Britain has made a special effort to forge a close relationship with Somalia’s new government which came into power in September 2012. This year Britain has already pledged to donate $300 million in aid to assist with the development of infrastructure, justice and security and has also ensured that Somalia will be a keynote of discussion at the annual G8 summit that it is hosting in June.
The Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud plans to transform Somalia through harbouring a democratic federal government, an initiative which has been embraced by both Britain and by the wider international community. At the 2013 London Somali conference, the British Prime Minister David Cameron asserted his confidence in Somalia’s new federal government stating that “today we are seeing the beginnings of a new future for Somalia. Extremism is on the retreat”. As far as the British government is concerned, Somalia’s success is reliant on the triumph of good over evil or put in other words the triumph of Somalia’s federal government over the extremist Islamist organisation Al-Shabaab. The UK’s generous aid donation has been justified because it has been assumed that aid will be utilised by the British backed Somali government to secure stability and to ultimately oust Islamic extremism from the country.
Britain’s stance on assisting Somalia’s new government as it strives to regain control of the country is at best naive and severely lacks appreciation of the complexity of Somalia’s clan based political backdrop. By backing the new Somali government Britain has inadvertently become involved with Somali clan politics, aligning itself with Sheikh Mohamud’s Hawiye clan. In general, rival clans oppose the new government believing that Mohamud intends to prioritise the wishes of his own clan. Sahan Research, a Nairobi based think tank has backed this impression by conveying Mohamud’s reluctance to complete a new constitution that outlines how power would be shared and it has also been suspected that Mohamd’s Hawiye clan will dominate the country’s police and security forces.
During the London Somali conference, Britain continued to court its relationship with Mohamud’s government by spending over £50,000 in accommodating the Somali delegation in one of London’s top five star hotels. This was much to the disapproval of the British tabloids which reported the vast sums that were paid out by the British tax payer to fund the Somali politician’s luxury trip to London. Potential investment opportunities were presumably what motivated such lavish spending but the consequences are that Britain has now placed both of its feet firmly inside the Hawiye camp. This has the potential to cause rival clans to look for alternative ‘mascots’ by aligning with rebel militant groups, causing further civil unrest and instability.
Britain has embraced federalism without comprehending how a federal political system will work successfully in Somalia. A one size fits all solution is not compatible in a country divided by numerous self declared autonomous regions and rival clans, and recent events in Jubaland have indicated that Britian’s optimistic vision for Somalia is most probably unattainable. On 15thMay 2013, Sheikh Ahmed Madobe, leader of the Ras Kamboni militia was elected as president, only to be contested hours later by Barre Hirale, a warlord from the rival Marehan clan. Neither so called leader was recognised by the Somali federal government in Mogadishu, and in the days that followed numerous other clan leaders announced themselves as president, heightening tension in the Jubaland region. Trouble escalated on 8thJune when hundreds fled a deadly gun battle between the Ras Kamboni and rival militant groups in the city of Kismayu, which resulted in at least eighteen deaths.
British policy has assumed that the prominence of Al-Shabaab has been the main contributing cause of violence in Somalia since the end of the civil war in 1991 and has neglected to pay much attention to Somalia’s complex web of clan politics. The Ras Kamboni militia are responsible for the most recent acts of violence in Jubaland yet in September 2012, the Ras Kamboni fought alongside AMISOM and Somali national forces in a battle to rid Al-Shabaab from the Jubaland capital Kismayu. It is laughable that the British so haplessly views Somalia’s troubles as being rooted in the operations of Al-Shabaab, yet it is likewise not so simple as to label any other Somali rebel contingency as the downright enemy of Somalia.
The following case study briefly outlines the complexity of Somalia’s clan relations by examining the Ras Kamboni’s current status in Somalia;
The Ras Kamboni militia comprises of members from the Ogaden clan, which has roots in Kenya and is also supported by the Kenyan government. Kenya has praised Madobe’s claim to presidency because it hopes that the Ras Kamboni’s presence in southern Somalia will act as a buffer zone, preventing the spillover of Al-Shabaab activities from Somalia to Kenya. On the other side of the spectrum, Barre Hirale’s Marehan clan disapproves of the Ogeden clan’s ties with Kenya and has demanded that the Kenyan government stays clear of Somali politics. By comparison, in in the north of Somalia, the semi autonomous state of Puntland has shown its support for both rival clans. The Ogaden and Marehan clans are sub-clans of the larger Darod clan and Puntland is keen for the south of Somalia to be under Darod administration, meaning that it will support both rival contingencies as it fears that the Hawiye led Somali government intends to marginalise the Darod’s influence in Somalia.
It is essential that British policymakers understand Somalia’s political context in order to be of any help when assisting in the region. The British agenda to end Islamic radicalism is of little use in Somalia given that the current situation in the country is far too complex to be so crudely summarised under a one dimentional label like ‘extremism’. Britain’s lack of experience in dealing with security measures in post colonial Africa gives yet more reason to question its capability of aiding Somalia’s successful transition to stability. In the mid 1990s, John Major’s Conservative government paid little attention to the massacres in the Great Lakes in the Democratic Republic of Congo or to the mass genocide in Rwanda whilst the New Labour government under Tony Blair also deterred from sending its troops to Sudan’s Darfur when troubles broke out in in 2004. It seems that British involvement in Somalia is driven by its own national interests to invest in Somalia’s oil reserves rather than by a broader desire to play a role in peace and security issues on the African continent. If Britain is to be successful in Somalia, it must first look beyond its whitewashed impression of Islamic extremism and instead must judge the situation in Somalia on what is actually happening on the ground.
By Beck Charlton
SomalilandPress.com