http://www.internationalrelations.house ... 070711.pdf
United States House of Representatives
Committee on Foreign Affairs
Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights
Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation, and Trade
As to recently ousted Prime Minister Farmajo, the spin put out by the public relations firms he
hired with international donor assistance notwithstanding, he was no reformer. When political
commentators said he came with “no political baggage,” it was a polite way of saying that he
had no experience of Somali politics on the ground—he had not been in the country for a
quarter of a century at the time of his appointment—and no base from which to lead. That is
not to say that he did not learn quickly from his colleagues in the TFG. He held the post less
than a year, but the auditors could not account for $648,000 from the salary account of the
Office of the Prime Minister. He also awarded his old boss, a former county executive from
upstate New York with no evident foreign policy credentials, to lobby the U.S. State
Department on his behalf. Given that Farmajo is a U.S. citizen and at least some of the
“missing” or otherwise misspent funds undoubtedly derive from assistance funded by American
taxpayers, perhaps the Department of Justice could be encouraged by the Subcommittees to
take a closer look into the matter and determine whether any laws have been broken and, if so,
what civil remedies might be sought or criminal prosecutions possibly brought.
