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Opinions expressed in this column are those of the contributors and not necessarily those of SW. ".....What the UN calls a government has not been legally elected by the Somali public. It is merely an idiosyncratic selection of participants, belonging to--but not actually representing--different clans, from the Djibouti conference bazaar, whose protracted proceedings were dominated by ex-ministers of the discredited regime of the corrupt dictator General Mohammed Siyad Barre—many of whom Somalis accuse of war crimes. Somalia today has broken into three parts (one more is in formation) : the self-governing ‘Somaliland Republic’ (now ten years old) and the neighbouring Puntland Somali state. These two regions with their locally elected governments, comprise about at least a third of the total population of Somalia. Their leaders, like the ‘official’ warlords of southern Somalia boycotted the conference and another group(the Rahanwein), representing a fifth to a third of the total population, have now also withdrawn their support to form their own local government. In reality, the UN’s Somali ‘president’, with his Islamicist supporters and mercenary militia, controls only a small part of the former capital, Mogadishu, and that is far from secure! Even the UN radio station, recently set up in Mogadishu, with intense propaganda reminiscent of earlier UN operations in Somalia, and directed by a brother of the new ‘President’ and relayed through the BBC Somali service in London (whose senior editor is another member of the clan)cannot disguise the alarming descent into chaos which UN intervention is producing. Externally, despite all the propaganda produced by the UN to secure international recognition for their protege, the response to date has rightly been cautious. Although it is apparently receiving some material support from Arab sources, only the Sudan, sensitive to Mr Abdulkasim’s Islamicist flavour, has so far recognised his regime. The local super-power, Ethiopia, with many interests in Somalia, is more circumspect and has shown little inclination to follow suit..." IM Lewis 29Oct00 UN 'Peace Conference' Creates New Somali Warlord and Re-ignites Somali Wars Ioan M. Lewis FBA Emeritus Professor of Anthropology 24 October, 2000
UN efforts to secure a government for Somalia through the deeply-flawed ' Peace Conference', recently concluded in neighbouring Djibouti, have already re-ignited armed conflict in the south of the country. Less than a week since Mr. Abdulkasim Salad Hassan, hailed by the UN as Somalia’s new ‘President’, announced his team of’ministers’, it is clear that the UN has in fact created a new military faction which is busy importing arms from Yemen to challenge the established warlords in the south. What the UN calls a government has not been legally elected by the Somali public. It is merely an idiosyncratic selection of participants, belonging to--but not actually representing--different clans, from the Djibouti conference bazaar, whose protracted proceedings were dominated by ex-ministers of the discredited regime of the corrupt dictator General Mohammed Siyad Barre—many of whom Somalis accuse of war crimes. Ironically, despite the prominence of these military figures, the UN mandarins whose input has been so crucial, have continued to claim that the conference brought together only ‘representatives’ of ‘civil society’ in Somalia, selected by the ‘local elders’ meeting in the time-honoured manner in the peaceful shade of trees, in the desert. Actually, in addition to their dubious backgrounds and far from this idyllic image, almost half those who sought their fortunes in the torrid heat of Djibouti are political refugees living outside Somalia, and cannot safely return to the areas inside Somalia which they claim to represent! The conference was also highly unrepresentative in terms of current political demography. Somalia today has broken into three parts (one more is in formation) : the self-governing ‘Somaliland Republic’ (now ten years old) and the neighbouring Puntland Somali state. These two regions with their locally elected governments, comprise about at least a third of the total population of Somalia. Their leaders, like the ‘official’ warlords of southern Somalia boycotted the conference and another group(the Rahanwein), representing a fifth to a third of the total population, have now also withdrawn their support to form their own local government. In reality, the UN’s Somali ‘president’, with his Islamicist supporters and mercenary militia, controls only a small part of the former capital, Mogadishu, and that is far from secure! For Mr. Abdulkkasim’s prospects of ever ruling Somalia to be taken seriously, he would have to have assembled a truly remarkable team of people, and proposed dynamic new policies to capture widespread popular support and trust. This is very far from being the case. Headed by former ministers of General Siyad’s discredited regime, the new ‘government’ includes several notorious figures as well as others who are almost unknown to the Somali public. Its organisation follows closely the old centralist pattern of Siyad’s days, and contains no genuine innovations of the far-reaching kind that would be required if rebuilding the shattered state of Somalia were a serious objective. There is not even a token woman. Crucially, and here the UN has a lot to answer for, there was no recognition of the need to accommodate the separate Somali states in the north. The public response in Mogadishu to the announcement(on 20th October) of this lacklustre crew was predictably unenthusiastic, and the major warlords ominously declared that they did not recognise Mr Abdulkasim’s UN-sponsored ‘government’. Externally, despite all the propaganda produced by the UN to secure international recognition for their protege, the response to date has rightly been cautious. Although it is apparently receiving some material support from Arab sources, only the Sudan, sensitive to Mr Abdulkasim’s Islamicist flavour, has so far recognised his regime. The local super-power, Ethiopia, with many interests in Somalia, is more circumspect and has shown little inclination to follow suit. This unfortunate and retrograde UN intervention in Somalia’s internal politics, is extremely untimely. Prior to the formation of the new UN faction, the situation in Mogadishu and the south was relatively calm, with signs that local peace-making efforts(the only kind that ever work in Somalia) were producing results, and the model for local state-formation provided by Somaliland and Puntland in the north was attracting increasing attention in the turbulent south. Now thanks to the UN intervention, the scales are tipped again towards violence. The past few days have already seen a number of political assassinations and kidnappings in Mogadishu of members of the new administration. With the provocation of the new faction, it is difficult to see how serious bloodshed can now be avoided. Even the UN radio station, recently set up in Mogadishu, with intense propaganda reminiscent of earlier UN operations in Somalia, and directed by a brother of the new ‘President’ and relayed through the BBC Somali service in London (whose senior editor is another member of the clan)cannot disguise the alarming descent into chaos which UN intervention is producing. Who supports this disturbing new twist in Somalia’s tangled history? Who benefits? Outside the locally autonomous northern Somali states(Somaliland and Puntland), many southern Somalis would welcome a credible Somali government which could be trusted to pursue the public interest—but not a recycling of Siyad’s rapacious, corrupt colleagues. Outsiders, especially in the UN and parts of the EC, evidently don’t care what kind of governance Somalia has as long as it has a government. In part to extend their own domains, their bureaucrats, particularly, need Somali counterparts. In addition to these considerations on the part of officials, EU member states which cannot readily absorb their Somali asylum-seekers, are desperate to ship them back to Somali jurisdiction. For this they need to have a Somali government in place. For their part, given their earlier unsuccessful intervention in Somalia—in which Mr Kofi Anan was involved personally—the desperate UN attempt to establish a Somali government and save face can also be understood. But this is no excuse for this gratuitously inappropriate attempt to re-impose centralist rule, on the failed Siyad model, and contrary to the more realistic policy of building upwards from local Somali developments on the ground. The future, I am convinced, lies in the spontaneous further development of these organic local political formations, not in imported Eurocentric quick political fixes: but the UN never seems to learn. |
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