Current Projects

» Dialogue for Peace
» Democratisation Programme
» Non-State Actors Project
» Peace Mapping Project
» Land Conflicts Project

» Completed Projects

Dialogue for Peace

The Dialogue for Peace is a program funded by Interpeace (WSP) and implemented by the Academy For Peace and Development. As part of the Dialogue for Peace, the Academy conducts an extensive process of public consultation on issues essential to peace building and state reconstruction. This involves meetings across Somaliland that bring local communities, civil society representatives and political leaders together to identify and agree on key issues and methods of addressing them in order to build a sustainable, peaceful society. The process maintains regular linkage with members of the international community, and engages Somali Diasporas in the dialogue as well. Where local consultations result in the willingness of local communities and political actors to directly work towards reconciliation, the Academy with the support of Interpeace facilitates such efforts that help underpin the efforts to achieve a sustainable peace.

The Academy has just finished the first phase of the program during which it has worked on three entry points, namely:

• Elections
• Decentralization
• Resource-based Conflicts

In all of these entry points, dialogue sessions have been undertaken, and research papers and documentary films have been prepared. As soon as the current phase is concluded, a second phase of the program will be launched in the course of a National Project Group Meeting that will define new entry points for the coming years.

Objectives of the Dialogue for Peace:

• To facilitate genuine dialogue through established neutral spaces,
• To ensure strategic engagement throughout the dialogue process,
• To transfer peace-building capacity to civil society and community leaders,
• To support, in a catalyst role, material contributions to peace-building and state building.

Key activities carried out in this program include:

• Peace process mapping,
• Civil society peace-building support,
• Action-oriented state and peace-building initiatives,
• Conflict prevention and reconciliation facilitation,
• And on-going dissemination.

(as of March 2005)

The democratization process in Somaliland continues to move forward showing signs of strength and stability. The people of Somaliland have, in the span of four months managed to successfully implement two back-to-back free and fair elections (the Local Council Elections in December 2002 and the Presidential elections in April 2003). The National Electoral Commission (NEC) of Somaliland, in conjunction with roles played by the civil society, the media, security, the political parties, the international community, and especially the people of Somaliland has during these two elections gained important experience and is now in a strategic position to solidly ground the democratization process in Somaliland through the up-coming parliamentary elections (anticipated in August 2005).

The success of this upcoming election will be an important milestone in the Somaliland's march towards the creation of a democratic society. It will also demonstrate the deep commitment to change. While these elections are very important to the people of Somaliland, the elections will also demonstrate to the larger Somali region, the path that can be taken to democracy. The parliamentary elections of Somaliland can act as a launching pad for a much greater democratization process which will include parliamentary training, strategic planning in further establishing and strengthening the democratic process throughout all Somali regions, and the development of a second phase of the democratization process for the Somali people.
The transition from acute conflict to peace in the wider Somali region and the recovery process through political and social reconciliation will require further efforts from all those who are involved. Patience and sustained commitment is needed to build on the cross-cutting achievements of the process through trust building, dialogue on the substantive issues and constitutional and institution building by all the local stakeholders and the international/regional community, respectively. Somaliland has achieved a political, institutional and constitutional framework that sets a precedent for the wider Somali region.

The project has four main components:

1. To prepare for, conduct and formally assess (post-election) the parliamentary elections in Somaliland. This electoral process is intended to build off of the investment that the key stakeholders of the Somaliland electoral process have put in place in previous elections as well as provide an example for the broader region as it also moves towards democracy. It will also be used as a training and exposure for the other Somali regions.
   
2. To instill basic capacity in the newly elected Somaliland parliament with the opportunity to develop further capacity through strengthened linkages with other on-going processes, establishment of external networks and access to parliamentary training institutions.
   
3. To review and provide recommendations for the legal strength of existing electoral and constitutional laws with respect to the democratization process.
   
4. To develop a strategic plan for the next phase of the democratization process in Somaliland. The strategic plan will be incorporated into a project proposal that covers the democratization process over a two year period to follow immediately upon completion of this phase. This strategy preparation is designed to also support the creation/development of electoral bodies, as necessary, to play a key role in Phase Two.

NSA project seeks to contribute to peace, democracy and poverty reduction in Somaliland by supporting NSAs to become more effective, legitimate and representative interlocutors who can engage with administrations, international agencies and donors, including the EC. It further aims to safeguard and expand the space available for civil society in Somaliland.

The project will establish mechanisms for coordination and consultation with range of NSAs at local and regional levels; it will assist NSAs to become more effective agents for change by enhancing their capacity to engage in policy formulation and influence activities; it will work to establish and support an NSA forum which can effectively facilitate dialogue, coordinate NSA advocacy activities, and engage in the development of country assistance strategies.

Objectives

The overall objective of the project is to enable civil society actors to engage more effectively with decision makers in government structures and with donors in support of poverty reduction, democracy and peace building. It aims to safeguard and expand the space available to civil society and to ensure accepted governance structures and procedures are put in place which increases the credibility and accountability of NSAs. The project will establish strategic links with an extensive range of civic and government institutions in support of objectives within the Cotonou Agreement.

Specifically the project will:

• Contribute to the effectiveness of NSAs in policy development and influence though supporting the establishment and activities of a democratic and legitimate NSA forum.
  
• Support dialogue, learning and information sharing, through the NSA Forum, between a broad range of NSAs, administrations, and the international community on key issues pertaining to peace democracy and poverty reduction.
  
• Facilitate mechanisms by which the NSA forum can establish democratic, transparent accountable governance structures and procedures which are based on principles of best practice and which guarantee the rights of women and promote diversity.
  
• Enhance the capacity of NSAs to play a lead role in the development of country assistance strategies with the EC and government authorities in the framework of the Cotonou Agreement.
  
• Contribute to a regulatory framework for the fair and effective participation of NSAs which safeguards the space available for civil society.
  
• Promote opportunities, within international donors frameworks, for consultation with NSA.
  
• Ensure that human security priorities, conflict prevention objectives and conflict sensitive analysis is reflected in the policies and practices of government administrations and international donors.
  

In January 2007, the Academy for Peace and Development, INTERPEACE and their partner organizations started a Peace Mapping Project as part of Phase II of the Dialogue for Peace Programme. The Peace Mapping Project aims to improve understanding of peace initiatives and reconciliation processes that have taken place between 1991 and 1997 in Somaliland. Documenting and analyzing key reconciliation initiatives, observations will be synthesized on particular challenges and factors that have influenced the success of reconciliation processes. This opens the possibility to draw broader lessons from this study which may be replicated elsewhere. During the preparatory phase of this project, the Academy established a research team and drew up a preliminary inventory of peace initiatives in Somaliland. The research team, from April 24-27, 2007 participated in a planning workshop in Kigali, Rwanda. The participants of the workshop reviewed the preliminary work undertaken and developed a work plan for the study. As the peace mapping research is based on Participatory Action Research (PAR) - a methodology generally employed by INTERPEACE and its affiliates - a working group was formed to lead and direct the overall activities.

Natural resource-based conflicts exist in almost every part of Somaliland, albeit at different scale and magnitude. Years of war with often several stages of population movement have blurred de jure and de facto property and access rights to land. In the almost complete absence of documentation (e.g. cadastral data) and regulatory authority, conflicts arise over sales, land encroachment and grabbing, etc. Disagreements over communal land use and access rights to common and public land also lead to occasional violence, e.g. between farmers and agro-pastorals. Nationalization and later re-privatisation of communal land (e.g. in Awdal), as well as range enclosures (in Togdheer) are among the key challenges in pastoral areas. Inter-communal tensions and minor clashes persist in former frontline areas (such as Gabiley/Awdal and in Eastern Sanaag). Where conflicts surface near administrative boundaries, they carry the additional risk of broader politicisation (e.g. in disputes over electoral boundaries).

Although Somaliland has made remarkable progress since the collapse of the Somali state, local institutions of conflict resolution (formal and informal) often remain fragile and unconsolidated. Conflicts that arise at the local level are managed by sets of sometimes complementary, sometimes competing formal institutions (government institutions, etc.), councils of traditional elders, religious authorities, civil society, etc. The capacity of these bodies to manage and resolve disputes differs widely, often lacking proactive initiative, shared analysis, sustainability, cohesion, creativity, and clear institutional relationships. In some areas, failure to conclude the settlement of such local conflicts also undermines the consolidation of collective governance institutions.

Management and resolution of land-related conflicts is complicated by the legal and institutional pluralism mentioned above. Land ownership and access is regulated by three different, sometimes competing, legal principles: Local customary law, universal religious law and universal state law. Despite the state’s claim to superiority, its actual capacity to regulate these tensions is effectively restrained by a varying mix of weak rule of law, little enforcement capacity, and weak structures in rural areas. Among the institutions associated with the different legal codes, traditional councils of elders by and large remain the most influential and effective bodies to address the problem. However, apart from other challenges, customary law is unstable and unreliable especially in fragmented local settings and when conflicts involve groups that lack strong and commonly shared traditions and institutions.

The project forms part of a wider programme in collaboration with the » Institute for Development and Peace (INEF), University of Duisburg-Essen. A parallel project within the programme exists in Afghanistan, in partnership with the » Tribal Liaison Office (TLO). The programme aims to strengthen local dialogue NGOs to enhance conflict resolution mechanisms in the course of integrated capacity building, dialogue, and action research processes, promoting awareness, analysis and good practices relating to land conflicts.

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