In an electoral campaign besieged by al-Shabaab fundamentalist violence, former New York municipal employee Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed became president of the problem-plagued Federal Republic of Somalia. Known as ‘Farmajo’ because of his love of cheese (formaggio in Italian), the 54-year-old had previously had a brief stint as the country’s prime minister. On 8 February he won the cross-clan support of the very narrow electorate charged with the country’s political future. Farmajo ran on a nationalist platform of freedom from famine and endemic corruption, and opposition to al-Shabaab. He is considered to be the ‘least corrupt’ of the top candidates in a system traditionally plagued by vote-buying among the 275 members of parliament and 54 senators who make the final decision. Somalis have not had a one person, one vote election since 1969. The vote was held in a heavily guarded airport complex near the capital, Mogadishu – the only place deemed safe enough. Without the presence of 20,000 troops from other countries in the Organization of African Unity, Somalia’s government might not survive at all.
Given the unprecedented popular enthusiasm for Farmajo, the dual Somali/US citizen may find it hard to fulfil the country’s high expectations. In addition to continuing violence, Somalis are faced with some of the worst poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. Some 1.4 million already-malnourished children are in danger of death from impending famine in the next few months. Farmajo is already dampening down expectations, predicting that it will take at least two decades to fix the country’s problems.
