Local Humanitarian Leadership (Nexus) 6.3 million people are currently in need of humanitarian assistance across Somalia and Somaliland, with 2.6 million internally displaced and an estimated 1 million displaced in nearby countries. Whilst the deepening climate crisis exacerbates needs, Somalia and Somaliland are becoming increasingly stable, as persistent war gives way to erratic conflict and increasing capacity of government. Despite this, international actors face the obstacles of persistent issues of restricted access and highly challenging security circumstances. Local actors by contrast are able to transcend these issues and to guide interventions with nuanced local knowledge. This represents an opportunity to lead and deliver humanitarian aid locally. Somalia is one of the countries where a Joint Response to a protracted crisis under the DRA (SOMJR) is being implemented. With the changing context towards greater local leadership, the SOMJR already focuses on widening the space for local responders in humanitarian emergencies and decision-making fora. However, the Joint Response is fully led by INGOs, which inevitably creates unequal power dynamics that can negatively impact on the meaningful localization sought by local partners in Somalia. The protracted crisis situation, the long-standing presence of the DRA in Somalia, as well as the emergence of strong local humanitarian actors present the reality in which this PoC process can be carried out, and where an innovative pilot Joint Response focusing on meaningful localization would beworth exploring.
The Nexus Platform is an innovative response to the need for joined-up, localized responses at the triple nexus of humanitarian, development and peace programming: intervening to deliver coordinated outputs in all 3 spheres, which is essential in the Somali context, where climate shocks and conflict perpetually undermine humanitarian and development outcomes and deepen humanitarian crises. Although specifically tackled in the Somali context here – climate shocks and conflict are global causes of ongoing humanitarian crises, making the Nexus Platform’s approach pertinent to challenges at the triple nexus in parallel circumstances. Comprised of nine local NGOs (footprint 30m USD), Oxfam andSave the Children International and entirely locally led, the platform is operational across every region of Somalia and Somaliland. The platform is built upon principles of South-to-South learning and civil society strengthening, whereby expertise is openly exchanged between member organizations to build a consortium that is more than the sum of its parts. Humanitarian response is central tothe platform’s nascent phase. The platform envisions both multisectoral humanitarian response and the development of an Anticipatory Response Mechanism – utilisingthe platform’s breadth of local access to trigger pre-emptive early action. The platform urgently needs – and is invested in developing – a model for its humanitarian programme areas through a PoC process which will allow the platform to rethink conventional humanitarian approaches that are particularly open to question in contexts such as Somalia. The process used to develop this model will be additionally adapted for the development of the platform’s ways of working in the development and peace spheres:whilst humanitarian actions are the platform’s immediate priority in its current scope of work, programs exemplifying locally-led decision making are planned in community development, government and civil society strengthening, women’s empowerment and other areas across the triple nexus and these will require their own guiding PoC processes.