Upon touching down in Uganda, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud was treated to a lavish welcome at Entebbe International Airport, courtesy of Uganda’s Foreign Affairs head honcho, General Jeje Odongo. CREDIT Villa Somalia
- Advertisement -
Mogadishu (AX) — Intent on bolstering key alliances, Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud embarked on a mission to Uganda this past Saturday. This trip signifies Somalia’s resolve to forge deeper connections with regional pals as it inches towards taking the reins of its security from African Union forces.
Once he made his debut at Entebbe, President Mohamud had a warm encounter with Uganda’s Foreign Affairs Minister General Jeje Odongo, as well as Somalia’s Defense Minister Abdulkadir Mohamed Nur, who tagged along.
Throughout his jaunt, President Mohamud has plans to cross paths with Ugandan President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni. The agenda? A chitchat spanning from bilateral dealings to matters of regional peace and safety. A prime focus will be nurturing the partnership while Somalia shifts from the African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS) to taking the helm of its security forces.
Since back in 2007, Uganda’s been in the thick of things in Somalia’s security blueprint, marking itself as the first nation to dispatch troops under what was known as the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM). With 6,223 boots on the ground in strategic locales like Mogadishu and the Shabelle regions, Uganda commands the largest slice of the mission pie.
Fast forwarding to December 2024, ATMIS will wrap things up, paving the way for dialogues between the leaders on kickstarting the African Union Support and Stabilization Mission in Somalia (AUSSOM) by 2025. Uganda hasn’t been a bystander but a key player in whipping Somali troops into shape. The training regimen is a mixed bag of infantry basics, counterterrorism drills, and specialty courses. Just this March, President Mohamud attended the graduation bash for Somali soldiers under Uganda’s tutelage.
AUSSOM won’t leave Somalia high and dry but will continue to have its back with a leaner force of 11,000 soldiers, aiming their sights on city security and safeguarding infrastructures.
The African Union Transition Mission in Somalia (ATMIS), made an official handover of the Kuday Forward Operating Base (FOB) to the Somali Security Forces (SSF) in the heart of Jubaland State. Nestled in Lower Juba, Kuday FOB had been under the watchful eyes of ATMIS’s Kenya Defence Forces (KDF) since all the way back in 2015.
So far, ATMIS has passed the baton on six FOBs and trimmed down troop strength by about 2,000 as part of the UN and African Union-approved phase three wind-down.
As per Villa Somalia’s grapevine, President Mohamud has plans to swing by other countries pitching troops to ATMIS in the near future.
Edited by: Ali Musa
alimusa@axadletimes.com
Axadle international–Monitoring
