     Guhaad | Friday, February 02, 2001 - 06:17 pm
I.M. Lewis's Retired Ideas and Somalia
IProfessor Abdi Ismail Samatar
Department of Geography
University of Minnesota
Dr. I. M. Lewis's recent (January 18, 2001) diatribe against the United Nations (UN), David Stephen, its special representative to Somalia, and Djibouti is another unfortunate signal of a retired anthropologist who is unable to comprehend that the Somali world is beyond his grasp. His praise for the European Union (EU) is self-congratulatory note: he concocted an EU funded conference that failed to attract Somali attention and support. As the Somali saying goes " Nin is amaaney wa ri is nuugtay."
Mr David Stephen, the UN Secretary General's Special Representative to Somalia
He criticizes the United Nations for not heeding what most Somalis are saying and want. This statement is identical to one made over a year ago by a former colonial officer regarding the Djibouti initiative. Lewis pronounces that "All those who have the interest of the Somali people at heart. should endeavor to understand how much progress in Somaliland and Puntland has been achieved." He adds "As every Somali knows Mr. Abdulqasim's government is indeed so unwelcome in Mogadishu ." [The fact is that tens of thousand of Mogadishu resident came out to receive Abdulqasim when he arrived at Mogadishu airport, contrary to Lewis's illusions].
Further "Whatever the Italian foreign office may image, in the wider Somali view." Careful reading of these statements indicates that Lewis either represents Somalis or knows all of us well or is in such an intimate touch with the Somali public that he can make such unsubstantiated declarations.
Only an arrogant and unreconstructed old fashioned anthropologist would be
blind enough to assume that he could speak for the native in 2001.
This brief note engages Lewis's three main declarations and not many of the
other more trivial statements in his texts. First, he claims that "social service provision and of representative government, though by no means perfect, far exceed what was achieved under the repressive dictatorship of General Mohamed Siyad Barre (in which the leaders of the Arta faction served) and are to some extend superior even to that of earlier civilian regimes (which I knew very well)." Lewis should realize that many of those who run the so-called "Balayo-lands" served Siyaads' regime. If people are guilty by association, then Lewis must be culpable of the crimes committed by colonial foot soldiers. This is not in defense of anyone in Transitional National Government (TNG) who has committed crimes before and after 1991, but to show the flaw in Lewis's logic. I can speak directly to the quality of services former civilian governments provided. I was a schoolboy in Somalia under the civilian governments maligned by the British colonial anthropologist. The educational services those governments delivered with meager resources were, almost, second to none. I wish the sectarian entrepreneurs in Hargeisa and Garowe could match health, education, post, public works, etc., of yesteryears. I still have in my possession post delivered letters to my school dormitories in Gabileh Intermediate and Amoud Secondary schools. No such services exist today in the north and northeast.
The trouble with Lewis and his acolytes is that they are so ungrounded in
the reality of these two regions. Ironically, Egal is doing a better job today in Hargeisa than he did in Mogadishu as Somalia's Prime Minister, if one is to believe Lewis's claims! To think of the leaders of Hargeisa and Garowe as representative democrats shows how far removed the retired professor is from Somali plight.
Second, Lewis accuses the UN of imposing the Djibouti conference and its
outcome on the Somali people ". Whatever may have been acceptable in the
colonial period, it is not the business, of any UN official, to make Judgements which, in effect, dictate to Somalis how they should identify or govern themselves." Unless Lewis is a Somali citizen, I wonder what we should make of his agenda for us? He certainly has the right to criticizes the government of Djibouti for feeling our pain and organizing the peace conference but it is illegitimate and smacks of colonial smugness to be told that the UN did Arta for us. Lewis's democratic heroes in Hargeisa and Garowe had every opportunity to attend the conference and partake in the democratic debate, but declined to participate because they were not given the power to craft the conference agenda and veto its outcome. I wonder what Lewis makes of the large number of people from the northeast and west that participated in the conference? The professor of anthropology apparently knows better!
Third, the old anthropologist attempts to discredit the Arta conference by claiming that "the Arta process in Djibouti embraced a wide range of participants including a number of notorious warlords and even 'street boys' recruited from Djibouti town to swell the numbers. Many genuine leaders and representatives, including those in Somaliland and Puntland as well as the principal despotic warlords in Mogadishu chose to boycott. " Lewis fails to grasp that the process was open to all key organs of Somali civil society and their leaders. It was not the Djibouti government that selected the participants, but the communities they represented. The government's meager resources were stretched to their limits to accommodate the vast number of people who came to participate in the onference. Consequently, the Djibouti government had no need to invent phantom ghosts to pad the register. The purpose of letting all key (willing and able) actors participate in the deliberations in Arta was to make the project as inclusive as possible and bring communities and contestants together. Lewis is apparently uninitiated in the area of conflict resolution. He needs to update his scholarship on this front if he expects to be taken seriously. It will serve him well to read works that deal with the South African negotiations, but I am afraid
this might be a tall order for an anthropologist marooned to the days of "British Somaliland."
Finally, Lewis failed the Somali people for forty plus years when he was an active academic. Although Somalia provided him scholarly raw material and
earned him a good living, his legacy for our country and people is sterile and retired ideas. We wish him well in his retirement and urge him to find something else to occupy his remaining years. Somalia does not need more exhausted ideas and advice as it has enough of its own.
Professor Abdi Ismail Samatar
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UN Paperclips for Somalia
Ioan M. Lewis FBA
Emeritus Professor of Anthropology
London School of Economics
18 January, 2001
Mr David Stephen, the UN Secretary General's Special Representative to Somalia
Mr David Stephen’s press release on Somalia (11 January 2001) lacks serious analysis of the current political dynamics of the country. Progress has been made in Somalia, he claims. Yes, indeed. But hardly as a result of UN initiative, and particularly not due to the Arta peace process’.
As Mr Stephen(the UN Secretary General’s Special Representative) neglects to mention, but as everyone with any familiarity with the actual situation knows, the greatest progress in rebuilding civil society has been achieved in the breakaway Republic of Somaliland and in the locally autonomous state of Puntland. In these two cases, standards of social service provision and of representative government, though by no means perfect, far exceed what was achieved under the repressive dictatorship of General Mohamed Siyad Barre(in which the leaders of the Arta faction served) and are to some extent superior even to that of earlier civilian regimes(which I knew well).
We live in an era of liberation and self-determination where such spontaneous local achievements should be cherished and encouraged, particularly, one would expect, by the international community. Whatever may have been acceptable in the colonial period, it is not the business, of any UN official, to make judgements which, in effect, dictate to Somalis how they should identify or govern themselves. At least the EU had the good sense to seek to build upon the local Somali political units which are now forming spontaneously rather than to foster grandiose efforts to re-impose an archaic colonial structure that failed conspicuously to deliver ‘good government’ in the past. All those who have the interests of the Somali people at heart(and by no means all Somali politicians have that!) should endeavour to understand how progress in Somaliland and Puntland has been achieved and how their successes might be replicated in the troubled south. By the same token, if the Italian ambassador spent more time studying these achievements rather than in patronisingly urging northern leaders to recognise Abdulqasim he might be in a position to make a more useful contribution to Somali affairs.
Far from being ‘based on the clan elders’ as Mr Stephen blandly states, the ‘Arta process in Djibouti’ embraced a wide range of participants including a number of notorious warlords and even ‘street boys’ recruited from Djibouti town to swell the numbers. Many genuine leaders and representatives, including those in Somaliland and Puntland(where the local elders have actually played a crucial role in peace-making and government)—as well as the principal despotic warlords in Mogadishu—chose to boycott the proceedings which, therefore, cannot obviously be described as nationally inclusive. This, naturally, restricts the validity of any decisions taken in Arta which are, in any case, of dubious constitutional legality. The Arta conference outcome, the self-styled ‘transitional national government’ is consequently, a tenuous minority enterprise, very far from enjoying the degree of national support inside Somalia which Mr Stephen claims, and hence appropriately lacking the international backing the Special Representative misleadingly reports. As every Somali knows, Mr Abdulqasim’s ‘government’ is indeed so unwelcome in Mogadishu that, despite the assistance of some of his local business cronies, its members have to shelter like prisoners in heavily guarded hotels. They cannot even utilise the clan’s Habar Ghidir airport outside the city without expensive militia escorts .It is hardly surprising that, consequently, despite the difficulties and expense of getting out, there should be a steady seepage of his assemblymen, and even some ministers, defecting to their home regions or elsewhere. Who can blame them.
The main current focus of conflict is ,however, in the Rahanwin region which, prior to Arta, was developing local autonomy along the lines of Puntland.. This in part reflects the fact that although Mr Stephen’s proteges agreed to establish their new ‘government’’s headquarters in the Rahanwin centre of Baidoa, they cavalierly reneged on this agreement and, in bad faith, sought to insert themselves amongst Abdulqasim’s own clansmen in Mogadishu. Mr Stephen speaks rather grandly of ‘federalism’—but the actual public statements of Mr Abdulqasim and his ministers have, on the contrary, emphasised their commitment to a unitary state which would incorporate Somaliland and Puntland whatever the wishes of the citizens there. This hardly augurs well for the ‘peace process’ (an empty piece of rhetoric) ‘reaching out’ successfully to embrace those communities. Here, again, we see how this premature and poorly thought-out UN ‘peace-building’ initiative is already proving counter-productive. It is not only contributing directly to the deteriorating security situation in southern Somalia, but also—and very understandably in the light of Abdulqasim’s and his associates’ involvement in Siyad’s brutal military suppression of the north—in reinforcing local nationalism in Somaliland and Puntland.
The most pressing problem is as usual, of course, in Mogadishu itself, now dominated by the Habar Ghidir invaders who overthrew Siyad and seized most of the property that is worth seizing (including women from minority groups). Mr Stephen speaks of the lack of ‘land writs’, presumably meaning written titles to property. Actually, this is one of the most explosive of all issues in the south and can only begin to be addressed in the context of a general political settlement amongst all the factions in the city(including Abdulqasim’s). Some of those who hold this stolen property, and who will not readily release it, are reportedly merchants whose opportunistic support for Abdulqasim is based on understandings that in return for their backing they can continue to hold what they have seized. The notion that written documents are all that is needed to resolve these issues is simplistic: those who illegally hold property will quickly manufacture documents to authorise their holdings. Indeed, earlier land registration programmes in southern Somalia resulted in most cases in powerful urban interests grabbing land from impoverished owners. These problems cannot be effectively dealt with piecemeal. They require a general political settlement in Mogadishu which could only hope to succeed if it demonstrated that it would actually be to the benefit of all the parties there to share (e.g. through tax apportionment) the resources(airport and port etc) which they currently control separately. Unfortunately, there is so far no indication that, despite the commercial interests which bind their leaders, Abdulqasim’s ‘transitionals’ possess the authority and influence to achieve this first step towards order and rehabilitation in Mogadishu. Whatever the Italian foreign office may imagine, in the wider Somali view(which is rather more important), it is only when these local issues are resolved that Mogadishu will have any legitimate claim to serve again as a Somali capital.
In the meantime, environmental abuse and illegal fishing along the Somali coast are topics where imaginative UN action could actually be of some use. Other than that, on current performance, rather than meddling in Somalia’s internal politics, perhaps the UN should limit its no doubt well-intentioned efforts to remedying the bureaucrat’s nightmare highlighted by Mr Stephen—the absence of paper-clips!
I.M. Lewis
London School of Economics
18 January 2001 |
