It’s Election Day in Somalia

And the next president could very well be an American. “After an arduous electioneering process marred with corruption, vote-buying, and delays, Somalia will finally hold its presidential elections on Wednesday (Feb. 8). Given the ethnic nature of Somalia’s voting system, lawmakers, elected through clan delegations instead of universal suffrage, will vote for the country’s next president. One key feature unites some parliamentarians and the majority of presidential candidates: many hold foreign passports. More than 100 of the country’s 275 legislators hold foreign passports according to Wakiil, an online initiative that promotes accountability by documenting the electoral process. And out of the 24 candidates cleared to run for the country’s top office (one dropped out this week), 16 of them have foreign passports. This reportedly includes both the current president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and his immediate predecessor Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, both of whom have Kenyan passports and are running for president.” (QZ http://bit.ly/2kPT6j2)

 

RIP Hans Rosling… “It was his first Ted talk that thrust renowned Swedish academic Hans Rosling into the international spotlight in 2006, billed as the man in whose hands data sings. Since then, the statistician more likely to illustrate an idea with a few multi-coloured lego bricks than a PowerPoint has been described as everything from a data guru to a Jedi master of data visualisation. He died on Tuesday, aged 68, after a year-long illness, surrounded by his family in Uppsala, Sweden.” (Guardian http://bit.ly/2kED21q)

 

Two Appreciations

 

The data wizard who helped us visualize a better world” (Humanosphere http://bit.ly/2kPGJTS)
A man who made global development data come alive. Plus: Watch his original viral it (UN Dispatch http://bit.ly/2kPIBw5)