Somalia faces long and turbulent election season

Significance

However, like the Senate elections, the process has gotten off to a staggered and chaotic start. Moreover, it threatens to be far more complicated and contentious.

Impacts

• International stakeholders might accept a sub-optimal election because of the attention Ethiopia and Sudan are currently demanding.
• Recent universal suffrage elections in Puntland may offer useful lessons to adapt such a model for the national stage.
• The control elites have over indirect polls will disincentivise moves to universal suffrage without more grassroots and external pressure.