Divided Somaliland and the way out

Bashir Goth

The Local Council Elections that were held in Somaliland on 28^th November 2012 left behind bitterness, bloodshed and deep divisions between the clans as well as moments of joy and celebration. Although the election started in a festive mood, its aftermath proved the fears of observers about the irreparable fissions that such unfettered democracy and flawed electoral system could bring to a tribal society like Somaliland. And on top of this comes the lack of independent judiciary that could handle disputes with fairness and the government’s rejection to abide by the rules it put in place.

In the following paragraphs therefore I will try to highlight the election’s twists and turns and its good, bad and ugly stories. 

The Good:

One of the good things about the election was its beautiful festivals and the joyful mood that prevailed during the campaign. It was beautiful to watch an isolated and internationally unrecognized state holding its 2^nd municipal election, the first one was in 2002, and the 4^th nationwide election since 2003. Parliamentary elections were held in 2005 and presidential elections in 2003 and 2010. And despite its glaring flaws, the local council election was another undeniable landmark in Somaliland’s quest for democratic transformation.  

It was a joy to watch the people exercising their democratic rights like any country in the world in party campaign forums. The youth and women have filled the campaign rallies to unmistakably show that they are the real force and game changers in the country. The youth have temporarily forgotten their unemployment status and used their positive energy in a constructive way despite the tribal undercurrents that denied them to achieve their full potential.

The long queues of the voting day, a symbol of democracy, peace and refinement, were admirable. It is always reassuring and heartening to see African people going to the polls and not to trenches to fight their case, to cast a vote and not carry a gun to settle disputes, to peacefully play by the rules of the game no matter how flawed they are and not resort to my-law-in-my-hand tribal fashion.

One whole month of festivities from 29^th October to a long day of civilized voting on 28^th November was enough to show the world that Somali people can be good, law-abiding citizens as any people in the world and that they are not always unruly, chaotic and warrior nomads as the world media loves to portray them.

The fact that several women were among the elected councils was also another promising development that showed the society’s changing attitude, albeit timidly, towards the role of women.

The Bad:

In a tribal nomadic society where people are divided on clan loyalties, the opening of the door for multiparty system has shown its devastating effect. In mature democracies, political parties run and campaign on ideological and political platforms. They have strategies to follow and political objectives to achieve. They try to win the support of the voters on their political, economical and cultural merits. Yes, political divisions could be rife and deep but they are based on economic and political interest rather than narrow and primitive ancestral bonds and blood ties. But in Somaliland like elsewhere in Africa, the political parties have no agenda, no strategies and no real and tangible objectives. It was boring to listen to party speakers repeating old platitudes and burnt out ideas. Their vital selling points were their clan identities and it was unfortunate to see all that exercise, mobilization and festival moods swallowed up by the tribal vortex. It was not difficult to see who voted for whom when the results came out. They showed how Somaliland politics rests purely on tribal crutches.

The Ugly

The ugly episode of the election was the government’s high handedness in dealing with the people’s complaints after the results were announced. It is natural for the losing parties or candidates in any election to feel cheated and demand for justice. In advanced countries such complaints go to the election commission which plays a neutral role. If the complainants don’t find the election commission’s decisions convincing, they go to the courts. In Somaliland, there is a general feeling that neither the election commission nor the justice system is free from government control. People therefore revert to the only tested institution they know and that works for them – the clan. Some parties and candidates therefore showed their grievances and complaints through clan protests and rallies. 

However, instead of handling the issue with tolerance and understanding, the government resorted to the use of force. Untrained and uncontrolled police force acting like clan militia used live ammunition on peaceful protestors, killing about ten young people and wounding many others in Hargeisa, Borama, Lughya and Zeila. 

Even worse than the cold blooded shooting, was the government’s lack of sympathy for the families of the victims and their indifference to the loss of human life. It took Silanyo almost one week to make a statement on the killing of five young protestors in Hargeisa and when he finally did he made it weak and remorseless which only added insult to injury. It was equally ugly and despicable to see the powerful cabinet minister Hirsi Ali Haji Hassan boasting in an interview to one of the websites that the government has paid the blood money to the families of the victims. Just like that, with no emotion, no regret, no remorse, and no promise of investigation and punitive action against the rogue police force. But at least here a statement was made, but the president has failed abysmally by not uttering a word about those killed by his policemen in Borama, Lughaya and Zeila.

In an episode reminiscent of dictatorial regimes, I watched the video of policemen shooting live ammunition indiscriminately at peaceful youth demonstrators in Borama. At one time, a policeman was strolling in the street with the gun in his hand after finishing his shooting business. He was threatening and swearing loudly, calling his victims as Waar laaya, Eeyda, eaydu dhashay which literally means “Kill them…the dogs sired by dogs.” By watching this, one couldn’t help but remember the ugly tribal militia brutalities that we saw elsewhere in Africa.

In the historical city of Zeila, the police have disbanded a group of peaceful squatters in the town’s local council building by force; killing at least one person and wounding others.

With all these crimes taking place, President Silanyo did not send a single message of condolence to the families of victims let alone apprehend the police individuals whose faces and criminal acts were watched by thousands on Youtube. But in an apparent act of defiance and a show of support and approval for his police force, Silanyo was quick to express sadness and send deep hearted condolences when several policemen were killed in a car accident. While on the contrary, the President did not think the life of a young girl who was run over by the police when they were departing Borama was worth his sympathy. 

The government’s unnecessary interference in the election of municipality mayors in major towns was to reignite bitter clan rivalries. The government tried to arm-twist council members in Erigavo, Buroa, Berbera and Zeila through monetary bribes and otherwise to get their favorite candidates elected as mayors.  This was a provocative tactic aimed at inciting people to take arms and fight in an illusionary war.

The government used Berbera and Zeila as testing grounds for its divide and rule policy. But it was fortunate to see the communities of these two areas act more wisely than the government and abort the government’s plans of pushing them into an internecine civil war. The communities in these two coastal towns who live in the most inhospitable areas in the region do not need to kill each other for the greed of opportunistic politicians but instead they need help to secure the basic subsistence of living such as water for human consumption and for their dwindling herds. 

As a foreign friend who frequently visits Somaliand wrote to me recently  “the people seem resigned to be stuck with bad politicians, though they deserve better, and get on with their own lives as best as they can.” Unfortunately the Silnayo government did not stop only at being a bad government but has also become a brutal one true to the Somali saying” Indha la’aantii, dad cunimo ayey ku darsatay”. And the tragedy is that there is no formidable political opposition as Silanyo seems to have succeeded in breaking the will of all potential political opponents by opening government coffers and silencing them with cash. It is only the lonely but courageous voice of Faisal Ali Waraabe and UCID party that still stands between Silnayo and his ambition to create a dynasty in Somaliland.

The way out:

Disappointed with the poor performance of Silanyo, the much touted UK educated leader, former SNM veteran and one of the longest serving ministers of Siyad Barre; the people of Somaliland are desperate for a bail out from their current economic and political wilderness. 

Many of them view the much anticipated Somalia-Somaliland talks as a Godsend exit strategy. The way Somalilanders swarm around Fawzia Yusuf Haji Adam, Somalia’s Deputy Premier and Foreign Minister, wherever she goes indicates how much hope they attach on her as their potential life line. We saw this during Fawzia’s recent visit to the UK and we saw it again when she made a stopover in Berbera airport en route to Mogadishu. Anyone who was anybody in Hargeisa came to visit her. No one even remembered the accusation of national treason that the government leveled against her when she accepted to serve in the cabinet of the new Somali government. Some of them including Somaliland’s Foreign Minister and Speaker of the House of Elders even went further, threatening her that she would be imprisoned if she ever returned to Somaliland. But on the contrary it was Silanyo’s government itself that was beleaguered by Fawzia’s presence at its airport.

Given to all foregoing factors and finding itself to be more divided than any time before, Somaliland needs a new direction to regain its vitality and the trust of its people. And the way of change is clear. It is to negotiate with the Somali government from a position of strength with clear strategy and tangible objectives.  But in order to do that Somaliland first has to hold an inter-clan reconciliation dialogue similar to the one held in Borama in 1993. It is only through a united voice from Zeila to Taleh that Somaliland can legitimately sit as an equal with their partners in Mogadishu.

The FOOTSTEPS OF DEATH

The following verse is a tribute to the victims of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, on December 14, 2012.

 The FOOTSTEPS OF DEATH


Tiny fingers, nimble minds             

Tender flowers of the nation

Kids, kids, kids

Kids learning

Kids playing

Kids asking

Kids wondering 

Kids not knowing

But also knowing

Hell was breaking

Death was coming

Childhood was losing

The world was changing

Right in their school

A gun man was moving

Senselessly shooting…

In Sandy Hook, Newtown

Right in their school

In the freezing winter

Kids were hiding

Holding their breaths

Holding their hands

Huddling together 

Hearing the shooting

The cries, the moaning

The wails of their friends

The feeble whispers

The failing voices

The fearful silence

Of their teachers

The footsteps of death

Right in their school

Life was freezing

Christmas was fading

Memories fleeting

Gifts, gifts, gifts

Gifts for Christmas

O how excited they were

About gifts waiting

Never to be unwrapped

Never to be unwrapped

Never to be unwrapped  

   -       Bashir Goth

The Somali President has spoken, can anyone hear his agony?

Bashir Goth 

In a speech that I consider to be one of the most powerful and most compassionate speeches that any Somali leader has delivered for a long time, Somalia’s new President Hassan Sheikh Mahmoud has spoken candidly and explicitly about some of the most serious challenges that his government faces and called for the nation’s collective and urgent attention to tackle these issues in order to restore the dignity of the Somali people and the country’s statehood.

He lamented that Somalia has become a brand name for terrorism, piracy, refugees and failure as a state. 

“We know that terrorist actions committed by some of our people may only be a small fraction of international terrorism but we unfortunately carry the name. We are much better  than to be called  terrorists, better than be branded as pirates, better than having the largest refugee camps in the world and better than being known as the most failed state in the world.”

The president talked about how the Somali people have lost their pride in their identity as one can see wealthy businesspeople running away from their homeland to settle in foreign countries just to obtain foreign passports.  He described this as the lowest one can reach when someone views his nationality as a shame.

He spoke about the ubiquitous and notorious checkpoints locally known as Isbaaro which have siphoned off the people’s meager incomes and sapped their strength for survival and hope.  

One of the most critical issues, however, that the President raised and caught my attention was the topic of violence against women and particularly rape.  And I am sure he inadvertently forgot to mention that Somalia has also become known as “the worst place to be a woman in the world” among the notorious names he listed.

The most disheartening and saddening example that he told was the tragic story of an elderly woman who was gang-raped by young men in full view of her husband. The couple had just finished their dinner and performed their evening prayers together when criminal gangs stormed their little home and committed their heinous crime.  The president said he couldn’t sleep several nights after he heard that tragedy and he understandably sounded helpless and wanted to convey the enormity of the crime and the indignity and humiliation that the Somali people in general and Somali women in particular are  subjected to on daily basis. 

He admitted that rape was the ugliest manifestation of the state of insecurity that the country has descended to over the past 20 years, reminding the regional governors that he was addressing prior to his departure on 26^th November 2012 on a tour of neighboring countries that it was their responsibility and that of the Somali people with them to extricate the country from this ugliness.

President Mahmoud sent a strong message against rape by announcing that his government was working on enacting new laws that would call for death penalty for rapists.  As commendable as this step maybe for challenging a crime whose perpetrators have until now gone away with impunity, another more effective way to punish and shame such immoral men may be to snip their male organs in public places, thus denying them the ability to commit such crimes in future and making them live with this constant reminder for the rest of their lives. 

Anyone who thinks this may be a harsh has just to remember how many mothers, sisters, wives  or daughters that such measure could safeguard  from being subjected to one of the most despicable crimes and live-long scars that one can endure. 

In a similar development, Somaliland’s Minister of Labor and Social Affairs launched an awareness week against the rape of women and young boys in Hargeisa. Talking to the press on the occasion of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on 25^th November 2012, Mahmoud Ahmed Garaad said that the general hospital of Hargeisa, Somaliland’s capital, receives almost one case of rape everyday. Among the shocking statistics he disclosed was that recorded figures of rape cases have increased in 2012 from what they were in 2011. He pointed out that over the last six months of 2012 alone, Hargeisa Hospital has treated 147 victims of rape of whom 127 were women and 20 were boys as young as 12 years of age. This doesn’t include other violence against women whether physical or mental as well as the tradition-driven abuse of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) that forces women to sexual bondage.

What makes this crime even worse in the Somali society as I mentioned in  a previous article and also reiterated by President Mahmoud of Somalia is the staunch defense that the rapists get from the community who shield them against any legal persecution due to tribal loyalties. This does not only encourage the continuity of rape but it also makes Somali women feel worthless and deprives them of living in dignity and denies them their rights as citizens. But the irony is that despite being victims to such inhuman treatment, Somali women, both inside the country and overseas, have proven to be the pillars without which the Somali people could not have survived through natural and man-made catastrophes over more than 20 years as  I highlighted in previous articles such as  Thebetter half and SomalilandWomen as oppressed breadwinners and peacemakers and Dumarka Soomaaliyeed Waa Dheemanta LaguBabaaday. 

The president has spoken about the security and social obstacles that hamper the country’s return to normalcy and the restoration of the people’s dignity. And at the top of these is the inhuman treatment of women. Therefore, with the nightmare of Al Shabab who kept women in both physical and mental darkness on the wane, one wonders if anyone can empathize with the President’s agony of helplessness and truly hear his appeal for action and change.
 

Somalia’s Taboo Breaker First Woman Foreign Minister

By Bashir  Goth

No matter what one thinks, or in what color one tries to see the appointment of Fawzia Yusuf Haji Adam as the first woman Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Somalia and indeed in the Horn of Africa and the Arab World, it is the historical significance of a woman reaching this far in tribal-based Muslim society, where women are seen only as an appendage if not indeed a property to their menfolk, that should not escape any conscientious person’s attention.

Given to the plight, suffering and humiliation that Somali women went through over the last 20 years despite being the pillars that sustain the existence of the Somali people both inside the country and the Diaspora, what better image is there to see than an educated and refined woman being the face of Somalia to the outside world, what a better answer to Al- Shabab who couldn’t see women anything more than a bra and an obscene body to be shrouded and hidden away in dark houses. What better answer to the Arab world where women despite spearheading the Arab Spring are being pushed to live in the 7^th century by religious fanatic who themselves aren’t shy to indulge in the 21^st century luxuries including smart phones and who spread their reactionary ideologies through modern social media. What better PR to the Islah-led government of President Hassan Sheikh Mahmoud; what a better bridge to use to bring Somaliland to the fold than a woman who does not only hail from Somaliland but also contributed more than anyone else to making a better future for the youth there and whose own children hail from Mogadishu, a symbol of unity through her own life like numerous other Somali women. 

I congratulate Fawzia Yusuf Haji Adam for winning such a historic achievement for Somali women. I say winning, because Fawzia has indeed waged a long and persistent struggle to prove that Somali women can take a leadership position by their own merit and not through charity quotas.

I don’t know Fawzia, never met her and never even spoken to hear, but I was following her mammoth efforts and initiatives for community development and her political ambition over a number of years. Fawzia first attracted my attention when she initiated the founding of the University of Hargeisa in the late 1990s. I remember how she strove relentlessly to make the university a reality which she did. She again came to my radar in 2008 with the launching of RAADTV, another great project through which she tried to give a different perspective to the Somali issue other than the hackneyed failed state, war-ridden, bowl-holding, refugee camp squatters stereotype image pushed by the international media.

In her vigorous and persistent endeavor not to leave only men to the leadership landscape, Fawzia again made a comeback in late 2011 when she created the Nabad, Dimoqraadiyad iyo Barwaaqo (NDB) (Peace, Democracy and Prosperity Party) in Somaliland with the long term objective of competing for Somaliland’s presidency. It was the first time in the history of the Somali people that a woman had shown the audacity to create and lead a political party in a society that frowns on women in terms of leadership.

Although Fawzia’s NDB party did well in the primaries and the communities had come out in full support to the rallies she held in the various regions of the country and she fulfilled all the required conditions, the Silanyo government of Somaliland has declared Fawzia’s party unqualified to be registered as an official party. Knowing that she was targeted for being a woman, Fawzia refused to go down without a fight. She organized a peaceful protest in Hargeisa where hundreds of people came out to back her cause. However, the Silanyo government did not hesitate to arrest her and keep her in detention until her supporters were disbanded.  Earlier, the government also aborted Fawzia’s attempt to become the chairperson of the Board of Hargeisa University, an institution that she was instrumental in establishing it. 

It is against this taboo breaking tradition that Fawzia again surprised the Somali people when she was recently appointed as Somalia’s first woman foreign minister. Here I recall Neil Armstrong's words when he first set foot on the moon, in 1969, and he said: “That is a small step for a man, a giant leap for mankind.” And the appointment of Fawzia as Somalia’s deputy prime minister and foreign minister is indeed a small step for Fawzia, a giant leap for Somali women, Horn of African and Arab women. It was in the middle of the 1980s when the eminent Kenyan-American scholar Dr. Ali Mazrui predicted on a BBC documentary on Africa that if ever a woman becomes a president in an African country it would be in Somalia. Mazrui made that statement in reflection of his visit to Somalia in the early eighties and how he saw Somali women actively contributing to the country’s development in all sectors. The Somali women have missed that opportunity due to the disasters caused by their menfolk but they played a crucial role in holding the Somali community together and keeping their children’s dream alive for a better tomorrow.

No matter how much I try I cannot emphasize enough the historical importance of this achievement for Somali women. But at the same time, I have no illusions about the enormity of suffering that Somali women endure and I am fully aware that getting a leadership position will not be a magic bullet to wipe out all their hardships. 

Today and for many years to come, I know Somali women will still be victims to the cruel practise of Female Genital Mutilation, that millions of Somali mothers will still be sacrificing their careers and their lives to raise kids and to put food on the table while their men are beholden to their narcotic addition of Kat, that many mothers will die while giving birth due to the lack of medical facilities, that the majority of Somali women will be struggling against odds to give warmth and shelter to their kids let alone education due to a grinding poverty, that millions of them will be mending and repairing the ruptures caused in their homes and their neighbourhoods by men fighting on hollowed pride and primitive tribal egos, that Somali women in the countryside will still be cultivating the land, looking after livestock in harsh terrain and moving children and family belongings like a mule on their backs while their men are enjoying their shameless AWOL, that millions of them who are in refugee camps or in internally displaced camps are preoccupied in eking out a living and do not care if a woman leads the country or not. 

All that is true and Fawia’s achievement will have no immediate impact on them, but I also know that like all human beings Somali mothers want to see their daughters have a dream. And at the top of this is a dream for freedom. Somali girls want to be free to have a choice in life and pursue their dreams; they want to be educated to improve their living standards, they want be part of the country’s decision making, they want to have their voice heard, to take their destiny in their hands and to have the right to lead and be followed if they so wish. And Fawzia’s appointment just gives them that dream. Today, girls from the squalid Dhadhaab Refugee Camp can look up to Fawzia and dream of a better future for themselves as well.

On the political side, I know many people may accuse Fawzia of being a Machiavellian and question her political honesty and credibility given to her recent political ambitions in Somaliland. But on the contrary, I believe that Fawzia is the best person that can take us to a new direction due to her well deserved name in Somaliland and the huge personal sacrifices she made to fashion a better future for the youth of Somaliland through education. There is no better investment to raise people’s awareness and enlighten them about their life conditions other than education. Today, as thousands of graduates from Hargeisa University are loitering in the dusty streets of Hargeisa without any jobs and without any hope for the future and while many of them take the risk of crossing or dying in the high seas to escape from the hopeless situation at home, it was time for a visionary person like Fawzia to give them another alternative. She did not give them education to see them all die on the high seas. One can argue that the few months that Fawzia campaigned for her NDB party in Somaliland have given her a great insight into the real conditions of the people. She found out that Somaliland was committing suicide if it continued in its current course. In fact, not only Fawzia but we must all have learned a lesson or two over the last twenty years that no part of the country could survive alone without giving allegiance and becoming under the suzerainty of a neighbouring power. Neither Somaliland nor Puntland or any other of the mushrooming foreign created tribal enclaves will be able to stand independently alone without bending their destiny to the wishes and dictates of foreign countries whose desire is to kill the old dream of greater Somalia by carving Somalia itself into insignificant and feuding mini-states.

It is with this conviction and geopolitical realization as well as the abhorring and debilitated state of Somaliland’s economic and social underdevelopment, lack of institutional systems, political bankruptcy, and growing dependency on nepotism, tribalism and corruption due to diminishing resources and visible absence of vision and creative leadership that prompted Fawzia to change course. It is only wise leaders who can take their people to a different direction when they see the road leading to a dead end. 

Fawzia is definitely not the first nor she would be the last Somaliland politician to go to Mogadishu, in fact one may argue with a degree of certainty that there is not a single Somaliland politician who is not willing to go to Mogadishu if and when the right opportunity arises. So why is the Hargeisa government making such a hypocritical uproar about Fawzia’s appointment? The truth is Silanyo government doesn’t object a Somalilander to have a leading position in the Mogadishu government, but what they do not want is to see a person with independent thinking and a vision like Fawzia to be their counterpart in Mogadishu. Fawzia has proven to be a wise Somaliland politician who wants to save her beloved Somaliland from its current political Guantanamo status and the Somaliland government has to welcome her and embrace her as their woman in Mogadishu who can superbly steer the Somalia-Somaliland dialogue with a politician’s shrewdness, the passion of a mother and a care of a daughter.

The new government of Mogadishu should also be reminded that they should not try to use Fawzia as window dressing and should give her full authority to be the country’s foreign policy steward. Any tampering with her authority will only backfire on them and erase the best action that they have done so far besides forming a lean cabinet, another praiseworthy first step.