James Madison University (Harrisonburg)
J. Peter Pham
25 June 2009
document
The following is the prepared testimony of Dr. J. Peter Pham, associate professor of justice studies, political science and Africana studies and Director of the Nelson Institute for International and Public Affairs at James Madison University, in front of the United States House of Representative subcommittee on Africa and Global Health on June 25, 2009 in Washington, DC. The hearing was entitled, ""Somalia: Prospects for Lasting Peace and a Unified Response to Extremism and Terrorism."
Chairman Payne, Congressman Smith, Members of the Subcommittee,
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today about the critical conditions currently prevailing in Somalia and threatening the security and stability of the entire Horn of Africa.
Permit me the liberty of observing that it is three years almost to the day since I appeared before the predecessor of this Subcommittee at its first hearing on the threat of extremism emanating from Somalia and this body—under your leadership, Mr. Chairman, and that of Mr. Smith—has maintained consistent vigilance on this important security issue, while simultaneously upholding the highest standards of respect for human rights. In particular, as a scholar who closely tracks developments in this subregion, allow me to add a personal note of appreciation for the chairman's leadership in keeping attention focused on issues relating to the Horn of Africa in general and for bringing about this historic hearing which brings together in the same forum high representatives of the Transitional Federal Government of Somalia and the Puntland State of Somalia as well as His Excellency the Minister of Defense of the Republic of Uganda.
I regret that the foreign minister of the Republic of Somaliland was unable to join us to share the experience of his people in avoiding the very scourges—including extremism, conflict, and piracy—which this hearing endeavors to examine. While I understand Somalilanders' sensitivity about any appearance prejudicial to their 1991 declaration of renewed independence and the delicate nature of the internal politics of Somaliland as it—alone of all the territories which were part of the Somali Democratic Republic before the collapse of the Muhammad Siyad Barre regime—moves its second democratic presidential and parliamentary elections in just three months, I nonetheless hope that the representatives of the Republic of Somaliland will provide the Subcommittee with information on its contribution to security and peace in the subregion.
Current Situation
This hearing convenes at a moment when Somalia is going through yet another grave crisis, the latest in its two-decade cycle state collapse, political failure, and, sadly, human suffering.
The various factions of al-Shabaab ("the youth"), an umbrella group that was formally designated a "foreign terrorist organization" by the U.S. Department of State last year, and their assorted allies—including the Hisbul al-Islamiyya ("Islamic party"), a group led by Sheikh Hassan Dahir 'Aweys, a figure who appears personally on both United States and United Nations antiterrorism sanctions lists—have proven themselves more resilient than many international observers have been willing to admit. Having in recent months consolidated their control of the area from the southern suburbs of the capital to the border with Kenya, the Islamist militants launched an offensive at the beginning of May with the apparent objective of circling the capital to its north as well. On May 12, al-Shabaab forces took control of Buulobarde, a key town in the Hiraan region of central Somalia that sits athwart a strategic crossroad on the principal route from Mogadishu to Ethiopia. On May 17, they seized control of Jowhar, located 90 kilometers north of Mogadishu, and its population of 50,000; the town is the capital of the Middle Shabelle region and had served as a joint administrative capital for the TFG. To add insult to injury, Jowhar is TFG president Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed's hometown. The following day, May 18, insurgents from Hisbul al-Islamiyya struck 20 kilometers further north, capturing another strategic town, Mahaday. Two days later, on May 20, just as it has done previously in Lower Shabelle, Jubba, and other areas it controlled, al-Shabaab proclaimed the establishment of a new Islamist administration for Middle Shabelle, appointing one Sheikh Abdirahman Hassan Hussein as the governor. The same day, the TFG-aligned mayor of Beledweyne, capital of Hiraan, Sheikh Aden Omar (Jilibay), hastily resigned, evidently frightened that his town would be the next one targeted by the insurgents.
Then, in just the last week, the already-bad security situation has deteriorated further as Islamist militants, following up on earlier incursion, brought their offensive into Mogadishu amid fierce fighting. Over the weekend, the Transitional Federal Government (TFG), reeling from the loss of several of its more effective members—including Mogadishu police chief Colonel Ali Said Hassan, security minister Colonel Omar Aden Hashi, former ambassador to Ethiopia and to the African Union Abdikarim Farah Laqanyo, and parliamentarian Mohamed Hussein Addow—appealed through parliament speaker Sheikh Adan Mohamed Nuur (Madobe) for military support from neighboring countries. On Monday, the TFG president declared a "state of emergency." The United Nations estimates that at least 160,000 people have been displaced in this latest round of conflict alone.
Now is not the time to assign blame. However, if we are to go forward, we have to acknowledge the realities on the ground. Notwithstanding the hopes that accompanied the installation of Sheikh Sharif as TFG president at the end of January—I would not call the extra-legal machinations in Djibouti an "election" and, unless we want to hold up the mockery of TFG's own charter by the parliamentarians' awarding of a two-year extension to themselves as a model for constitutional government across the region, the legitimacy of the legislature should be viewed as questionable—the results have been disappointing. With all due respect to our distinguished guest from the transitional regime, the TFG is not a government by any common-sense definition of the term: it is entirely dependent on foreign troops from the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) to protect its small enclave within Mogadishu, but otherwise administers no territory; even within this restricted zone, it has shown no functional capacity to govern, much less provide even minimal services to the citizens.
Even if Sheikh Sharif manages to reconcile the TFG's original secular framework with its more recent, albeit ill-defined, adoption of shari'a, the transitional government faces an almost insurmountable deficit of capacity, accountability, and, thus, credibility. Thanks to the frequent peregrinations abroad by Sheikh Sharif and members of his government, more Somalis than ever view the internationally-recognized interim authorities as little better than foreign puppets—and ineffectual ones at that. All of the TFG's "outreach" to date has amounted to pulling in an occasional warlord or two with bribes paid from funds it has received from Western or Arab countries. These characters have little interest in either governance or even security and have stayed "loyal" only so far as the money is forthcoming. Furthermore, while literally thousands from the TFG president's Abgaal sub-clan turned out just two months to sign up in response to an internationally recruitment drive, more than 90 percent of those who enlisted have since disappeared with their sign-up bonuses and, more ominously, their weapons, some of which have been documented as ending up in the hands of insurgents to whom they were presumably sold. Thus such forces as the TFG nominally has managed to field in the current fighting would be more accurately described as those of warlords whose interests, at least for the moment, happen to align with the interim regime's.
While this grim recital of just some of the TFG's shortcomings may seem gratuitous in light of the mortal peril that it faces at this moment, the point I am trying to make is that even in what many would view as the "best-case" scenario coming out of the current crisis—that the TFG will somehow manage to rally enough support among Somali clans and communities to push back the current offensive and win itself some time—the transitional regime is not very well-positioned to win a "long war" against the insurgency by wooing some of the insurgents and by defeating or at least marginalizing others, much less to emerge as the foundation for whatever political settlement Somalis eventually agree on. I am quite sorry to be unable to offer a more optimistic assessment of the existent capacity for governance, but reality is what it is and policy must be constructed on that basis.
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