Why Not Somaliland? Why Couldn’t We and Can’t We…?
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SayliciPress Analysis: We strongly believe Hassan has a point. Somaliland Republic regained its lost independence and soveriynity 21 years ago. Though we went through multiple milestones such the building of our democratic institutions, rebuilding the country, went through four successful elections including two presidential elections, one parliamentary and one municipal election, yet we did not realize to acquire our dejure recognition from a broken world still led by declining hegemonic colonial powers.
These colonial powers who determine who is recognized or not did not bother to recognize the aspirations of the people of Somaliland. Some of the blame will go around and falling a little short of reaching our ultimate goal. Both our leaders and the Diaspora failed to articulate the importance of our independence and its utmost importance to everybody including our neighboring dictators who call themselves IGAD (which I call Ill-educated IIDAAD DESPOTS). Somalilanders must tell the world, had they fail to recognize our hard won independence the whole area will be not see peace. We must bluntly tell our neighboring despots nobody else will enjoy independence if the people of Somaliland are denied to have their Allah given rights for freedom. They must know Somalilanders are determined to safe guard their sovereignty and will keep, and sustain It by any means necessary. Despite all that there is a flicker of hope in the horizon. The ongoing Arab spring will revolutionize both regional and international politics. Already it made two regional lackluster rubber stamps pseudo-organizations called the Arab league and so-called African Union on the verge of becoming obsolete and irrelevant. The later failed and was even stood by the violently ousted Kaddafi when was ravaging Libya. The Arab League miserably failed to do anything abut Syria, Yemen and Egypt. Therefore, these revolutions are expected to effect radical structural change in the world. In that back drop Somaliland cause may be received a region which already lost four of its staunchest anti-Somaliland dictators, Mubarak, Giraffe, Saleh and Zhine Al-Abidine Bin Ali. The political landscape surrounding Somaliland is much different than what it was just a year ago. The other thing we need to vigorously try is to find friends and allies everywhere in the world including the state of Israel.
After more than 20 years, who do we blame for the lack of diplomatic recognition and how do we go around this never-ending “somali-wayn” quagmire to attain our goal? To be blunt and humble at the same time, I think we can only blame ourselves, to certain degree, and of course our past and current governments! Well, some will argue that Kosovo, South-Sudan, South-Ossetia, Abkhazia…all had powerful political friends such as (respectively), the West and Russia…Even thought, legally speaking, we, somalilanders have a stronger case because we existed as an independent nation already (which means our cause is not in conflict with that “sacred AU and UN territorial indivisibility act). But yet, we seem to be having hard time convincing the world to our, well justified, cause and win some friends. Yes, as she said, that famous singer, “Gadhba gadhbaa la tusaayeh, gacalkeen miyuu lumay…” Gacalkeen or our supposed friends are, unfortunately the anti-democratic-Arab-Muslim brothers who sadly ganged up on our beloved democratic Somaliland…Why? Because we are simply the example and the embodiment of Hope and Progress, in all the sense of the words, unlike them. But still…why couldn’t or can’t we win the heart and mind of the “free world” or those of Kosovo, South-Sudan, Eritrea, South-Ossetia, Abkhazia… at least? Well, this is leading me back to one of my above questions: Who to blame for this stalemate?
First of all, we, Somalilanders, except celebrating and partying on May 18th, don’t advocate or express ourselves as vehemently, (peacefully of course) as we should in front of the world. We are everywhere on this planet, yet we are too invisible to be taken so seriously by the international community. Just look at how Palestinians are exhibiting their cause to the highest political level, the UN, without mentioning their clever use of the international media. A huge-gigantic Palestinian flag is hoisted in front of the EU office in Brussels as a reminder of the Palestinian rights to self-determination. Did we forget how, tirelessly, the former Yugoslav republics citizens were present day and night in the streets of the biggest world capitals? In other words, they were LOBBYING hard for their causes. But even if we, the ordinary Somalilanders, failed or not willing to organize ourselves to that level, WHERE was or is our government? Do we or does our government understand what is nationhood? At this crucial juncture of our unfinished democratic and peaceful struggle, our politicians have the moral responsibility to lead, support, assist and encourage us in organizing us, the citizens, no matter where we are in this world (more importantly in the west). What other noble cause than this would they (the government) assist us with if they remain passive all the time? How much money would the organization of a peaceful rally (in front of the world) cost our government, at least twice a year, in front of the UN and EU headquarters or even at Westminster? Certainly not even a fraction of the kind of money our politicians spend wastefully on themselves. We’re all aware of that by the way. But my point is that our governments were (in the past) and is passive, inert…
We need an efficient, active, competent and operational LOBBY group set up and funded by the government of Somaliland in order to get the international community attention and acceptance. It’s been more than 20 years brothers and sisters. If peace and democracy prevail in Somaliland today, it’s thanks to the ordinary Somalilanders who worked hard for that. It’s not politicians who brought that to us. We know what their primary interest is most of the time. So, each and every one of us should wake this government up and tell them to get their acts together… 20 years on and still…
Some, will say, we are lacking a mutual agreement of separation with the Somali-wayn so-called government in order to be accepted. But, did Kosovo, Bosnia, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia have agreement with Serbia or with the former Yugoslavia before leaving the federation? NO! Nevertheless they got what they wanted with a big smile from their western friends. Speaking of political friends, I think we have to remind ourselves and our so called Arab-Muslim brothers that we have the same rights as Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Bahrain, and Turkey to have a diplomatic relation with Israel. It’s not a secret, they all have relations with Israel and that‘s fine. Why it’s OK for them to deal with Israel but NOT OK for us? Are we mentally and psychologically possessed, controlled and brainwashed by the fake and so called Arab-Muslim brothers? Are we that subservient to them? It smells like that, to certain extent. So we should start talking with the first nation who recognized Somaliland in 1960, Israel, to get out of the arab-muslim-somali-wayn entrapment. Did I hear that Israel approached us not longtime ago? I think so! Why didn’t our governments follow up that lead? Oh! By the way and for the record, the former Foreign affairs minister of Somaliland, Mr.Abdillahi Mohamed Duale (during Riyaleh government), is an adviser to the president of South-Sudan. One could say that we are lucky to have one of us at such key position but, again, we can’t get any attention from Mr. Salva KIRR (south-Sudanese president). Mmmmm…Are our politicians dragging their feet and delaying this elusive recognition purposely, for reasons we don’t understand? Perhaps!
Finally and concretely, we should hold accountable our government(s) (past and present) for this diplomatic failure and stagnation.
We should pressure our government to set up and fund a real international and effective LOBBY group.
Our government should engage and approach any state willing to assist us in our cause, starting with ISRAEL and with the newly independent nations in order to break this 20 years old vicious circle.
And of course, we the ordinary Somalilanders should not only get together on the 18th of May but also, come out massively to promote our self-determination rights in the streets and wherever we are in this world. If we don’t help ourselves, nobody is going to help us.
Long live Somaliland!
Source: Hassan H. Ottawa, Canada