The SSC Leaders are Somali Unionists,
not Terrorists
By Ali H. Abdulla
Dec. 24, 2010
Dugsi Malaha Qabyaaladu waxay dumiso moyaane.
Tribalism does not offer shelter. It only destroys things. Timadde
In an organizational behavior class for my MBA degree in the United States, we had an old professor who liked to tell us riveting stories to hammer complicated subjects into our young minds. One of the stories he told us was about an old Jewish merchant in Germany who had a grocery store. The old man was harassed every day by a German boy who stood in front of his store shouting slurs and repeating the word Jew over and over again. The wise old man devised a clever scheme to get the boy off his back. One day he approached the boy directly and offered him a coin as a reward for his relentless behavior. The old man kept his promise and the boy got rewarded for his daily ritual. After several days, the boy stopped coming and the old man enjoyed a well deserved peace and quiet. This was not a bribe but a manipulation of Human behavior. The kick the boy got from the insults was weakened by the reward he got and the feeling was no longer the same. The boy insulted the Jew to offend and hurt him. The payment he received for his effort gave the message that the Jew was not bothered by the insults.
I wonder if the same technique would work with a clannish Somali Cyber Warrior who has become adept at smearing the leaders SSC, one of the mushrooming Somali enclaves known as the Lands: Somaliland, Puntland Galmudugland, Makhirland, Banadirland, Jubaland etc., all based on clan affiliations to the detriment of the Somalia State. Maybe he should be offered a reward for every article he writes about the SSC which seems to have become his specialty.
In a recent article, Mr. Kahin attacked the President of SSC, a new regional administration that is sandwiched between two mature regional administrations that both claim it, Puntland and Somaliland. Puntland uses the clan card to claim the territories although it failed to defend that claim after being routed by forces loyal to the Somaliland administration that also claims the area as part of the old British Protectorate. Jama Ghalib argues that the Dhulbahante never signed the treaties of protection with the British like the other tribes in Somaliland and therefore are justified in not recognizing the borders drawn by the colonial powers when they divided Somalia into five parts. Somaliland tries to use these borders to convince the World Community to recognize its unilateral secession from the Somali Republic. It is a weak argument that only draws blank stares from world leaders.
Normally, I would not dignify Mr. Kahin's article with a rebuttal but the Internet has become a dangerous source of false information where people like Kahin spread all kinds of propaganda against their imagined or real enemies. Because of its anonymous nature, Kahin is probably a pseudonym, and the difficulty of suing some one for libel, the web has become the perfect place for people like Kahin to spread their venom and propaganda against their perceived enemies. Junior research Analysts interested in Somalia would probably come across such material and use them as fact. Searching Google News for Somaliland for example would pick up Kahin's article, and an unwary researcher would find it and most probably take it at face value. Luckily, more seasoned and savvy organizations like the CIA and the FBI, which Kahin prays for paying attention to his accusations, would put such articles through the rigors expected of them and question the motives behind such baseless accusations. If that were not the case, thousands of innocent people would end up in Gitmo. Although Mr. Kahin lives in a Western democracy, Canada, he fails to comprehend the gravity of using heresy and libel against innocent people.
Mr. Kahin accuses Mr. Saleeban Essa, the president of SSC of being a terrorist affiliated with the Alshabab, an extermist organization wreaking havoc in Somalia after taking over from the predatory warlords, who starved innocent people to death. They, however, introduced another from of suffering that threatens the very existence of Somalia as a viable nation. The reckless behavior of the Shabab continues to threaten the sanctity of Somalia and may eventually lead to the break up of Somalia into tiny enclaves. The West, wary of Islamic extremism, would have no qualms supporting a number of small Somali States such as Somaliland and Puntland, although a United and Strong Somalia would be a better solution for preventing such extremism from spreading to the rest of the Horn of Africa.
SSC stands for three regions in Northern Somalia known as Sool, Sanaag and Ayn. Although Mr. Kahin has coined a new name for these regions, PSSC or part SSC, referring to the fact that some areas of these regions are inhabited by other clans also, the areas are mainly inhabited by the Dhulbahante, a sub-clan of the major Darod family, one of the four major Somali clan families. Mr. Kahin is from the Issak clan-family some of whom seek breaking away from Somalia after fighting a destructive civil war with the forces of the Siad Barre Regime that collapsed in 1991. The majority of the the Issak-clan family are understandably wary of a Somalia dominated by the other three clan-families, The Darod, the Hawiye and the Rahanweyn. The hardliners, such as Kahin, fight for a separate homeland dominated by their clan-family. Mr. Faisal Ali Warabe, the Chairman of one of the three clan-based political parties in Somaliland openly called for ethnically cleansing the Dhulbahante from Somaliland if they refused to join an Issak-dominated independent enclave. Warabe and his admirers have coined a new phrase in Somali “Dhul ma Guuree, Dadkaa Guura”, It is easier to move the people than the land. Such behavior is tantamount to terrorism and should attract the attention of the International Court of Justice and Mr. Okambo. The seemingly democratic political parties admired by some western think tanks are no more than clan-based entities that put clan interests above national interests. Even the recent seemingly free and fair elections in Somaliland had major flaws and were not held in the SSC regions which resisted such elections that have a long term goal of dividing Somalia.
Even the most famous religious cleric in Somaliland, Sheikh Adan Siro, openly entices his audience in his fiery Friday sermons to fight for keeping the SSC regions within Somaliland. For example, in one of his sermons he advised the Somaliland regime to send 500 Issak boys to SSC to marry from the Dhulbahante to emulate the behavior of the Prophet of Islam who used to marry from the tribes fighting against him as a method of pacifying them and enticing them to join Islam. The Sheikh probably regards the Dhulbahante as infidels who are in need of converting to Islam, ignoring the fact that the Dhulbahante lost thousands of people in the struggle for Somali Independence. Were it not for these brave dervishes, he would probably be giving his sermon in a church instead of the Hawadle mosque in Hargeisa.
This is a small sample of the numerous tactics employed by the hard-liners in Somaliland to terrorize innocent people who refuse to be dragged into a secessionist enclave that can only make matters worse and plunge Somalia into another prolonged civil war. There are many Issak people who are opposed to the concept and I apologize to them if they feel offended by this article which basically tries to reveal the ugly face of the hard-liners. Jama Ghalib, Osman Jama Kallun, Mohamed Abdullahi Oomaar, The Jirde Huseein Family and thousands of ordinary people in Somaliland directly oppose the ugly tactics employed by the hard-liners. Sadly, most of them would be arrested and thrown into jail were they to visit their home towns in Somaliland. Even Dr. Sifir, an aging Somaliland statesman who used to be opposed to the Somaliland secession had to apply for a special presidential pardon from Silanyo, the former Chairm of the rebel movement that contributed to the destruction of Somalia and the current president of the secessionist enclave, in order to spend the rest of his life in his homeland. Mr. Omaar, the current Foreign Minister of the Somali Republic, almost ended up in the infamous Mandhera Jail when he stopped at Berbera airport in transit to Mogadishu.
As for Mr. Essa, he is a Law-abiding US citizen who ran a successful business in his adopted country, the USA, after fleeing Somalia when it descended into chaos. In October 2009, he was invited to Nairobi, Kenya, to attend a conference organized by a group of businessmen from the SSC regions. The agenda of the conference was to form a regional administration for these regions that are landlocked and have no access to the sea, and suffered from perennial neglect for decades. SSC residents lagged behind all the neighboring Somali regions that organized themselves after the collapse of the Somali government. The educated elite of SSC either migrated to other countries or sought jobs in the neighboring administrations such as Somaliland and Puntland neglecting their own territories and people who have become pawns in the counter claims of Puntland and Somaliland. In a meeting with Mark Bowden, the UNDP Resident Representative and Designated Official for Somalia in Kenya, his staff admitted neglecting these regions and considered them as disputed territories. The SSC areas have been no-go zones for relief agencies for the last 20 years.
The SSC conference in Nairobi aimed at rectifying the miserable situation of the SSC regions and elected Mr. Essa and his deputy Mr. Sabarey to lead a team of professionals to tackle development and security issues in the area. Mr. Essa has even fallen out with many of his compatriots who sought immediate armed struggle to liberate the SSC regions from the occupying Somaliland forces. His approach so far has been conciliatory and politically based. He traveled to Mogadishu with the 19th Senior Sultan of the Dhulbahante, Garad Jama Garad Ali Garad Jama, and met with members of the Somali government there. If Mr. Essa is an AlShabab affiliated terrorist, then Sheikh Sahrif and his Prime Minister Mr. Farmago are terrorists also. In his misleading article, Mr. Kahin argues that members of the Somali Transitional Federal Parliament warned against the danger of the SSC group and its close relationship with the AlShabab failing to mention that those members are from Somaliland. In my humble opinion, these members deserve to be impeached from the Federal Parliament as they are guilty of supporting a secessionist enclave against a Unionist group, the SSC.
Mr. Essa has also met with members of the US Embassy staff in Nairobi to brief them about the objectives of the SSC and they are very much aware about his direct role in the SSC struggle for unifying Somalia and resisting a forced secession against his people. Recently, the former Prime Minister of Somalia, Dr. Ali Khalif Galaydh has endorsed the SSC as a viable solution for preventing potential conflicts between Somaliland and Puntland over these regions. It is unthinkable for a respected professor and a former Somali Prime Minister to endorse a terrorist organization.
The real terrorists are those who destroyed the Somali Government with clan motivation. The clan-based militias such as the SNM, SSDF and the USC were all terrorist organizations that played a major role in destroying the Somali government and the subsequent chaos in Somalia. Warlordism, Piracy, Islamic Extremism, Starvation, Human trafficking are all the fruits of the actions of these terrorist organizations that are now trying hard to transform themselves into independent countries. All of them, with out any exceptions, used the ugly clan card to entice their followers to rise up against the government. This is in sharp contrast to the EPRDF of Ethiopia which had a national agenda instead of a clan agenda. The Ethiopians went on to build a strong Federal government comprised of nine ethnic groups that speak many different languages while the clan-based Somali rebels such as the SNM went on to dismantle the Somali State and created a major headache for the International Community.
Mr. Kahin tries to paint the SSC leadership as terrorists although they have never killed any innocent civilians and are trying hard to avoid bloodshed. The SSC is for uniting the Somali people while the SNM and its die-hard followers, such as Kahin, Siro and Warabe are out to destroy Somalia.
Mr. Kahin in a similar article boasts that he visited Las Anod, the Capital of the SSC regions which is under occupation by the secessionist forces of Mr. Silanyo. In that visit, he claims to have met an old man who denied the presence of Issak forces in the city. We all know that in statistics, you need a reasonable sample to test a hypothesis such as the one he is postulating. It is true that there some Dhulbahante sympathizers to the presence of Somaliland troops in the area, at least those who benefit from that presence in the form of salaries and other incentives. However, Kahi’s sample is tainted, unscientific and cannot be relied upon. He should take Statistics 101. I would like him to listen to Aqil Hoolif, one of the influential Chiefs in the city who contradicts his findings.
Mr. Kahin who is fond of clan names should also listen to Professor Abdalla Mansuur on the BBC Somali Service. The informative talk proves that the Somali people are all one and that clan-families were not based on blood ties but on fluid and changing clan-alliances. Those alliances were necessary centuries ago but these modern times require a different model of alliances based on unity as a Somali State.
Although the SSC phenomenon is based on a single clan that has realized belatedly its untenable situation as a bone of contention between two opposing administrations, it is mainly a reaction to the dangerous threats springing from the desire by some to break up the Somali Republic. If the threat disappears, the need for SSC would simply disappear under a Federal system of government that is based on true democracy. If some of the Issak are wary of becoming a minority in the bigger Somali Family, then the Dhulbahante have the right to be wary of becoming a minority in the smaller Somaliland Family. The solution is simple. Somaliland should renounce its secessionist agenda and join the SSC regions in forming the first Democratic Federal State of Somalia. What the secessionists are doing can only ignite an ugly clan war that will only introduce more suffering in Somalia. Forcing a secessionist agenda on certain clans can only be met with the resistance it deserves.
No wonder that the famous Somali poet, Timadde labeled Tribalism as a destructive force. It destroyed Somalia and will continue destroying it if we do not use it wisely as it was intended by God, to know each other. Even the Prophet of Islam labeled the wrong use of tribalism as being rotten.
Finally, I would like to caution western researchers and policy makers to ignore most of the material that fills many Somali websites specially those that are motivated by hidden agendas and propaganda. In Somalia, it is all about clans all the way down. Do not be fooled by the western democracy ideals that some of us present on the surface. We have a long way to go to achieve such ideals.
Ali H Abdulla
E-Mail:aliegeh@gmail.com
