With a presidential election delayed for months and deadly clashes between security forces and clan militias, Somaliland’s reputation for stability lies in ruins. Violence erupted in the breakaway northern Somalia region a few weeks after elections were postponed late last year. President Muse Bihi Abdi, in power since November 2017, has been accused of sidelining some clans which have in turn demanded separation and direct administration from Mogadishu. Mohamed Haji Ingiriis, a Somali scholar who specialises in the Somali state and society, examines Somaliland’s rapid slide to instability.
