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FM AMEMBASSY NAIROBI
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INFO RUCNSOM/SOMALIA COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
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RUEKDIA/DIA WASHDC PRIORITY
RUEAIIA/CIA WASHDC PRIORITY
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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 NAIROBI 002767 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
DEPT FOR AF/E AND A/S FRAZER 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PINR SOCI MOPS SO
SUBJECT: SOMALIA - BAIDOA STALEMATE CONTINUES 
 
REF: A. NAIROBI 2652 
     ¶B. NAIROBI 2681 
     ¶C. DJIBOUTI 991 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary:  A five-day face-off in Baidoa, the seat of 
the parliament, between Transitional Federal Government (TFG) 
President Abdullahi Yusuf and Prime Minister Nur Adde 
continued December 11 with the estranged leaders showing no 
willingness to compromise.  Yusuf and Nur Adde have 
reportedly met once since Nur Adde followed the President to 
Baidoa. At that December 7 meeting, Yusuf continued to insist 
that he would not accept Nur Adde's proposed cabinet (Ref A), 
and that the November 25 Djibouti communique (Ref B) was a 
non-starter.  (In a separate, December 9 meeting with the 
Ambassador, Puntland President Hersi backed co-clan member 
Yusuf in rejecting the communique's call for an expanded 
parliament.)  Nur Adde told us that he planned to remain in 
Baidoa until at least December 14, and that he hoped to 
engineer parliament's approval of his cabinet.  Yuuf, who 
canceled his planned participation in the December 10 - 11 
Nairobi piracy ministerial, seemed determined to wait by Nur 
Adde's side.  Both TFG leaders have been wooing the 
parliamentarians who have been trickling back to Baidoa. 
Speaker Sheikh Aden "Madobe," after initially siding with 
Yusuf over fears that he might lose his position if a new 
leadership was elected, has reportedly sided with Nur Adde 
after receiving assurances that fellow clan members were not 
gunning for his speaker's seat.  End summary. 
 
Yusuf Searches for a Strategy 
----------------------------- 
 
¶2. (SBU) After days of unhappiness following the signing of 
the November 25 Djibouti communique that called for the 
creation of a working group to explore doubling the size of 
the parliament, extending the transitional government's 
mandate by two years, and possibly electing new leadership, 
Transitional Federal Government (TFG) President Abdullahi 
Yusuf threw down the gauntlet by issuing on November 3 a 
press release that called, on behalf of Puntland, for a new 
reconciliation process.  Yusuf then traveled to Djibouti (Ref 
C), where he asked for, but did not receive, the support of 
President Guelleh.  On December 5, the President flew to the 
seat of the transitional parliament, Baidoa, and, according 
to TFG Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein "Nur Adde," "began 
bribing parliamentarians" with money he received from Libya. 
 
Nur Adde Presses Parliament 
--------------------------- 
 
¶3. (SBU) In a December 6 conversation, a composed Nur Adde 
told Embassy that Yusuf's presence in Baidoa would not stop 
him from flying there on December 7 in an effort to win 
parliament's approval of his transitional cabinet.  Nur Adde 
at that point was confident that parliament speaker Sheikh 
Aden "Madobe" would "back the Djibouti process," by which he 
meant the provisions of the November 25 Alliance for the 
Re-liberation of Somalia (ARS) - TFG communique that called 
for doubling the size of the parliament, extending the 
mandate of the transitional institutions by two years, and 
choosing a new leadership.  (In the days following the 
November 25 communique, Madobe had unexpectedly seemed to 
side with Yusuf.  Some observers suspected he was worried 
that he would not remain speaker if a new leadership was 
chosen.  Others thought that Yusuf could have been successful 
in bribing the Speaker.) 
 
Yusuf - Nur Adde Meet 
--------------------- 
 
¶4. (SBU) On December 7 in Baidoa, Yusuf and Nur Adde held 
their first face-to-face meeting since the Prime Minister 
traveled to London in an unsuccessful attempt to win approval 
of his cabinet on November 8.  Contacts in Yusuf and Nur 
Adde's camps confirmed that Yusuf remained unwilling to 
accept Nur Adde's nominees, and that Nur Adde refused to back 
down.  Since that meeting, the President and the Prime 
Minister have each had long meetings with larger groups of 
parliamentarians and, no doubt, many one-on-one sessions. 
The fact that Yusuf, Nur Adde, and Madobe separately 
celebrated Eid-ul-adha on December 8 was read by observers as 
further confirmation that there was little prospect for the 
 
NAIROBI 00002767  002 OF 002 
 
 
TFG. 
 
Parliament Tied to Djibouti Process 
----------------------------------- 
 
¶5. (SBU) In conversations over the last five days, members of 
parliament in Baidoa have told us that a majority of their 
colleagues support the November 25 communique, although there 
appears to be a consensus that an additional 275 MPs is too 
many, and an insistence that the 4.5 formula for clan 
representation be used in selecting new MPs.  (The ARS 
leadership has assured us privately, and ARS Chairman Sheikh 
Sharif has said publicly, that it would observe the 4.5 
formula.)  As one parliamentarian told the Embassy, "we 
understand that we will lose (our jobs) if the Djibouti 
process fails."  Those parliamentarians more closely aligned 
with Nur Adde were, as expected, extremely critical of 
Yusuf's behavior while in Baidoa: "He knows only one word: 
'no,'" one said.  Still, a vocal minority in Parliament worry 
that the understandings reached in the communique negotiated 
by Nur Adde and Sheikh Sharif amount to a sweeping victory 
for the Hawiye clan. 
 
Puntland President Explains Yusuf 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) In an extended, December 9 conversation, President 
Hersi of the semi-autonomous Puntland region offered 
Ambassador Ranneberger his best gloss on Yusuf's thinking. 
The TFG President was not opposed to Djibouti, Hersi 
insisted, but Yusuf knew "others" were using money to 
influence the Parliament, and that's why he was in Baidoa. 
The principle Nur Adde had used in selecting his cabinet was 
"loyalty, not competence," the composition of the TFG's 
High-Level Committee was "flawed," and the November 25 
communique was an "agreement between two people (Nur Adde and 
Sheikh Sharif), and both of them were of the same sub-clan." 
In opposing the communique, and Nur Adde's cabinet nominees, 
Hersi maintained that Yusuf was protecting the interests of 
Puntland. 
 
¶7. (SBU) Hersi then offered a more detailed critique of the 
communique.  He joined consensus among deputies in arguing 
that 275 is too many slots to add, and he worried that only 
members of the Hawiye clan would be appointed by the ARS. 
These and other "mistakes" could have been avoided, Hersi 
said, if the UN SRSG Ould-Abdallah had allowed Yusuf to fly 
to Djibouti. 
 
¶8. (SBU) Special Envoy for Somalia John Yates pointed out 
that the November 25 document was not an agreement, and that 
a joint working group was to use the communique in making its 
recommendations to the parliament within thirty days.  S/E 
Yates noted that the ARS had pledged to use the 4.5 formula 
in recommending members for parliament, and he pointedly 
noted that Nur Adde had made numerous efforts, all of them 
rejected, to reach out to Yusuf. 
¶9. (SBU) Ambassador Ranneberger urged Hersi to lobby Yusuf to 
cooperate in advancing the Djibouti process.  "It is 
important for the TFG to unite, and work with the ARS," he 
said, or al-Shabaab will continue to gain ground in Somalia. 
He also reassured Hersi that the principle of federalism was 
enshrined in the Transitional Federal Charter, and had not 
been at issue in the discussions about the Djibouti process. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶10. (SBU) It appears that neither the TFG President nor Prime 
Minister has been able to win a clear advantage in Baidoa, 
although Nur Adde told us recently that he is still hopeful 
that parliament will approve his cabinet by December 14. 
Even if it approves the cabinet, it is uncertain what that 
might mean for the recommendations coming out of the Djibouti 
process.  With Yusuf giving every sign that he intends to 
resist a unity government and playing the clan card to 
prevent perceived gains in the TFG, it appears that he is 
stymieing progress on the Djibouti Agreement at every turn. 
RANNEBERGER