By Faisal Roble

On October 29, 2015, a German/Austrian journalist contacted me from Vienna for an interview about Somalia. Sooner after, several questions reflecting the prevailing view on Somalia hit my email rack: the bloody power struggle between moderate forces and terrorists and the prospect for the next twenty years; whether Somalia will be broken into several states; and the country will hold a national election in 2016.

Cognizant of the fact that several international conferences were underway in Vienna at the time of the interview, I made sure that my answers align with the broader view held by Somalis and refute the current institutionalized narrative that one often hears or reads in western media. Despite contemporary entangled politics, incompetency and endemic corruption at the highest level of government, Somalia is and shall recover from its most recent protracted trauma, if only because of its organic nationhood.

What kind of People are Somalis? (Soomaali waa Kuma?)

Somalia and Somalis had for many years projected a singular, albeit positive, image to the outside world, mainly concerning their land and their people. Straddled between the Kush Mountains to the west, the Red sea to the northeast, the Indian Ocean to the east and south, Somalis for generation remained a force to be reckoned with in the highly priced geopolitical region of the Horn of Africa. As much as Ethiopia has been the singular Christian community in the region historically, thus the beneficiary of the mythic fable surrounding Prester John (Samuel Huntington), Somalis have equally been a distinct people in the region, but part of the grater Islamic civilization (Ibna Battuta visited Somalia in the fourteen century, while Ahmed Al-Khazali and his reign in the 16th century reached as far as the border towns between Ethiopia and Sudan).

Dubbed a nation of poets by the 19th century eccentric British traveler, Richard Burton observed that Somalis are woven tightly together by a powerful language and religion (Somali and Islam, respectively). These two structural factors define their unbridled nationhood. Sir Burton, who extensively traveled through the land of Somalis, thought of them as free-willing, fiercely independence and culturally entrepreneurial.

By encountering the likes of the versatile Cadosh (Geri) in the Marar prairie who accompanied Burton to Harar, the City clerk of Harar who prepared his papers to enter the town (Hawiye), the skillful traders in Saylac (Isaq and Harti), the Mukhalis Raghi (Isse) and the well-connected Haji who took Burton to Sharmarke’s court (Gadabursi), plus powerful Garads (Garad Adan, Garad Wiilwaal, Boqor Sharmarke, Ugaas Doodi, etc.), Sir Burton observed fervent Somali communities at the cusp of nationhood as far back as 1840s. (Clan identity is mentioned only to add emphasis on Somali families’ integration as far back as 1800s.)

Add to this the skillful utilization of Somali poetry by Said Mohamed Abdulle Hassan in his historic war of liberation against European colonialism, or Haji Afqalo’s patriotic versus, among many other poets, the leadership of Sheikh Hassan Barsame, and you have a gallant history penned in a positive narrative. More importantly, Somalis’ indispensable cultural unity, kinship and a common existential view about their surroundings offer a definition of their true being; indeed, Somalia’ own description of their identity is starkly different from that often portrayed by contemporary Western journalistic coverage.

Through their powerful poetry, Somalis eloquently describe and define, so as to leave behind a repository of their being, the lay of their land; this land comprises the expansive Savana land in the Haud, where camel thrives; the fertile agricultural and [best] tropical fruits-producing river banks sandwiched between Shabelle and Jubba rivers, the flora and fauna (myrrh and gum) that binds Hafun with Harardheere, the farming fields of Jarar valley and Jalalaqsi bonded by the Shabelle River, the scorching Guban terrain that ultimately dead-ends in the salt deposits along Djibouti’s Red Sea line then merging with the crisp white sands of the panoramic coastal ridges of the Indian ocean that stretch from Ras Guardafui, through Haafun, pass through Hobyo and Banadir upto Ras Kamboni. This is the geography that Somalis defended for over a millennium and will do so in perpetuity.

Blessed with the two most important superstructures that define nationhood (common language, religion and a defined geography), Somalis emerged as a viable nation prior to the colonial penetration of the continent. On the contrary, most African nation states have been a byproduct of colonial social engineering. Hence, the believe that Somalis have been a nation and would remain so is tenable, despite present tribulations and traumas caused by the absence of a solid and unified middle class to vanguard state formation.

It is not, therefore, the current broken politics that defines who the Somalis are or their existential philosophy of being Somalis. Rather their unique geography accentuated by their exquisitely poetic language (Somali), Islam and a keen sense of their kinship define their lasting nationhood.

However, since 1991, journalists, aid expats and Eurocentric scholars defined the Somali community by its broken politics. Some even went as far as breaking up the country into mini states. But politics is nothing more than a temporal attribute in a nation’s historical trajectory – in other words, the current crisis that engulfed Somalia must be viewed as a temporal phenomenon that will come and pass with changing seasons.

Armed with this keen sense of the deeper existential meaning of the Somali being, I responded to several political question in the following manner.

Read more: Correcting Somalia’s Maligned Image

Faisal Roble
WardheerNews contributor
Email: faisalroble19@gmail.com
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Faisal Roble is a writer, political analyst and a former Editor-in-Chief of WardheerNews, mainly interested in the Horn of Africa region. He is currently the Principle Planner for the City of Los Angeles in charge of Master Planning, Economic Development and Project Implementation Division.