Remembering Jalle Siyaad Barre

[AbdiWahab252]

His obituaries from different foreign papers. The man's dark side has to be recognized too:

Obituary:Siad Barre



BY RICHARD GREENFIELD


Mohamed Siad Barre, policeman, soldier, politician: born Shiilaabo, Ogaden, Abyssinian Somaliland c1910; Head of State, Somalia 1969-91; Secretary-General, Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party (SRP) 1976-91; married Khadija Maalin and Dalyad Haji Hashi; died Lagos 2 January 1995.

On the evening of 26 January 1991 Mohamed Siad Barre was forced by opponents of his regime to flee Mogadishu, the capital of Somalia, for his clan homelands. He did not give up his ambition of recapturing the city for many months, but, confronted by a vengeful Somali militia, and alarmed by disagreements between his own family and supporters, Siad eventually fled to Kenya. It was the end of his 22-year rule in Somalia, which had started as Socialist experimentation and degenerated into dictatorship.

For a time after his flight, Siad was accommodated in some style at the expense of the Kenyan government, but popular indignation and a press campaign led the Kenyan president, Daniel arap Moi, to refer the problem to the President of Nigeria, Maj-Gen Ibrahim Babangida, then also chairman of the Organisation of African Unity. Siad's entire party was evacuated by plane to Lagos, although some were refused refugee status and returned.

Although treated well by the Nigerian authorities, the fallen dictator was paid scant respect by the average Nigerian, and his home was robbed more than once. Unable to the end to accept responsibility for the famine and anarchy which has accompanied thesuccession struggle in Somalia, Siad died a frustrated and embittered man.

Siad was born in Shiilaabo, in the Ogaden area of Abyssinian Somaliland, now the Ethopian province of Haraghe, in about 1910. Siad's exact age has long been kept a state secret. His mother was Ogadeen and his father, who died when Siad was very young, was from the Marehan clan with which Siad more closely identified himself. As is still the custom, he was given a nickname by his fellow herdboys, ''Afweyne'' or ''Mighty Mouth'', which stuck with him for the rest of his life, despite subsequent efforts by sycophantic presidential aides to create alternatives, such as ''Father of Wisdom''.

Siad travelled to Lugh and Mogadishu in nearby Somalia Italiana for what formal schooling he had and then, in order to join the Corpo Zaptie, Polizia Africana Italiana, he adopted the Marehan town of Garbahaarey, within Somalia proper, as his supposed birthplace.

After British Commonwealth forces entering from Kenya overran the Italian colony early in 1941, Siad went on a course run by the King's African Rifles at Kabetti, in Kenya, and thereafter was employed in the special branch of the British Colonial Police,which took control of the Corpo Zaptie. This experience was his introduction to political intrigue, at which he proved adept. He rose to the highest rank then possible for an indigenous Somali.

The Allied powers could not agree on the disposal of Italy's former colonies and the issue had to be referred to the United Nations. Eventually, in 1949, Italy was granted United Nations Trusteeship over Somalia, to prepare for independence after 10 years. The Carabinieri returned and Siad was awarded a two-year scholarship to the Carabinieri Police College in Italy, and thereafter he attended courses in politics and administration in Mogadishu. He was the first Somali to be commissioned as a full polic e officer and was embarrassed to be Commander of Police in the Benadir province in 1958 when an active Egyptian diplomat, Kamal Ed Deen Saalah, was assassinated, when his security guard was mysteriously withdrawn.

In 1958, Somalia's own police force was formed, and by 1 July 1960, when Somalia became independent - uniting with the former British Somaliland Protectorate to form the Somali Republic - Siad had won accelerated promotion to the rank of Brigadier-General of Police. Siad opted for the Somali National Army on its formation in April 1960. He was one of its deputy commanders and was promoted to succeed the Commander-in-Chief when the latter died in 1965. Meantime successive fairly tolerant but complacent c ivilian regimes made the mistake of ignoring mounting public disquiet, especially over corruption levels. On 15 October 1969, President Abdurashid Ali Shermarke was assassinated. The crime may not have been politically inspired, but the national assembly dithered over his successor and in the early hours of 21 October, Siad led 20 army officers and five police officers in a bloodless coup d'tat.

Significant political figures were detained, the constitution suspended, the national assembly closed, political parties banned and the Supreme Court abolished. The country was renamed the Somali Democratic Republic and on 1 November the conspirators constituted themselves the Supreme Revolutionary Council (SRC).

Although, for the next few years at least, Siad took care to cultivate a consensus for successive changes, the path towards dictatorship was soon defined. Major-General Mohamed Siad Barre became head of state and chairman of the SRC, its politburo, the cabinet and the committees for defence, security and even judicial matters. During the ensuing 12 months, after which ''Scientific Socialism'' was pronounced (without public debate) the new national credo, potential rivals were detained and the Vice-Chair man of the SRC and two other influential leaders executed.

Statues to 'national heroes' were raised and, throughout the land, indoctrination centres introduced slogans and mass-mobilisation campaigns, stressing an end to feuds and conflict over water and grazing. They promoted self-reliance and literacy, a new Roman script having been introduced - a considerable achievement.

The complex security paraphernalia and the paramilitary organisations so typical of all repressive states, whether of the right or the left (and Somalia was a confused mixture of both), were installed. The new National Security Service (NSS) began to run its own interrogation and detention centres and even courts. Prison conditions for a growing number of political and other prisoners were uniformly harsh and torture was rife.

As early as 1963, Somalia had entered into a military aid agreement with the Soviet Union. The extent, if any, to which there had been Soviet participation in the planning of Siad's 1969 coup is still disputed but in 1974 Siad signed a treaty of co-operation with the Soviet Union.

The banks, insurance companies, electrical power production, petroleum distribution, sugar estates and the refineries were all nationalised, but not the banana plantations, in which there were substantial foreign interests. Socialist policies of state control over production, exports and imports were implemented through mushrooming but uneconomic state agencies.

Possibly as a counter against Soviet influence, but also with an eye on petro-dollar aid, Siad led Somalia into the League of Arab states in 1974. In that same year he was elected Chairman of the Organisation of African Unity. To his Soviet friends, however, he was proving unorthodox, more pragmatist than socialist. His Somali peers in turn recognised an addiction to raw intelligence and a growing pattern of concentrating power unto himself.

Siad's models were Nasser and Kim Il Sung, cult personalities rather than ideologues. He also openly admired the Chinese and held Sekou Toure of Guinea and Nicolae Ceausescu in the highest esteem.

The Soviets pressed Siad for the formation of a civilian ''vanguard'' party to which their intergovernmental co-operation and aid could more easily relate. In 1975, Siad announced a succession of largely cosmetic changes leading to the establishment, the following year, of the Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party (SRSP). Former SRC members, disdaining demilitarisation, nevertheless became the politburo, and a carefully screened party congress adopted a prepared constitution. Siad was ''chosen'' to be General Secretary of the Party, as well as head of state, and chairman of both its politburo and central committee.

Meantime, the Somali military forces had increased rapidly in size, technical ability and political influence - to the consternation of neighbouring Ethiopia, Kenya, the French in Djibouti and the United States. Yet this was a time when serious drought was striking the entire Horn of Africa. Moreover the Ethiopian empire seemed to be crumbling.

For years, Somalia had clandestinely assisted Somali, Oromo, Eritrean and other nationalities and organisations opposed to the central governments in Ethiopia and Kenya. In June 1977, the Somali Cabinet and the Central Committee of the Party authorised the Somali military to intervene directly in support of the Western Somali Liberation Front. The Somali army entered the Ogaden on 23 July 1977 and overran it. After a vast airlift of men and matriel, a Russian-directed Ethio-Cuban army speedily dispatch ed the Somali army back home. Siad - who had abrogated all his agreements with the Soviet Union and actually broken relations with Cuba - shared with his Irish-American doctor but few others the vain hope that President Carter would come to his aid. The Somali officer corps were livid: the country stunned.

Parallels are few in history where a president and his regime survive such humiliation. A bungled attempted coup in 1978 was brutally suppressed and the machinery of government was soon totally distracted and inundated by unprecedented flows of refugees tragically, but probably wisely, fleeing the reimposition of Ethiopian rule over the Ogaden. Subsequent challenges to Siad's leadership, although they often evoked nationwide sympathy, were almost invariably organisationally clan-based.

Siad came to rely more and more on his wider family, including his in-laws, and those of his clansmen who were military men rather than politicians or skilled bureaucrats. Their subsequent accelerated promotions wrecked army morale. As Siad's popularity further waned, these few followers urged even greater repression. The National Assembly was suspended. States of emergency and midnight arrests became the norm. Opposition organised itself militarily, even opting for the unthinkable - support from the leaders of the Ethiopian empire-state.

To Siad, the mnemonics of liberation fronts merely hid angry clan groupings. Once so identified, whole areas were devastated. Among the first to suffer were the Majeerteen. But it was confrontation with the Isaak, the largest clan in the north, which revealed the depths which Siad and his relative-generals were prepared to plumb. The word ''genocide'' came to be used by international human rights observers.

Then in May 1986 whilst Siad was being driven through blinding rain by the Mayor of Mogadishu, his car hit a bus and was promptly rammed from the back by a vehicle full of bodyguards. Local people rushed to help, but they were machine-gunned. Siad, in a coma, was saved by the hospital plane of the Saudi monarch, but another factor - a family squabble over succession possibilities - further complicated the political scene.

Siad decided that the time was ripe to make a deal with the Ethiopian leader, Col Mengistu. Neither could any longer spare troops to face down each other, when there was mounting civil conflict to which they could be transferred. Either side would cease to fuel the other's problems and restrain the ''dissidents'' on their territory. But before Mengistu could suppress the SNM (as he had the SSDF), the Somalis went home. Siad reacted without any restraint: Hargeisa, the nation's second city, and former capital of British Somaliland, and other cities of the north were strafed, rocketed and bombed. In 1988 and 1989 columns of refugees were not spared. The final countdown had begun.

On the domestic front, cynicism and disillusion reigned. Foreign aid, especially that meant for the overestimated but none the less enormous refugee population, came to be the national staple and humanitarian aid groups, and their protectors, a second government. For the West this was expensive and could not go on for ever. Official meetings with the ageing president, however, developed into tireless monologues and on occasion into degrading diatribes. A diabetic insomniac and a chain smoker, Siad frequently kept his weary ministers and officials up until dawn to no avail. Morale collapsed.

Meantime, greedy relatives and hangers-on occupied themselves by securing ever more uneconomic loans, foreign exchange advances and unfulfilled contracts. They poached and destroyed wild fauna on a prodigious scale, not only in Somalia but across her borders in Ethiopia and particularly Kenya. The trade in ivory was so vast and profitable that Siad's own family became deeply involved. Siad himself was not, however, much interested in amassing personal wealth, but he could be vindictive to anyone who opposed any member of his wider family.

The majority of the people had never been much impressed by the pomp and circumstance of state occasions. Despite popular toleration of gymnastic displays and spurious cultural shows, the ever popular traditional poets had as often as not paid scant respect for ''Afweyne''. But the machine- gunning of herds of domestic animals and the poisoning of wells was totally alien. Thus Siad's secret policies of divide and rule broke down. At home he simply ran out of clans. The Ogadeen, the Hawiya and even the heretofore quiet Rahanweyn deserted him. Abroad too - China, Libya, South Africa and (regrettably) Italy apart - he ran out of allies. Despite the natural timidity of the Department of State (its human rights desk quite excepted) the Congress was adamant: no human rights: no aid.

As 1990 drew to a close, angry rebels infiltrated the Somali capital to confront the heavily armed presidential guard (the red berets) drawn to a man from Siad's own Marehan clan.

Confronted by guerrilla groups and rebellious clans - the Majeerteen, Siad found that it was in fact the Somali peoples' God-fearing love of freedom and what has been aptly termed a culture of pastoral democracy, that brought him to the road's end. He dispatched most of his relatives to enjoy their often ill-gotten gains in their villas abroad, himself taking refuge in a bunker close by the capital's airport and the coral coastline of the Indian Ocean; the prelude to his last days in power. 'Mighty Mouth': over 20 years' rule, Siad led Somalia from Socialist experiment to dictatorship

Copyright 1995 The New York Times Company
The New York Times

January 3, 1995, Tuesday


Somalia's Overthrown Dictator, Mohammed Siad Barre, Is Dead


By GEORGE JAMES


Maj. Gen. Mohammed Siad Barre, who was overthrown as President of Somalia in 1991 after ruling that impoverished African country for more than 20 years, died yesterday in exile in Lagos, Nigeria.

Official accounts put his age near 74, but reference books place his birth variously between 1912 and 1920.

General Siad Barre's departure from the scene four years ago left Somalia without a central authority, on the brink of mass starvation and with a civil war among feuding clans and their militias.

As commander of the armed forces, he had taken control of Somalia, in the Horn of Africa, in 1969. The country of about nine million -- mostly nomads -- with a per capita income of about $175 a year is one of the most impoverished.

General Siad Barre's rule was marked by a war with Ethiopia, a flip-flop in political alliances from the Soviet Union to the United States, and growing allegations of human rights abuses.

In its final years, his Government steadily lost control of much of the countryside to the chiefs of warring clans, plunging the country into racking social and economic problems. Human rights groups issued reports citing a consistent pattern of political imprisonment, torture, political killings and discrimination against the Isaaks clan.

In May 1986, President Siad Barre was seriously injured in an automobile accident, but later that year he was nominated by the country's sole legal political party for re-election, ran uncontested and won a new seven-year term.

Yet there continued to be questions about the extent of his recovery. Reports of feeble health combined with the country's internal strife led to a weakening of his grasp on power, American officials believed. Toward the end, they said, he was struggling to arrange a succession that would insure that his family and clan -- the Marehan clan -- remained in power.

Many believed he was grooming his son, Maslah, who was a Soviet-trained army general.

Instead, Somalia was steeped in turmoil. United Nations and United States troops partly managed to open relief-supply lines to a famished population, but that costly effort, too, has yet to bring about a political solution and peace to the country.

According to his Government's version, General Siad Barre was born in 1919 or 1921. He was educated in private schools in Mogadishu, the capital, and attended the Military Academy in Italy and School of Administration and Politics in Somalia.

From 1941 to 1960 he served in the Somali Police Force and rose to the rank of chief inspector. In 1960, when the Somali Republic was created out of territories formerly ruled by the Italians and British, he was made a colonel and deputy commandant of the newly formed Somali National Army. He rose to brigadier general in 1962 and major general in 1966.

On Oct. 21, 1969, shortly after the President, Dr. Abdirashid Ali Shermarke, was assassinated by a police officer in a factional quarrel, General Siad Barre led a successful and bloodless coup. Assuming power, he espoused "scientific socialism," arguing there was no inconsistency with the principles of Islam, and turned to the Soviet Union for support.

In 1977, his army invaded the disputed Ogaden area of southeastern Ethiopia. At about the same time, Ethiopia split with the United States and became more closely aligned with the Soviet Union. With the help of Cuban troops and billions of dollars' worth of Soviet weapons, the Ethiopians turned back the Somalis in 1978.

General Siad Barre denounced the Russians and turned to the United States. Somalia received military and economic aid from the United States for a promise of American use of the port of Berbera on the Gulf of Aden. But aid declined drastically as allegations of human rights abuses rose. In 1989, Somalia revived contacts with Libya.

In May 1988, fierce fighting broke out in the north between the Government and rebels who contended they had been discriminated against by the Siad Barre Government and were fighting for a more democratic Government.

A report commissioned by the State Department and made public in September 1989 said the Somali Army "purposely murdered" at least 5,000 unarmed civilians over a 10-month period in the early phases. The Government denied the allegation.

More than 10,000 people were reported killed in the months that followed, with allegations that the Somali military had bombed towns and strafed fleeing residents.

Amnesty International said in August 1988 that since 1981 the Government had used torture and "widespread arbitrary arrests, ill treatment and summary executions" of civilians suspected of collaborating with the rebels.

In his last year in office, President Siad Barre promised reforms to introduce multi-party democracy.

In June 1990, a hundred prominent citizens signed a declaration called the Mogadishu Manifesto, calling for his resignation and the appointment of a transitional government pending free elections.

He called the manifesto "destructive," and jailed 45 of those who had signed it, but about a month later he ordered their release. He agreed to multi-party parliamentary elections to be scheduled in February but later canceled them and the civil war took its course.




Copyright 1995 Guardian Newspapers Limited
The Guardian

January 3, 1995

ARCHITECT OF MISERY

Obituary: Mohammed Siad Barre


By Patrick Gilkes


PRESIDENT Mohammed Siad Barre's dictatorial and tyrannical regime in Somalia came to a predictable end in January 1991, when he was forced to flee from his capital, Mogadishu, after months of fighting. It was typical, however, that he refused to accept the inevitable and retreated to his own home area in the west of the country, from where he made several efforts to fight his way back.

He was only forced out in April 1992, first into Kenya, and then to Nigeria after Kenyan MPs forced President Daniel Arap Moi to give up the idea of providing a refuge for such a discredited figure.

Siad Barre, who has died aged 74, came to power in rather different circumstances. Originally he was a policeman for the Italians before the second world war, then for the British, and again under the Italian mandate over Somalia. After independence in 1960, he became chief of police and was appointed vice -commander of the Somalian army and commander-in-chief in 1965. At the time of the constitutional crisis of 1969, following the assassination of President Abdel-Rashid Ali Shermarke he seemed a natural choice as figure-head for the army officers who had seized power.

The coup was bloodless, and popular in a country tired of the anarchic pluralist politics of the Somali clans. But its leaders underrated Siad Barre. Never highly regarded and referred to, somewhat disparagingly, as a "man of average intelligence and no formal schooling", he proved far more adept at political manipulation. It was not long before he had seized full control of the supreme revolutionary council.

His regime originally claimed it had come to remove tribalism, or its Somali equivalent, clanism, but it soon became apparent that little had changed. Siad Barre's regime, particularly when opposition appeared, was swift to reactivate clan links, and the alliance of his own Marehan, his uncle's Ogaden clan, and the Dolbuhunta clan of his son-in-law, formed the basis of his power.

In the first years he introduced an element of efficiency into Somali bureaucracy, coupled with his moves towards "scientific socialism", though he was never a convert. Socialism, as his alliance with the Soviet Union, was valued as a way to achieve control. He never managed to produce an acceptable blend of Marxism and Islam to satisfy the highly individualistic and Muslim Somalis.


He did, however, preside over the important introduction of a written Somali language, forcing acceptance of a Latin script. Literacy campaigns were a considerable success, but they were coupled with a huge personality cult. Siad's gaunt features loured over all offices and buildings and enormous hand-painted posters became a familiar sight in the streets.

Like others in the Horn of Africa he also managed to play off the great powers during the Cold War, having a close alliance with the Soviet Union until 1977, when Somalia went to war with Ethiopia over the Ogaden desert and the Soviets changed sides. Siad Barre then looked to the United States for support and, to a limited extent, obtained it. His attack on Ethopia had been popular and, surprisingly for a military dictatorship, he survived Somalia's defeat. But opposition increased as his regime became ever more ruthless in suppressing criticism and opposition. The US was not impressed by his human rights record and his support crumbled.

When Siad Barre came to power he found a capital city that was rundown and shabby; when he fled, 21 years later, he left a city still as shabby and rundown, but with the additional serious damage brought about by the artillery fire of his own troops. He had achieved little except to exacerbate Somalia's intractable clan differences. He had tried to project himself as a wise, avuncular leader, but his secretive, repressive and extensive security forces, gave the lie to the image.

He lived in constant fear of assassination, and his personal guard, drawn from his own clan were almost as paranoid. Although substantial funds found their way abroad during his regime, it was largely at the hands of his family. He himself lived frugally in Villa Somalia, the presidential palace. An insomniac and chain -smoker, he delighted in calling people for interviews in the middle of the night. It was an off-putting tactic that underlined the security and police background from which he never escaped.

Siad Barre's overwhelming desire was to have, and to hold on to, power at all costs. It was this that brought him down, and ultimately lies behind the disastrous events, and the on-going civil war in Somalia since he fell.

Mohammed Siad Barre, born 1919; died January 2, 1995

[abucubeed]

bottom line is he knew how to treat hyennas aka hutus

guulwadoo siyaad that is how we should remember the HERO

[Luq_Ganane]

And the old man Caydid died in a alley in Mogadishu like a LA drug peddler, after being shot by his own cousins.

[guhad122]

This is the man who destroyed our beloved country. My uncle was telling me the other night how many Somali elders, chiefs, Ugaases and Suldaans tried so hard to convince this guy to transfer the power before this got out of hand. Remember the first Manifesto? The Somali intellectuals and elders tried their best in persuading this guy to save the country. At that time, USC, SPM and SNM were advancing rapidly and these intellectuals knew that things were getting out of hand.

What Maxamed Siyaad Barre created is what is happening in Somalia now. He divided our people, created clan ideology on their minds, and made all of them thieves and politicians.

Ilaaheey ha u naxariisto Marxuumka laakiin he took Somalia with him Walaahay

[shidow1]

Hogayaha Guud Ee xisbiga Xantiwaathaga kacanka soomaliyet.....Eh na Mathahwayna Ummata somaliyet melkasta Xajogto......May God bless his sole..

[Alchemist]

[quote="guhad122"]This is the man who destroyed our beloved country. My uncle was telling me the other night how many Somali elders, chiefs, Ugaases and Suldaans tried so hard to convince this guy to transfer the power before this got out of hand. Remember the first Manifesto? The Somali intellectuals and elders tried their best in persuading this guy to save the country. At that time, USC, SPM and SNM were advancing rapidly and these intellectuals knew that things were getting out of hand.

What Maxamed Siyaad Barre created is what is happening in Somalia now. He divided our people, created clan ideology on their minds, and made all of them thieves and politicians.

Ilaaheey ha u naxariisto Marxuumka laakiin he took Somalia with him Walaahay[/quote]

My father was one of the man who signed the Manifesto that advised Sayid Barre (AUN)to transfer power.. The Manifesto was put together by all Somalis... Sayid Barre refused to accept the advice and put most of those man in prison including my father... Just imagine if he stepped down, there would have been no reason for the civil war.. In the end everything is written before hand though..

[shidow1]

Guys Cuugtat is no use.....every leader in Africa is a criminal they have their plus and minus......Anyway he was a simple of the somali people for quite sometimes.....let the old man rest in peace....

[Hiiraan boy]

caku habargidir. wali cuqdadi ceydiid bey qabaan nacala waxa tihina ku yaale

aw252 and alchemist are both habargidir

war habargidir iyo ceydiid killed kumanaan xawaadle and siad barre never killed xawaadle.

aw252 ciilka aan u hayay habargidir ha igu so celin.

[guhad122]

Walaahay my uncle was on that list too! Every Somali intellectual was on that list. Their advice was simple; just trasfer the power and save the country.

[Cali_Gaab]

This is starting to turn into a siyaad barre memorial service god dammit if this is in reference to kacanka 21st of October "Siyaad" Month you got 8 days of talking about the old man...

Siyaad barre
Las Canood
Muktaars references to homosexuality
Ina baxar
xamari gash poppin up here and there with primary school behaviour

Thats all you hear

[Luq_Ganane]

Alchemist,

You are in the same boat as A/Wahab. You nor your kind have no place in this kind of discussion. Your people literily ravaged the country, and after you finished you sat on your tails and pointed fingers at a man who's been dead for all these years. What losers. Debating Government/politics with you is like a White man in America debating with a black about who the founding Fathers of America were. It doesn't make sense.

[Luq_Ganane]

Gud-doqon,


Stop blaming dead men and 'Ilokyar' for your problems. Quit the calacal, moning, groaning and bijing and if you don't like your situation, xiniyo yeelo and do something about it and quit the nacnac.

[kambuli]

Guulwade Siyaad,
Aabihii Garashada Geyihaayagow,
Hantiwadaagu waa habkaa barwaaqo noo horseedeeyey,

I don't remember the rest.....

[Luq_Ganane]

Alchemist,

Keep in mind HG are where they are today because of yourselves. For years and years you guys were saying MSB (aun) was the Shaydan of Somalia, and you worshpped your Prophets, Caydid, Ina Caydid, Cusman Atto, Qeybidid and other qashin thinking they were going to free you and give you sharaf. Well, you see where it got you today. You were 100x better off under MSB, but I guess people learn the hard way.

[AbdiWahab252]

HiiraanBoy,

U are totally clueless and don't embarass your Xawadle with your nacnac talk.

Siyaad Barre did not kill Xawadle

Then why were the Xawadle the most support members of the USC starting from Mustaxiil ?

Luq,

Mengistu left quietly and look at Ethiopia now.