OP-ED: Somalia’s 2026 Transition: Steering Through a Proxy Election Before National Collapse
Somalia’s 2026 presidential transition is no longer a contained domestic debate about electoral mechanics. It is an inflection point where a stubborn internal deadlock meets a widening geopolitical contest, raising the risk that the vote becomes a proxy battleground — and that fragile state-building gains unravel.
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Months from the national vote, there is still no agreed framework for how to elect a president. The long-sought ambition to move to one-person, one-vote balloting after decades of indirect, clan-based models has collided with entrenched elite interests and constitutional ambiguity. Without a credible, inclusive agreement, the race to choose who sits in Villa Somalia threatens to morph into a contest over Somalia’s sovereignty itself.
Stalled talks, shrinking time
Negotiations between the federal government and opposition leaders have repeatedly broken down. Opposition summits warn that in the absence of consensus, Somalia risks parallel political processes — competing timelines, rival claims to authority, and possible violence. With the mandates of parliament and the presidency due to expire in May 2026, any unilateral extension would likely deepen fragmentation and corrode institutional legitimacy.
The precedent of rival national projects looms large in Somali memory. Without agreement on electoral rules and an umpire acceptable to all sides, the state could again fracture into competing centers of power. The current suspension of Somali politics is unsustainable, and the margin for error is rapidly closing.
Geopolitics at the doorstep
These domestic tensions are unfolding in a far less forgiving regional environment. In late 2025, Israel moved to formally recognize the self-declared Republic of North Western State of Somalia — a territory that announced independence from Somalia in 1991 but until then had not won international recognition. Framed by Israeli officials as a security calculus tied to Red Sea dynamics and threats from Yemen, the decision disrupted long-standing norms of territorial integrity and triggered condemnation across the Middle East and Africa. In Mogadishu and among Somali nationalists, it landed as an affront to sovereignty.
Somalia has responded by fortifying ties with external partners. A new defense pact with Saudi Arabia adds to Mogadishu’s security architecture and aligns Somalia more closely with a Gulf power intent on shaping Red Sea outcomes. It also amplifies Gulf rivalries — notably the Saudi-UAE competition — inside the Horn of Africa, where aid, investment and security cooperation often carry political strings.
Turkey, meanwhile, remains deeply embedded in Somalia’s security sector. What began as training and advisory support has taken on a more kinetic edge, with Turkish F-16s reported deployed to Mogadishu and ground units participating in operations against insurgents. Ankara’s decade-long investments in infrastructure, naval cooperation and counterinsurgency mean it is not a distant stakeholder but a central actor in Somalia’s security calculus.
Washington, Riyadh, Cairo and other capitals are recalibrating in response — balancing rhetorical support for Somali sovereignty with their own strategic agendas in the Red Sea corridor. The result is a feedback loop: the more Somalia’s internal contest hardens, the stronger the incentives for outside powers to pick favorites; the more external actors signal preferences, the harder it becomes for Somali factions to compromise.
From impasse to proxy risk
When domestic legitimacy is thin and timelines immovable, power tends to substitute for process. If talks on an electoral model collapse entirely, the likelihood of rival election tracks and shadow security chains of command rises. In that scenario, foreign partners could be drawn in deeper — directly or tacitly backing the factions that best reflect their strategic interests. Somalia’s election would cease to be a test of rules and become a test of alignments.
That is the core danger of a proxy election: constitutional interpretation and polling modalities give way to external patronage and security leverage. The costs would be paid by Somali citizens in renewed instability and by the region in a more volatile Red Sea–Horn corridor. After years of international investment in Somali institutions, a contested 2026 transition could reverse hard-won gains in governance and security.
What can still be done
A slide into proxy dynamics is not inevitable. But preventing it requires immediate, concrete steps that narrow the zone of dispute while broadening the coalition behind the process.
- Adopt a minimum viable electoral consensus: Lock in a basic, time-bound framework that all major actors can live with — even if imperfect — prioritizing clarity on voter rolls, dispute resolution and sequencing of steps over maximalist models.
- Empower a neutral umpire: Mandate an independent, broadly acceptable body to certify milestones and adjudicate complaints. Its remit should be narrow, public and backed by a mutually agreed legal instrument.
- Synchronize the security chain of command: Establish a joint command cell to protect electoral infrastructure and deconflict deployments among federal, state and allied units. Transparency here is the best antidote to accusations of coercion.
- Set rules for foreign engagement: Invite international partners to endorse a compact committing to non-interference in candidate selection and to channeling support only through the agreed electoral architecture.
- Lock timelines with public checkpoints: Publish a calendar with verifiable milestones — legal reforms, registration, accreditation, polling — and require weekly public reporting to reduce rumor and manipulation.
- Protect civic space: Guarantee media access, observer accreditation and basic freedoms of assembly and expression tied to the electoral period, backed by penalties for violations on all sides.
- Create guardrails for federal member states: Clarify roles and responsibilities between Mogadishu and member states in writing to preempt parallel processes while respecting constitutional prerogatives.
Signals to watch
The following signposts will indicate whether Somalia is moving toward a rules-based transition or toward a proxy confrontation:
- Whether the government and opposition agree on (and publish) a common dispute-resolution mechanism.
- Public, joint statements by key external partners affirming non-interference and support for a single electoral track.
- Unified security planning for election protection, including transparent chains of command and shared rules of engagement.
- Legal clarity from Somalia’s constitutional court or an agreed arbiter on term limits and extensions.
- Reduction — not escalation — of unilateral political activity by federal member states and national institutions.
The stakes for 2026 — and after
Somalia’s 2026 election is about more than choosing a president. It is an exercise in whether political actors will privilege process over short-term advantage and whether foreign partners will restrain their instincts to shape outcomes. If Somali elites cannot settle on ground rules, and if external powers fill the vacuum with leverage, the vote could entrench division rather than renew legitimacy.
There is still time to pull back from that edge. A credible, inclusive agreement would not only safeguard the ballot but also signal that Somalia’s sovereignty is not up for transactional bidding in the Red Sea–Horn marketplace. The alternative — a proxy election that determines authority by alignment rather than consent — would be a dangerous step toward national unravelling just when the country can least afford it.
By Ali Musa
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.
