Successes, Failures and Politicization of Aid in Somalia 1991-2012 Dissertation

Successes, Failures and Politicization of Aid in Somalia 1991-2012 - Dissertation Example Due to the politics involved, the response to the needs of the people was very much delayed. Limited public interest in the crisis also led to issues in the distribution of aid. There has been much politicking in the UN agencies on the distribution of aid in Somalia (Hilhorst and Jansen, 2010). The UN processes were also ineffective as they were more process focused, not results focused. The strong competition with the NGOs also made things complicated. Risk adversity also became the principle of the humanitarian agencies. A contributing issue is accountability, where donors held the organizations responsible for what they did, and not carrying out sufficient crisis response measures for this issue (Warsame, 2012). The intense media scrutiny also presented problems and the aid agencies were delayed in their aid. Institutional interests were also given more importance than beneficiaries. The release of aid is still an industry; as proof small organizations which used to engage in aid are not multinational organizations with vast influence and budgets (Wiles, et.al., 2004). Through such changes, the need to protect the reputation of the company seems to take more importance. With the professionalization of the aid industry, the people manning such activities have also become professionalized. Careers have now been borne from such industry and the hiring of experienced personnel has become more important (Wiles, et.al., 2004). In some instances, lack of accountability was observed. With the gaps in the integrity of the system, the lack of soul-searching in the humanitarian community following the Somalia famine was unexpected. This may have been credited to the shortcomings in the system, alongside limited public and media interests which allowed the humanitarian community to persist with limited considerations made on their impact on Somalia (Wiles, et.al., 2004). A semblance of success in securing humanitarian aid in Somalia can be attributed to support gained f rom the civil society. However, even as civil society has a significant role to play in supporting unarmed civilians, civil society often suffers from limited support (IRIN News, 2009). In a 2009 appeal made by concerned civilian agencies seeking humanitarian aid in Somalia, their appeal amounted to $919 million, indicating increasing needs with allocations also requested for air transportation. The limits of the aid are based on the capacity and resources of the international community and there is a need to secure a partnership to fill in the gaps (IRIN News, 2009). The civil society has already paid significantly for their assistance to the poor. Access to south-central Somalia where the humanitarian needs are significant, much conflict has been seen especially with the abduction of aid workers (IRIN News, 2009). The security situation has not improved much for aid workers in the country. Two major NGOs have temporarily suspended their operations in the country and aid agencies h ave also been conflicted with the problem of piracy (IRIN News, 2009). Most times, humanitarian access has become unpredictable, and despite such issue, successful aid groups have still responded to the crisis. These agencies have understood that their responsibility to