Prosperity Hopes As Somalia Prepares to Elect President

The Nation (Nairobi)
September 13, 2004
Posted to the web September 13, 2004

Henry Owuor
Nairobi

With its 37 ports under the control of clan warlords, Somalia is a land where "tax" is only a word in the dictionary. But its Indian Ocean coastline extends for more than 3,000km, much longer than that of South Africa.

Says Mr Hussein Farah Aideed, leader of the faction that controls Mogadishu, the capital: "Historically, no Somali government has controlled more than seven ports, not even Siad Barre's military regime."

He says that Somalia is only second to Iran in terms of goods shipped from the United Arab Emirates' (UAE).

Somali traders are the luckiest in the world as they unload goods at ports and hardly pay tax to the clans manning them. The goods are then sent all the way to Nairobi, Addis Ababa in Ethiopia and other parts of Africa - even as far as South Africa.

Mr Aideed adds that, historically, Somalis are traders who control transport in eastern and central Africa, but it is now difficult to install a government in Somalia as Somalis have tasted freedom" in a free-market economy.

Seeking the presidency

Mr Aideed, who is seeking the presidency in the elections later this month, is the chairman of the United Somalia Congress (USC) that includes the Somalia National Alliance faction. The group, he says, has five rotating presidents and controls 85 per cent of the country, including Mogadishu.

The Aideed group, also known as the Somalia Reconstruction and Reconciliation Council, has the goal of democratically seeking dialogue with other factions through mediation by the regional Inter-governmental Authority on Development (Igad).

According to Mr Aideed, at an African Union summit in 2001, his group signed a no-preconditionality principle committing it to working for the creation of an all-inclusive national unity government in Somalia, a country that has been at the mercy of warlords for the last 14 years after Mr Barre was deposed.

The SRRC is democratic and is against militants that want to make Somalia a base for Islamic militants," he explains.

He was a late entrant to the new parliament sworn in Nairobi late last month, and points out that he had to wait for clearance from his faction before being sworn in as an MP.

Even after taking the oath, he tells of serious mismanagement of the Somali peace process by Igad, which he claims has violated rules set by a transitional charter that spells out how MPs should be selected. He tells of a case in which men have taken up women's seats in parliament.

The transition charter says that, of the 275 members of Parliament, 12 per cent shall be women. However, says Mr Aideed, only 20 women have been sworn in, representing just over 7 per cent.

At the same time, an arbitration council set up by the clans has received complaints from 55 other people who claim that they were denied the right to be MPs.

Mr Aideed blames the wrangling on the fact that the regional government appointed people with vested interests in Somalia to preside over the talks.

Kenya is represented by Mr Mohamed Affey, while Mr Abdul Aziz represents Ethiopia. Djibouti has since removed its envoy and redeployed him to Paris to avoid wrangling.

Mr Aideed says that the chairman of the talks, Kenya's Mr Bethuel Kiplagat, is balanced in his decisions, while the Somali envoys are biased. He blames a decision by Mr Kalonzo Musyoka, when he was Foreign minister, to appoint Mr Affey, Kenya's ambassador to Somalia while, he claims, he had interests to protect in Somalia.

Mr Aideed says non-Somali Kenyans would be more suited for the job. The clans that have seats in the Somali national assembly are Digil Mirifle, Darood, Dir and Hawiye, with 61 seats each. A fifth clan of farmers and fishermen has 31. Unlike the other clans, this group is not nomadic, and lives between Rivers Juba and Shabele, where they grow bananas.

Says Mr Aideed: In order to have good democracy, you have to empower the farmers and fishermen, as the nomadic clans and the farmers have always fought for control of the resources, foremost being the ports of Kismayu, Mogadishu, Bosaso, Berbera, Marka and Elmaan.

Berbera, one of the most prominent Somali ports, was built by the British colonialists, but was taken over by the Russians in 1961, and by the Americans in 1979.

Somalia, a land of changing fortunes, is never still. It had its last constitutional government in 1969 when President Abdurashid Ali Shamake was killed by his bodyguards. The army, led by Mr Barre, took over until 1991 when the clans came in. But the clan wars were there even during the Barre dictatorship.

Despite the clan warfare, the economy has improved more in the last 10 years, and so have health and education, than during the 31 years that it had a government. Schools are run privately.

The Somalis currently have a choice of 15 television stations, 20 mobile phone companies that serve a very vibrant market where it costs only between Sh560 and Sh960 to call for a whole month.

There are 3 million Somalis abroad constantly calling home and transferring money through the phone service run by the clans.

The Somalis operate in a unique system where sharing resources is the norm. Wages for civil servants, including the police, may be in the form of food, not always money.

Meanwhile, in Nairobi, Somali MPs are to elect the chairman and vice-chairman of parliament on Wednesday before electing the president on September 22.

Besides Mr Aideed, other presidential candidates include the leader of the Transitional National Government, Mr Abdulkassim Salat Hassan, Puntland administration president Abdulahi Yussuf, Mr Jama Ali Jama, also from Puntland, Mr Musa Sudi Yalahow of National Salvation Council and several former members of the Barre regime, among them Mr Abdulahi Addow, a son-in-law of the former president, and Mr Abdurahman Jamaa Barre, Mr Barre's half-brother who was his Foreign minister.

The former Barre men have not been home for the last 14 years, but are said to be armed with wads of cash they allegedly looted when they presided over the country's finances.

Some of the presidential candidates are backed by Arab League countries and the radical Al Isll Al Ittihad factions of Islam.

Says Mr Aideed: Islamic militants run schools and a lot of businesses in Somalia and want to control the country."

Besides the elections, the Igad foreign ministers are to meet in Nairobi on Wednesday to review the progress of the peace process.

Mr Aideed has called on the Igad chairman, Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, to help solve the women's issue and ensure they get their rightful share in the parliamentary seats allocation.

Once the elections are over, Igad will hand over to the Africa Union and the UN. The AU is to provide a peace force once the more than 60,000 militias are disarmed.

A cabinet will also be created, and so will a civil service and a police force. There will also be the repatriation of refugees from as far-flung places as Australia.

Currently, Somalia has 275 MPs who have not reconciled. Says Mr Aideed: To solve all this, we have to go on the ground and do a five-year transitional programme."

The new government is to move to Mogadishu once all its departments are up and running, a process that could take another two months. If all goes well, there should be a new government before the end of the year.

But still, one warlord, Gen Mohamed Hersi "Morgan", is currently advancing with troops towards the Somali port of Kismayu. This is simply the first test for the new government. What the world is sure of is that the US and the UN will this time keep off Somalia, remembering the debacle of the early 1990s, the last time they tried to restore law and order in Horn of Africa country.

As Mr Aideed says, African peacekeepers are the only ones welcome in Somalia this time. If they fail, this country that offers a perfect playing ground for terror groups, will have been lost forever to the various warlords who police the towns and sea and airports.