Hiiraan Online

1. Argument and Counter-argument about the Victory

On the days preceding the withdrawal of the Ethiopian troops and afterwards, there have been argument and counter-argument which still go on among the ARS members and its supporting population like this. The ARS Asmara wing and its supporters hold an opinion that it is the armed struggle that forced Ethiopia to withdraw its troops. The ARS Djibouti wing and its followers argue that it is not the armed struggle but the political negotiation particularly the Djibouti Agreement that brought the withdrawal of these forces. It seems that these two arguments are simplistic and incorrect. There is philosophical wisdom that says ‘practice without theory is blind and theory without practice is pointless.’  In the same token, armed struggle without political negotiation is blind and political negotiation not supported by armed struggle is pointless. So, the correct idea is that the combination of the armed struggle and the political negotiation compelled Ethiopia to pullout its troops from Mogadishu. This misleading argument must stop at this point and let us talk more pressing and important issues.

2. Need for dialogue and Compromise for the Supreme Common Interest

The ARS Djibouti and Asmara wings and the al-Shabab wing, on the one hand and the TFG, on the other hand, must begin urgent, purposeful and responsible dialogue intra and inter themselves to come to a comprehensive agreement designed to prevent any more violence and loss of more Somali lives and for the supreme common interest for peace and normalcy to return to our broken and bleeding Nation. In addition to that these groups and the TFG must also begin dialogue and agree to general security and political agreement boiling down to a common compromise of forming a unity government including all the above-mentioned stakeholder institutions, groups and individuals. If one side or sides refuse this life and death compromise idea for peace and reconciliation for the salvation of the country and the people, they must be exposed and recognised as enemies of the Nation.

3. The Need for Unifying Leadership

In recent years in Somalia it has been the political leadership that has been dividing, creating conflict and failing the Somali Nation. Therefore, today the Somali nation badly needs than ever before in its history a unifying leadership that translates the victory over the Ethiopian occupation into a success of lasting peace, security, political reconciliation, and socio-economic rehabilitation and reconstruction of the country.

For this reason all the eyes of the Somali people and the international community are fixed on how the Djibouti Agreement could be translated into a formation of an inclusive unity government with a fair dispensation of political power not only among the parties which have signed the agreement and but also those who have not signed it so that a collective leadership that represents all the various sections and groups of  the Somali nation emerge. Such coalition needs a unifying leader with these leadership qualities:

a) Sense of Patriotism

b) clear national political and socio-economic developmental vision

c) social, administrative, political skills and experience

d) diplomacy,  purposefulness,  and determination

e) sense of justice and fairness

f) honesty and transparency

g) sense of respect, tolerance and compromise

h) sense of reaching out, reconciliation and inclusion

i) compassion and considerateness

k) knowledge and experience  about international relations and ability to make friends for the nation;

l) Etc.

4. Mr. Nur Hassan Hussein  (Nuur Adde) – can possibly  be unifying leader

So far several persons announced their candidacy for the presidential post vacated by the resignation of Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed and some others may follow suit. But do they have some or majority of these leadership standards? As far as I know them and as many people account, only the current Prime Minister, Mr. Nur Hassan Hussein (Nuur Adde) has proved to have some of these leadership perquisites during the one year or so he was the prime minister of the TFG. Unlike his predecessors, when he took office he set out the following three exigent and important policy principles as the priorities of his government:

a) improving the out of control security situation;

b) providing humanitarian aid to the IDPs from Mogadishu and other needy people, and

 c) working towards peace and reconciliation.

What did he do about these three policy issues? Given the existing crippling constrains (e.g. the stifling Ethiopian occupation which created all these problems and resultant weakness and absence of functioning institutions of the TFG), Mr. Nur Hassan Hussein has taken tangible steps including:

a) putting to an end to the illegal arrest and detention of hundreds of innocent Somalis    kept in unliveable dungeons where they were tortured and extracted exorbitant ransoms and bribes by certain TFG security officers;

b) stopping the constant shelling attacks, burning and looting on the main Bakaraha Market and other business centres in Mogadishu and organising a self defence security force for it in order to protect the peoples’ properties;

c) releasing the Ethiopian detained anti-occupation and outspoken members of the Hawiye Elders Traditional and Unity Council members (including its spokesman Ahmed Diiriye Ali) and stopping the TFG militias manhunt of Chairman of the Council Mr. Mohamed Hassan Haad and giving him and the Councils members freedom and security; and;

d) above all his clear vision and committed pursuance of national reconciliation between the TFG and ARS despite many formidable obstacles such as the then president AbdullahiYusuf’s adamant objection and sabotage by the Ethiopians, Mr. Nur Adde and his supporting team in the TFG cabinet have succeeded to help bring together these to rival parties to talk about peace and reconciliation finally producing the Djibouti Agreement under the auspices of the UN Office for Somalia led by the Mr. Ahmedou Ould-Abdullah, the Special representative of the UN Secretary-general, who unlike his predecessors have seriously and passionately committed himself to see peace, reconciliation and conflict resolution  happen in Somalia ; and

d) the most important issue, that Mr. Nur Adde together with the ARS Djibouti wing and the national anti-Ethiopian occupation resistance movement have much credit is the withdrawal of Ethiopian troops from Mogadishu. The UN SRSG Mr. Ould-Abdullah and the brotherly President Ismail Omar Ghelle and government of the Republic of Djibouti, who facilitated the peace and negotiation talks leading to the agreement that lastly brought about this troops pullout.

These are the positive steps undertaken by Mr. Nur Hassan which created positive atmosphere of expectation and rapprochement among the Somalis who had lost any hope from the TFG leaders and those before them. Therefore, given these positive measures under extremely difficult and dangerous conditions implemented by him and his team, I think that Mr. Nur Hassan Hussein has shown such qualities and actions of a responsible and serious leader that today the Somalis need so much. He proved himself as pro-peace and reconciliatory, tolerant and compromising, diplomatic and tactical, compassionate and committed, purposeful and experienced politician who can be a unifying leader if he gets capable, educated and experienced team around him.

There are also the leaders of the ARS who have shown exemplary sacrifice and leadership qualities to some extent in the anti-Ethiopian occupation resistance struggle such Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed (chairman of the Executive Council of the Islamic Courts Union) and ARS chairman of the ARS Executive Council (Djibouti wing);

And Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden, former speaker of the TFG ‘parliament’ who had resigned his post and quitted the ‘parliament’ together with some thirty or so members after the Ethiopian invasion and occupation of Somalia. These leaders others have drawn huge support and respect from the Somali people for their rejection and resistance to the Ethiopian occupation although they have lost much of their popularity and support of the resistance movement inside the country after they had signed the Djibouti Agreement and accused of not properly consulting with the leaders and fighters conducting the resistance inside the country. They might possess potential leadership qualities but the fact is that they have hardly or little administrative and political experience in government. Other potential leaders can possibly emerge from outside the framework of the TFG and the ARS leaderships.

In a word, so far, given the above described leadership qualities and performances he has shown during his one year tenure of office, the incumbent TFG Prime Minister Mr. Nur Hassan Hussein is the most qualifying leader who can fill the presidential post recently vacated by the former president Abdullahi Yusuf and can possibly unify the TFG and the various factions of the anti-occupation resistance movement and political and social sections especially the civil society inside the country and civil society in the Diaspora.  

Omar Salad

London, UK

Email: [email protected]