On 25 March 2025, journalist Dalmar Isse Ahmed, also known as Dalmar Socdaal, was arrested at a restaurant in Somalia’s north-central city of Galkayo, according to the Somali Journalists Syndicate, and the journalist, who spoke to CPJ after his release.
Dalmar, who founded and runs the online outlet Jiindhe Media, told CPJ that five security officers — some wearing Puntland police uniforms and others in plain clothes — ordered him into a marked police Toyota pickup, without explanation, and took him to the city’s Hala-Bookhad Police Station.
The commander of the station told Dalmar that he had been detained for “spreading propaganda” in support of Somalia’s federal government.
The semi-autonomous state of Puntland withdrew its recognition of Somalia’s federal government in 2024 and announced it would govern itself independently because its leaders were opposed to constitutional amendments replacing clan-based voting with universal suffrage.
The northern half of Galkayo is part of Puntland and the southern half is in Galmudug, another of Somalia’s six federal states.
Dalmar said he rejected the police commander’s accusation, stating that Galkayo hosts administrations from Puntland, Galmudug, and the Federal Government, and he had the right to engage with all authorities in his work.
On 13 March 2025, Dalmar posted a video on his Facebook page, in which he applied for a national ID card at the federal government’s National Identity and Registration Authority (NIRA) office in Galkayo, on the Galmudug side of the town, and encouraged others to do the same.
Dalmar, who is from the Puntland side of Galkayo, said elders from his sub-clan later told him that Puntland authorities were displeased with his promotion of the federal ID registration process.
On 27 March 2025, Dalmar was released without charge, after interventions by his elders.
CPJ did not receive responses to an email requesting comment from the Puntland ministry of information and queries sent via messaging app to the region’s information minister Farhan Ali Hersi, attorney general Ahmed Mohamed Yusuf, and presidential spokesperson Jama Deperani.