Author: web dessk

The threat of terrorism and organised crime is becoming increasingly entrenched across Africa, the head of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime told the Security Council on Thursday, warning that illegal trafficking is depriving millions of a decent livelihood.

UNODC chief Ghada Waly said there were around 3,500 victims of terrorist acts in sub-Saharan Africa last year, nearly half of those recorded worldwide.

The vast Sahel region in particular has become home to some of the most active and deadly terrorist groups, and it is essential to gain more understanding of the links between organised crime and terrorism, through rigorous data collection, she added.

The evidence is there that the illegal exploitation of precious metals and minerals such as gold, silver and diamonds, are fuelling the extremists with significant sources of income, and benefitting the groups that control extraction, and trafficking routes.

She said based on UNODC research, “we have established that illegally mined gold and other precious metals are being fed into the legitimate market, providing huge profits for traffickers.”

Wildlife trafficking has also been reported as a possible source of funding for militias, she added, with the illegal trade in ivory alone generating $400 million in illicit income each year.

Millions exploited

With a population of around 1.3 billion, almost 500 million Africans were living in extreme poverty during 2021, she told ambassadors.

“This criminal exploitation strips the people of Africa of a significant source of revenue. It robs the millions of people who depend on these natural resources for their livelihoods. And it fuels conflicts and exacerbates instability.”

The climate emergency and the COVID-19 pandemic have also wreaked havoc on already fragile economies across Africa, and illicit trafficking only serves to further jeopardize development and wind back progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.

She said sustainable development would be impossible without peace and stability for the continent, noting that UNODC is “the guardian” of the UN Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, the main international bulwark against the black marketeers.

Battling the networks

“We support member countries to put in place the policies, legislation, and operational responses required to better address terrorist threats…In 2021 alone, we implemented 25 counter-terrorism projects in Sub-Saharan Africa, with over 160 activities delivered, and trained 2,500 people.”

She told the meeting that in the Sahel today, the UN training workshops are being organized with The UN Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute, to strengthen the understanding and skills of criminal justice officials to work across agencies, share intelligence, and “bring down terrorist networks and those who fund them.”

UNODC also supports ten countries across the Sub-Saharan region to improve their frameworks to counter terrorist financing and money laundering – including in the Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Niger, and Somalia.

Ms. Waly said UNODC was also working to strengthen inter-agency coordination among intelligence services, law enforcement, financial intelligence units and prosecutors.

She said that conflict zones in Africa were being disproportionately affected by illegal mining and trafficking in precious metals.

“Mineral supply chains are often linked to child abuse, human trafficking, forced labour and other human rights violations. With 60 percent of Africa’s population under 25 years of age, young people are both the future of the continent but also its most vulnerable citizens.”

But she said once empowered, young people can become powerful change agents: “They can create a better future and advocate on behalf of themselves and their communities and protect their natural resources.”

Empowering youth

Ms. Waly said she was especially proud of UNODC’s youth-driven, Peace-building project, which in partnership with UNESCO, empowers young people to become ‘weavers of peace’ in the cross-border regions of Gabon, Cameroon, and Chad.

The aim, she said, was to create a network of 1,800 young “weavers of peace”. To enable them to become actors in conflict prevention and peace-building in cross-border regions, and identify alternative ways of making a living for those in vulnerable cross-border communities.

Defund the terrorists

“UNODC remains fully engaged to support Africa’s fight against the criminal trade in wildlife and natural resources”, she assured ambassadors, adding that she welcomed the engagement of the Council, “to the growing concerns that these illicit revenues are financing terrorist activities and armed groups.”

She said the UN’s crime fighting effort was ready to assist all African in securing their “right to peace, stability, justice and prosperity – for today and future generations. Leaving no money for terrorists. Leaving no one behind.”

 

Source: United Nation

The recently concluded conference on Integrated National Financing Frameworks (INFF) and Open Budgets for Sustainable Development in Africa praised Somalia’s progress in financial transparency and the open budget process. In late September, a survey on Open Budget was unveiled at the meeting in Nigeria’s capital, Abuja.

Mr Yussuf Mohamed Adan, Somalia’s State Minister for Labour and Social Affairs, at the Conference.

Somalia joined the Open Budget Survey (OBS) initiative in 2016 and has completed three rounds of (OBS), which are conducted every two years. Somalia’s transparency score in the 2021 round was 20 out of 100, a significant improvement overits previous performance. It was ranked next to Tanzania.

“We are pleased to have been reviewed through this open process.” Our commitment to transparency and public participation in budget and financial processes is clear. “We are determined to provide value and accountability to our people,” said Yussuf Mohamed Adan, Somalia’s State Minister for Labour and Social Affairs, who attended the conference.

“We are excited to usethese tools to improveour transparency, oversight, and accountability levels, as well as tohelp our external partners see value for their investments,” Mr Adan added Somalia is undergoing debt relief under the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative. Through the proposed industry of an integrated national financing framework (INFF) and an independent peer review open budget process, experts believe the country can eventually rely on its resources rather than Oversee Development Assistance (ODA).

Dr Mohamed Osman, CEO of Sadar Institute, local host for the Open Budget Initiative in Somalia, and Country Representative for the United Nations University of Peace in Somalia, spoke during the conference.

“The Integrated Financing Framework (INFF) and Open Budget Initiative are unique in that they focus on introducing new financial instruments aimed at financing sustainable development goals in conjunction with national goals and priorities,” said Dr Mohamed Osman, CEO of Sadar Institute, a local host for the Open Budget Initiative in Somalia, and Country Representative for the United Nations University of Peace in Somalia.

“The goal is for developing countries to move beyond reliance on traditional ODA and finance their own Sustainable Development goals in the future,” Dr Mohamed added.

During his opening speech, Nigerian President Mohammadu Buhari emphasized the importance of integrating national budget systems to reduce reliance on foreign aid.

President Mohammadu Buhari during the opening session of the INFF launch event held in New Yor Friday, 23rd September 2022 on the margins of the 77th session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA77) in New York.

While participating virtually, representatives from the Ministry of Finance developed a NIFF short-term action plan focusing on financing reform, establishing a new focus for an open budget, and advancing public financial management reform with the Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and the Sadar Institute.

“Somalia will benefit greatly from the results of this survey. It will improve our budgeting process and instill trust in our employees and external partners “Said Mohamed Tahlil Ahmed, the Ministry of Finance’s Head of Budget and Reporting.

“It will open up more oppor Financingt unities for us as we try to overcome the challenges brought on by decades of civil war,” Mr Tahlil added.

Mr Mohamed Tahlil Ahmed, the Ministry of Finance’s Head of Budget Reporting and Monitoring.

Mr Mohamed Tahlil Ahmed, the Ministry of Finance’s Head of Budget Reporting and Monitoring, Somalia, at a past event

Representatives from 54 African countries, UN Agencies, Civil Society Organizations, and other development partners attended the four-day Abuja conference.

As the Covid-19 pandemic dealt shocks to both the sustainable development outlook and the means of financing recovery and medium- to long-term progress in 2020 and 2021, interest in integrated national fina ncing grew.

Some of the delegates during the INFF Conference held in Abuja, Nigeria

The African continent has led the way in terms of the number of countries willing to participate in the Integrated National Financing Framework (INFF) initiative. More than 40 countries use the approach in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA).

The term “integrated national financing frameworks,” or INFFsfor short, was introduced in the Addis Ababa Action Agenda for the very first time. Countries requested INFFs to obtain assistance in implementing their national strategies for sustainable development. During the 2019 United Nations General Assembly, sixteen countries reaffirmed their commitment to being this approach’s pioneers.

INFFs serve as a bridge between the policies that mobilize and regulate public and private funding. They assist governments in aligning and enhancing the contribution of financial policies tonational development plans. They facilitate greater collaboration between public and private actors and strengthen the connections between various financing policy areas.

In conclusion, the State Minister of Labor and Social Affairs lauded the efforts of the event’s organizers and Nigeria, the host nation. The State Minister reaffirmed that Somalia would adopt the INFF strategy, as the Ministry of Finance already had plans to promote this initiative. The State Minister emphasized that his ministry will work with the Ministry of Finance to address the public participation score, which requires significant public participation. “We will work with our Ministry of Finance to include public participation in the budget preparation guidelines and throughout the budget process,” stated Yusuf Mohamed, Stfor State Minister labour and social affairs.

As the conference came to a successful conclusion, countries pledged to advance transparency in the budgeting process and to consider adopting a NIFF. The Somalia delegation, led by State Minister Yusuf Mohamed Adan, participated in a series of side meetings with other countries in the region, including Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda, and South Sudan, to discuss enhancing budget transparency and ensuring public participation.

 

Source: Somali National News Agency

The public uprising against Al-Shabab terror group has not yet peaked, according to national security adviser to Prime Minister Hamza Abdi Barre.

Kamal Dahir Hassan Gutale who spoke to Voice of America said he expects more communities from different regions to join the fighting.

“The public were always ready to fight al-Shabab [radical insurgents],” said Kamal in an interview with VOA’s Harun Maruf.

He added: “What is different this time is the government; the president and the prime minister have started to encourage them and stand with them when the community decided to mobilize.”

The Somali federal government has strongly hailed the local mobilization efforts and is calling for expansion of the resistance to other provinces to totally eradicate terrorists.

 

Source: Somali National News Agency

Anti-AlShabab terror group public revolution came at the right time, according to former the commander of national military.

In an interview with Voice of America, General Dahir Aden Elmi, stressed this mobilization will be the way to defeating militants.

Elmi said that in the past there was no coordination between the local militias and the government troops in combating al-Shabab.

“A lot of times the government and the locals fought separately. The locals fought alone, and the government fought alone. The result was a lack of accomplishment,” he told VOA.

“If the government supports this [mobilization] with power, I see this will be the way to defeating Al-Shabab,” he added.

Government troops have joined the locals in an offensive against Al-Shabab in recent weeks, and liberated more than 40 localities from the radical group.

 

Source: Somali National News Agency