Garowe’s UN Staff Dismissed as Funding Dries Up — ‘We Worked 20 Years, Now Nothing’.
GAROWE — The United Nations’ regional office in Puntland is preparing to lay off a significant number of employees by the end of October, in what insiders describe as one of the sharpest contractions of its operations in northern Somalia in recent years.
The layoffs will reportedly affect security personnel, administrative staff, and sanitation workers — including some who have served the UN’s Garowe compound for over two decades.
According to multiple sources inside the organization, the decision was triggered by a deepening financial crisis within the UN’s Somalia mission, known locally as UNITAS, which has struggled for months to pay rent and cover operational expenses for its privately leased headquarters.
Quiet Downsizing, Silent Closures
While the UN has not officially declared the move a “closure,” insiders told WARYATV that the entire Puntland office could soon be consolidated under the UNDP compound, located a short distance from the former UNITAS site.
The shift, they said, effectively signals a quiet downsizing of UN operations in Puntland’s capital.
“The staff have already signed resignation letters,” said one official familiar with the process, requesting anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. “The office hasn’t been able to sustain itself. There’s no money for salaries, no money for rent — even vehicle maintenance has been frozen.”
The move follows a broader financial realignment within the UN system in Somalia, as international donors reduce funding amid competing global crises, including conflicts in Ukraine, Gaza, and Sudan.
Human Cost of the Cutbacks
For Garowe’s local workforce — many of whom joined the mission during Somalia’s post–civil war reconstruction in the early 2000s — the layoffs are both financially and emotionally devastating.
Some have spent their entire professional lives working under the UN flag, handling logistics, cleaning, or guarding the compound.
“They told us we’ll get a month’s notice and then nothing,” one departing staff member told WARYATV. “We worked through droughts, insurgencies, and even the 2010 bombing scare. Now they’re saying there’s no budget for us.”
A Larger Pattern
Diplomatic observers note that the Garowe downsizing fits into a larger UN retrenchment pattern across Somalia, where budget pressures and shifting donor priorities are forcing agencies to merge programs, cut staff, and reduce field presence — especially in relatively stable regions like Puntland.
“What you’re seeing is the UN shrinking into core hubs — Mogadishu, Hargeisa, and occasionally Kismayo,” said a Horn of Africa policy expert based in Nairobi. “Garowe, for all its past importance, may be the first to feel the full financial squeeze.”
For Puntland’s government, the UN’s retreat could have ripple effects — slowing coordination on humanitarian response, governance reform, and security sector support, at a time when the region faces renewed tensions with Mogadishu and funding shortfalls in local development programs.
End of an Era?
If the Garowe office ultimately closes, it will mark the end of more than two decades of continuous UN presence in Puntland — an institution that weathered piracy crises, drought emergencies, and political transitions.
For now, UNITAS leadership has not issued a public statement. But among Garowe’s departing workers, the mood is one of quiet resignation.
“We gave the UN our best years,” said one long-serving cleaner as she packed her belongings. “Now it feels like they’re leaving without even saying goodbye.”