By Ahmed Khalif
The latest humiliating incident, on 19 February 2016 at the Jomo Kenyatta Airport in Nairobi in which the Kenyan Airport Security Authority detained the Somalia’s Prime Minister and his delegation for more than 12 hours, was a kick in the teeth to the Somalis all over the world (including Somali-Kenyans); it was a typical example of help to a foe in need.
Historically Kenya-Somalia relationship was modus vivendi at the best, at the daggers drawn oftentimes but never cordial. The seeds of this bad blood between them were sown by the British colonial rule as it lumped together a large portion of Somali lands (known today as North Eastern Region of Kenya or N.F.D) with another piece from Buganda lands to create what is today known as Kenya. The self-determination rights of the ethnic Somali people of this land were completely denied; and they were subjugated under the Kenyan rule, even after plebiscite was taken from them in which they raised their voices loud, and clear against that.
When the Republic of Somalia gained its independence, it tried to legally give a voice to its voiceless blood brothers in the international stages. Kenya on its side found a willing partner in the issue: Ethiopia under whom also ethnic Somali people of Ogaden – a vast territory in South Eastern of Ethiopia which also the British colonial rule give to her gratuitously – were, and still, languishing, and signed a defence pact with her. In their defence pact Kenya and Ethiopia declared Somalia as their common enemy and agreed to form a united front against any resistance from those ethnic Somali people under their occupations and from Somalia as well. Kenya never took a direct fight with Somalia, even though it was explicitly on the Ethiopia side in the wars between Ethiopia and Somalia; but now, after Somalia is debilitated by civil war and Ethiopia army is in there, Kenyan boots are first time in Somalia soil; vultures over the carcass scenario.
However, the humiliations and the intimidations that the Kenya Authority subjects to the Somalis are not something that newly started; it is an old tradition; thousands of pages can be written about it but in here we can only mention a few. In April 2014 thousands of ethnic Somalis (Kenyan or Somali nationals), from all walks of life, were rounded up from the streets, hotels, their homes, and their businesses in Nairobi into concentration-camp-alike sports stadium where they were held and abused in months in the name of national security, until eventually small number of them were deported to Mogadishu.
On April 27, 2014, the Consular general of the Somali Embassy in Kenya, Siyad Mohamud Shire, was arrested by police and was only released after he was interrogated. Earlier in January of the same year Ilyas Yusuf Warsame, a secretary the Somali Embassy, was arrested by police.
Multitudes of abuses, rapes, extortions, robberies, illegal incarcerations, and killings are reportedly subjected to the Somalis ( both Somali refugee and legal immigrants as well as Somali-Kenyans) in Kenya; even mass graves of summary executions were recently discovered in the Somali inhabited North Eastern region of Kenya.
Earlier, on September 19, 2003 – while so called Somali Reconciliation Conference was going on in Nairobi – the former President of Kenya Daniel Arap Moi, in his speech at the American Defence University in Washington, in plain words stated that Kenya and Ethiopia were always hindrances, not a help, to the Somalia peace process. That was not a slip of tongue but an illuminating truth which still holds true to this day.
The bad blood between Somalia and Kenya will pale into the background compared to the one between Ethiopia and Somalia; Ethiopia claims the whole Somali inhabiting peninsula (including Djibouti, NFD, and Somalia), let alone consenting to the self-determination rights of the Somali people in the Ogaden region; Ethiopia believes that it can’t co-exist with Somalia whatsoever; it believes Somalia’s demise is its existential condition, a believe that Kenya also shares with her. They [Ethiopia and Kenya] are in the process of eliminating Somalia for good; a chance they would hardly want to miss when it presents itself; thus, their soi-disant peace keeping mission in Somalia today is a paradox and an absolutely ridicules.
Kenya’s frequent embarrassing of the top Somali government officials and diplomats display the tremendous credibility gap in its peace mission in Somalia; in depreciating the same government that it asserts it’s on its rescue, Kenya bears its absolute duplicity.
Kenya’s actions are obviously well planned; it apparently tests the waters by frequently gauging the feelings of Somalis before taking a bigger action; as long as the Somalis do not react to small embarrassment it steadily marches to disgrace them more.
As regards the Somalis, all wounds of honour, it is said, are self-inflicted. No one can take your honour away or grant it to you except yourself; in other words you are simply treated by the others in the way you treat yourself; you are to be respected by others only when you respect yourself; even God helps only those who help themselves. Somalis put themselves very low; they literally put themselves at the feet of their enemy and expect a mercy be showered upon them. Instead of defending their sovereignty and dignity, they keep eating up themselves, like the proverbial cats of Kilkenny, until only wriggling tails and broken nails remained from them. As the old wisdom says: “Those whom god wishes to destroy first lost their minds.” today, Somalis seem that their minds are taken away.
As a Somali, such humiliations of the top Somali government officials and diplomats make my blood run cold; the way Somalis are persecuted in Kenya and humiliated all over the world extremely saddens me; yet it is for sure, if we, Somalis, don’t draw a line in the sand that can’t be crossed, there will be more humiliations to come.
Somalis, so far, are taking the humiliations with their hands down; it looks like we forget that freedom (honour and dignity) cannot be bestowed but it can only be achieved through blood, sweat and tears.
After all, it is a for sure thing that neither Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda, UN, AU, AMISOM, Al-shabab, nor Ahlusuna will restore the Somalia’s lost reputation in the world stage; and whoever awaits that from them is barking up the wrong tree. They are foreign conspirators working hand in hand in the destructions of Somalia; the proof of that are their actions.
It is only we, Somalis, who can repair our tarnished name by showing love and respect for ourselves then everybody else, have to love and respect us; but so long we hate and kill each other everybody else will hate and kill us. The world will simply treat us the way we treat ourselves.
Defeat, it is said, is a state of mind; one is defeated only when he/she accepts defeat. It is also said that, failure is not falling down but failing to try to get up; anyone can fall down but only he who gives up trying to get up fails. Dear brothers and sisters; we are in an imminent danger, an existential one but still we can avert it; and only WE, Somalis, can stop it; let us throw the yoke of the tribalism, the shackles that fettered us down; let us put on the patriotic mettle, throw our fists up in the sky and say: SOMALIA HA NOOLAATO! And we will win.
Ahmed Khalif
Email:Ahmedkhalif@yahoo.com