UN expands civil protection programme

The UN Development Programme (UNDP) for Somalia, which is already operating in the self-declared state of Somaliland in the northwest, has decided to expand its Somali Civil Protection Programme (SCPP), to cover the whole of Somalia with the aim of improving standards and practices within the judiciary, promoting law enforcement, effecting the demobilisation of armed militia groups, and enhancing landmine action.

The intention is to assist in the establishment of uniform guidelines, codes, practices and consistent training in these four areas over the next three years, according to a UNDP press statement.

“For the UNDP, it’s all about peace and security, and improving these areas will go some way to establishing that on the ground,” UNDP spokeswoman Sonya Laurence Green told IRIN on Tuesday. “There will be a high priority on regularising, countrywide, standards and codes of conduct in relation to the four areas,” she added.

“These four areas [the judiciary, law enforcement, demobilisation and landmine action] form the bedrock of a stable society,” said Senior Deputy Resident Representative Andrea Tamagnini. “The SCPP aims to reinforce Somalia’s still-fragile peace. There are real opportunities for economic and social recovery, and the promotion of human rights... but the environment is still limited by armed militia, the proliferation of landmines and the inadequacy - or lack of - law and order.”

In Somaliland, the SCPP has included mine action and law and order - demining the market town of Burao and training 500 police, for instance.
The authorities in Somaliland, and in Puntland in the northeast, have identified the programme as “essential to social and economic recovery” and last week agreed a strategy to implement it, according to the UNDP.

The programme will involve increasing the representation and role of women in the Puntland police, providing for their training, increasing fund-raising for limited equipment, transport and supplies for the police, and developing judicial and correctional facilities in the region.

An SCPP office has already opened in Garoowe, the capital of Puntland, and a mine action centre for the northeast is currently being opened. Mine action will concentrate for the moment on the coordination of mine-clearance surveys in Galkayo, one of the areas of the northeast worst affected by landmines, according to UN sources.

The SCPP will also involve itself in supporting the creation of a local, properly equipped NGO to carry out humanitarian demining in the northeast, according to the project document.

Apart from Somaliland and Puntland, the transitional government of Abdiqasim Salad Hasan has asked the UN to expand the SCPP to cover the whole of Somalia, “especially with regard to reintroducing and reinforcing civil courts in southern Somalia”, in order to assist the restoration of security and law and order, according to the UNDP.

In central and southern Somalia, the SCPP will assist preliminary assessments of the need for an effective code of law, enforcement of that law, and provision of support for the judiciary and correctional facilities.

All in all, the US $5.5 million expanded civil protection programme - standard enough in itself in terms of what the UNDP does throughout the world - was very important in Somalia, where political and civil administration broke down in large parts of the country after the overthrow of President Siyad Barre in 1991, according to diplomatic sources.
The programme could be seen as part of a process by which consolidation of different systems might be facilitated if ever Somalia were to be reunited, they said.

Meanwhile, crime and insecurity persist in Somalia in areas where there is no comprehensive demobilisation of armed militias, and although emerging Somali administrations are establishing basic law enforcement, their capabilities remain limited. Large numbers of landmines “remain a threat to people and livestock, and limit access to valuable resources”, according to the UNDP. In that context, the abiding objective of the UNDP in Somalia is “to foster an environment in which development can alleviate poverty, promote human rights, and support stability and peace”.

According to the SCCP: “The achievement of peace, of which the enhancement of civil protection constitutes a basic integral element, remains the highest priority for the Somali people at this point in time.”