African leaders set to discuss security in Somalia

With only nine months left before the mandate of their government expires, transitional government leaders attending the Nairobi meeting are expecting to be audited by the very neighbors that helped create it in 2004.

Somalia's government was created at an earlier IGAD conference in 2004 and at the opening of the conference on Tuesday, many of the group's members expressed frustration with the successes of the Somali government so far.

Speaking during the opening of the foreign ministers meeting on Tuesday, Moses Wetang'ula of Kenya criticized infighting within the government, and its inability to create effective government institutions and a new constitution.

"Little has been accomplished in last four years," said Wetangula, referring to the charter that expires in September next year.

The minister called on the United Nations to takeover Africa Union forces in Somalia as the Africa's body lacked funds to sustain the mission. He said Kenya wanted a peaceful, stable and prosperous Somalia that it can do business with.

"Time is now for all of us to realize we don't have more time to discuss Somalia crisis in capital cities. We should pick new momentum. Somalis have suffered for too long - 18 years," Wetangula said.

Ethiopian Foreign Minister Seyoum Mesfin, who chairs IGAD's Council of Ministers, expressed similar concerns.

"Somalia's problems are not security but political. Ten months prior to the end of the transition period, the TFG has not managed to create any institutions of governance to speak of," said Mesfin.

"We decided to talk with the TFG leaders and the transitional federal parliamentarians in a frank manner and with the intention of making our alarm at the lack of progress in institution building and at the continuing feud within the leadership which in our view had contributed to the paralysis of the TFIs."