Somalia Faces Choice Between Institutions and Political Elites

By Abdirahim Husu MohamedSunday June 7, 2026

History offers a blunt warning: societies rarely dread order; they dread disruption. Yet time and again, nations that have managed to remake themselves have done so by moving through uncertainty on the way to lasting stability and growth.

From the Industrial Revolution to the shift from monarchy to democracy, from the end of apartheid to sweeping economic reform, change has almost always arrived with unease. It unsettles people. It invites resistance. It can sharpen political tensions as citizens fear losing power, opportunity or the familiar ground beneath them.

Somalia is no exception.

Much of today’s political debate centers on elections, constitutional amendments, power-sharing formulas and the balance between government and opposition. Those are real issues, and they matter. But beneath the headlines sits a more fundamental question: what kind of state is Somalia trying to become?

For more than 20 years, Somalia’s political order has largely rested on negotiations among elites, stakeholder bargains and temporary settlements. That model helped pull the country out of collapse and gave it a way to rebuild institutions. For its time, it was essential.

Without those compromises, Somalia may never have reached the level of stability and state-building it enjoys today. They created the opening for institutions to return, public services to expand gradually and international partners to back recovery efforts.

But many now argue that Somalia cannot live in perpetual transition.

In their view, the country must steadily move toward stronger institutions, clearer constitutional arrangements, more predictable governance and a political culture that depends less on personal negotiations and more on rules that are known, accepted and enforced.

That kind of shift is never simple.

When any country reorders how power is distributed, disagreement follows. Some will say reform is moving too fast. Others will insist it is crawling forward. Some will warn of excessive centralization, while others will fear political deadlock and paralysis.

Those reactions are not unusual.

History makes clear that transformation rarely feels comfortable. In nearly every country that has undergone meaningful political, economic or institutional change, those who benefited from the old order have resisted, while others have struggled to understand the new one.

For Somalia, then, the question is not whether change should come.

Change is already under way.

In recent years, the country has seen a series of reforms and national initiatives designed to strengthen state institutions. These include debt relief efforts, measures to broaden domestic revenue collection, continuing constitutional talks, voter registration drives and the implementation of the National Transformation Plan. The pace and direction of these efforts remain contested, but together they reflect a wider national debate over how Somalia should be governed and what role institutions should play in shaping its future.

The harder task is managing that change in a way that builds trust, safeguards national unity, widens political inclusion and creates institutions capable of serving generations yet to come.

That burden does not rest with the current government alone. It also falls on the more than 70 percent of Somalis who are under the age of 35. It falls on political leaders across the spectrum, on civil society, on the private sector, on traditional elders and on every stakeholder committed to a peaceful, prosperous and developed Somalia.

The old guard must be ready to adjust to new realities.

The new generation must be willing to learn from the past.

Both sides must recognize that leadership today is about more than political survival. It is about building institutions that endure beyond individual careers.

No country develops because of strong personalities alone.

Nations advance when institutions become stronger than the people who temporarily occupy them.

They move forward when citizens trust systems more than individuals, when laws carry more weight than personal ties and when public office serves the national interest rather than narrow political advantage.

That kind of progress demands sacrifice.

It demands patience.

It demands compromise.

Above all, it demands a different way of thinking about leadership and governance.

So the central question for Somalia is not simply who wins the next election.

The deeper question is whether Somalia will continue relying mainly on political elites and negotiated settlements, or whether it will succeed in building institutions that serve every citizen, regardless of who holds office.

History may well judge this moment not by the disputes of the day, but by whether Somalia managed to shift from a system dependent on individuals to one anchored in institutions.

Somalia’s future will be shaped not by the strength of any one politician, but by the strength of the institutions they leave behind.

Abdirahim Husu Mohamed

Senior Advisor to the Minister of Planning, Investment and Economic Development. The views expressed are solely his own.

The views expressed in this article are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect Hiiraan Online’s editorial stance.