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Reading the papers or listening
to the radio these past few days must have caused a mixed
feelings among the Somali people at home and abroad. And
why wouldn’t it be? From the first polluted “peace
talks” in Addis and in Cairo 12 years ago to the
latest (the 15th) Eldoret/Mbagathi in Kenya the majority
of the Somali people are cautious to welcome another Arta-like
package.
Analysts predict one thing. That we have
a great problem on our hands and an even bigger problem
lurking in the minds of some of the warlords who failed
to get a piece of the cake, or those who felt they have
been sidelined during the swearing-in ceremony for the
clan-based transitional federal parliament.
“If we lose this opportunity which arrives after
nearly two years of hard work under very difficulty circumstances,
the country will regress to where it was,” a Kenyan
journalist quoted one of the few civic leaders at the
talks, who said he believed the slogan No Clan Left Behind.
“Let’s give peace a chance,” said.
They’ve even elected an eighty-year-old
chairman in their first meeting at Bomas in Nairobi, despite
the fact that some delegates failed to appear for the
swearing-in ceremony.
Still I have a problem believing that
all clans are comfortable with the so-called 4.5 arrangements.
Disenfranchising certain minority clans
in Somalia have gone for far too long because of our long
embedded cultural norms, which prevent us from openly
condemn this ancient absurdity. The problem is further
compounded by the victim’s unwillingness to protest
or seek legal redress in the international arena, such
as Amnesty International and the United Nations Human
Rights Commission.
But how do we change this? For starter,
intellectuals, human rights advocates, religious leaders,
university professors and my writing colleagues in all
the media have the collective power to end discrimination
against ethnic minorities, the so-called Midgans, Tumals,
Somali Bantus (Jareer), and other brutalized groups in
our midst. Why not begin with the Imams stepping forward
during their Friday sermons at mosques throughout the
country. Surely if anything, such bold step would catalyze
the healing process.
Secretly many of us will admit that there’s
a certain appeal to discriminate against our fellow countrymen
just because they happened to be hard working, God fearing
shoe- makers, metal workers and savvy farmers, who made
their presence felt in the middle of a nomadic society
after the famous Industrial Revolution, and the invention
of the first wheel by man in the West. They produced shoes
from raw hides and melted iron ores, (which they themselves
had discovered) to devise important implements, such as
hoes, axes, knives, spears and even the slippery needle
under very dangerous circumstances.
Instead of being proud of their daring
and bold inventiveness in the field of technology, and
of providing food to the hungry masses, they became target
of scorn, vulnerable both in their homes and on the streets,
typecasting them as second-class citizens in their own
country.
ANOTHER ARTE?
Going back to the circus of the year in
Kenya, the stories recently splashed in the press sounded
optimistic, omitting the fact that a big problem awaits
for those who were elected to get the country out of the
doldrums. One report from the capital said there were
smiles on the faces of the inhabitants upon hearing the
successful swearing-in ceremony of all the candidates.
But this smile could become “the smile of another
death” reminiscent to the immediate aftermath of
Arte conference and the election of Abdiqassim Salad Hassan’s
ineffective Transitional National Government, whose members
holed up in heavily guarded hotel rooms in Mogadishu for
security reason. Clan militia gunmen virtually kept them
as hostages to the gun just like the rest of the long-suffering
population.
They
knew from the word go that ours is not your typical scenario
where law enforcement officers hunt down the culprits
and bring them to face the law. They knew ours is where
drug-addicted free lance gunmen stop public transport
vehicles and forcing the driver and passengers to pay
cash or else… Ours is where people suspected of
belonging to families who regularly receive remittances
from abroad as well as expatriates are kidnapped for ransom.
Some
of my colleagues are already predicting the same Arte
symptom will show its ugly head again (a repeat performance,
if you like) where ministers and MPs bar themselves behind
a hotel’s steel gates. Other reports say the new
MPs would remain in Nairobi until the capital is deemed
to be safe. The question that quickly comes to mind is:
how long? Because for one thing the streets are still
under the full control of young militia gunmen and thousands
of hard core criminals who escaped from Mogadishu’s
Central Prisons in the immediate aftermath of the bloody
civil war.
In a situation like this it requires strong
stomach of the person who wants to run the country. Who
that person will be is open to conjunctions. What means
will be used to grasp the seat of power is not yet clear.
But that someone will assume the mantle is certain.
People
close to the venue allege that huge amounts of money have
been changing hands, not to mention the promise of cabinet
posts. It all boils down to the famous Somali play of
the 1960s: “Ama la’idooray ama daadka
i qaad.”
I
should like to acknowledge the valuable emails from all
those who feel as I do: that as long as the Somali people
are free to choose the kind of society in which they and
their children wish to live, they should at least be fully
informed as to what their decisions may mean, and, remember,
while most of us like to get a good night’s sleep
now and then, the war criminals keep busy all the time.
Let them all rot in a spider hole!
By M. M. Afrah©2003,
Email: afrah95@hotmail.com
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