Puntland’s Political Amnesia: Stop Acting Like the Third Republic Hasn’t Collapsed
For years, Puntland’s political establishment maintained what amounted to a nuclear option: if Mogadishu violated the constitutional arrangement agreed upon in 2012, Puntland would walk away.
Editorial illustration: The Collapse of the Third Republic. Image supplied by Puntland Signal
The warning was simple. There was a red line. Cross it, and Puntland would no longer be bound by an agreement that the other side had abandoned.
The problem is that the people who built that red line are no longer necessarily the people sitting behind the trigger.
For the past 12 years, Puntland has developed a political school of thought obsessed with returning to Mogadishu, negotiating with Mogadishu and gradually transferring pieces of Puntland’s autonomy back toward the center.
It was sold as compromise. It was described as federalism. At times, it appeared under the fashionable language of “double-track” governance.
But there is an old political lesson that Puntland appears to have forgotten: when you give a centralized power an inch, it will eventually demand a mile.
For twelve years, Puntland has conceded inches while Mogadishu has demanded miles.
Now the bill has come due.
The fundamental question facing Puntland in 2026 is not whether another round of meetings can produce another communiqué. It is whether the constitutional framework Puntland agreed to still exists in any meaningful form.
If Mogadishu has unilaterally abandoned the rules that were supposed to govern the federation, then Puntland cannot spend another decade negotiating over the corpse of the same political arrangement.
You cannot simultaneously declare that the constitutional red lines have been crossed and behave as though nothing has happened.
That is political amnesia.
And it is precisely where Puntland’s current strategy needs to change.
The argument is not that Puntland suddenly “left” an agreement. The argument is that if the agreement has been fundamentally abandoned by Mogadishu, Puntland is entitled to reassess its own position.
That would mean returning to the political logic of 1998: Puntland governing itself, protecting its territory and dealing with Mogadishu only where its interests require it.
From there, the future should be determined by realities rather than nostalgia.
If Mogadishu continues down the path of centralized one-man rule, Puntland could increasingly be pushed toward a much more independent political posture. If, instead, there is a genuine attempt to preserve a common Somali political framework, then the discussion should be about a radically different model: two systems, one country, with power actually distributed rather than endlessly promised.
That would require more than speeches.
It would require constitutional safeguards that make unilateral action impossible.
Consider natural resources.
If Mogadishu wants to negotiate an arrangement concerning resources located entirely within territories under its administration, Puntland does not need to dictate what Mogadishu does with its own backyard.
Likewise, Puntland should be able to negotiate agreements concerning resources within Puntland without Mogadishu claiming ownership over them.
But agreements that genuinely affect multiple jurisdictions, shared commerce, common infrastructure, territorial interests or national obligations should require the consent of all affected governments and legislatures.
That is what meaningful federalism looks like.
It also creates an important firewall against foreign influence.
If an outside power wants to negotiate with one government, it should not be able to obtain an agreement affecting everyone simply by cultivating one political leader, one minister or one parliament.
Power should be distributed widely enough that no foreign government, wealthy businessman or aspiring strongman can simply purchase access to the entire political system through one capital.
That is not an argument for corruption. It is the opposite.
It is an argument for institutionalizing checks and balances so that corruption at the center cannot become corruption everywhere.
Puntland has demonstrated that it can defend its interests.
It has fought terrorist organizations. It has confronted armed threats. It has resisted political encroachment. It has maintained institutions of its own for decades.
But military resistance is only one part of political survival.
The greater challenge is intellectual.
Puntland needs to stop behaving as though another twelve years of negotiations will somehow produce a different Mogadishu.
The same political establishment cannot repeatedly move the goalposts and then demand that everyone else continue playing by yesterday’s rules.
And the intellectual argument coming from Mogadishu is becoming increasingly difficult to take seriously when comparisons are selectively applied.
When Puntland or other regions point to federal systems such as the United States or Canada, the response is often that “we are not Americans” or “we are not Canadians.”
Fine.
But then stop borrowing the language of federalism when it is convenient and rejecting its underlying principles when they become inconvenient.
A federation cannot mean that the center gets all the powers while the regions are expected to provide the political legitimacy.
That is not federalism.
That is centralization wearing a federal costume.
Puntland’s government therefore faces a choice.
It can continue acting as though the old political order is still intact, repeatedly returning to Mogadishu to renegotiate the same unresolved questions over elections, constitutional authority, resources and shared governance.
Or it can recognize that the political landscape has changed and begin operating accordingly.
The latter does not necessarily mean immediate independence.
It means preparing for political reality.
Puntland should protect its territory, strengthen its institutions, control matters falling within its jurisdiction and require legislative consent for agreements that affect its interests.
Most importantly, Puntland should stop treating the preservation of a broken political arrangement as an end in itself.
The third republic, as Puntland understood it, was built around an agreed constitutional framework.
If that framework has collapsed, then Puntland must stop acting like it has merely suffered a temporary disagreement with Mogadishu.
The question is no longer how Puntland can rescue the old arrangement.
The question is what political arrangement comes next.
Puntland does not need to burn the bridge today. But it should stop pretending that the other side has not already set fire to it.
Puntland should adopt a clear foreign policy doctrine that protects its interests, strengthens stability, and preserves independent decision-making, according to a policy paper published by the Puntland Strategic and Policy Institute (PSPI).
The political narrative surrounding our region suffers from a double standard that is hard to ignore. When foreign capitals openly chase strategic ambitions in the Horn of Africa, it is accepted as normal statecraft. But the moment Puntland moves to secure its own borders, economy, and future, external forces treat it as a political crisis. Every functional government on earth looks after its own people first. Puntland is an independent reality, and it is time the outside world started treating it as one.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has presented a regional security map identifying Puntland among territories considered friendly to Israel and the United Arab Emirates. The presentation highlights Puntland’s strategic importance in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, but it also raises questions about why parts of Sanaag administered by Puntland are depicted within Somaliland’s boundaries.
