Somalia: Clue of Hope for a Nation Kept in Quintessential Failure - By Dr. Elmi M. Nur

Dramatic changes of Somali political arena once again have revealed a new exciting episode with contrasting folds of degeneration and regeneration implications. The withdrawal of forces of invasion after the failed mission of their miscalculated proxy war, and surprise quit of Col. Abdullahi Yusuf- one of the most enduring warlords in Somalia- from the top leadership created a sense of relief and optimism.

The extraordinary expansion of parliamentarian seats, the sweeping victory of Sh. Sharif as a president has been widely received as a new era of reconciliation forgiveness and peaceful dialogue among all sections of Somali society. The aggressive attempt of persuading his opponents and presenting his political priorities to the people of war-torn capital is also very impressive as it is considered as a bold gesture of hitting the ground running in few days of his appointment.

Nominating a man of mostly his age, professional with clean political career who descends from respected presidential family is additional advantage to the Sharif’s government which appears as the government of unity and with realistic reconciliation tone. Most of the Somalis around the globe have welcomed this new leadership but that can soon go in vain if material evidence and clear acceptable vision of country reconstruction, workable reconciliation programs are not seen in place.

With these interesting developments are in the making, Somalia appears to be on the verge of total transformation of replacing the realm of failures by potential achievement of sustainable stability but with new thorny challenges. This political shift has created an exceptional opportunity for Somali people to generate constructive dialogue on core issues of remaking Somalia, namely: (1) Rediscovering national identity, (2) Reconciling with the painful history through collective pardons and consensus programs of cleaning past failures (3)Redefining priorities of present socio-political strategies, (4) Reestablishing responsible national institutions with real representations  and addressing peoples’ urgent needs and their aspirations.

With so many years of chronic state failure; total breakdown of social cohesion; absence of public services, Somalia as a nation’s distinctive identity and traditional ideals have been severely damaged. It has lost value of its cultural heritage, its basic meaning of statehood, patriotism, brotherhood and collective interests. Consequently this weakened the natural sense of being stakeholder, loyal citizen and owner of ones own destiny, which has lead to irreparable loss of national history and soft/hardware of infrastructures of public endowments. Despite all these terrible events Somalia as a nation has never died and has never surrendered.

Hence, there is a need for the new leadership to rediscover the fundamental source of the existence of this nation in its defining moments and give it the recognition that it deserves, as the secret of this nation’s strength and spirit of its survival. In its identification there is undeniable fact that can be drawn from the events in the past that Islam, as the ideological foundation and a complete code of life for the society since its advent times, is the driving force of this homogenous society and determining factor of its socio-political setup beyond clannish bondage and surrogate factional barriers.

From colonial days of Sayed Muahammd to the present social struggle led by ICU and ARS, Islamic faith constitutes as the philosophical bedrock and unfailing dynamic force that runs from religious hearts to the patriotic dormant souls of the society. The recorded history proved that it is only Islamic message that is able to mobilize the people in masses and to build stronger, enduring and effective coalition for a noble endeavor. It is through this combined effort of sagacious Islamic scholars and selfless nationalists who safeguard the nation and shoulder their responsibility at the most difficult times.

This undying treasure constitutes important part of this nations’ identity that ought to be nourished institutionalized and employed for good purpose. In these perspectives rediscovering of the identity implies casting out the doubts and misconceived duality-Islamists vis-à-vis and so called terrorists, similarly the right of people to defend their own land and interest of individuals in committing crimes beyond the borders.

Tackling these delicate matters demands for acknowledgement of the fact that negotiation, persuasion and incentive modes are most effective tools specially in a situation of state building and peace making process for people that know nothing about bowing in front of a brother for wining his blessing, let alone to the presence of external forces; a nation that prefers death to declaring surrender to its enemy whatever military power that it might have.

Somali society, owing to its tightly-knitted clan system and its homogeneity in faith and culture which serves as filtering measures, instantaneously discards unwanted foreign interventions and alien ideologies as human body rejects strange organs or unsafe intruders. Historically Somalis have had very effective indigenous traditional system of reconciliation and problem solving experience for their clan and political disputes based on their religion and customary laws.

After the collapse of Siyad Barre’s government in 1991-1992, alongside the UN sponsored conferences of warlords in neighboring capitals, there were parallel reconciliation system, actively working on in Somaliland, Puntland, Mogadishu and other regions in the south. However, it is empirically undeniable fact that since the collapse of last regime whenever there is a serious attempt towards bringing the nation back to track, there have been exogenous irritated forces, adamant to aborting any positive endeavor towards peace and stability, so as to keep this young nation in an unbreakable vicious circle of desperation and hopelessness.

Today there is a real chance and favorable conditions of reversing this trend of institutionalized failures and created chaos. There is will of long suffered people yearning for peace, freedom and dignity life, there is a new leadership with new blood and vision and there is a wide recognition in the world of past blunders and disingenuous programs. There is an unprecedented opportunity that requires comprehensives gradual program of reconciliation, starting with addressing those which are vital and very acute and demand for urgency and utmost care. 

There are many events in our past history some require only forgiving and forgetting them, some need to be learned, analyzed and digested, so as to be properly understood and accordingly the future strategic political priorities to be formulated. Some are clearly external factors others are internal ones due to our home disorder.  Some though are living with us they are looming upon our peace and stability at home and send hostile signals around the corners of the world (former warlords and opportunist groups; in the name of imagined terror or high seas piracy); they have to be handled with cautious, in its domestic consumption and international dimension. In all cases accommodation, rehabilitation and re-orientation may be preferable to isolation and radicalizing policies which finally doomed to failure in the past.

The empirical facts that can be drawn from the past experience dictates that the public intuitions must necessarily demonstrate its representation with actual performance addressing the need of the people and sincere efforts of finding indigenous solutions for domestic problems and most importantly they must speak as a single entity on issues of common concern. And the new leadership need not reminded that the expectations are high and options are limited, challenges are huge and task ahead is very hard, which may through narrow passages and probably dangerous tunnels. For digging Somalia out of the dark and deep hole it has entered is definitely daunting job that demands for sincere and dedicated task force with integrated programs of combining traditional skills and professional talents.

The legitimacy of this government should not, like its predecessors, be measured by the endorsement or reservation of architectures of failed agendas (empowering brutal warlords and engaging so called war on terror). It should not draw its power from the presence of ill-defined mission of AMISOM army. Its credibility should be gauged by how it wins the minds and hearts of long suffered people of the south and aspirations of autonomous regional governments. Most of the transitional governments failed due to lack of credibility and consequently appeared as alien regimes in their own country.

It is the duty of this administration to show the difference. To be the real voice of this ruined nation; to make possible the displaced millions safely return and rebuild the remnants of their ravaged homes; to protect the people’s invariable right to live and freedom, rule and choose their true representations; and ensure that this Muslim society is able to rule according to the law that it prefers to none, the only law of this land- Islamic shariah to prevail.

However some people may simply think that implementing shariah stereotypically implies only chasing hungry gangs and chopping off their hands or legs, or searching for immoral attempts in dark rooms and bringing suspicious actors to a public mockery or death penalties. But in brief, as an integral part of the Revelation, the shari’ah is the guide for human action which encompasses every aspect of life - social, political, cultural, and economic aspects. It provides a scale by which all actions on the part of the individual agents, society, and the state are classified, namely: obligatory; recommended; permissible; reprehensible; and forbidden.

The basic source of the Law in Islam is the Qur’an, which includes all the necessary rules of the Law as a "guidance for mankind. The explanation of the rules and their codification (the Sunnah) was provided, for the most part, by the Prophet (saw). The expansion of regulative rules of the law and their extensions to the changing situations was accomplished with the aid of consensus of the knowledgeable community, analogical reasoning - which derived rules by discerning an analogy between new problems and those existing in the primary context - and finally through independent reasoning of learned scholars in the law. These are the basic sources of Islamic law that constitute the essential components of shari’ah.

Thus, its partial implementation or applying it certain criminal aspects without professional procedures, required authority and knowledge of existing circumstances and in isolation with its core objectives may damage the name of shariah and produce contrary results. We need to understand that applications of shariah starts with the existence of peace and necessary degree of freedom for people to carry out the responsibility of Islamic obligations. With the absence of peace and safety of life one is allowed to raise a voice even against his own inner faith. And with the absence of necessities for ones life he is allowed to seek for his survival beyond the permissible lines the law in normal conditions. So restoring peace and creating ordinary situation with functioning institutional infrastructures must be seen as part and parcel of Shariah implementation which requires for collective efforts all community members and total commitment.

After restoring peace and reliable stability in the south, the Somali political journey is to resume once again and interestingly it may not begin from the present millennium period, but long back from 1960s for nothing worth enough is available in between. The presently re-liberated south and long bending unilaterally independence of the north replayed significant episodes of the earlier history of Somali nation. The new leadership of the same breed of those in 60s is  actually facing some sort of similar socio-political circumstances and eventually will find itself in need to address the same old issues like ‘unity of the country’.

However, the difference that can be noted is probably the absence of earlier political advantage in the south and nationalistic euphoria in the north.  So it is expected that the negotiations will be comparatively tough and demands to be greater. According to the impressions made from the recent hints, one can imagine that the subject matter of discussion may not be stick to the extreme positions and to the shallow rhetoric statements in the past like ‘independence is non-negotiable’ in contrary to  ‘unity is sacrosanct’ of the opponents. The realistic scenario in the horizon seems to be conducting sooner or later a constructive public debate in both parts of the country with the spirit of exploring best possible options and available forms and their prospective consequences upon the life of the common people.

Dr. Elmi M. Nur  -  Sweden

Email: elmi_eco@yahoo.com