Merely to perpetuate the bombings and shelling in Mogadishu?
by Abdalla A. Hirad
Sunday, September 09, 2007
Roughly a week after the culmination of the National Reconciliation Congress in Mogadishu, a hotchpotch of groups in adversity with the Federal Transitional Government (TFG) of Somalia commenced a meeting in Asmara, the Capital of Eritrea. The meeting is expected to last for 10 days, with the objective of establishing an umbrella organization between the various groups—including members from the ousted Union of Islamic Courts, the atrociously dissident former members of TFG parliament led by the deposed former House Speaker, Sharif Hassan Adan, and some disillusioned individuals living abroad who for reasons of their own are bent on adversity as their motto of the recent past.
The meeting is hideously represented by individuals such as Hassan Dahir Aweys and Shariif Ahmed, among others, who made it their job to continue to cause a great suffering for the Somali people. However, it seems that their greatest promoters such as Ali Khalif Galaydh, the Samatar brothers and others have not had the stomach to join the club some of whom are accused of mongering terror by the powers that be in the world—particularly so, in Eritrea which the US State Department threatened to include in its list of States Sponsoring Terror, unless. But there are numerous others who happen to share sentiments with them—particularly those who participated in the Leister and London Meetings of the last six months. So it is not as if these are not represented in the Asmara Meeting.
This floundering bunch of clerics and charlatans feigning political opposition hardly have any compassion for the people of Somalia nor do they have any principled cause or the popular following to seek political office at the national level. Their continued condoning of the shelling and the killings in Mogadishu attest to the fact. Their refusal to renounce violence and agree to reconciliation, despite the repeated offers of the TFG and continuing international pressure, has been another indication. Many of these are hardly literate and the majority of them hardly have the experience in government or political office. If and when they had the opportunity, most of these have only been underdogs in their short political lives at best, or had emerged as the losers in a shortly lived contention with others. So they collectively lack the education, experience and the leadership to seek political office. What is more; they are seeking these offices in a most absurd way—only repeating the old ways which brought Somalia to its knees and kept it the way it has remained for the last 17 years.
Their latest pretension to oppose the TFG has been that they resent the fact that Ethiopia, an old enemy of Somalia, is occupying the country—a false claim, indeed. In fact, the TFG sought Ethiopia’s military assistance, not only because it was denied its seat in Mogadishu by these power mongers, but also because these clerics militarily sequestered it in its temporary seat in Baidoa. Needless to mention that the so called free parliament who are currently seeking to coalesce with the UIC leadership had voted for the invitation of foreign troops under the leadership of Shariif Adan, himself an illiterate demagogue of the highest order. Now’ these former TFG members of parliament, ironically calling themselves the “Free Parliament”, have become guests (for life?) of Eritrea, in the hope that they may strike a deal with the Islamists—a most unlikely eventuality!
When asked as to what they wish to achieve in their meeting by a BBC Somali reporter, these charlatans stated that they wish to form an umbrella organization for the various groups in order to unite the people of Somalia against the Ethiopians and the TFG. It is not surprising that these war mongers are decided on continuing the war even before they started their outrageous Meeting of sorts. The question is: for what? Is the goal to replace Eritrea with Ethiopia? Whatever the answer, the fact remains this bunch of charlatans seem to live in the seventies and eighties—at the height of the cold war, in the era of princes—when foreign sponsorship was on of the modus operandi for political change. They can hardly swallow the fact that the TFG may have been the last government to be installed by a foreign country in Somalia, and that the time may be over for Eritrea to export terror and weapons to anywhere in the world.
Actually, their goal of uniting the Somali people against the so-called Ethiopian occupation amounts to no more than equipping underage kids with bombs and hand grenades to kill civilians, and provoke the TFG’s Security Forces to exchange fire with them so that civilian can be killed in the cross fire. For now, Somalia’s people have chosen peace and stability as denoted by the participation of approximately 2000 delegates, led by the traditional leaders of all the Somali clans, in the National Reconciliation Congress, held in Mogadishu during July and August 2007—in fact, an extreme replica of the Embagathi Meeting the result of which the Eritrea Meeting Club has disputed in favor of anarchy, chaos and perpetual absence of government in Somalia. And while the world is hoping that these charlatans and war mongers may organize themselves responsibly towards seeking peace and accepting talks with the TFG, I am sure all are disappointed that these war mongers have already vowed to continue their strife to fight the TFG.
These charlatans are supported by some pseudo experts who internationally claim the knowledge of the Somali political arena and who spread false prophecies about the Somali situation. These false prophets lobby the power corridors of western governments and seek to let off the pressure of the international community against the falsely dissident groups to come to the table which is the only viable alternative to bring Somalia to peace and stability. Failing the international endeavor at peaceful dialogue, which these power mongering dissidents wish and want to fail, the future for Somalia is bleak. The TFG will crumble and the result may then be the following:
Firstly, there may be an intra-clan civil war primarily in Mogadishu, and which may spread to other parts in Somalia—courtesy of the UIC and their sponsors elsewhere.
Secondly, with the TFG out of place, Ethiopia will fend for itself to fight the UIC, which she already accuses of responsibility for the insecurity in its Ogaden region.
Thirdly, Kenya also feeling the threat, will ensure that its borders remain closed to Somalia and perhaps begin to close them to the Ogaden part of Ethiopia.
Fourthly, with the TFG out of place, and Ethiopia wildly chasing the geese in Somalia, Eritrea will intensify its support to the UIC in a stateless Somalia.
Fifthly, instability may typically spread to the peaceful northern regions of Somalia, to the south west regions and to the neighboring countries—including Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and even Afawarke’s Eritrea which has a large segment of Muslim population.
These frivolous dissidents think that they will attain power in Somalia by chasing fireflies—gaaraabidhood in the Somali language. Given the above scenario, it may be cheaper in terms of lives lost and resources wasted, in the end, to pressure these spoilers to come to the table. Failing this pressure, indeed, the world might wish to take them for their vows and charge them for mongering war and terror in Somalia and bring them to justice which they deserve.
Abdalla Hirad
E-mail: [email protected]