After a Malaysian journalist was shot to death while on a mission trip in Mogadishu Friday, the Prime Minister urges the public not to point fingers. “Let’s not play this blame game,” Malaysia Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak (Najib) said Sunday, in a media conference at the Royal Mayasian Air Force base in Subang. “The most important thing for us is to take stock of what has happened.”

The deceased journalist, Noramfaizul Mohd Noor, 39, worked as a cameraman for the Malaysian National News Agency, Bernama. He had a wife and two children. Najib spent time consoling Noramfaizul’s family.  According to Bernama, Noramfaizul “was shot while travelling in a four-wheel-drive vehicle with other Malaysian media personnel covering the humanitarian aid mission to Somalia by the Putera 1Malaysia Club.”

Officials said that a clash between the African Union (AU) troops and other gunmen resulted in Noramfaizul’s death. Another reporter was severely wounded. A security official told the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) that initial reports indicate that AU peacekeepers were responsible for opening fire on the cameraman’s vehicle. Further investigation of the incident is being conducted.

Adbukarim Ali, a security official with the AU-backed government army, reported to Agence France-Presse (AFP) that the shooting occurred at a busy area, which was Kilometer Four, in Mogadishu. “The men were hit by bullets when they were in their car, as they apparently were returning to their hotel,” said Ali.

In an article by Reuters, Muhideen Mohamed, a volunteer with the Malaysians described the deadly scene.“Two bullets hit the journalist, one in the head and another on the shoulder. He died on the spot,” Mohamed said. Mohamed also reported that the second reporter suffered a bullet wound to the arm.

All 54 members of the Putera 1Malaysia Club mission flew back to Subang on board the aircraft carrying the remains of Noramfaizul, reported Bernama. “There’s a limit to what you can prepare for any eventuality,” Najib said. “Isyallah (God willing), we’ll try our level best in the future to prevent such a thing from happening again.” Najib also said, “this deadly shooting is part and parcel of journalism.”

According to the BBC, as the Somalia’s food crisis has intensified. There has been an increase in the number of foreign aid workers and journalists traveling to region to help.

In July, The Washington Post reported that the famine in parts of southern Somalia had already killed tens of thousands of people, mostly children. Humanitarian aid officials described the situation as the “worst humanitarian crisis in the troubled country in two decades.”

On August 30, an article in Bernama said that a group representing the Putera 1Malaysia Club, which included Noramfaizul, had arrived in Mogadishu.Atuk Abdul Azeez Abdul Rahim, mission chief and club president, said that their humanitarian work would focus on five areas in Somalia; Magadishu being the first stop.

The mission aimed to distribute 250 tones of food and provide medicine to approximetly 45,000 families.The report by Bernama concluded with the statement that, “Bernama TV reporter Khairulanuar Yahaya and cameraman Noramfaizul Mohd Noor are among the media crew taking part in the mission.”

The BCC said that the crisis in Somalia was “severely aggravated by civil strife.” According to AFP, “Clashes between rival militia groups happen regularly in Mogadishu, a city that has been battered by a bloody insurgency as Al-Qaeda-affiliated Shebab rebels fight to unseat the Western-backed government.”

Such tumultuous conditions make humanitarian aid missions, like the work of Putera 1Malaysia Club, particularly dangerous. Noramfaizul is not the first individual to be killed while trying to better humanity in Africa.

Media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) rank Somalia as the deadliest country in Africa for media personnel, with 23 media workers killed since 2007.

Image Courtesy of  http://www.flickr.com/photos/oxfameastafrica/

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United Nations has declared a famine in two areas of southern Somalia as the region suffers the worst drought in more than 50 years. So far an estimated 10 million people have been affected by the drought in Somalia.

Millions of people are at the brink of death and despair due to widespread starvation and malnutrition. More than 166,000 desperate Somalis have fled their country to neighboring Ethiopia and Kenya. Many of those who are fleeing the country are using their very little money to pay for buses but most of them are forced to walk hundreds of miles in search for food, shelter and peace.

The problem became more severe with the fact that Al-shabab, an Al Qaeda affiliated group, imposed a ban on foreign food supplies and other essential commodities for life.

Mark Bowden, the United Nations humanitarian coordinator for Somalia said that “if we don’t act now, famine will spread to all eight regions of southern Somalia”. He further elaborated on the situation in Somalia that ‘Every day of delay in assistance is literally a matter of life and death’

A famine in any region is declared only when acute malnutrition rate among children exceed 30 percent and 2 people die because of inaccessibility to food and water.

The Al-shabaab group banned a number of international aid agencies from operating and extending the basic assistance provided by them. In 2009 they also restricted UN World Food Programme on the basis of allegation of distorting local economy and of being anti-Muslim.

Johnnie Carson, the assistant secretary for African affairs at the state department said: “The issue and the problem is Al Shabaab”. According to UN Refugee agency, every day ten children under the age of five die from chronic hunger and hunger related causes in a refugee camp in Ethiopia.

UNHCR Report further provide details into what has been the major cause of very high mortality rate, the report said that main cause was malnutrition and outbreak of measles in the region.

At the Scene
Mohamed Mwaliu, told the BBC news, “I met a woman, Amina – who came from central Somalia, somehow she was able to get a lift in the lorry but most heartening part of her journey was that she walked 50 KM carrying her one and half year old son on her back, only to realize, when she arrived that he is dead.

Furthermore, Mwaliu says people are in such dire and disgraceful conditions that they are ready to walk miles on order to reach camps set for draught victims.

In another story, Mwaliu said he met a woman called Habiba from a village near Buurhakaba city in south-west Somalia who reached the capital, around 125 miles by foot. Another woman told the BBC that she left her sick child on the road since he was too weak to make up the journey to Kenya.

The Aid and Beyond
Recently 31 ton of UNHCR consignment including plastic sheeting for shelters, blankets and sleeping mats arrived in Mogadishu airport. Despite millions of dollars being spent in aid in Somalia it is yet a distant dream to reduce hardships of the people soon.

It is only because of food shortage, absence of rains, corruption and conflict; people of Somalia are living the worst nightmare anybody can go through.

The extent of human suffering is far beyond human capabilities of tolerance and patience. The hope is for rain in October to wash all maladies of the people of Somalia and let them live a stable and prosperous life.

Image Courtesy of By SSGT CHARLES REGER [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

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