March 22nd, 2012 Comments Off

Mark Tran
Thursday 1 March 2012 15.32 GMT The Guardian

guardian.co.uk

Somaliland’s capital, Hargeisa. Photograph: Andrew McConnell/Alamy

Amid the war-ravaged landscape of Somalia, the self-declared independent state of Somaliland has carved out a reputation for relative calm.

Last week’s London conference on Somalia made a nod to Somaliland, formerly a British protectorate, and the semi-autonomous region of Puntland. Without naming them, the final communique “welcomed the success in some areas of Somalia in establishing local areas of stability, and agreed to increase support to build legitimate and peaceful authorities, and improve services to people living in these areas”.

Neither region was named because of Somalia’s political sensitivities. Somaliland has not been recognised internationally since it broke away in 1991 after the fall of Siad Barre, the Somali dictator, and Somalis strongly reject the idea of Somaliland’s independence. It was a diplomatic breakthrough in itself to have Ahmed Mahamound Silanyo, the Somaliland president, present at last week’s meeting.

As the London communique indicated, Britain plans to concentrate its aideffort on Somaliland. The Department for International Development (DfID) plans to spend an average of £63m annually on Somalia until 2015, devoting more than 40% of its aid on this north-west corner, home to 3.5 million people.

Somaliland will need the money. Its 2012-16 national development plan(pdf) published in December set out a capital investment proposal of $1.19bn. The government is expected to provide $74m, the private sector $132m, the diaspora $4m, but the overwhelming amount is expected to come from aid donors – $979m, 82% of the total investment plan.

“Given the meagre resources available to the government from its budget and the absence of credit facilities, the bulk of the investment required for the national development plan is expected to come from external sources,” says a summary of the plan. The areas for investment are the economy, infrastructure, governance, social and the environment. Most of the investment for infrastructure is set to repair and upgrade Somaliland’s dilapidated road network.

Somaliland’s minister of planning, Dr Saad Shire, provided an overview of Somaliland’s economic objectives before an enthusiastic crowd of supporters in the UK parliament on Wednesday at a session chaired by Alun Michael from the all-party parliamentary group for Somaliland. The message was that Somaliland was open for business.

Shire trumpeted Somaliland as ideally located for access to east African markets, particularly Ethiopia, markets in the Middle East and even Asia – and what must be one of the world’s most favourable regimes for foreign investors.

Foreign direct investors will pay no tax for three years. After that they will have to pay only 10% on profits, which can be freely repatriated. There will be full compensation for any expropriations, which would be done only in the “public interest”. There will also be no minimum wage. Shire listed a number of foreign investors already doing business in Somaliland, including Coca-Cola, Western Union and Nubian Gold.

In an idea that went down well with his audience, Shire said Somaliland suggested the Somali diaspora make a $1 voluntary contribution to the state when they send remittances, which would come to between $300m and $400m a year. Several people in the audience said they would be willing to contribute much more than $1, while Quman Jibril Akli, from Somaliland Focus UK, went so far as to say the $1 contribution should be made compulsory.

Others cautioned against relying too much on the diaspora, as future generations may not feel the same emotional tug. “Our grandchildren may not have the same commitment, we’re just a stopgap,” said one Somalilander.

As for aid, Somaliland’s lack of international recognition – despite being independent to all extents and purposes for the last two decades – means most aid goes through UN agencies rather than directly to the government. The clearly frustrated Shire complained that the aid usually ends up “in the wrong place [at] the wrong time”, despite consultations.

He also voiced a complaint that will sound familiar to relief agencies: aid does not arrive until starving people are shown on TV screens.

“Last year we appealed for development money to dig 10 to 12 huge reservoirs, each costing about $400,000, which would have taken care of the drought, or at least provided some water,” he said. “But the international community was not willing to spend the money. It was really a mistake, that’s what’s wrong with aid.”

To have more control over when and how to spend money, Somaliland is in the process of setting up a trust fund. The plan is to have it up and running by September, with the UK and Denmark providing an initial amount of $20m in the hope that others will follow.

“We only see 20p out of every £1 of aid,” Shire said. “Donations go through long channels; it’s like passing ice cream round, by the time it gets to the recipient it will have melted. What we get isn’t that much. We hope the $979m will go into the right sectors.”

Somalia: Far from a failed state?

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Somalia – Failed State

Three reasons to help Somalia
Is al-Shabab on the back foot?
Window of hope
Somalis hit the beach
With leaders from more than 50 countries and international organisations due to gather this week for the London Conference on Somalia, BBC Africa analyst and Somalia specialist Mary Harper argues that Somalia’s business leaders offer reasons to hope for the war-torn country’s future.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron has managed to convince some of the world’s most powerful people, including UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to come to London because Somalia is seen as the world’s most comprehensively failed state, representing a threat to itself, the Horn of Africa region and the wider world.

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I expect livestock exports from the port to increase dramatically from three million head of livestock in 2011 to 4.5 million in 2012”

Ali Xoorxoor
Berbera port manager
The conference will focus on three issues that have already had far-reaching and devastating consequences: Piracy, terrorism and famine.

But away from the headlines and the stereotypical media images of skeletal children, skinny pirates in tiny skiffs, and gun-wielding Islamist insurgents, their heads wrapped in black and white scarves, there is another side to the Somali story that is positive, enterprising and hopeful.

Remarkable things are happening which could serve as models for a new start.

It may come as a surprise that, despite coming top of the world’s Failed State Index for the past four years in a row, Somalia ranks in the top 50% of African countries on several key development indicators.

A study by the US-based Independent Institute found that Somalia came near the bottom on only three out of 13 indicators: Infant mortality; access to improved water resources and immunisation rates.

It came in the top 50% in crucial indicators like child malnutrition and life expectancy, although this may have changed since last year’s famine.

“Far from chaos and economic collapse, we found that Somalia is generally doing better than when it had a state,” said the institute.

“Urban businessmen, international corporations, and rural pastoralists have all functioned in a stateless Somalia, achieving standards of living for the country that are equal or superior to many other African nations.”

‘Freewheeling capitalism’
Of course many people in Somalia have suffered horribly during the past 20 years of state collapse, but some sectors of the economy, both traditional and modern, are positively booming.

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Phone subscribers (per 100 inhabitants)

Country 2000 2009
Somalia
1.4
8.1
Eritrea
0.8*
3.7
Ethiopia
0.4
6.0
Nigeria
0.5
49.1
*mainline phone data only
Source: UN data
It may come as another surprise that two northern Somali ports account for 95% of all goat and 52% of all sheep exports for the entire East African region.

According to the London-based Chatham House think-tank, the export of livestock through these ports, and the nearby port of Djibouti, represents what “is said to be the largest movement of live animal – ‘on the hoof’ – trade anywhere in the world”.

I recently visited one of these ports, Berbera, in the self-declared Republic of Somaliland, where port manager Ali Xoorxoor told me: “I expect livestock exports from the port to increase dramatically from three million head of livestock in 2011 to 4.5 million in 2012.

“This is because of healthy demand from the Gulf, especially Saudi Arabia, and new markets emerging in Egypt, Syria and Oman. The Egyptians are especially fond of our camels, mainly for meat.”

The livestock trade has exploded since Somalia’s government imploded in 1991.

One trader told me exports from the northern ports alone is worth more than $2bn (£1.3bn) a year; this does not appear to be an exaggeration, when one considers that just one sheep is worth at least $30 and a camel several hundred.

Academic Peter Little found what he described as a “spectacular surge” in cross-border cattle trade from Somalia to Kenya, where cattle sales in the Kenyan town of Garissa, near the border with Somalia, grew by an “astounding” 600% in the years following the collapse of central authority.

In his book, Somalia: Economy without State, Mr Little describes how “a freewheeling, stateless capitalism” has flourished in the country.

A trend-setting boutique in Hargeisa is one of several innovative businesses
On their way to market, Somali nomads drive their livestock through hundreds of kilometres of harsh, hostile terrain, much of it occupied by militias including the Islamist group, al-Shabab.

These nomads know how to negotiate their way through enemy territory; perhaps they have a thing or two to teach Somali politicians and international agencies struggling to get aid to those who need it most.

Cold Coca-Cola
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The khat network reaches every corner of Somalia every day of the year and doesn’t stop for wars, drought, floods, epidemics, Friday prayers, Ramadan – anything really”

Nuradin Dirie
Somali analyst
Another traditional area of the Somali economy which has thrived in a stateless society, and could serve as a useful model, is the khat trade, worth hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

This narcotic leaf, grown in Kenya and Ethiopia, is delivered fresh, with tremendous efficiency, to remote parts of Somalia, including those affected by drought and famine.

Special “khat planes”, pick-up trucks and people on foot ensure khat gets to market before noon, the day after it is picked.

Otherwise, the khat-chewers will not buy it.

The local authorities and international aid agencies could learn something from those in the khat business about how to deliver supplies, perhaps of food, medicine and other essential items, to difficult and dangerous areas.

As Somali analyst Nuradin Dirie says: “The khat network reaches every corner of Somalia every day of the year and doesn’t stop for wars, drought, floods, epidemics, Friday prayers, Ramadan – anything really.

“I suggested to the UN that it could make use of khat networks to vaccinate children as this would create an opportunity for 100% vaccination coverages.

Khat users insist on having fresh leaves to chew – so it must be delivered soon after harvesting
“Of course I did not succeed,” he says.

“I have travelled quite a lot inside Somalia. To little villages and big towns, to far away rural areas and to remote coastal outposts.

“Wherever I go, I always manage to get a cold Coca-Cola. If they can store cool Coca-Cola, there is a strong possibility they can handle vaccinations too.”

Other more modern sectors of the economy are also thriving.

Somalia has one of the cheapest, most efficient mobile phone networks in Africa.

It is home to Dahabshiil, one of the largest money transfer companies on the continent, which together with other remittance outfits, delivers some $2bn worth of remittances to Somali territories a year, according to the UN.

Like the khat traders, remittance companies deliver money to remote and treacherous places all over Somalia.

Can-do attitude
Some humanitarian groups use these companies to deliver cash-for-food and other forms of assistance; perhaps more use could be made of these pre-existing remittance networks, which link Somalis together, wherever they are in the world, connecting them in a matter of minutes.

Many Somali camels are exported to Egypt, where they are highly prized
There is a startling contrast between the productive, can-do attitude of the Somali business community, and the sometimes obstructive, counter-productive approach of the politicians.

Members of the Somali diaspora, and those who stayed behind during the long years of conflict, are doing daring, imaginative and positive things.

A group of British-educated brothers from the self-declared republic of Somaliland has built a Coca-Cola bottling plant amongst the sand, anthills and cacti, creating a surreal environment of green lawns, gleaming white walls, glossy red paint, and polished factory floors.

A pioneering young woman has recently set up an art gallery in Hargeisa.

Another has opened up a boutique, where smartly dressed attendants sell shoes, handbags, brightly coloured lingerie, and men’s and women’s clothes in the very latest Somali fashion.

A man in Mogadishu runs a Billiards and Snooker Federation.

There are also political models and inspirations on offer within the Somali territories.

The most striking is Somaliland, which broke away from Somalia in 1991, and has built itself up from war-torn rubble into probably the most democratic polity in the Horn of Africa.

It has done this on its own, from the bottom-up, combining the old with the new, to create a political system that gives authority to clan elders as well as those elected by the public.

The Somali business community and places like Somaliland have “worked” because they have married the best of the traditional and the modern.

Much that has “failed” in Somalia is a result of combining the “bad”, divisive things about the traditional clan system with dangerous modern elements, especially weapons.

It might be more productive for anyone interested in helping Somalia back onto its feet, including those at the London Conference, to deal with and learn from the business community instead of the politicians.

This is a life time opening. For the first time in more than two decades, we will be able to present our case to the leaders of more than 40 countries; these include among others, our immediate neighbors and friendly members of the Security Council. This is an Allah sent blessed opportunity for Somaliland.

We have nothing to fear, because we have to tell the story of Somaliland history and democracy that can not be claimed, denied or opposed by our opponents. Remember, our opponents consist of sea pirates, warlords and former Al-shabaab allies; they must have all the reasons of fearing us not the inverse, because they have no rational case to present against our cause. This is the right time to trounce them with the power of logic and irrefutable facts.

We will present our case and state that our well-merited sovereignty is not negotiable. We can ask the international community to recognize our sovereignty right away and if not to arrange for internationally monitored referendum.  I have no worries what so ever regarding the international community forcing us into the abhorred union with Somalia. In the worst case scenario, Somaliland will get easy on the pocket, unprecedented and long-awaited international exposure and I think this is a chance that merits being highlighted, grasped and not wasted.

The downside of not attending the conference includes; maintaining the status quo of talking to our selves about our aspirations, but not to the international community.  Risking losing whatever sympathy and support we get from the international community. Furthermore, wasting this opportunity will mount to a political disaster for Somaliland government.  We can’t afford to cowardly cover ourselves with a blanket and talk to ourselves about recognition. We have to be bolder than that, no one; I say no one can take away what we have today.

Attending this London conference will tip the scale to our side; therefore, we must all be in favor of attending this conference. Yet still, we can ask for protocol alterations here and there, for instance, we can ask the host country to grant us a conference protocol status equal to other attending states, because apart from Djibouti, we will be the only Somali entity with a democratically elected, functioning government and with a real constituency. We can also ask for the schedule before hand and then decide which sessions to attend and which not to attend.

We must start preparing and rehearsing for our presentation from today. This conference will decide our destiny and we must present our case in the most eloquent and powerful fashion. How about getting Raqiya Omaar involved in this process or may be asking her to do the presentation on behalf Somaliland government?  A good presentation of our case will get us all the support that we need from the international community and a bad presentation will make us lose our case, so we must pay a great attention to the presentation of the infinitesimal details of our case.

The anarchic TFG and its allies have lethal forces and evil ideas to destroy their country and the lives of their people, but Somaliland has noble ideas and democracy for building its country and the lives of its people, so let us face them and let the international community be the witness.

“How are you going to make money in a country that doesn’t even exist?” That was probably the question that many people had at the back of their minds when Mohammed Yusef told them he would invest in Somaliland. Others perhaps did not even know Somaliland had declared independence from Somalia in 1991 and that, in spite of not having been recognised internationally, it does have – unlike Somalia – a working political system and a strong business sector.

Mr Yusef of course knew. Although he now manages a very successful investment firm in the United Kingdom, Invicta Capital Limited, he has always kept in touch with the land where he was born six decades ago, while it still was a British protectorate.

“If what my parents say is true, I always had a mentality for trade, for business, and it’s not inconsistent with the family history because the family originated from a fishing village on the Gulf of Aden,” he told the BBC’s series African Dream.

“My great-grandfather was one of those people that would trade with Aden.”

Mr Yusef was educated in the UK where he trained as a solicitor and practiced as a commercial lawyer before starting his own law practice specializing in commercial law, copyright and media law in London.

In 1999 he founded Invicta, a private equity firm providing finance for the media, commercial property and renewable energy sectors which, according to its website, has raised over £1.4bn ($2.3bn) of investment capital.

Minding the gap

His Somaliland business is handled through a company called Prime Resources which has a staff of nine people in Hargeisa, the capital.

According to him, the firm has invested in mining, and oil and gas exploration and is about to embark on a $40m exploration programme. It is also evaluating business opportunities in Somalia in the agricultural and property sectors.

“When I first started looking at investment in Somaliland even my professional colleagues would say: ‘You’re mad. This doesn’t make any sense’,” he remembers.

“Not only did they confuse Somaliland with Somalia but it does have the problem of being an unrecognised country,” he told the BBC’s Mary Harper.

“But actually nobody ever made money from following the herd and the most money is often to be made where there is a mismatch between what people perceive to be the place and the reality of what it is, and Somaliland is exactly in those kinds of circumstances where there is a huge gap between the reality and the perception.”

“So actually there is a method to my madness and it isn’t inconsistent with the basic principles of business: Go find yourself a situation that nobody else has spotted and be prepared to hang on in there while everybody else catches up.”

“There is no inconsistency between what we look for when we invest in an opportunity here [in London] and what we look for over there, except that the potential rewards in Somaliland are far greater, ironically.”

The Hollywood connection

Mr Yusef’s first business venture was buying and selling a film library.

“I was lucky in that I knew who my buyer was going to be, so it was one of those crazy situations where I knew I could buy for X and sell for Y,” he said.

“In many ways, it’s the worst first lesson to have in business because you run away with the idea that business is actually quite easy.”

However, this experience was probably helpful to him when, later, he decided to specialise in structured film financing.

Invicta has been involved in the financial side of many successful film projects, including Wallace & Grommit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit, Da Vinci Code and James Bond’s Casino Royale.

Although now he manages big money, Mr Yusef says that he started with very little.

“I had enough capital to pay the rent of an office for six months. I think it was enough to pay the secretary and assistant. That was it.

“But it didn’t take much. It never takes much. Not having money is never really the obstacle, it’s the excuse.”

‘Fascinating people’

Mr Yusef says that for him one of the most exciting things about his business is meeting people.

“You meet fantastic people, even the ones you don’t like. They’re fascinating”.

He believes that it is often easier to get to know others in stressful situations because they cannot “keep their pretences up for very long”.

He also takes delight in the intellectual challenges offered by his job.

“Every situation is different from the last. And the mistake often made is to assume ‘Oh, I know how that story is going to end’. So there’s always that tension – positive stress is what I call it – that keeps one going,” he says.

“After a while, it may sound a bit glib to say this, the money motive isn’t the main driver. Once you’ve reached a certain level of security – you’ve paid the mortgage if you still had one and taken care of the basics of life, and you can afford one or two luxuries – people who accumulate businesses and business interests just to make more money are a little bit unwell, I think.

“The biggest driver for people in business, if you look at it, is the creative drive, to create something from nothing and step back and say: ‘That was nothing then, look at it now’. I’m sure that’s the key motivator for most people who are successful in business.”

And what advice would he give to someone who wants to start in business?

“Control your fear and never give up because you will fail more than you succeed, and I think that’s the thing that my father taught me more than anything else, and that’s that ultimately you will prevail if you take your losses as well as your successes and learn from the losses. We learn nothing from success and everything from failure.

“I think the thing that separates the natural businessman and, let’s say, a business consultant, is the tenacity that is required. Many people give up on their dreams and their ideas faster than they should, and even when they do fail, they should figure out why they failed and then look for the next opportunity.”

African Dream is broadcast on the BBC Network Africa programme every Monday morning.

Every week, one successful business man or woman will explain how they started off and what others could learn from them

In Somalia, the Saudi Connection

By Christopher Whalen

This article was originally published washingtonpost.com Sunday, October 17, 1993; Page A19

LIKE THE slow economy and NAFTA, U.S. military intervention in Somalia was not Bill Clinton’s idea. He inherited the situation from the Bush administration, which itself was unsure whether troops should be sent into that war-torn shell of a country.

But even now, informed analysts say, the White House does not fully appreciate why it is in Somalia and the grave regional political consequences of a hasty withdrawal. What most Americans, including White House policymakers, may not fully understand is that the situation in Somalia is being exacerbated by America’s old enemy in the Middle East — Iran.

Many observers accept that U.S. intervention in Somalia was spurred by George Bush’s avowed “humanitarian concerns” or even a cynical attempt to prepare the American public for eventual involvement in Bosnia’s genocidal war. Last week, in a speech critical of the Clinton administration, Bush reiterated that view: “The mission was to go in and save lives,” Bush said. “People were starving, and American troops went in there and they opened the supply lines and they took food in. They weren’t fighting.”

In fact, though, the United States is in Somalia for other reasons, too — the same geopolitical reasons that persuaded Bush to go to war against Saddam Hussein: to protect the increasingly isolated Saudi Arabian monarchy from the combined threat of Iranian military and political power and Islamic fundamentalism. This time, “humanitarian assistance” became the sole label for the latest intervention, an intervention that follows a long tradition of American defense for European interests. As Charles Callan Tansill wrote in his classic 1952 book, “Back Door to War”: “The main objective in American foreign policy since 1900 has been the preservation of the British empire.”

One former Cabinet official in the Carter administration notes that the Bush administration wanted to be seen “doing something” about Somalia. This official, a longtime student of the region, says that continued instability in eastern Somalia was viewed as a long-term threat to Saudi Arabia and the major interest of America’s principal allies — namely Persian Gulf oil. Specialists in Gulf oil politics, such as veteran journalist Sol Sanders, also recognize that Iran’s limited but growing role in East African states like Sudan and Somalia is part of a much larger strategy to gradually encircle the prime target in the region — Saudi Arabia — with a web of regional alliances and covert military operations.

Strategically, as Yossef Bodansky wrote recently in Global Affairs, “all of this effort was aimed at {a} Sudanese-Iranian presence in the Horn of Africa toward a transformation of the Red Sea into a ‘Green {Muslim} Lake.’ ” Iran’s ultimate objective is to put pressure on Saudi Arabia, in this instance by destabilizing Somalia and Yemen — the latter located just across the narrow strait that divides the Arabian peninsula from the eastern tip of Somalia. Since the British withdrawal from its naval base at Aden in 1967, safeguarding against threats in the Horn of Africa has been left to the United States. Veteran Middle East-watchers say that Iran today is “firmly entrenched” in war-ravaged Sudan and has established guerrilla training bases there, directly across the Red Sea from Saudi Arabia.

These bases in Sudan, according to State Department spokesman Michael McCurry, were used to train the supposedly “untrained militia” that badly wounded American Ranger forces. In actuality, warlord Mohammed Farah Aideed’s men are a well-trained and motivated light infantry force that operates with support from Iran and elsewhere in the same way that previous Somali factions took arms and money from successive European, Arab, American and Soviet governments.

Given the resurgence of Iran’s regional military and political influence, it should surprise few Washington observers that the financial and logistical support for Aideed, who was himself trained in Soviet and Warsaw Pact war colleges, is coming in part from Tehran. U.S. officials concede that several Somali factions receive support from Sudan, which in turn maintains links with Iran.

During the Reagan and later Bush administrations, Iranian expansion was held in check by its long war with Iraq and other less obvious means, including a de facto embargo on foreign loans and on arms shipments by most (but not all) major producers.

Today, analysts believe that Iran is fast rebuilding its military capability even as its covert ties throughout the region grow faster. One former U.S. intelligence operative in the region told me that Iran has purchased “several dozen” Russian-made nuclear artillery shells from former Soviet army units in Kazakhstan. “They don’t yet have the capability to deliver these weapons,” he told me, “but they have them and they will very quickly figure out a way to use them.”

The rising coercive power of Tehran — and the subordinate position of the OPEC cartel’s largest oil producer — could be observed at the latest OPEC meeting last month, at which Saudi Arabia agreed to limit production to 8 million barrels per day, while other members, including Iran and Kuwait, were effectively given increased quotas. Indeed, press reports say that the OPEC accord was finalized only after “consultation” among Iran, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, elevating the second-tier Iranians to full-partner status with OPEC’s two largest, long-term producers.

Iran and Saudi Arabia were described by many observers of that meeting as “cooperating” to push other producers to agree on new production ceilings. Yet even with demand for oil in non-industrialized nations rising, any Saudi accommodation with Tehran is driven more by fear than comity and trust. Without a strong U.S. military and political presence in the gulf to counter the obvious ambitions of Iran, Saudi Arabia’s position at the OPEC bargaining table is weakened to the detriment of the interests of the industrialized nations and the long-term OPEC oil producers. From a domestic political perspective, Somalia presents Bill Clinton with the same political threat that Jimmy Carter faced in Iran unless he soon manages to extricate U.S. ground forces or — less probably — uses a more realistic justification for their presence. In this regard, it is notable that the Iranians and British, who have a long and painful colonial history in Somalia, are leaving the scene as U.S. military involvement grows. It is particularly ironic that there are currently no British troops in the U.N. operations zones in eastern Somalia.

Comparisons between America’s role in Somalia in 1993 and the American “exchange” of responsibility with the French in Vietnam is more than coincidental, particularly given the ultimate lure exerted by oil. As in Vietnam, America is in the position of defending a weakling regime (Saudi Arabia) that cannot survive in its own increasingly dangerous neighborhood.

It has been said that an American military withdrawal from Somalia will have a negative impact on U.N. relief efforts. From a geopolitical perspective, particularly seen from Europe or Tokyo, an American withdrawal would have serious consequences in the Persian Gulf. The Saudis and other fearful Arab states would believe that Washington can no longer be trusted to serve as regional watchdog to protect a vulnerable oil superpower from intrigues and pressures by Iran, the traditional regional power in the gulf. Yet both fiscal realities and a shift in the American political mood point to a decline in U.S. willingness to send the children of Carolina farmers and Michigan factory workers to fight and die in places like Somalia for objectives that their leaders cannot even define.

As the United States withdraws militarily from Somalia, the Saudis may be forced to capitulate to further Iranian demands at the OPEC negotiating table and elsewhere, a development that can only exacerbate the kingdom’s deteriorating financial and political situation. For Washington, the long-term results of an eventual disengagement from Somalia may suggest an unlikely irony closer to home. Ten years from now, we may all rue the fact that Bush and then Clinton failed to push for redevelopment of new, secure energy sources in this hemisphere — particularly in Mexico through NAFTA — at a time when America’s ability and willingness to project military power in the Persian Gulf was gradually declining.

Christopher Whalen is a writer and consultant based in Washington.

Unfortunately, like all documents signed in the previously 15 failed reconciliation conferences concocted by the international community, this too was an exercise in futility. For the past two decades, multiple agreements were signed in order to give the erroneous impression that this would be the panacea that solves all our problems. Each time, these so-called agreements have lead to new phases of complications.

Ironically, despite the wide consensus to end the international community’s monopoly and the popularity of seeking an organic solution to the Somali problem, the Road Map made it, at least to the second round. Of course, not without a carrot—emerging out of the transitional status—and not without a stick—cutting the international aid. Like any benevolent Mafia Godfather would do, the Transitional Federal Government (TFG) was offered an offer that it could not refuse….

The Roadmap is made of four benchmarks: Security, Constitution, Political Outreach and Reconciliation, Good Governance; Each with its own specific tasks and timelines.

Generally these benchmarks and tasks are fine, except the following few controversial impositions: handpicked “stakeholders”; federalism as a system of governance; granting the parliament the authority to reform itself; and indirectly facilitating the secession of the political entity known as Somaliland.

First, on Stakeholder: While inclusiveness of the stakeholders is often repeated as a prerequisite to sustainable reconciliation, the Somaliland issue is surprisingly (or perhaps not) missing, not to mention that regional administrations such as Puntland and Galmudug are ensured exclusive status. Then there is the issue of Ahlul Sunnah wal Jamaa’ah (ASWJ) as a militia group that is neither considered a regional administration nor as part and parcel of the TFG. Therefore it deserves more scrutiny.

Historically ASWJ was a pacifist Sufi community, though presently they are a force to reckon with. They have unrelenting support from certain elements of the international community who exploit them as a tactical allay. It became the aggressively promoted panacea and the ingredient added to any and all potions fed to Somalia for quick healing. Since stepping onto the bloody stage of Somali politics, it has proven itself as a political chameleon that on one hand improves conditions and on the other worsens. Some times they work as one unit, other times they work as a fragmented group that are at odds with each other. They fight along clan lines or along sectarian lines, depending on the political convenience. Wittingly or otherwise, the only unwavering thing within this group is its loyalty to advance the “myopic strategic interest of Ethiopia to keep Somalia divided.”

A couple of years ago when a number of high ranking officials of the old Somali National Army (SNA) held a conference in Washington, DC to piece together a security strategy to stabilize the country. The central pillar of their proposal was to do away with clan militias and rebuild the SNA. Ethiopia, in its own paranoiac and often self-defeating reaction, used an ASWJ General to sabotage the effort. The day the conference was concluded, the General gave relentless interviews clearly intended to sow the seeds of suspicion that these highly regarded high officials were in fact plotting to establish another military regime. He did not have to provide any proof.

Second, the Security Benchmark: There seems to be a disproportionate focus on security issues that are in the immediate best interest of the international community but hardly any thing that is in the best interest of stabilizing Somalia and protect its national integrity. The Roadmap focuses on dealing with piracy—and no one is denying that piracy should be dealt with—and does not mention any thing about strengthening and integrating the army under one command. Implicitly, the document sets the stage for indefinite dependency on AMISOM- the AU troops in Mogadishu. Meanwhile, ASWJ is an armed faction that does not come directly under the SNA.

Even more bizarre is the fact that the Security Benchmark pressures Somalia to make certain concessions on its Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) or ocean rights to its neighbor Kenya.

Third, the Constitution Benchmark: The problem with this benchmark is beyond irony and more on the hilarious side! Despite the wide consensus on the part of the international community and the Somali public opinion on the need to reform the over-bloated (550 member) mostly corrupt transitional Parliament, the Road Map hands the power to reform to the very ones who are in need of reform. The Speaker of the Parliament is granted the power to fill all oversight and implementation committees. He is granted the power to literally handpick any and all whom he sees fit to advance his vision.

Arguably the most expensive constitution ever drafted, yet the most shallow in addressing the most pressing issues facing the nation and all the fault-lines that could ignite new problems in the near future: the Somaliland issue, clan exclusive territories and the grazing rights of the nomadic community, resource sharing and taxation, national security, and who has the exclusive authority to frame foreign, defense, and monetary policy for the country, to name a few.

The United Nations Political Office for Somalia (UNPOS) claims that they have spent over $60 million to draft the constitution at hand. A classic example of how the “Mafia network” in Nairobi squanders the monies donated in the name of Somalia, and how it perpetuates the self-destructive culture of corruption by some in the Transitional Federal Institutions (TFI).

Imagine how many starving children that dollar amount could feed!

In conclusion, while the Road Map does have a few positive tasks in all the benchmarks, it still remains as a precooked sham spearheaded by certain frontline countries such as Ethiopia, Uganda, and Kenya who are the direct beneficiaries of perpetuating the Somali conflict.

*Dr. Oduesp Eman teaches political science and international relations