There has been a significant increase in reporting to Loop since the 17th of August, as a result of a joint project between the PSEA Network and UNICEF. They have been advertising the Loop short code free number to communities via a radio program telling people about their rights and how to report for 9 days on 5 local radio stations.
As a result there have been over 1300 pieces of feedback received in a two week period. Feedback continues to come in after the radio program has ended. In Somalia word of mouth spreads very quickly, and people in Somalia appear to be passing on the information about Loop and the short code number. We see reports coming in from different geographic regions and locations (including from prison).
The radio announcements have led to a significant increase in feedback as well as sensitive reporting. The sensitive cases in August have been on aid diversion (9), SEA (4) and GBV (including rape) cases (5).
All feedback in Somalia is through voice recordings, and all feedback came in using the Interactive Voice Response and Reply (IVRR) in both Maay and Maxatiri languages. We are working on adding on Benadiri and Barawani in the coming month to help access other communities.
Loop moderators continue to be working on moderating the recorded messages. Their top priority, based on the scale of feedback, is to identify and attend to all sensitive reports in as short a time delay as possible. In two weeks Loop has handled 24 sensitive reports. As a result, the data on the open platform is not 100% accurate as not all open feedback has been moderated and posted to the platform yet. Therefore this report focuses primarily on the sensitive cases received so far.
Loop team review, triage and refer on, through existing referral pathways specific sensitive reports that come in. The Loop Sensitive Case Managers, the moderators focusing on sensitive reporting collectively have experience in protection, CFMs, investigations, safeguarding and codes of conduct. They also speak four national dialects and work together, following Loop policies they refer on the information (for assistance and investigation) applying the survivor-centred approach and protecting people’s confidentiality and privacy. They have actioned each report within the 48 hour window.
It is difficult to determine whether recorded messages are coming from minority groups - listening to dialects used is the only approach if they choose not to share this information. However, Loop’s previous months data shows that we have had some reports coming from minority groups members and organisations. Loop will work on improving the voice instructions about how to use Loop to invite authors to share this information so that we can better collect data on clans and minority groups.
As shown in figure (3), the majority of reports are related to aid diversion, then SEA and GBV.
Some callers are victims/ survivors of SEA or GBV, others have been witnesses.
Aid diversion reports are either generic or from people who seem to have direct experience yet prefer to remain anonymous. This is a trust issue we see across all countries. None the less they are still reporting to Loop as an independent mechanism which enables anonymity, and the information can be acted on.
1 SEA report involved minors. 2 SEA reports involved many survivors. 1 GBV report is reporting FGM in a specific village and another required an urgent lifesaving referral which occurred. One protection report comes from a person in prison. 1 report is a person with special needs whose report was not responded to through the other recommended channels.
People reporting into Loop this month tend to consent to share information about the perpetrators (names and phone numbers) but choose to remain anonymous and not consent to us passing on their names or contact details to focal people within the relevant organisations. Loop acts as a middle independent actor, to maintain the anonymity of the authors and the relevant organisation, if consent is not given by the callers to share their names or Personally Identifiable Information. This doubles the effort and time Loop staff spend managing cases; however, it ensures authors' concerns, including all the important information are raised and, hopefully, addressed.
Some callers, after sharing feedback using Loop, are then unreachable, rendering cases as ‘pending’. We have a policy to continue to call the author back at irregular times for two weeks. However, we share sensitive allegations, after anonymising them, when we fail to establish contact with the authors; this is because of our duty to report and because the information might be enough to act on and/or triangulate with other sources.
Sensitive reports have come in and been referred on to a wide variety of actors. This includes: the PSEA network, GBV AoR and local and global reporting channels.
Some organisations are responsive to emails (including acknowledging receipt of the referral, requesting further information and updating Loop on key progress milestones (not details of the case). We are working with others to improve responsiveness.
It is not always easy to find the appropriate reporting channels for national and international NGOs, even though we coordinate with the different clusters. We research organisations’ reporting channels through their websites and actively reach out to organisations to obtain their relevant focal points for SEA, fraud and corruption, misconduct etc. When this information is not available or organisations are not responsive, our standard practice is to refer the information available on to relevant stakeholders that can take action to ensure an accountable response, such as regional or global level representatives, country-level PSEA networks etc.
Loop refers authors to relevant organisations for further investigation. If the organisation is responsive and an assistance referral is also required for SEA, ideally the implicated organisation is responsible for making the referral according to best practice. However, there are urgent situations where it is not possible to wait for organisations to respond such as GBV survivors who require medical assistance, and so Loop works hard to also ensure we contact survivors and refer them to life-saving services. The victims of rape have been referred to local and international actors in the areas they live, and Loop follows closely with the families to ensure their needs are being met and additional referrals are made if required. We have had rapid, positive and supportive responses from relevant organisations and Ministries with regards to referrals for assistance so far.
To collectively help improve the accountability of Aid in Somalia, we invite organisations to:
We are available to do onboarding and introductory sessions if helpful, to speed up the referral process if a report does come in.
We are available to do onboarding and introductory sessions if helpful.
