Somalia president says ready to liberate country from Al-Shabaab

In his piece to The Economist, President Mohamud said his country is set to use a ‘mixture of different security strategies’ to defeat Al-Shabaab

Somalia’s President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has reiterated his administration’s readiness to liberate his country from Al-Shabaab terrorists.

“We will liberate all remaining territories, no matter how small or remote, so that our people can live in peace,” Mohamud said in his piece to The Economist on Wednesday.

Recalling that he personally “survived at least three attempts” to his life by the terror group in the past, the newly elected president warned that international terrorism still wreaks havoc across the world despites reports that deaths from global terrorism are in decline. “It is arguable that terrorism is not on the wane, but that terrorists are reinventing themselves and adapting,” he wrote. “We must do the same.”

While recognizing that a military approach alone is not enough to defeat Al-Shabaab, Mohamud said talks with the group are needed but only if they are “on a path towards rejecting their violent ideologies.”

The president also highlighted the need to consolidate Somalia’s state-building agenda as crucial in the fight against terrorism. “For a better society we need good governance, economic opportunities, stronger rule of law and more inclusive politics. Bad politics underwritten by rampant factionalism and perpetual crisis, as exemplified in the delay to the recent Somali elections, only serve to weaken fragile states like Somalia and to give respite and encouragement to terrorists,” he wrote.

While appreciating international partners’ support for Somalia in the fight against terrorists groups, he warned that “containing and degrading” groups like Al-Shabaab “is no longer enough” adding that they “must be militarily and ideologically defeated”.