After years of fighting, Somalia, a country often described as a "failed state" has a new president and a new parliament. Courtesy of the "Roadmap for the End of Transition" drawn up last year in September, the Horn of Africa country held elections for the first time in 20 years in September 2012.

The document, signed by six Somali leaders including those of breakaway regions of Puntland and Somaliland had identified priorities to be carried out to ensure a successful shift from the Federal Transitional Government to a nationally legitimate administration.

First, 215 out of a total of 275 members of parliament were sworn in, in August, just weeks after the National Constituent Assembly (NCA) adopted a provisional constitution to replace the eight-year-old Transitional Federal Charter.

Then the lawmakers voted in Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, a 56-year-old activist, as president. Incumbent President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed also admitted defeat in a run-off. With the national constituent assembly's adoption of a provisional constitution, life could change for Somali women, non-Muslims and members of minority clans.

Now, both Somalis and foreigners who support this course have been brimming with hope that this would be the final attempt at reaching national reconciliation and help rebuild Somalia. Somali envoy to Nairobi, Mohamed Nur told ChinAfrica his country was on course to prove to the world that even failed states can rise again.

"It [the elections] means a lot to us. With every step, [we] can now hope for a more stable Somalia: It is a big challenge but it can be attained," he said.

Somalia's efforts have so far received congratulatory messages from the UN, AU, Intergovernmental Authority on Development (Igad) and several other supportive countries.

Boubacar Diarra, the Special Representative of the Chairperson of the African Union Commission for Somalia, was the first to congratulate Somalis for their new parliament. "This is a historic moment. Today, Somalia has a new beginning with a new political framework based on a popular and legitimate provisional constitution," he said.

But even as congratulatory messages came in, critics were fully aware that Somalia still had a long journey to regain an image of normalcy. The International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think-tank warned in its latest report that the peace process ought to be "given" to the people rather than "controlled and dominated" by the same signatories who set the ball rolling last year.

The first two steps, having a provisional constitution and electing members of Parliament, required the efforts of traditional elders.

The elders, formed in a council of 135 traditional leaders, had to vet members of their respective clans in choosing who should represent them in the National Assembly.

Somalia is one of the few countries in the world that should have easily been united by ethnic composition, but clans have often taken center stage in fueling conflicts and even helped previous failures at bringing reconciliation. Both Ahmed and Mohamud come from the same clan, Hawiye.

The international community resorted to a grassroots approach to help clan elders take part in the selection of members. It was a well-coordinated effort by the traditional elders, the Technical Selection Committee and the international observers.

Thus far, some observers argue that stability in Somalia is long overdue and this was just one step toward that.

"Obviously, Somali people need a stable government. You realize that reconciliation has not been addressed by the international community. Their focus has been on pushing for power sharing," Joakim Guntel, a longtime analyst and author on the Somalia conflict told ChinAfrica.

But he warned that the peace process has to move away from "a very small exclusive community" of politicians in Mogadishu. "We hope that the process would bring on board new people. If that turns out to be the result, there would be new hope."

For the past 20 years, Somalia has mainly been a burden to neighbors: More than 600,000 refugees live in Kenya, Ethiopia and Djibouti, according to the UNHCR. The country's extremists, al Shabab, who view the elections as illegitimate, have been exporting their terror recently to Kenya and Uganda, and making Somalia's seas dangerous to navigate due to rampant piracy. Al Shabab's piracy operation, which funds the organization's terrorist activities, netted $111 million in ransom during 2010, according to the UN Drugs Office.

Despite all this, the UN Secretary General's representative to the African Union Mission to Somalia (Amisom), Augustine Mahiga thinks there is confidence the new government would handle Somalia's problems like piracy, security and food scarcity better.

But Guntel believes that may not be achieved in the short term because Somalia currently has no working systems and would take longer to rebuild and have a government that is collectively represented.

The UN has vowed to support the new leaders. President Mohamud, whose temporary residence was bombed by al Shabab the day after his election, has pledged to reform the justice system. The world waits to see Somalia's future unfold.

(Reporting from Kenya)