State forces of Galmudug, Hirshabelle and South West

In short

Each federal member state keeps its own forces, usually called Darawiish (Dervish); Robinson notes that the name recalls the rural mobile police of the years before 1991 (IPI, below). This page covers Galmudug, Hirshabelle and South West State. Puntland's and Jubaland's forces have their own pages: Puntland security forces and Jubaland security forces. This page records what the sources say, without taking sides between the states and the federal government.

How state forces began

Colin Robinson, writing for the International Peace Institute in 2019, recorded that South West's Darawiish were created in 2015 as "effectively clan home guards" and became the South West State Special Police Force in February 2016. He wrote that state forces were often seen as closer to their communities than the Somali National Army, since they serve where they are recruited, but that promised federal and international support had largely not reached them (Colin Robinson, IPI Global Observatory, 7 November 2019).

The National Security Architecture

The federal government and the member states agreed a National Security Architecture in May 2017, endorsed at the London Somalia Conference, setting the size, command and funding of the army, police and other forces. A revised version followed in March 2023. The Somali Dialogue Platform, in a 2024 policy brief, recorded that Galmudug, Hirshabelle and South West took a more accommodating view of the architecture than Puntland or Jubaland, partly because of the shared campaign against al-Shabaab and partly because they depend on federal funds (Somali Dialogue Platform, The Shaping of the Somali National Security Architecture, March 2024).

Clan militias

The same brief recorded that Galmudug and Hirshabelle backed the arming of the Macawisley clan militias in the 2022 offensive, while Puntland, Jubaland and South West opposed it, fearing that state assets would be turned to clan agendas. A South West minister interviewed for the brief said arming clan militias was "akin to arming al-Shabaab". In October 2023 the president named Ali Jeyte, a former Hiiraan governor and Macawisley leader, as coordinator for what the government called community defence forces; in May 2023, after his dismissal as governor, he had declared Hiiraan separate from Hirshabelle (Somali Dialogue Platform).

The Galkacyo joint force

In February 2018 Galmudug, Puntland and the federal government set up a joint army force for the divided city of Galkacyo, with equal contributions from the two states, under central army command. The brief describes it as a possible model for the army, and records that its pay fell from US$350 to US$200 a month and that its first commander was killed by al-Shabaab (Somali Dialogue Platform).

Barawe, 2023

In June 2023 South West State police, newly deployed to Barawe, the state's designated capital, fought federal army units that had been in the town since AMISOM and the army took it from al-Shabaab on 6 October 2014. The brief records that many in South West saw the army there as drawn mainly from Hawiye clans around Mogadishu, and that a South West minister alleged the soldiers taxed local people (Somali Dialogue Platform).

Pay talks, 2026

On 13 April 2026 Dawan Africa, citing state media, reported that the federal government had pledged to align the pay and benefits of South West's Darawiish, then stationed at Awdiinle, with those of the army, after meetings attended by the intelligence director Mahad Mohamed Salad and the police commissioner. Officials said the government was "working toward standardizing their rights"; the units were later moved back to Baidoa and their former bases (Dawan Africa, 13 April 2026).

Sources differ

• Who pays. State forces are usually funded by the member states; federal pledges to fund or absorb them have been made several times.
• Barawe. The 2024 brief draws mainly on South West officials' accounts of the fighting; it does not set out a federal account.
• Clan militias. Galmudug and Hirshabelle supported arming them; South West, Puntland and Jubaland opposed it.

Read the primary sources yourself

• Somali Dialogue Platform, The Shaping of the Somali National Security Architecture (2024): PDF.
• Colin Robinson, "State-level military forces can potentially turn tide in war against al-Shabaab", IPI Global Observatory (2019): article.