By Avv. Omar Khalif Abdi - licensed lawyer, policy strategist
“Political administrations come and go, but judicial institutions must endure, protected by constitutional legitimacy, independence, continuity and the rule of law.” Avv. Omar Khalif Abdi
Introduction
The establishment of the Supreme Judicial Council should be welcomed if it strengthens the independence, professionalism, accountability, and public credibility of Somalia’s judiciary.
The 2026 Constitution provides a stronger constitutional foundation for judicial independence by recognizing the judiciary’s administrative and financial independence and establishing both the Supreme Judicial Council and the Judicial Fund.
Yet there is a difficult question that cannot be avoided: why has the institutional history of Somalia’s judicial councils been marked by repeated establishment, political controversy, and dissolution? The predecessor of the Supreme Judicial Council, the Judicial Service Council, has passed through more than a decade of constitutional and political developments.
The Council was conceived under the 2012 constitutional framework, given a statutory foundation through Law No. 28 of 2014, and subsequently became the subject of contested appointments and institutional disputes.
The issue, therefore, is not simply whether Somalia needs a Supreme Judicial Council. It clearly does. The deeper question is whether the institution can be established in a manner that is constitutionally complete, legally defensible, politically independent, and durable beyond the government that establishes it.
From the 2012 Constitution to the 2014 Law#
The constitutional foundation for judicial governance was established under the 2012 Provisional Constitution, particularly Article 109A.
The objective was to create an institutional mechanism capable of supporting judicial independence and managing important affairs of the judiciary. The 2013 national judicial conference in Mogadishu reinforced the need to move judicial reform from political commitments toward functioning institutions.
The next major step came with Law No. 28 of 8 July 2014, the Law Establishing the Judicial Service Council. The law established a statutory framework covering the Council’s membership, functions, judicial appointments, disciplinary matters, budgeting, reporting, and institutional relations.
Yet the existence of legislation did not eliminate the political and constitutional difficulties surrounding the Council.
The Cycle of Establishment and Dissolution#
The institutional history becomes more complicated when the subsequent dissolutions are considered. On 11 March 2015, President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud issued Presidential Decree No. 08 dissolving the Judicial Service Council on the stated basis that its establishment was inconsistent with the 2012 Provisional Constitution and the 2014 establishing law.
The Council returned to the political agenda in 2020 and 2021, when new appointments generated further disputes concerning constitutional procedure, the authority of a caretaker government, and the role of the two Houses of Parliament.
Then, on 9 October 2022, President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud again cancelled the instruments through which the earlier Judicial Service Council and Anti-Corruption Commission had been activated and directed that the establishment process be corrected in accordance with the Constitution and applicable law.
This repeated cycle should concern every Somali who believes in institutional government: establishment, political dispute, constitutional challenge, dissolution, and re-establishment. The danger is that judicial institutions become associated with the political administration that appoints them rather than with the Constitution that creates them.
The 2026 Supreme Judicial Council#
The 2026 Constitution introduces a new institutional model. Article 144 establishes the Supreme Judicial Council to safeguard judicial independence and expressly provides for administrative and financial independence. Article 145 sets out the Council’s membership, including the President of the Supreme Court, the President of the Constitutional Court, the Attorney General, presidents of higher courts of the federal member states and the Benadir Region administration, the Chairperson of the Independent Human Rights Commission, senior lawyers from Bar Association Somalia, and legal experts with more than ten years appointed from Ministry of Justice.
The leadership structure is particularly significant. The President of the Federal Supreme Court serves as Chairperson, while the President of the Constitutional Court serves as Deputy Chairperson. Where the Deputy Chairperson is absent, the Attorney General performs that function. This creates an important constitutional question because the Constitutional Court has not yet been fully constituted.
The Constitutional Court Gap#
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The central question is not simply whether one member of the Supreme Judicial Council is missing. The deeper issue is that the constitutional office of the President of the Constitutional Court is expressly incorporated into the leadership structure of the Council. In my view, this creates a serious constitutional institutional gap that should be addressed openly.
However, it would be legally excessive to conclude automatically that every decision of the Supreme Judicial Council is invalid because of this gap. Article 149 establishes rules concerning meetings, quorum, and decision-making. Therefore, the absence of one member does not necessarily invalidate every decision where the required constitutional conditions are otherwise satisfied.
The more difficult question is whether the Council can be considered fully constituted when an office expressly identified in Article 145 remains institutionally unfilled. There is an important difference between the temporary absence of a Deputy Chairperson and the non-existence of the institution from which that Deputy Chairperson must come. An authoritative constitutional interpretation would therefore be preferable to an informal administrative assumption.
Is the Timing Politically Significant?#
This is where the title of this article becomes important. The question is not whether establishing a Supreme Judicial Council is politically motivated simply because it occurs during a particular administration. Governments inevitably implement constitutional institutions during their terms.
The real question is whether the timing, appointment process, and institutional design provide sufficient safeguards to ensure that the Council will survive political transition. Somalia has already experienced repeated institutional resets. If a new government can simply replace or dissolve the Council because it was established by its predecessor, then the Council cannot develop the institutional continuity required for genuine judicial independence. A constitutional institution must belong to the state, not to the administration of the day.
What Somalia Should Do Now#
Somalia should take three practical steps.
First, the Constitutional Court should be established and operationalized. This would remove a significant institutional gap and complete an important part of the constitutional architecture.
Second, an authoritative constitutional interpretation should address the position of the Constitutional Court within the Supreme Judicial Council. If the Council must operate before the Constitutional Court is constituted, the legal basis and limits of that interim arrangement should be clearly established.
Third, most importantly, the Council must be protected from the political cycles that have previously destabilized judicial institutions. Its legitimacy must come from the Constitution and law not from the political circumstances of the government that appoints its members.
Conclusion#
Somalia’s journey from the Judicial Service Council to the Supreme Judicial Council reflects a long struggle to translate constitutional principles into durable state institutions.
The judiciary, as the third branch of government, is not an extension of the executive, nor should its institutions be treated as political agendas that change with every administration. Since 2012, Somalia has experienced legislation, institutional experiments, contested appointments, and repeated dissolutions in 2015 and 2022.
The 2026 reform therefore presents both an opportunity and a serious constitutional test. The Supreme Judicial Council must be established and protected as a national constitutional institution, grounded in law, procedure, independence, and continuity. Its legitimacy must not depend on the government that establishes it, but on the Constitution that authorizes it.
Political administrations come and go, but state institutions must endure. The fundamental question is therefore not simply whether the Council has been established, but whether Somalia is prepared to treat the judiciary as an independent third branch of government rather than as an instrument of political agenda.
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Avv. Omar Khalif Abdi is a licensed lawyer, policy strategist, and legal drafter at Somalia’s Ministry of Justice and Constitutional Affairs.
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The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views of Dawan Africa.