity. The key issue is we must work hard on patriotism. Democracy is critical for Ethiopia. Regarding elections and peaceful power transition, there were huge deficits in the past half a century. We must lead these with law, and instill constitutionalism.

PP is working to ensure more opposition party members will be part of the government and work with the government in the next term. The presence of different views in the governance organs is crucial for nation building and development.

Professor Berhanu Nega of Ezema is working with the government. But Berhanu and Ezema still have different ideologies and perspectives from PP. However, both are working for the national interest. This is what would become a culture. Whatever difference we have, we must work together for the interest of our country.

The national dialogue has identified agendas on which different groups have different views and positions. The initiative will draw solutions for these disagreements. Then everyone, every political force, despite any difference, will be able to work together for the benefit of the country.

Regarding economic development, PP has clear principles. We have managed to reduce national debts. Ethiopia is paying its debts. Despite the successes, there can be ups and downs. Due to our economic reform, Ethiopia has departed from dependence on debt and aid. We made the country self-sufficient in forex, food security, and others. Exports especially have grown by a large margin. This is a major outcome of the economic reform. The economic growth sources are diversified to several sectors like manufacturing, tourism, mining, ICT, and others. In social aspects, health, education and other provisions have substantially increased.

The housing problem is identified as a critical challenge. Therefore, one of our next big tasks is in maximizing housing provisions. Several more projects are already in the pipeline currently.

But the ultimate role of PP is protecting Ethiopia’s sovereignty, ensuring that Ethiopia’s national interest agendas like sea access are well accepted among the international community.