By Ismail H. Warsame

This question may sound  absurd to many people until they find out that a Somali Northern Faction Leader dared to raise it in front of Mengistu Haile-Mariam of the Derg, Ethiopia, and Muamar Al-Qaddaffi of the Libyan Jamahiriya. The context was in a response to a question Qaddaffi asked Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed and Yusuf Sheikh Ali Madar in Tripoli, Libya, circa 1983-4 in a meeting between the four leaders, in a last attempt to unite the first Somali opposition forces against Siyad Barre Regime, and thus to avoid a potential civil war in post-Barre Somalia. I was a witness and participant in these events.

Whatever sinister project Mengistu Haile-Mariam had in mind for Somalia at the time, there was no doubt that Qaddaffi was sincere in helping Somalia to stay united and strong after the fall of Siyad Barre. Yusuf Sheikh Ali Madar, then the Chairman of the Somali National Movement (SNM), wanted to impress Qaddaffi and Mengistu on how difficult it was to bring the Issak clans back to a united Somali republic.

Because of the Tripartite Agreement in the early eighties between South Yemen, Ethiopia and Libya under the proposal and sponsorship of the Somali Salvation Democratic front (SSDF), all Somali opposition elements and entities were supposed to unite under the umbrella of the later, and no separate Somali organization (front) would be allowed to operate from Ethiopia against the Military Regime in Somalia. SNM had no choice but to announce its establishment in London, UK, in 1982.

SSDF, in pursuit of its core policy of uniting all Somali opposition forces, sought to persuade Ethiopian, Libyan and Yemeni leadership to facilitate negotiation talks between SSDF and SNM. SSDF sent a delegation led by Abdirahman Sugule Xaabsey and the late politician and technocrat, Jama Rabile Good to SNM’s new leadership in London, headed by then its Secretary-General, the Late Mr. Duqsi. Under the sponsorship of SSDF, SNM leadership was invited to an urgent unification talks in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The talks proceeded painfully slow and difficult.

Eventually, the talks between the two fronts SSDF and SNM reached a stalemate and kept on and off for years. However, in the meantime, SSDF was bank-rolling SNM with money and military hardware all the way to Col. Kosaar’s Chairmanship until SNM reached a self-sufficiency through its grass-root support. Finally, a minimum deal was reached to share SSDF’s Radio Kulmis which was renamed as Radio Halgan, the United Voice of Somali Opposition Forces. Beside this, there was little cooperation in other areas.

On the other hand, Mengistu’s leadership started to show its first signs of double-dealings in the negotiation talks with some masked sympathy for dissident elements that were against the SSDF leadership, a situation that even prompted some members of SSDF opting out to join SNM. These included the late Hersi Magan (the Author of the Radio Kulmis Drama and Short Story, Laaska Daawada and the father of Ayaan Hersi Ali, the notorious Somali-Dutch Anti-Islam lady), Mohamed Haji Adam (a former Minister of Puntland during Abdullahi Yusuf’s mandate), Captain Slaweyn (who was killed fighting alongside the SNM fighters, Burco) and the late col. Gardheere. Col. Gardheere eventually ended up disappearing in Afgoi War Front in a counter-offensive attack under the umbrella of Somali National Front (SNF=SSDF, SPM and SNF)) against the late General Aideed’s militia after the fall of Siyad Barre. No one knows how he died. Some speculate that he committed suicide after he lost the battle due to a sabotage in ammunitions and fuel by Siyad Barre’s generals in a futile attempt to re-instate the dictator and thus deny victories to Barre’s former enemies.

Finally in 1985, the SSDF leadership came into an open clash with the Derg leadership, with prominent members of SSDF ending up in Mengistu’s political solitary confinement cells, some losing their lives. This later led the SSDF to splits into two factions, United Somali Congress (USC) and an inactive SSDF, which later regenerated itself locally in North-eastern regions of Somalia. The USC wings of Rome, Ethiopia and Mogadishu concentrated and focused on Mogadishu, while SNM embarked upon foolhardy raids on Hargeisa and Burco. This paved the way for Somalia’s destruction. An organized communal violence and clan cleansing started in Mogadishu, Hargeisa, Berbera and Burco. We are here today to witness the result of this national suicide. The question is however, in well over two decades, if we see any victors? Perhaps, Somalia’s neighbours!?

Post-Barre Somalia is painful and beyond any human comprehension : the mass starvation and diseases, illiteracy, lost generations, mass exodus of human stock of those who barely managed to flee, clan cleansing, mass rape of women, mass killings of innocent, looting and plunder of both private and public wealth and private properties particularly in Mogadishu and lower Shebelle regions, but not limited to them, amid unprecedented in the history of communal violence and barbaric treatment of human life unread even on ancient and pre-historic societies. Some knowledgeable people say that that Rwandan Genocide cannot even measure up to what happened in the Somali Civil War. But, because the Somali case was dismissed by the international community as traditional, chronic clan disputes and warfare, it never got a fair hearing or attempts to investigate the magnitude of the mayhem.

Post-Siyad Barre also saw many attempts by those who always try to walk the extra mile in saving Somalia. One such bold and long attempt in 1999-2001 was the proposal to persuade the late Prime Minister of Somalia, Mr. Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal, to stand up for Somalia and reclaim his legitimacy as the last legal Prime Minister. As the world community had no alternative for Somalia, there was a 100% chance that he could marshaled all the necessary support to put Somalia back together. It wasn’t to be.

Incidentally, Mr. Egal declined to attend a meeting with Abdullahi Yusuf and Hussein Aideed arranged by Qaddaffi (dinner meeting) in Sirte, Libya, in which Mr. Egal would have been crowned as the next President of Somalia, subject to a National Conference to be held before Arta Conference or in the place of Arta’s. For the record, this was the main reason Abdullahi Yusuf boycotted the Arta Conference, despite the fact that many people were citing other factors. Mr. Mohamed Ibrahim Egal had to choose between the comfort of Somaliland Presidency and the unpredictable and highly contested high seat of Somalia’s State, which was in tatters and disintegration. The move also required a rare political courage from Egal, given the hostile, isolationist and myopic politicians and elites in Hargeisa. He chose to play safe during his remaining few years in life.

The Italian centre-left coalition government before Silvio Berlusconi become the Prime Minister in 2001, tried one last attempt to salvage Somalia and re-build it from the ashes of the Civil War and subsequent vicious circle of violence and statelessness. The outgoing government represented by the Italian Foreign Ministry had three hundred million US Dollars projected for Somalia’s reconciliation effort. The initiative involved to bring Abdulqassim Salad Hassan/Ali Khalif Galaydh of the TNG, Abdullahi Yusuf of Puntland and Mohamed Ibrahim Egal of Somaliland and have them agree to a minimum common platform of loose cooperation like joint development, humanitarian and security projects. Again Mr. Egal could not dare to test the waters. Abdullahi Yusuf, despite his well known disgust for Abdulqassim, Ali Khalif and TNG, accepted the deal for the sake of Somalia.

The failure of unification talks between SNM and SSDF in the eighties, and the absence, therefore, of unified national, political, security and stabilization plans led to the proliferation of clan-affiliated militia organizations amid chaos and anarchy that ensued following the unplanned expulsion of Siyad Barre from Mogadishu. Here, both Somali and expatriate scholars identify SNM with Somaliland’s unilateral secession attempt, but abysmally fail to see or acknowledge the fatal damage done and the vital role played by SNM-affiliated clans in helping turn Somalia into an ungovernable, primitive and clan-hatred enclaves that everyone has lost including the North-Western Regions of Somalia (Somaliland). A national tragedy that is still unfolding with all kinds of issues and ramifications: extremism, sea-piracy, dangerous and debilitating illegal foreign fishing and plunder of national marine wealth, loss of sovereignty, environmental destruction and above all, mistrust among the Somali clans to come together again, not only for a common good, but to preserve their very existence as human species in a country of their own..

An equal paradox in Somali body politics, if there is such a thing now, since the disappearance of central authority, is the people, who claim the national capital, Mogadishu, as exclusively their own, but maintain the notion that it is still the Somali capital- people’s capital, who still wants to be the presidents of the Republic, ministers, mayors, civil servants, .etc, and yet want neither a functioning government nor a shared capital city-an irrational and absurd situation. Look, the problem of disunity of purpose and national awakening extends beyond the borders of Somalia. It is solidly manifested more strongly within the Diaspora. Their Fadhi-ku-Dirir (the coffee shop worriers/arm-chair fighting) on clan bashing and controversial local issues at home country, has become a past-time and a favourite game of choice. They were expected to be more enlightened and experienced, having tested the bitter agony of life in exile and loss of possibilities of peaceful retirement at their home of birth.

But, the stupidest of all is to see and watch a so-called Somali politician, who got extremely lucky to get elected as President of a state and has yet to understand his once in a life time opportunity to make a difference in his own country in need.

Ismail H. Warsame
WardheerNews Contributor
E-mail: ismailwarsame@gmail.com
Twitter: @ismailwarsame