THE
TRAGEDY CONTINUES TO RAGE
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FLASH BACK 1991 AND THE IMMEDIATE AFTERMATH
PART FOUR
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The
tragedy that is Somalia has sadly continued to rage
since the overthrow of General Mohamed Siad Barre
in 1991 with no sign it will end soon. As a matter
of fact, the country has regressed into the depth
of anarchy and a veritable pirate country with ruthless
warlords running virtual killing fields and fiefdoms
based on clan hegemony. |
As
the world watches, clan hegemony takes center-stage at
the expense of central authority, national sovereignty,
unity, cohesion and integrity. In fact, the country has
for all intents and purposes, ceased to exist, and to
this day, the status quo remains without hope of change
Consequently, the peoples' hopes for peace and stability
have been dashed so many times that they are now resigned
to their fate and continue to suffer the rule of the gun,
silently.
It
is evident that the petty political power barons are using
everything in their rotten arsenals to derail peace initiatives
in a bid to seek hegemony through clan entities.
Numerous
attempts to broker a political settlement that is all-inclusive
and representative, including the current shouting match
and occasional nasty fistfights that stunned the Kenyans,
woefully failed as the warlords continue to pursue parochial
and insular objectives. These objectives range from the
tenure of the office of a non-existent presidency, clan
issues, the return of stolen farms and real state properties
to their original owners, accountability, transparency
and a broad-based federal system of government as well
as bringing to justice those who committed crime against
humanity.
But
those with blood on their hands vehemently object these
optimistic and rosy objectives for obvious reasons.
General
Barre must have been turning in his grave at the thought
of his ex pupils hitting each other over the tenure of
Villa Somalia, his former residence and power base, now
in ruins.
In
hindsight, the nail-biting question is: why didn't the
warlords who toppled the military regime order their militia
to lay down their guns and embark upon setting up a broad-based
government of national unity, instead of turning the guns
on each other? Evidently, this was a political earthquake,
which continued to shake the whole country to this day.
The
epicenter of the political earthquake was Mogadishu, but
the shock wave was felt throughout the country. Dozens
of new warlords made their presence felt and started to
keep the people as hostage to the gun, replicating Mogadishu-style
quagmire.
Only days after General Barre fled to his home region
of Garba-harey, the victorious guerrillas and a civic
group known as Mogadishu Manifesto installed Ali Mahdi
Mohamed as interim President of the Fourth Republic.
| Late
one night in a small hut at Mustahiil inside Ethiopian-controlled
Ogaden region, General Mohamed Farah Aideed, Colonel
Ahmed Omar Jess and the late Abdirahman Tuur had came
together for a rare meeting to discuss how to divide
the Somali cake between them and what steps should
be taken against the Manifesto Group, who they thought
have usurped power in the capital by installing one
of their own, Ali Mahdi Mohamed, a wealthy Mogadishu
hotelier |
|
The
trio in Mustahiil was so irritated that they could not
hear the names of the Manifesto Group mentioned in their
presence. The Manifesto Group was comprised of prominent
citizens, including the first President at independence,
Adan Abdulle Osman, two former police chiefs, lawyers
and merchants.
 |
Aides
described how General Aideed visibly squirmed as the
BBC's Somali Service and Focus on Africa heaped compliments
after compliments on the popular uprising led and
financed by the Manifesto Group and executed by General
Mohamed Noor Galaal and his young warriors under the
banner of the United Somali Congress (USC) Committee
of Mogadishu. |
Aideed
has been sidelined in the past by AFIS (the Italian
administrators under UN Trusteeship Council) and
later by General Barre, but now his vanity and pride will
never allow him to believe that a mere hotelier and a
group of what he called Afar-jeebleyaal (people with four
pockets i.e. merchants) would have the temerity to sideline
him. No, he would not let that happen again.
Days
later he arrived in Mogadishu with a big bang and declared
war against the Manifesto Group and the Afar-jeebleh,
who he said had hijacked the government without first
consulting with the Somali people.
Then
he and his well-seasoned combat militia went straight
to the radio station in order to declare his own coup,
but was foiled by militia loyal to General Galaal, the
man who directed the popular uprising against Mohamed
Siyad Barre and who was allied with Ali Mahdi and the
Manifesto Group. General Aideed watched his battle-hardened
militia overpowered, without firing a single shot.
After
his aborted coup to take over the radio station, Aideed,
a powerful orator, addressed a huge rally at Mogadishu
Stadium. He repeated his accusations against Ali Mahdi
and the Manifesto Group for "stealing" the office
of the Presidency without a mandate from the majority
of the Somali people. He vowed to crush the group, who
he said were colluding with the ousted dictator "to
return the country back to the dark days of dictatorship
and clan hegemony."
He
said Barre's forces, led by one of his sons-in-law, General
Morgan (the Northerners called him The Butcher of Hargeisa),
continue in the Bay and Gedo regions of southwestern Somalia
and the struggle is far from over.
"If
the hated dictator comes back to the capital it would
be a grave insult and disaster to those of us who fought
hard to dislodge him," General Aideed told the crowd.
Soon
after that Aideed extended his influence by enlisting
the support of several smaller Hawiye sub-clans and vowed
to dislodge Ali Mahdi and the Manifesto Group even if
he had to level the city "making it look
like Hiroshima." One irony is that Ali Mahdi,
General Mohamed Noor Galaal and General Mohamed Farah
Aideed belonged to the same Hawiye clan, but of different
sub-clans.
As
predicted the city was devastated as supporters of General
Aideed and Ali Mahdi fought it out with long range-artillery
guns, mortars and Katyusha rocket launchers, and it indeed
looked like Hiroshima. It was strapped bare by looters
who carted away anything they considered valuable, including
the National monuments, hospitals, schools and historic
buildings, such as the National Museum, banks and government
archives. Nothing was left intact and the fighting continued
unabated. An estimated 45,000 lives, mostly women, children
and the elderly, were lost in only two months as each
man tried to consolidate his position. This figure had
escalated to hundreds of thousands in successive internecine.
| Some
4000 prisoners, including hardcore convicts from death
row, who escaped Mogadishu's Central Prison, joined
the mêlée with hundreds of guns stolen
from the prison armory, after overpowering their guards,
and the result was very devastating. |
|
The
first foreign journalist who reached the city found dogs
and rats feeding on decomposing bodies, which littered
the streets and in public gardens. Customized armoured
vehicles, with young boys behind the wheels, raced the
streets, and Mogadishu slipped further into insanity.
Teenagers mounted makeshift barricades and shot at anything
that moved. The notorious Green Line that divides the
capital into north and south sprung up overnight, and
it has become one of the worst killing fields, rivaling
Pol Pot's killing fields in Cambodia. To cross it is tantamount
to committing suicide. Other parts of the city automatically
became No-go areas.
 |
Taking
advantage of the inter-Hawiye clan warfare in Mogadishu,
Mohamed Siyad Barre rallied his own clansmen and
made an attempt to repossess his seat of power in
the capital as earlier prophesied by Aideed, but
like previous attempts, he failed to achieve his
goal as former archenemies, the Abgal and the Habar-gedir
sub-clans conveniently joined hands, for the time
being, to push "the invaders" back to
Garba-harey.
|
Clan
armies from both sides laid waste to Somalia's breadbasket.
As they fought, they pillaged crops and massacred
Somali
Bantus, the Rahan-weyn and other traditional
farming communities, eventually triggering off the first
seeds of man-made famine in the country.
To
be continued…
By M. M. Afrah©2003,
Email: afrah95@hotmail.com
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