putting the cart
before the horse
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Putting he Cart
Before he Horse:
Contested Nationalism and the Crisis of the
Nation-State in Somalia
Edited by
Abdi Kusow
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Copyright © Abdi Kusow, 2004
All Rights Reserved
First Printing 2004
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any
means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise
without the prior written permission of the publisher.
Cover design: Ashraful Haque
Typesetting: Jerusalem Typesetting
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Putting the cart before the horse: contested nationalism and the crisis of
the nation-state in Somalia / edited by Abdi Kusow.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-56902-202-x (hardcover) -- ISBN 1-56902-203-8 (pbk.)
1. Nationalism--Somalia. 2. Somalia--Politics and government. I.
Kusow, Abdi.
DT403.25.P88 2004
967.7305’3--dc22
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2004014126
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To my wife,
Alangti Aw Umur Mad Aliyow;
and to Loo-ma-oyayaasha (those for whom no one sheds tears over their
death and destruction or to whom no one gives credit to their contributions in the making of the Somali nation) wherever they are.
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Acknowledgement
his book would not have materialized without the moral and intellectual support of family and friends. Ali Jimale Ahmed shared his wisdom and critical gaze
throughout the project. It was, in fact, in the constant conversation with him
that the idea of the book was born, and from that moment on provided cheerful
encouragement and supportive criticism. I owe a tremendous debt to my good
friend and mentor, David Russell Maines, for his undying support. He has been
there whenever I needed him. To Linda Benson for making my family and I truly
welcome to the Benson-Maines home. Lenny Markovitz, Peter Kivisto, Yacob
Fisseha, and Vincent Khapoya have shown a particularly keen appreciation of my
work over the years. I owe them a special gratitude.
I also wish to acknowledge the contributions of a number of colleagues
and friends, Hassan Mahadallah, Mohamed Haji Mukhtar, Ahmed Qasim Ali,
Abdulkadir Arif, Abukar Arman, Abukar Balle, Dr. AbdiNur Mohamed, Abdullahi Osman (Xirey), Omar Raghe, Nur Barre, Abdiaziz Abukar (Baffo), Malaq
Mukhtar Mohamed Adan, Omar Eno, Mohamed Eno, and Nur Abdi Hussen; my
colleagues at Oakland University, Peter Bertocci, Judith Brown, Lindsay Cooper,
Jennifer Dierickx, James Dow, Jay Meehan, Linda Morrison, Lynetta Mosby, Terri
Orbuch, Jo Reger, Cindy Schellenbach, Gary Shepherd, Suzanne Spencer-Wood,
Richard Stamps, and particularly Kathy Barrett for their support over the years. I
am grateful to Linda Fortin for editing an earlier version of the manuscript; and
to Christina Gonzalez for standardizing the footnotes, and for transcribing and
scanning the images in Chapter Two.
hanks to my brothers, Abdullahi Jasaaye, Ali Atore, Ahmed Katara, and
Isak Kusow; sisters Fartumo and Rukia Kusow; brother in-laws, Mahamud Mohamed (Bono), Adan Bulle, Ali Omar, Mad Karin Omar, Mowlid Omar, and Abdi
Omar; sister in-laws, Shukri Jamac, Fadumo Abukar, Fadumo Omar, and Nacima;
uncle/brother Ali Abdi Semed Aw Muxumed; and my nieces and nephews for
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putting the cart before the horse
their unconditional love. To my late father, Alangki Aw Kusow Edeng whose deep
understanding of the hidden meanings of everyday things, and appreciation of every day people, along with my mother, Ina Cabdi Semed Aw Muxumed whose love
and straight forward approach to life gave me an early and a committed sense of
the importance of critical awareness, particularly as it relates to those whose voices
are unacknowledged. I owe them more than I could possibly repay. A special and a
deep sense of appreciation must go to my father in-law, Alangki Aw Mad Aliyow;
and my mother in-law, Alangti Aw Nurow Ali, for their unconditional love, and for
truly adopting me as their own.
To my Luley, however, must go the greatest appreciation. She has remained
true to me despite my constant obsession with writing rather than living and enjoying life; and to my children, Karima, Omar, and Abbas for being such wonderful
children.
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Contents
Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
i.
heoretical Framework
1. Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia: A
Prolegomenon
Abdi M. Kusow, Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan . . . . . . . . .
ii. History, Nationalism, and Colonial Resistance
2. Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
Mohamed Nuuh Ali . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
3. The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
Cedric Barnes, British Academy Post Doctoral Fellow, soas,
University of London.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4 Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
Hassan Mahaddala, Southern University . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
5. Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine
Case)
Mohamed Haji Mukhtar, Savannah State University . . . . . . . . . . . . .
iii. Social Identities and Shifting Gender Roles
6. Men Drink Tea While Women Gossip
Ladan Affi, University of Wisconsin, Madison . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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putting the cart before the horse
7. Transformative Islam & Shifting Gender Roles in The Somali
Diaspora
Rima Berns, McGown, Ph.D.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8. Landless Landlors, And Landed Tenants: Plantation Slavery In
Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
Omar A. Eno, York University, History Department . . . . . . . . . . . .
iv. Resource Problems and Monitory Systems
9. Land Rush in Somalia
Ahmed Q. Ali . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
10. The Collapse of the Somali Banking System
Abdulqadir Arif Qassim . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
x
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Preface
S
onventional somali historiography is mainly derived from the as-
Csumption that the society has been and remains a nation sui-generis, a priori,
or what Somalis call Muqadas (holy) nation. he most revealing expression of this
sentiment is found in Laitin and Samatar’s (1987) book title, Somalia: A Nation in
Search of a State.¹ his title, as it were, represents a long line of research that depicts
the society as a self-same nation, downplays, and sometimes violently oppresses any
mention of social and political faultlines. he only acknowledged political and social
faultlines, according to self-same nation thesis, are those that resulted from Faragelin
Shisheeye (foreign intervention) otherwise colonialism both European and what
Somalis habitually refer to Gumaysiga Madow (black colonists).² If colonial actors
are not blamed, moreover, the breakdown of the Somali moral fiber, according the
self-same nation thesis, is traced to the actions of one or another post-colonial regime
which allegedly pitted hitherto harmonious and homogeneous clans against each
other, and thereby, destroyed the cultural and spiritual values of the society leading
to the present crisis.³ More importantly, this historiography articulates the making
of the Somali nation as the result of the Darwiish anti-colonial resistance movement who supposedly rescued the nation from the British overlords, in the case of
Mohamed Abdulle Hassan; and Ahmed Gurey, in the case of Gumaysiga Madow,
while conveniently ignoring the contributions of the peasant masses, women; and
in general, what I would call Lo-ma-oyayaasha, those for whom no one sheds tears
over their death and destruction; and to whom, no one gives credit to their contributions in the well-being of the nation.
For the methodologically and theoretically informed scholar, however, articulating the making of the Somali nation through the activities of the Darwiish; and
more importantly, locating the social faultlines of the nation on Fragelin Shisheeye
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putting the cart before the horse
(foreign intervention) or individual dictators alone is, to paraphrase Ahmed, shouting “wolf ” when the predator is not, in fact, “wolf ”, but one of the sheep.³ his
kind of historiography is, moreover, analogous to “the tale of the African peasant
who was stopped by a traveler in a large car and asked the way to the city, who
responded after reflecting on the matter a while, ‘if I were you, I wouldn’t start
from here.’⁴ Somali historiography, in other words, starts from where the African
peasant warned against by concentrating on one or another kind of foreign intervention, or the invention of a single variant nationalism. he point is not to dismiss
the effects of colonialism or post-colonial regimes on the traditional structures of
the Somali society, or any other colonized people for that matter. However, we
suggest that conceptualizing the idea of Somaliness in terms of mere interactions
between colonial overlords and undifferentiated local masses may not be sufficient
cause to have had totally disrupted the supposed Somali traditional tree under
which its pleasant shadows all social and legal problems were amicably resolved.
It is not, either, to dismiss the recent scholarship that has tried to engage Somali
historiography through multiple causal factors, including, but not limited to resource problems (Omar and De Waal 1993; Besteman and Cassanelli 1996) racial
and ethnic cleavages (Besteman 1996; Eno 1996; Menkhause 1989), or class-based
exploitations (Samatar, 1989; Little 1996).⁵ Taken together, these arguments are very
instructive in furthering our understanding of the causes and the consequences of
the current Somali social faultlines. However, they are very limited in that they
do not specify the sociological conditions that may have paved the way for certain
groups to expropriate land, exploit, stigmatize, and/or racialize certain segments
of the society. In other words, they fail to appropriate the ideological narratives
through which the act of land expropriation, racialization, or class cleavages have
been legitimized.
One scholarship that has tried to understand Somalia for what it is, and not
what it ought to be is that which is articulated in The Invention of Somalia, (1995).⁶
he chapters in that volume lay out the most credible starting point for what I refer
to as the “contradiction between master and empirical narratives of Somaliness,” and
provide a far more delineated understanding of the current crisis in Somalia. he
collection of chapters in The Invention of Somalia, for example, introduce issues of
legitimation and contested identities, and thereby provide fresh ontological and
conceptual framework through which contemporary Somali social realities can be
understood. he central argument put forth in the The Invention of Somalia is that
the notion of Somaliness and therefore Somali nationalism, like all identities, are
socially constructed, and are therefore liable to counter interpretations.
he essays in this volume contribute to that project and suggest that a more
meaningful historiography is one that can appreciate the multiple, often contested,
and sometimes oppressed voices that exist within the social boundary of the nation.
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Preface
he book is specifically intended to further move Somali historiography beyond
the self-same nation theory and focus instead on contested identities and conflict of
interpretations as a possible framework for understanding the current social and
political realities in Somalia. Consequently, the essays in this volume underline the
multiple and often contested meanings of Somaliness, and collectively attempt to
begin to clear the terrain for a new theoretical analysis of Somali society. In the first
chapter, Kusow argues that the fundamental problems that inform much the of the
social crisis in Africa, and Somalia in particular, result from “contested narratives.”
By “contested narratives,” he means a condition of interpretive conflict between the
simultaneous existence of two major paradigms, lineage (national/master) versus
territorial (empirical) narratives – of Somaliness – that involve relationships among
people, place, and the history on which nationalism is predicated. he first paradigm is based on founding myths that have no application to the everyday realities
of the people. hese myths, nonetheless create: 1) a symbolic and narrative-based
processes that privilege certain categories and cultural meanings that delimit the
social boundary of Somaliness by defining who belongs and who does not, and 2)
establishes an invented core cultural center upon which the notion and the boundary
of Somaliness is drawn. his paradigm constructs the social boundary of Somaliness
in terms of lineage priorities and on the elevation of regional and localized traditions and, then camouflages them as national symbols and values. he territorial
narratives, on the other hand, demarcate the social boundary of Somaliness not in
terms of lineage, but rather on economic, moral, and territorial priorities. As simple
as the territorial narratives may seem, in actuality, they discredit the notion of the
self-same nation by embracing the existence of multiple voices and the increasing
identity assertions of previously suppressed social identities, including but not
limited to language, caste, gender, and/or racialized social groups. he contested
ways in which the two paradigms organize and structure social relations, and
therefore, the social boundary of Somaliness, we argue, create what Paul Ricoeur
characterized as a conflict of interpretations, and result in what Habbermas referred
to as legitimation crisis.⁷
he remaining chapters of the book are organized into four thematic areas.
he first theme is a critical re-reading and re-writing of earlier misrepresentations
of Somali history and nationalism. Employing Linguistic approaches to the past,
Mohamed Nuuh Ali, reconstructs the social and economic developments of the past
three millennia in the Eastern Horn of Africa. His is a more complex picture of
Somali historical developments than the pastoral-based oral tradition that has been
the stable of Somali historiography since the turn of last century. Cedric Barnes
deals with the misrepresentations of the nation and therefore Somali nationalism.
Focusing on the Jigjiga area, he calls our attention to how earlier scholars have emphasized high politics while overlooking the political and economic circumstances
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putting the cart before the horse
of local populations. By high politics, Barnes refers to the earlier understanding of
“the division of the Somalilands either “as the triumph of Ethiopian independence
or the betrayal of the hopes for Somali unification and the repartition of the Somali
nation by the very same forces of imperialism, which overlooked the political and
economic circumstances of the local populations concerned.” Barnes provides a solid
argument that links Somali nationalism to local economic circumstances.
Hassan Mahaddala’s essay contributes further to the overall assertion of this
book that there is nothing Muqads (holy) about Somali nationalism. Mahadalla
critically analyzes the canonical categories of language, Islam, history, and the
tradition upon which much of the historiography of Somali nationalism has been
articulated, and refers to it as pithless nationalism – one with no particular and
identifiable foundation, except that which is socially constructed.⁸ Had there been
an a priori Somaliness that transcends other differences, as some would like us to
believe, the existence of Djibouti as a nation separate and distinct from the holy
union begs for an explanation. What about the so-called Somaliland’s bid to secede
from the union? Is it based on differences of language, religion, or culture, or the
oppressive acts of the Siyad Barre regime on the people of Hargeisa? Alternatively,
is it because of differences, British versus Italian, in colonial history? Whatever
Somalilandness as opposed to Somaliness may be based, it sure defies what brother
Lewis has been telling us for more than half a century now. Similar arguments can
be made about the Somali communities both in Kenya and Ethiopia as exemplified by their reaction to Hussein Aideed’s 2002 interview with irin, in which he
implied his desire to unify all the Somali communities under one flag, and to which
both communities reacted angrily, and rejected his comment outright. All of these
comments attest to the fact that, like all communities and nations, the Somali nation is, in some profound sense, to borrow from Benedict Anderson, an “imagined
community” and that such an imagination is determined by the prevailing social
and economic circumstances and not by any predetermined categories of similarities and/or differences.⁹ In other words, Somaliland’s claim to an identity distinct
from the rest of the Somali regions is equally dubious as the claim of the sui-generis
Somali nation to which the leaders of today’s Somaliland have contributed to and
played a big role in its concoction.
Mohamed Mukhtar continues the undoing of the Darwiish nationalism and
colonial resistance by introducing hitherto hidden and ignored accounts of the
nationalist resistance movements in southern Somalia. Mukhtar’s essay provides a
more inclusive picture of the different anti-colonial movements and thus a more
global understanding of Somali nationalism and the making of the modern Somali
nation. What nationalist historiographers and therefore the equation of Somali
nationalism as the result of the Darwiish activities cannot explain is the many
nationalist and anti-colonial resistance movements that have emerged in many
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Preface
parts of the country’s modern history, including the 1890–1907 Gosha movement,
the Banadir Resistance Movement from 1888–1921, and the well-known Awaysia
Movement led by Sheikh Aweys. In fact, one can argue that the Darwiish movement played an insignificant part of the nation’s overall social and political history.
he majority of social movements, colonial resistance or otherwise, involved in the
making of the modern Somali nation occurred outside the Darwiish sphere. More
importantly, though, the history of modern Somalia dates at least one thousand
years before the British colony occupied northern Somalia. Somali societies have
interacted with cultures as far away as China and India and have resisted different
foreign powers, including the Portuguese, Egyptian, and Omani in the Banadir
Coast. All of these occurred much earlier than the Darwiish movement. Even if
the idea of Somali nationalism were understood in terms of European colonial
resistance alone, one would have to account for the fact that Somali interaction
with European colonialism took place more in relation to the Italian colony than
the British occupation of northern Somalia. his is, again, not to dismiss the role
of the Sayyid, but to reject the elevation of his movement as the only meaningful
site for understanding Somali nationalism and colonial resistance.
he next three chapters amplify what we mean by contested social identities
and social exclusions. An informative example of what we mean by contested narratives is exemplified in Ladan Affi’s chapter title derived from that famous Somali
proverb, Rag Waa Shaah, Dumarna Waa Sheeko (men drink tea, while women gossip).
Here, Ladan shows that despite the fact that this proverb was intended to characterize Somali women as mere circulators of gossip who contributed nothing to
the economic and social well-being of the nation; it is men who have contributed
nothing but the destruction of the nation. Ladan continues to argue that Somali
women have not only been written out of the history of the nation, but that they
are now beginning to debunk existing views as they claim the right to be heard,
participate, and confront conventional understanding of Somali realities produced
by males. In a slightly different way, Rima Berns McGown extends Ladan’s argument by examining Somali gender identities and conflicts in the diaspora through
what she aptly characterized as transformative Islam. She specifically examines how
Somalis in exile have not only become significantly more religious than they had
been in their homeland, but in the process, reconstituted new ways of practicing
Islam which in turn transformed social relations and interactions between husband
and wife as well as children and their parents. One of the most significant implications of this changed environment, according to Berns McGown, is that gender
roles have shifted such that women increasingly hold more power than before
within households. Such transformations have brought previously taboo issues such
as the role of women in the household, premarital and extra marital affairs to the
forefront. Accordingly, one of the most significant transformations of the Somali
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putting the cart before the horse
society in the Diaspora is the change of power and status from men to women.
According to Berns McGown, it is the women who have been most likely to have
found work, support their families, and in many situations, have been at the forefront in the re-imagination of Islam within the family in the now predominantly
Judeo-Christian societies in which they find themselves.
Omar Eno’s essay, “Landless Landlords and Landed Tenants,” represents
the first work about slavery in Somalia written by a Somali scholar. It attempts to
dispel the contention that the majority of the Bantu/Jarer populations of Southern
Somalia are slaves imported from East Africa. On the contrary, writes Eno, “oral
traditions as well as available archival records indicate that the majority of the
Bantu/Jarer people occupied their present location as far back as the tenth century.”
More importantly, though, Eno’s essay shows how a significant segment of the
Somali population has been reduced to second a class citizen status, and placed
outside the social boundary of Somaliness.
he next topic pertains to issues of resources and resource misappropriations.
Written with a sharp sociological eye, and of course, from first-hand experience
based on more than a decade’s work on development projects as a civil and hydraulic
engineer, Ali provides a sociological analysis of how land misappropriation remains
one of the most salient obstacles to achieving a fair and more durable political and
social structure. Ali’s argument is a clear departure from earlier works that used
resources as an important factor in understanding the current Somali crisis in that
he marshals a rich data along with an actual experience on the ground. In a similar
vein, Arif provides a historical analysis of how monitory systems inherited from
the colonial administration and adopted by successive post-colonial Somali regimes
coupled with shifting policies and erratic management systems ultimately collapsed
the Somali banking system.
Finally, we belief that the relevance of any scholarship, and Somali scholarship
not being an exception, requires its students to pursue ideas that earlier generation
did not, and perhaps could not imagine for whatever reason(s), and to continuously
make it more in touch with the every day realties of the people to which it tries
understand. he collection of the essays in this volume, we hope, will make a small
contribution towards realizing that goal.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
David Laitin and Said Samatar, Somalia: A Nation in Search of State (Boulder co:
Westview Press, 1987).
he reference here is to the expansionist ambitions of the successive Ethiopian regimes.
Ethiopian regimes have as well accused Somalia of similar expansionist tendencies.
What is not acknowledged in these allegations and counter allegations, however, is
the suffering of the every day people in both counties.
Mohamed Dahir Afrax, “he Mirror of Culture: Somali Dissolution Seen hrough
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Preface
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Oral Expression,” in Ahmed I. Samatar, ed., The Somali Challenge: Form Catastrophe
to Renewal (Boulder, co: Lynn Rienner Publishers, 1994).
Ali J. Ahmed, Daybreak is Near: Literature, Clans, and the Nation-State in Somalia
(Lawrenceville, nj: he Red Sea Press, 1996).
Kawame Anthony Appiah, In My Fathers House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), p. 26.
Catherine Bestemen and Lee V. Cassanelli, eds., The Struggle for Land in Southern
Somalia: The War Behind the War (Boulder: Westview Press, 1996); Peter D. Little
“Conflictive Trade, Contested Identity: he Effects of Export Markets on Pastoralists
of Southern Somalia” in African Studies Review 39, no 1 (1996); Rakiya Omar and
Alex de Waal, Land Tenure, The Creation of Famine, and Prospects for Peace in Somalia
(London: Africa Rights, Discussion paper, no 1, 1993), Abdi I. Samatar, The State and
Rural Transformation in Northern Somalia (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press,
1989); Omar Eno, The Historical Roots of the Somali Tragedy and the Vulnerable Minority Groups, particularly the Bantu/Jarer, Paper presented to the African Studies Annual
Conference. Orlando, Florida, 1995; Kenneth Menkhause, Rural Transformations and
the Roots of Underdevelopment in Somalia’s Lower Jubba Valley, Ph.D. Diss., University
of South Carolina, Columbia, South Carolina, 1989)
Ali J. Ahmed, ed., The Invention of Somalia (Lawrenceville, nj: he Red Sea Press,
1995).
Paul Ricoeur, The Conflict of Interpretations: Essays in Hermeneutics (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1974); for a more extensive discussion of Legitimation Crisis,
see Jurgen Habbermass, Legitimation Crisis, Trans. T. McCarthy (Boston: Beacon Press,
1973).
Peter Berger and homas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality (New York:
Doubleday, 1966).
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread of
Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1983).
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Chapter One
Contested Narratives and he Crisis of the
Nation-State in Somalia: A Prolegomenon
Abdi M. Kusow
Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan
S
he purpose of this chapter is to a sketch a preliminary outline for a new
Tperspective through which the social structure and the ultimate source of the
social conflict in Somalia can be viewed, framed, and analyzed. his perspective
starts from the ontological assumption that the fundamental problems that inform
much of the social crisis in Africa, and Somalia in particular, result from “contested
narratives.” By “contested narratives,” I mean a condition of a conflict of interpretations between the simultaneous existence of two major paradigms – lineage versus
territorial narratives, of Somaliness, involving the relationship among people, place,
and the history on which nationalism is predicated. he first paradigm is based on
state-sponsored idealistic images and founding myths that have no practical application to the everyday realities of the people. his paradigm constructs the social
boundary of Somaliness on the basis of lineage priorities, or what Ahmed referred
to as “imagery reflective of the pastoralist modus vivendi,¹ otherwise locally known
as Maandeeq, and camouflaged as national symbols and values. hese priorities
and values, as it were, privilege certain cultural meanings that delimit and define
who belongs and who does not in the Maandeeq social boundary of Somaliness.
he second paradigm (the territorial narrative) constructs the social boundary of
Somaliness not on lineage/Maandeeq priorities, but rather on economic, moral, and
territorial priorities. he contested ways in which the two paradigms (narratives)
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putting the cart before the horse
organize and structure social relations, and therefore, the social boundary of Somaliness create what Habbermas characterized as legitimation crisis.² Accordingly, I
argue that the current social crisis in Somalia must be seen as a war over contested
ideas and social identities, i.e., a conflict of interpretations.³
he first part of the chapter examines the assumptions, and therefore the
social and political implications of the lineage-based narratives. In this section, I
specifically analyze how the lineage narrative permanently excludes certain segments of the society from the social boundary of Somaliness, while it simultaneously includes and excludes others. he second part deals with the assumptions of
the territorial narrative and how it structures the social boundary of Somaliness in
ways diametrically opposed to those of the lineage narrative, while the final section
provides some concluding remarks. I must point out, however, that the purpose
of this essay is not to lend authenticity to either of the paradigms, but to simply
delineate the ontological assumptions that inform each narrative and how the two
assumptions ultimately confronted each other on the ground leading to the current
crisis. As the title indicates, the chapter is decidedly theoretical and the categories
used are as simply heuristics, and therefore, must be understood as such. A more
detailed analysis of the arguments and categories used in this chapter will appear
in a forthcoming project.
Lineage-Based Narratives
he lineage-based narratives follow from the premise that the Somali founding
ancestor originated from southern Arabia, settled in the northeastern region of
the country, and married a local Somali woman. his union, according to the narrative, started what later became the source of contemporary Somali society, and
by extension its national identity.⁴ As simple as it may seem, the above narrative
establishes two ontological points: (1) an original, Muslim and non-indigenous
founding ancestor and, (2) an original dispersal point. he first part of the narrative establishes the Somali ancestor as an immigrant from Southern Arabia who
practiced Islamic values, otherwise Arab and Muslim. he second part of the narratives locates the original landing as well as the settlement place of the founding
ancestor in the northeastern region of the country. Each dimension of the narrative
constructs a social boundary of Somaliness that includes certain segments and clans
and excludes others from the social boundary of Somaliness. For example, the Islamic
aspect of the ancestor removes, those (Midgaan, Yibir, to mention only a few) who
initially retained pre-Islamic cultural traditions and values and stigmatizes them
as less than noble. he implied Arabness of the ancestor removes those allegedly
accused of having African ancestry. his aspect of the narrative effectively removes
the Bantu/Jarer Somalis from the social boundary of Somaliness. Taken together, the
original founding ancestor and the original dispersal point construct a social bound2
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
ary of Somaliness by enacting “a process of simultaneous exclusion and inclusion.”
Certain groups are explicitly and permanently placed outside this boundary, while
others are included or excluded depending on the prevailing political arrangements
and power structures. In what follows, I will discuss the process of exclusion and
inclusion through caste, race, and lineage-based categories.
Caste-Based Exclusion
Since the Somali mythical ancestor is narratively considered to have migrated
from southern Arabia, and because Islamic values dictated the new moral values
of the society, the first task of the narrative was to engage in the violent removal
of non-Islamic cultural traces and heritages and those who refused to become part
of the social boundary of this new Somaliness. According to this narrative, during
the arrival of the founding ancestor, there existed in the land a vicious magician
king who ruled the country. his king was a ruthless one who terrorized the people,
raped women, killed innocent children, and in general exploited the people until
the founding Somali ancestor, with the help of Saint Aw Barkhadle, caused two
mighty hills to close on him. his event created the distinction between the noble
and non-noble groups.
he articulation of noble versus non-noble categories is also enacted through
another narrative which contends that the ancestors of both the noble and nonnoble caste were two biological brothers who, otherwise, differently reacted to the
advice of their father regarding the moral conditions under which one can consume
un-Islamic slaughtered mead or one from an already dead animal. he narrative
reads, before the brothers set out on a long journey, their father advised them that in
case they became hungry at any time during the journey, they should eat whatever
they find, even if it was the meat of a dead animal. However, the father warned that
when they reach their final destination, they should force themselves to vomit in
order to cleanse their souls of the negative elements that the non-halaal meat may
have left behind. As the narrative goes, midway through the journey, the brothers
became so hungry that they ate the meat of a dead animal. However, after they
reached their final destination, the younger brother followed his father’s advice and
forced himself to vomit, while the older bother refused to do so. What happened
after that is well known: the descendants of the younger brother became the nobles,
while those of the older brother became outcasts.
Despite its mythical quality, though, this narrative has been very successful
in effectively marginalizing and stigmatizing a significant portion of the Somali
society as having an unholy origin. hese groups are variously known as Yibir,
Midgaan, or Tumaal, and to this day, they remain outside the social boundary of
Somaliness. Social intercourse of all forms, including marriage, with any member
from caste group is quietly discouraged. hey are, in essence, considered as socially
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putting the cart before the horse
polluting in ways, not one dissimilar to that of the untouchables in India. Drawing
from this narrative, a number of scholars have spent a great deal of energy studying either their speech patterns or their blood type to corroborate the narrative.
he most important example of such undertaking is Goldsmith and Lewis’s (1958)
serological examination to determine whether genetic differences existed between
what they categorized as noble versus the caste groups. Goldsmith and Lewis, of
course, did not find any differences between the two samples, but insisted that
the results were tainted by the small sample size from the caste (53) as opposed to
the somewhat larger sample from the nobles (1,000). hey implied that had they
used a larger sample from the caste group, they would have arrived at a different
conclusion. What is more important here, though, is not whether they found any
differences between the two samples, but that the research itself was intended to
verify pseudo-scientifically the claims of the lineage narrative.⁵
Racialized Exclusions
he other group permanently removed from the Maandeeq social boundary of Somaliness is the so-called Bantu/Jarer Somalis. At one level, the narratives concerning
the Jarer Somalis did not require such an elaborate narrative system as that of the
caste groups because of their supposed African-like physical appearance which allegedly makes them distinguishable from the Somali one, whatever that may mean.
hey are referred to as Adoon, meaning slave, or Jarer, meaning “hard textured hair.”
In other situations, they are referred to as Gosha (people of the rain forest), or Reer
Shabelle (people of Shabelle river). Despite the variations in naming, though, all
such references are derogatory in nature because they are, according to the lineage
narrative, associated with African-like physical characteristics, slave status, or with
primitive and uncivilized mode of existence in the impenetrable tropical rain forests
around the Jubba and Shabelle rivers of southern Somalia. Beyond the alleged physical and location-based stigmatization, though, the Jarer people are stigmatized, and
in some cases, violently oppressed by the narrative that that they originated from
imported slaves from East Africa during the nineteenth century, which further
facilitated their social exclusion from the boundary of Somaliness.
he idea of racial exclusion is applied to the so-called Banadiri groups as
well. he Banadiri is collectively known as Gibil Cad (white skin). According to
the lineage narrative, the Jarer Somalis are accused of being too African, while the
Banadiri Somalis are considered too light to be Somali. Moreover, the original
homeland of the Jarer is said to have been somewhere in Africa, while that of
the Banadiri groups is located somewhere in the Arabian Peninsula, Portugal, or
Persia depending on the whim of the narrator. he Jarer and the Banadiri Somalis,
however, belief that they have lived in Somalia as long as other Somalis did, if not
longer. For example, according to Luling, one Jarer respondent in Afgoi told her,
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
“Our ancestors were born here, they did not come here.” Moreover, Luling points
out that all the basic cultural values of the Jarer indicate a long tradition of cultural
association with the river rather than a labor force recently imported from outside
the country.⁶ he implication of the counter narrative, which suggests that the
Jarer people are indigenous Somalis, underscores the core of the argument of this
paper, which is that the existence of indigenous Jarer Somalis in Somalia prior to
the Somali arrival is bound to challenge the lineage narrative that strips them of
any claim to land holdings in Somalia. he Jarer, caste, and the Banadiri have now
started to organize themselves around their own identities in lines, not one, dissimilar to that of the black power movements among African Americans in the
1960s. More important, these attempts reveal the contested nature of Somaliness, or
to use Paul Ricour’s phrase, the “conflict of interpretations” that exist in Somalia
today.⁶ It shows the increasing confidence of previously stigmatized groups or individuals who have earlier been forced not to reveal their identities, lest they pollute
the social environment. It further attests to the changing political climate and the
radically shifting power structures in Somalia today as is reflected by the increasing political assertiveness of hitherto unrecognized groups who, since the Reewing
Reistence Army’s (rra) defeat of Aideed’s occupation of Baidoa, rediscovered their
own political voices. hese assertions are starting to redefine the social boundary of
Somaliness in ways that politician, commentators, and social historians could not
have imagined just a decade ago.
he process of simultaneous exclusion and inclusion is not limited to those
permanently removed from the social boundary of Somaliness, but affects the socalled major clan family groupings too. In what follows, I will discuss how the
lineage narratives structure the relationship between and among the so-called major
clans. I will then provide examples of how the basic tenets of the lineage narrative
are contradicted by the territorial narrative’s alternative definition of the social
boundary of Somaliness. I will then provide some concluding remarks intended to
summarize and elevate the preceding comments into a more theoretical level.
Segmentary-Based Exclusion
So far, I have been concerned with how the Islamic and Arabian aspects of the narrative effectively and permanently removed the Caste and the Bantu/Jarer groups
from the social boundary of Somaliness. his process, as I have pointed earlier, is
very simple in that the narrative claims that those who retained pre-Islamic cultural
values and those accused of having African-like physical features are simply not
Somalis and therefore excluded from the social boundary of the nation. he most
complicated construction of the social boundary of Somaliness, however, pertains to
the narrative aspect that attempts to structure the relationship between and among
the so-called major Somali clan family groupings through a system of simultane5
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putting the cart before the horse
ous exclusion and inclusion. he process of simultaneous inclusion and exclusion is
articulated in what I refer to as “the degrees of distance and/or closeness” from the
common ancestor or the supposed original dispersal point. he degree of distance
or closeness is organized along spatial and a social dimensions. he social dimension refers to the degree to which groups claim direct lineage from the mythical
founding ancestor and the degree to which they represent the supposed core cultural
values of the Maadheeq nation. he genealogical location of a particular clan on
the lineage chart determines its position in the social hierarchy, and therefore, its
degree of Somaliness. he basic premise of the social dimension is that the further
away a clan is removed from the founding ancestor genealogically, the lower that
clan is located in genealogical hierarchy, and therefore, the lower its social status.
Spatially, it refers to the geographic distance a particular clan family is removed
from the supposed original landing place of the original ancestor, or dispersal point.
he basic premise of the spatial dimension is that the further south a clan family is
located, the further away it is from the mythic origins and therefore the lower in
the social hierarchy. Several binary opposition categories operate on these dimensions that either include or exclude certain groups from the social boundary of the
lineage-based Somaliness. Specifically, the state-sponsored official Somali language
and literature is a major element through which the lineage narratives enact the
degrees of distance and closeness from the social boundary of Somaliness. he
state- sponsored language and poetry is based mainly on the speech of those that
claim to have descended from the original ancestor and dispersal point. he further
south one moves, according to the lineage narrative, the less likely the language is
thought to embody any mystical or aesthetic values. It is also from this alleged core
cultural area that provided, according to the narrative, what Saadia Touval referred
to as “he Heroes of Somali Nationalism.” According to Touval, the two most
important figures of Somali nationalism, Imam Ahmed Ibn Ibrahim al Ghazi and
Sayyid Mohamed Abdulle Hassan, came from the region of the lineage narrative.⁷
Another category pertains to the degree to which a particular clan is considered as
nomadic. According to the narrative, Camel herding is the most dignified mode
of production, and the degree of Somaliness is gauged through it. All other modes
of production, from fishing to agriculture, are by comparison, despised. More
important, the notion of pastoral nomadism versus all other modes of production
has been one of the most important principles of social differentiation in Somalia.
It cuts across all regions and segments of the society from the nation to the clan
and sub-clan. Whether one observes Baidoa or Bossaso, one quickly learns that
pastoralism is more valued than other modes of production. However, as we will see
later, this way of understanding Somaliness is facing another and equally powerful
counter-narrative – that of territorial priorities.
Perhaps the most important category through which the lineage narrative
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
attempted to define and delimit the social boundary of Somaliness pertains to the
way the Somali lineage chart is presented. Unlike those who, as I have mentioned
earlier, are totally excluded from the social boundary of Somaliness, the lineage narrative structures social relations among the so-called Somali clan family groupings
by designating certain clans as direct descendents, and therefore, more Somali than
others. he degree of Somaliness is determined by how far lineage-wise a particular
clan group is away from the original ancestor, which, when combined with spatial
distance, that is – how far geographically a particular clan is away from the narrated
original dispersal point, creates what I refer to as a “Segmentary Lineage Stratification System” or “simultaneous exclusion and inclusion.” For example, in the port
city of Kismanyo, the lineage narrative divides the entire population of the city and
its surroundings into two oppositional categories – Harti and the Giir-Giir. he
lineage narrative defines the term Giir-Giir as having multiple stripes/identities
and denotes a lack of specifically identifiable and valued social identity or direct
lineage to the original ancestor, and the Harti, as the direct descendents of the
original ancestor.
he distinction between direct and indirect connection to the Maandeeq original ancestor is based on the premise that only those affiliated with the Maandheeq
nation are the direct descendents of the original ancestor. he rest, according to the
lineage narrative, consist of clan groupings that do not claim direct Abtirsi to the
original ancestral line, but sometimes contain small groups (sub-clans) who may
have diverged from the original lineage and dispersal point and later intermarried
with and adopted the cultural patterns of the indigenous groups that preceded them
in the area. he narrative suggests that these small immigrant groups later served as
the elite segments within those clans, and still maintain contact with their original
source and serve as middleman groups between the Northern and Southern clans.
his is what allowed the lineage narrative to claim that certain sub-clans within
the Hawiye and Digil and Mirifle are Darood by original lineage. his process is
known in Baidoa as Geeki Mariidi (in the old days). he phrase, according to the
Reewing-speaking Somalis, underscores an elaborate system that attempts to portray
their clan structures as simply resulting from the amalgamation of individuals and
groups that originally resulted from the great Somali North-South migration. he
Rewing, according to the lineage narrative, migrated from the north, settled in the
interriverine regions, adopted the social and economic patterns of the indigenous
populations they encountered, and finally assimilated them into their clan systems
and developed a unique sense of clan identity. In order to proof this, the lineage
narrative translated the name Rewing into Rahanwayn which, according this narrative, means a large and diverse congregation, or a place with abundance in land
and pasture.⁸ hat is why, according to the lineage narrative, the area attracted many
groups and individuals from different clan families who later formed what has
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putting the cart before the horse
become known as the Rahanwayne confederation organized along territorial-based
kinship systems, instead of the traditional Somali lineage-based systems which is
supposedly common among other clan groups.
he narrative claim that certain sub-clans within the larger Somali clans
diverged from the original dispersal point is also applied to a number of Hawiye,
Banadiri, as well as Jarer sub-clans. At the center of this process is an elaborate
system, though now defunct, that attempted to impose the cultural values, symbols,
mode of production, and speech patterns of certain segments of the society on the
entire Somali population in a descending order starting from the supposed original
settlement of the original ancestor. Almost all the social and historical events as
well as notable events and figures of the nation are said to have either originated or
taken place in certain regions of the country. his assimilative process is, in many
ways, made possible by the fact that the sponsors of the lineage-based narratives
directly or indirectly controlled most of the post-colonial Somali political structures.
More important, such processes are not limited to a particular clan or situation,
but is part of a larger phenomenon common among larger clan groups as a way
of enhancing their political power through what Somali describe as Toleyn (to be
incorporated into a particular clan). Regardless of “who claims whom,” however,
the general pattern is that the more southerly a particular clan is spatially located,
the more likely they are claimed by a northern cousin clan. hose who are claimed
are seen as having no meaningful lineage structure of their own, and are therefore,
implicitly accused of being outside the boundary of the lineage-based Somaliness.
Territorial-Based Narratives
he territorial narrative, on the other hand, constructs the social boundary of Somaliness in terms of social, economic, and territorial priorities and values. Social values,
according to the territorial narrative, functions along several dimensions, the most
important of which, is the degree of anarchy displayed by a particular clan or found
in a particular regional setting. he degree of anarchy is determined in terms of
South-North and the central assumption is that the further north one observes, the
more it becomes clear that the rules of social, political, and individual engagements
is determined by urban nomadism. Urban nomadism, according to the territorial
narrative, is a condition in which the idea of nobility and proper social values is
measured by the tip of the gun; or through what Richard Burton unfortunately
referred to as “Turbulent Republicanism,” and sadly embraced by Somalis as a sign
of nobility. On the other hand, the further south one observes, according to the
territorial narrative, the more the rules of social relations are dictated by peacefulness and respect for social authority and communal collaboration.
he turbulent republicanism of the lineage narrative, according to the territorial narrative, is revealed by a dialogue that supposedly occurred between the late
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
Mohamed Rajis, a well known Somali lawyer, and a certain warlord at one of the
more than the dozen Somali reconciliation conferences held over the past decade.
One of the warlords informed Rajis, during one of those meetings, that since his
clan did not have an armed militia, he had no right to be in their company, let
alone be part of the power-sharing discussions. Rajis responded, according to the
narrative: “if this were the only criterion for one’s inclusion in the social boundary
of Somaliness, and the right to take part in the reconciliation conference, then, I
will go back to Somalia, kill few innocent people and come back, at which point,
he said, I am sure you will accept me as a true member of the community.” he
conflict of interpretations between the two paradigms is also revealed in the wellknown Somali folk story of a nomad burglar and an urban dweller in Mogadishu.
he nomad burglar went to the house of a family in Hamar-Wayne in the middle
of the night to steal a cow. While the burglar was untying the cow, the wife of the
owner saw him through the window and informed her husband of the unfolding
event, to which the owner replied, it is ok, don’t worry, he will bring it to the market
tomorrow, and there I will buy it from him. To the eyes of the lineage narrative,
these stories are part of a national comedy circulated through and shared in the local
tea houses and chat chewing sessions, and are intended to characterize the reaction
of the owner of the cow, and by extension, those who do not follow a Maandheeq
mode of production, as cowards and morally weak.
he territorial narrative, however, interprets the above dialogue or the encounter between the burglar and the owner of the cow from a different ontological framework. he territorial narrative asserts that it is, in fact, the burglar and
the warlord in the Rajis narrative, and by extension, the moral foundation of the
lineage narrative that suffers from lack of cultural sophistication and issues of civil
morality. he following narrative related to me by a colleague who interviewed a
number of Bantu/Jarer Somalis from Afgoe illustrates the point as the following:
A certain prominent Bantu/Jarer in Afgoe who, after the human atrocities committed by one of the militia occupying the city, attempted to organize an armed
group to stop the atrocities. Before he was able to mobilize his militia, however, a
word about his intentions was leaked to the Bantu/Jarer religious and traditional
leaders. he leaders, according to the narrative, warned him not to follow up with
his activities and informed him that it was not their custom to take part in activities that may result in the lose of human lives, no matter how much injustice will
be exacted on them.⁸
Beyond the moral priorities, though, the territorial narrative constructs the
social boundary of Somaliness on territorial priorities. Here, the territorial narratives
shift the social category of understanding from lineage to a territorial priority. It
constructs the process of exclusion and inclusion based on who owns what ancestral land, where, and how. he process of exclusion and inclusion employed by the
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putting the cart before the horse
territorial narratives, unlike that of the lineage narrative, is determined through
the degree to which a particular clan owns a collectively acknowledged and clan
delimited ancestral homeland. he assumptions of the territorial narrative are as
old as the lineage-based narrative. One can, in fact, make the argument that the
1969 military coup was not about saving the nation, but rather, a result of Siyad
Barre’s reading of the writing of the territorial narratives on the wall. his is what
led Siyad Barre to reorganize the regional map of the nation by subdividing certain
regions and adding more, in order to make sure that the motives of the territorial
narrative were never realized. Since the civil war, however, the moral assumptions
of the territorial narrative have gained an almost national folk status. he question
of who owns what, where, and how, is based on the distinction between what is
locally known as Mudnaan iyo Asal (originality and priority to ownership of the
land) versus Xuraysato (takers of the land by force).⁹ he underlying assumption
behind this distinction is the perceived existence of true owners of land versus
newcomers who have taken the land by force. In fact, the question of who owns
Kismanyo, Baiadoa, Mogadishu, Beled-wayne, Jowhar, and Hargeisa, are now part
of contemporary vernacular and are analyzed in coffee houses in Nairobi, Toronto,
Mogadishu, as well as in Somali Internet Forums, in the same intensity. he following forum discussion in Jowhar.com represents one of the typical assumptions
that inform the basic assertions of the territorial priority narrative. Here, one forum
participant asks: “Who owns Jowhar originally, who is the largest clan statistically?
Who is the group that is culturally and collectively recognized as the original owner
of the city? I do not mean Cida Xuraysatey (those who took it by force).”¹⁰ Similar
discussions involving who owns Belet-Wayne, Hargeisa, Kismanyo, Gedo, Mogadishu or Baidoa are carried in the Puntland, Arlaadi, Ruunkiinet, and Somalitalk
forums. hus, the multiple and contested ways of defining the social boundary of
Somaliness and the fact that neither the Maandeeq nor the territorial narratives
embodied the necessary infrastructure to impose a durable hegemonic domination
on the other led to what Paul Ricour referred to as a conflict of interpretations.
Conclusion
he purpose of this essay is to further move Somali scholarship beyond the self-same
nation theory and introduce the notion of contested identities as a possible framework for understanding the current social and political realities on the ground. I
argue that the social structure of the Somali society has historically contained two
oppositional narratives; a mythical-based state supported lineage-based narrative
and an equally powerful territorial narrative. he lineage narrative operates from
the premise that the Somali society is essentially homogeneous and fundamentally egalitarian society. However, it implicitly creates a process that privileges
certain categories and cultural meanings that delimit the boundary of Somaliness
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
by defining who belongs and who does not and who is privileged and who is not
by establishing a core cultural center upon which the notion and the boundary of
Somaliness is measured.
he territorial narrative, on the other hand, constructs the social boundary of
Somaliness neither on genealogy nor on the existence of a cultural core, but rather
on social, moral, and territorial priorities. It assumes that the Somali society is
homogeneous on an abstract idealized level, but in its everyday reality, consists of
different groups with different social values and modes of production. As simple
as it may seem, this narrative discredits the notion of the a priori nation by acknowledging the existence of previously oppressed social identities, including but
not limited to language, caste, and/or racialized social identities. In other words,
those suppressed groups are no longer accepting their fate. Another reason for the
crisis is that the idea of segmentation has been totally misconstrued in that both
the state and Somali scholars have portrayed lineage segmentation as essentially
egalitarian, while in reality it embodies an explicit social hierarchy. In short, clan
differentiation in Somalia takes the form of social stratification. hese clan-based
hierarchies produce similar stratification arrangements as that found in racial and
ethnic societies. In other words, it determines who gets what, when, and where.
he current Somali civil war must, therefore, be seen as a contradiction between
the territorial and state-supported lineage-narrative culture.
Such theorizing may be unsettling to some of our Somali and Somalist colleagues who have spent the better part of their academic careers engaged in what I
would call a revive and rescue mission intended to recreate a supposedly glorious and
self-same Somali past, rather than a more objective historiography. It might as well
make the everyday Somali who has been led into the false conscious belief that if
s/he acknowledges the existence of multiple as well as oppressed voices, the nation
will collapse. he simple answer is to say that the nation has already collapsed. My
point, however, is that the existence of multiple voices is not necessarily a threat
to national cohesiveness, and the best way to ensure a long lasting political and
social stability is to embrace both the nation and its fragments at the same time
and in the same degree. he key criterion that determines whether or not a society
can flourish as a nation depends on the degree to which individuals and groups
are included in the social, political, and economic boundaries of the nation. Once
all individuals and groups are included their likelihood of feeling and acting as
participants in the making of the nation increases, and that will in turn, increase
the social and political stability of the nation.
A note on the relationship between scholarship and those who produce it is in
order here. What I have in mind, of course, is the academic as well as the everyday
Somali habit of interpreting scholarship, not on the merit of the words on the pages
they read, but rather on the social characteristics of the author. I remember some
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putting the cart before the horse
time ago, at the 1994 African Studies Conference in Toronto, Canada, a prominent
scholar who specializes in Somali affairs (Professor Z) asked me, after learning
that a group of Somali scholars were holding an academic conference intended
to critically challenge the self-same Somali historiography, whether I was one of
that group, to which I responded in the affirmative. Scholars Z reflected on my
response for a moment and said, well, are you from the South, to which, I again
said yes, and explained that I was specifically born in Baidoa. he scholar again
thought for a moment and said, “I understand.” To this scholar, my biography
simply explained the reason why I was part of that group. Of course, this kind of
thinking is not limited to this particular individual, but rather is a well-known
phenomenon in which Somali scholars as well as lay individuals try to locate the
geographical and social origins of the author before evaluating their work on the
merit of its contents.
To be fair, this problem is not just a Somali one, but rather, part of a general
academic dilemma pertaining to value positions. As Howard Becker expresses it
“To have values or not to have values: the question is always with us.” Implicit in
Becker statement is whether or not value-free scholarship is ever possible. Becker
argues that since social scientists are frequently part of the social worlds of the
people they study, and it is impossible to do “research that is un-contaminated by
personal and political sympathies; [therefore the real] question is not whether we
should take sides, since we inevitably will, but rather whose side are we on.”¹¹ he
idea of clarifying whose side are we on is critical in doing research in a socially
charged country like Somalia where political arrangements are being re-worked
as we speak, and different groups openly present conflicting views of who has the
right to define the social boundary of Somaliness. In such an environment, clearly,
those who write about it are also, rightly or wrongly, implicated in the process and
therefore are obligated to clarify their ontological positions.
For the purpose of this chapter, and in the spirit of saving Professor Z from
the arduous task of figuring, once again, the ontological biases of this particular
scholar, I like tell her/him whose side I am on. I am on the side of adding voice
to the history of hitherto unappreciated experiences and contributions of what I
will call Loo-ma-oyayaasha. he concept Loo-ma-oyayaasha literally means “those
for whom no one sheds tears over their death and destruction or to whom no one
gives credit to their contributions in the making of the nation.” It originated as a
local phrase to capture the experiences of those known as the un-armed groups
during the height of the Somali civil war. More generally, though, it encompasses
those who are not included in the Mandeeq-based social boundary of Somaliness.
It captures the experiences of rural and urban peasants, the poor, women, the
stigmatized and the genealogically unaffiliated folks. his is not to suggest, however, that Loo-ma-oyayaasha, as a concept, is intended to capture another seamless
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Contested Narratives and The Crisis of the Nation-State in Somalia
homogeneous entity. In fact, I would like to suggest that it also contains multiple
and contested voices such that the questions we ask in the future are not about, for
example, how Somali women, peasants, and the poor have been written out of the
history of nation, but which Somali women, or peasant groups are written out. In
other words, I am also on the side of critically analyzing all aspects of the Somali
people such that my only preconceived notion is that social arrangements are not
necessarily what they seem to be on the surface. I realize this endeavor is not an
easy task and requires scholars to adopt a new methodological looking-glass, so to
speak, and to find information from multiple sources and analyze data more critically by examining what the nation is, instead of what it ought to be.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
Ali J. Ahmed, DayBreak is Near...Literature, Clans, and the Nation-State in Somalia
(Lawrenceville, nj: he Red Sea Press, 1996)
Jurgen, Habbermass, Legitimation Crisis, Trans. T McCarthy (Boston: Beacon Press,
1973)
Paul Ricoeur, The Conflict of Interpretations: Essays in Hermeneutics (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1974).
he original assumptions behind the contemporary Somali origin Narratives can be
traced back to the pre-Islamic religions of the Cushitic-speaking peoples of the Horn
of Africa. hese religions were organized around ancestors endowed with supernatural
powers, and who allegedly descended from the sky. hese supernatural entities were
widely known in the region as Waaq (Sky God) and variously found on certain trees
by locals who later encouraged them come down by offering them gift mainly young
women for marriage. he coupling of the Sky God and the local women were probably
used to provide answers to question and uncertainties about the origin of human beings. However, with the introduction of Islam, and particularly in the case of Somalis,
the central plot of the pre-Islamic narratives-the Sky God and the tree were replaced
with Southern Arabia as the original home of Islam, and the original birthplace of
the Somali ancestor as well. For a discussion of these narratives, see Abdalla Mansur,
“he Nature of the Somali Clan System,” in Ali Jimale Ahmed, ed., The Invention of
Somalia (Trenton, New Jersey: he Red Sea Press, 1995); See also Abdi M. Kusow, “he
Somali Origin: Myth or Reality,” in Ali Jimale Ahmed, ed., The Invention of Somalia
(Trenton, New Jersey: he Red Sea Press, 1995), 81–99; and Viginia Luling, “he Man
in the Tree: A Note on Somali Myth,” Proceedings of the 3rd Somali Studies Congress,
Rome, Italy, 1986
Goldsmith, K. and Lewis I.M. “A Preliminary Investigation of the Blood Groups of
the ‘Sab’ Bondsmen of Northern Somalia”, Man viii (1958): 188–190.
Luling, Virginia, Somali Sultanate: The Geledi City-State over 150 Years (London: haan,
2002); Luling, Virginia. (n.d). “he Origins of the ‘Bantu’ People of the Shabelle: he
Implications of Some Rituals.” Unpublished Manuscript.
Paul Ricoeur, he Conflict of Interpretations: Essays in Hermeneutics
Touval, Saadia, Somali Nationalism: International Politics and the Drive for Unity in
the Horn of Africa (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964).
Personal Communication with Omar Eno, 2003.
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10.
11.
Anonymous, re: Magalada Jawhar Yaa Isla leh, June 1, 2003. Baravanet Forum, Retrieved on July 31, 2003, http://pub13.bravanet.com/forum/fetch.php?usernum=10781
18870&msgid=14327$mode/
Becker, Howard, “Whose Side are We?” Social Problems 14:239–247.
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Chapter Two
Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To he Past
Mohamed Nuuh Ali
S
he eastern horn, running from the east side of the Ethiopian Rift to the
TIndian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden, is a vast region of varied climate, soils and
terrain. he western edges are highlands, once forested, with sufficient rainfall for
agriculture in all its forms. Much of the east is low and dry country. his eastern
area has two major divisions: the Northern Horn (northern Somalia and Jabuuti)
in which the higher terrain runs east-west, has a general elevation of less than 500
meters above sea level, except certain northwestern areas which reach up to 2,000
meters. Rainfall is higher in those northwestern parts, from 400 to 800mm a year.
here are extremely arid sub regions in the north: the Bari and Nugaal (northeast)
regions of Somalia receive 50 to 100mm of rainfall a year. By contrast, Muddug,
in the middle of the Eastern Horn, gets about 200mm a year. he southern-most
region between the rivers gets 600mm a year. here, the soils vary from sandy and
infertile to black and quite fertile. Further inland, between the highlands to the
west and the southern agricultural regions lays another belt of dry lands, receiving
less than 400mm of rain.
his variety of terrain, climates and soils prompted different human adaptations among cultivators, pastoralists and hunter-gatherers. hese adaptations in
turn spurred complex social and economic interactions among the region’s societies. But up until now historical studies of the Eastern Horn have tended to focus
on recent centuries, and on geographically more limited perspectives than that of
the whole region. his project will seek to reconstruct the broad outlines of social
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and economic developments of the past three millennia in the varied world of the
Eastern Horn.
he primary source will be linguistic evidence drawn from different varieties
of Soomaali now spoken through most of that region. hese data will be used, first
to reconstruct the internal relationships of the Soomaali language groups and from
this to infer the patterns of social divergence and movement of people; secondly, to
reconstruct the vocabulary of culture and economy at the different stages of history as revealed by the previous exercise; and thirdly to infer interactions among
societies from the patterns of word-borrowing. he later stages of this social and
economic history will overlap in to the eras when there are other sources of evidence,
especially the oral, or where available, written sources.
Background
he most extensive treatment today of Soomaali historiography has been undertaken by anthropologists (Cerulli, 1931; I.M. Lewis, 1960, 1979). heir work has
been founded largely upon two types of sources, viz. oral traditions and Arabic
documents. H. Lewis (1966) and Turton (1975) have shown that I.M. Lewis (1960)
and Cerulli (1931) relied upon oral tradition from a restricted area of the Soomaali
nation, so that their work overemphasized the participation of Arabs and the role
of the Oromo in the emergence of Soomaali nationality. Not only was the oral
tradition collected by these two unfortunately limited to the extreme northwest
and extreme east of the Soomalli-speaking world, where the presence of Arabs
has been more marked than in other Soomaali areas, but neither Cerulli nor I.M.
Lewis distinguished between strata in the traditions they did use.
H. Lewis and Turton also recognize the inadequacy of these two types of
sources when used alone for the reconstruction of Soomaali pre-colonial history. It
is possible to improve upon the anthropologists’ work and to carry the story much
further back in time by distinguishing and historically analyzing, as they have not,
the genetic (Cushitic) and borrowed elements of the Soomaali language. he use
of this kind of evidence becomes possible when linguistic methods are the primary
research tool.
Early Documentary Sources
he history of the Soomaali speaking peoples has commonly been seen as a history
of contacts between Africa and the Arabian Peninsula. And this effect is largely the
result of the nature of the sources (Arab documents, oral traditions) upon which
Soomaali historiography, as spearheaded by I.M. Lewis (1960) and E. Cerulli
(1957–1959), has so far focused on events that took place during roughly the past
thousand years, while tending to neglect historical events prior to those contacts.
One is that this period is accessible to the historian, since there are some written
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
accounts, stemming mostly from Arab travelers and Ethiopian records. he other
is the nature of Soomaali traditions collected.
Historical writing on the Eastern Horn, both in the earlier colonial period
and since independence in 1960, has been dominated by political concerns. Colonial
historians directed their attention to historical processes of expansion, occupation,
and conflict – processes which affected orderly administration and the stabilization
of frontiers. Research directed to such ends was not without scholarly merit. Oral
traditions and ethnographic information gathered by these early colonial historians
have provided modern historians with many fruitful insights into Soomaali culture
and society. However, most colonial researchers were not historians by training, and
their work could not be expected to deal systematically with historical problems
that lay manifestly beyond the scope of colonial administration and development.
While the causes and nature of Soomaali pastoral movements are important
themes in Soomaali history, attempts to document them do not tell us very much
about how Soomaalis adapted to the various environments they came to inhabit.
Linguistic research over the past quarter century has disproved the idea that
Soomaalis originated in the northern regions of the Horn and have been expanding
southward ever since. It is now widely accepted that the earliest Soomalli speakers
lived in what is today southeastern Ethiopia and that subsequent migrations have
taken groups of them both north and south at different points in the past. Despite
what this suggests about the long-term presences of Soomaali communities in
the Horn, there is still a tendency to emphasize the expansionary movement of
the Soomaali population as a whole, at the expense of the less dramatic processes
of social and economic change that took place within the various regions of the
peninsula. Colonial historiography, preoccupied with frontiers of expansion, has
produced a somewhat one-dimensional image of early Soomaali history. he regional diversity of the Horn suggests that it is time to look at patterns of change
over more circumscribed areas and to supplement migration studies with greater
attention to social and economic history, ethnogenesis and ecological adaptation.
he first clear written reference to the Soomaalie speaking people is found in
the writing of the thirteenth century geographer Ibn-Said which says that Merka,
which consisted of more than fifty villages, was the capital of one of the Soomaali
ethnic groups. he next references to the Soomaali-speaking peoples are contained
in a song of King Yeshaq of Abbyssinia, who reigned from 1414 to 1429. In this song
the name Soomaali is first recorded. It thus places Soomaalis quite far north and
as resisters of Abyssinian expansion during this period, if not earlier.
A third early document containing recognizable referent to Soomaaali groups
is an Arabic chronicle dealing with the Jihad wars of Axmed Gurey against the Abyssinian imperialism. he Soomaali groups mentioned in the Futuh-al-Habasha are
generally ones, which still inhabit northwestern Somalia. he evidence of this work
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written between 1540 and 1550 is therefore a good indication that the composition of
the Soomaali population of northwest Somalia has not changed significantly since
then. Again this datum accords with the linguistic evidence placing the northern
Soomaali settlement before the fifteenth century. But what should be noted here
is that the Arabs were not until very recently aware of the differences between the
Ethiopic and the Cushitic-speaking peoples in Northeast Africa. he fragmentary,
general descriptions of the documents cannot tell anything about the early history
of the Soomaali speaking peoples, and they do not lead either to or away from the
hypotheses of major population movements. hey only give an impression of the
stability in the Horn of African in both the ways of life and the occupations of
certain Soomaali communities.
Oral Traditions
By utilizing the earlier documents as secondary sources and the oral traditions
are primary sources, some scholars, particularly Cerulli and I.M. Lewis, have supposed that the Soomaali speaking peoples originated in the northern part of their
present areas and have been spreading south at the expense of Oromo, whom they
presumed were the first Cushitic speaking occupants of the Horn. hese Oromo
who moved south were thought in their turn to have dislodged Bantu-speaking
peoples from the Webi Shebeelle area.
Until the mid-1960s, it was commonly thought that the pre-Soomaali cultivating peoples of the Jubba-Shebeelle region were speakers of Bantu languages like
those who have long inhabited much of Kenya and Tanzania to the south. So far
archaeology and linguistics have no actual evidence of a Bantu settlement along
the banks of Jubba and Shebeelle (Turton, 1975), even though there are Swahili
speaking communities in Baraawa and the Bajuuni Islands along the coast. he
survival of those two societies up to now can perhaps be explained by their fishing
occupation, which filled, an ecological gap, since the other surrounding Soomaalispeaking communities were not competing with them. here are also Swahili and
Zigula speaking people in the Jubba River farming areas but they seem to have
settled more recently, perhaps during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
(Turton, 1975).
hose scholars who have accepted traditional history as a framework for
the actual history of the Soomaali and supported or modified it by reference to
documentary and other evidence of varying reliability acknowledge, as do many
educated Soomaali, that many of the traditional references to Arab ancestry will not
stand careful scrutiny and are probably a function of the desire of the deeply Islamic
Soomaali to link themselves to the people of the Prophet. hose who question the
basic framework acknowledge that there has been substantial Arab influence and
even, on occasion, and infusion of Arab blood. hey do, however, question whether
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
the point of origin of the Soomaali was in the north, as even the modified version of
traditional history implies, and they have queried the pre-Soomaali presence of the
Oromo in much of present day Somalia. his reconstruction described migrations
throughout the Horn of Africa in terms of shunting movements in which pressure
always come from the north. he oral traditions of the Soomaali pastoralists seemed
to corroborate and indeed add detail to this reconstruction.
Recent Views
On the basis of linguistic evidence supported by a critical reading of documentary
sources, anthropologist Herbert S. Lewis (after Fleming, 1964) argued in the mid1960s that the point of origin of the speakers of the Eastern Cushitic languages, of
which Soomaali is one and Oromo another, lay in southern Ethiopia and northern
Kenya. Lewis suggested further that the Soomaali began their expansion to the
north and east substantially before the Oromo and that there were Soomaali groups
in southern Somalia as early as the twelfth century, three to four centuries before
there is any clear record of Oromo presence in the area. In this he has since been
supported by the work of E.R. Turton. In Lewis’ view Soomaali groups preceded
the Oromo in the north; sections of the Oromo moved, respectively, north and
east beginning in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. According to H.S. Lewis,
early written sources suggest a picture that is entirely compatible with population
stability and the hypothesis that the Soomaali were already established in much of
their present-day territory several centuries before the first recorded use of the name
in the fifteenth century. Lewis also argues that the Soomaali traditions concerning
their origins are suspect: first, because of the great time depth involved; secondly,
because their claim that they came from the north can be seen as a necessary accompaniment to their rationalization of descent from Arabian migrations. Moreover, a close inspection of Soomaali traditions of clashes with the Oromo reveals
a more confused picture than might at first be expected. Most of these traditions
are to be found among Soomaali communities that are known to have experienced
constant contact with the Oromo for nearly 300 years, during which time there
were innumerable disputes over the control of grazing territories and water.
he ultimate origins of the Soomaali and their earliest movements were still
matters of scholarly dispute in the mid-1970s, as were the characteristics of the
peoples who preceded them in the areas that they occupied and who were absorbed
into the Soomaali-speaking societies.
Soomaali Language Classification
To study such early periods of Soomaali history, there are essentially two academic
disciplines: archaeology and historical linguistics. As yet there is no archaeological
evidence available for this project, though there are indications in rock art, Stone
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Age implements and possibly in rock shelters, which seem to indicate the potential for archaeological research. In the absence of much archaeological data as yet,
linguistic evidence will be employed here to reconstruct the early history of the
Soomaali speakers. he ideal correlation of the two kinds of evidence must wait
for future research.
he first step is to establish the genetic relationships of the languages of the
region whose history one wants to study. Since genetic relation among languages
implies a common source language spoken in a single (though possible socially or
economically plural) speech community, understanding the distribution of genetically related languages is a major step in tracing the patterns of dispersion of that
original community and beginning to search for the factors which might have
led to the diffusion of their language among other peoples. Historical linguistics
has been shown to be an effective tool at the disposal of the culture historian, but
until recently researchers in Northeaster Africa have failed to take advantage of
this. hrough the use of the principles of historical linguistics, and especially of
migration and dispersal theory as developed and used by Sapir (1916) and others,
and as applied by Fleming (1964), Bender (1971), Ehret (1974, 1976), Sasse (1975) and
Heine (1978) to the Horn, it is possible to derive from linguistic data hypotheses
as to the centers of origin and dispersal of speech communities and the directions
of population movements and ethnic expansions. As will be demonstrated here,
some application of this type of evidence has already been made in work that has
transformed the historical picture of the Horn.
he Soomaali language belongs to the Afroasiatic family. Within this family,
Soomaali is a member of the Cushitic subfamily whose original homeland must be
sought on the Ethiopian Highlands (Ehret, 1976:93). Along with Afar-Saho and
Oromo, among others, Soomaali is derived from the lowland sub branch of the
Eastern branch of Cushitic. Within Lowland Eastern Cushitic, Soomaali forms
one division of a sub branch called Omo-Tana. Hans Juergen Sasses summarizes
the early history of the Omo-Tana group thus:
“he presence of Somali-like languages so far away from the homeland of the
Somali people clearly demonstrates that the ancestors of the Somali speaking
tribes (communities) once occupied a territory far more to the southwest than
modern Somalia. Indeed the present location of Rendille and Baiso suggests
that proto-Somali speakers formerly inhabited a broad belt stretching from
the eastern shore of Lake Rudolf on the west along the present state border
of Kenya to the Juba and Tana regions on the east and extending northwards
into southern Ethiopia. In a word, it seemed that a Somaloid community
was superceded by the intrusion of Borana Gallas (Oromo) and other ethnic
groups…” (Sasses, 1975:1)
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
his conclusion was first suggested by Harold Fleming (1964:35–92), who
called Soomaali and its closely related languages “macro-Somali,” and later by
Bender (1971), who called the group “Somaloid.” It contradicts earlier views according to which the Soomaali people originated in the northern part of their
present territory.
he geographical distribution of the present day spoken languages requires
indeed that the ancestral home land of the Omo-Tana speaking people has to be
located in the boundary areas of Ethiopia, Kenya and Somalia, Since all Omo-Tana
languages, with the exception of Soomaali ii (or Sam) languages (see below), are
spoken between Lake Abaya and Lake Turkana, it must be argued that the homeland of the Omo-Tana speaking people was in roughly this area. As the present
distribution of the network of historical relationships among the East Cushitic
languages suggests, it is perhaps also around this general areas that the origin of the
earlier proto-Lowland Eastern Cushitic population, and probably the still earlier
proto-Eastern Cushitic speaking community, has to be placed.
he early Western Omo-Tana apparently arose in the areas between Lake
Stefani and Lake Turkana. Two of the communities of this grouping, the Arbore,
expanded south about a thousand years ago, following the eastern shore of Lake
Turkana up to its southern end, and among the societies they encountered and
interacted with, was a group of fishing peoples living along the lake who took up
their language, called today Elmolo. In more recent times there has been a spread
of Rendille and Sambuur from the east and south respectively, and these groups
absorbed the presumed pastoral ancient Elmolo community. he only Elmolo left
still speaking the language in this century were a group of probably subordinate
fishing communities along the lake itself.
Soomaali languages and dialects, which form the eastern branch of Omo-Tana
(following Ehret and Ali, 1983), are by far the more widely spoken Omo-Tana group.
he total number of Soomaali speakers exceeds six million. Most of them live in the
Republic of Somalia, where Soomaali is the national and official language. Other
areas inhabited by Soomaali speakers are the Republic of Jabuuti, western Somalia,
and the Northwestern Province as well as the Tana area of Kenya.
he Soomaali dialect classification followed here is that of Ehret and Ali (1984),
which is based on three linguistic criteria. A first set of criteria came from cognate
counting of the core vocabulary of 100 words, including such items as numbers
and parts of the body generally deemed by linguists to be especially resistant to
change and borrowing, taken from 40 Soomaali languages and dialects. Using this
list, a lexicostatistical comparison was undertaken of each member language or
dialect to all others in order to calculate how many words they share in common,
as a percentage measure of how closely related they are to one another. Secondly,
and more conclusively, sound change histories and patterns of lexical innovation
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were examined to corroborate, refine and revise the internal branching within
Soomaali arrived at from the cognation patterns. he genetic sub classification of
the Soomaali languages and dialects was constructed by gathering the most closely
related subgroups into larger subgroups, and so on until the following family tree
was reconstructed.
Evidence of word borrowing between two languages can be used to posit
historical interaction between the speakers of the two languages, since borrowing
normally occurs when people speaking two languages interact directly with one
another. he Soomaali languages and dialects have a number of different sets of
loanwords, indicating that their speakers have interacted with different peoples at
different times. By identifying these sets and arranging them sequentially when
possible, one can reconstruct these patterns of historical interaction. Defining the
time periods in which loan words are incorporated into a particular dialect yields
significant information concerning the history and context of physical interaction
and absorption of ideas and technologies.
he tree diagram shows the various stages of Soomaali language history. hus
Soomaali-i is the branch of Omo-Tana containing Bayso and Jiiddu as one sub
branch and what Heine (1978) called Sam as the second sub branch; Soomaali-ii
is Heine’s Sam, composed of Rendille as one sub branch and Soomaali-iii as the
second sub branch. Soomaali-iii contains the remainder of the Soomaali languages
and dialects, such as Garree-Aweer, Tunni, Baardheere, and Soomaali-iv, the later
itself dividing into Maay and Banaadir-Northern subgroups.
In its earliest stage, the proto-Soomaali language differentiated into two major
branches: Bayso-Jiiddu and Somaali-ii. he cognation percentages of this split,
leaving aside contact-affected scores, focus on the low to mid 40s. In the second
stages, Soomaal-ii diverged into Rendille and Soomalli-iii, a division marked by
cognation percentages on the low to mid-50s, similar in range to the breakup of
Bayso-Jiiddu at 54. In the third stage of development, Soomaali-iii divided into
(A) Garree-Aweer (B) Jubba (Tunni and Baardheere), and (C) Soomaali-iv. he
cognation percentage for this divergence runs from the high 50s to the low 60s.
Soomaali-iv further diverged into Maay and Banaadir-Norther subgroups with
lowest cognation percentages centering around the mid-60s, and finally the Banaadir-Northern branch separated into the more recent Banaadir, Baraawa, Jowhar
and Shebeelle-Northern subgroups with minimum cognation percentages in the
mid–to high-60s.
he result of this classification is that is establishes the proposal that Bayso
and Rendille are closely related to Soomaali proper, first suggested by Fleming
(1964:83). It also confirms the partial classification of Heine, which demonstrated
with substantial linguistic evidence that the closes related languages to what was
then thought of as “Soomaali” are Aweera and Rendille. We do accept the wider
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
connection of the Soomaali and Omo-Tana groups as postulated by Sasse (1975:19)
and Heine (1978:9–10), namely that there is an Omo-Tana division of Lowland East
Cushitic to which Soomaali in all its varieties belongs. We differ, however, with
Sasse and Heine regarding their division of Omo-Tana into Western, Northern
and Eastern groupings. Instead we have divided Omo-Tana into Western and
Soomaali. In our classification Western includes Arbore, Dasenech and Elmolo,
while Soomaali includes Bayso-Jiiddu and Soomaali-ii or Sam. But while our
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putting the cart before the horse
classification reconfirms the linguistic arguments of Heine and Fleming, it differs
significantly in scope, taking into account dialects and languages not dealt with in
any of these earlier classifications (see Table 1).
Discussion and Concluding Themes
From the preceding discussions a primary outline has emerged of development in
the Easter Horn, the areas between the Rift Valley and the Indian Ocean, over the
period from about 1000 bc to 1500 of the present era. he main source of insight
into this history has been linguistic. Language is a diachronic record: a given sample
of any language must embody, most visibly in its lexicon, elements of the past of its
speakers and the traces of past contacts between that language and other languages.
Systematic study of its relationships provides the context and controls for analyzing
that evidence. he Soomaali tongues, as the primary languages of the region, have
provided the focal bodies of data.
As vehicles of past contacts among peoples, the lexicons of these languages
necessarily contain loanwords that, properly recognized, reveal interactions between Soomaali and non-Soomaali communities on the one hand, as well as intraSoomaali relations. he treatment of such loans presented here show the power
of linguistic evidence for historical reconstruction: the history of this region has
emerged as the layers of loans and re-loans, and the identities of donor groups,
were identified, sifted and ordered into a series of ethnic interactions. he language
history of Soomaali reveals a series of amalgamations of peoples of different backgrounds, who together comprise Soomaalis today.
Unlike linguistic evidence, lineage histories are localized: they are exclusivist
because they distinguish a group of people from their neighbors on the basis of
some locally important criterion. Such a criterion gets elevated, via the institutionalization of lineage histories, into something culturally primary: into a group
concern that obscures historical connections between groups. Of necessity, such
lineage histories are limited in time depth: the memory of the community’s traditions telescopes chronology, blurring ancient events into a pastiche of more recent
themes. Here oral traditions have been utilized to enrich some of the more recent
portions of this chronicle.
At the outset of the period studied, ca 1000 bc, much of the Eastern Horn
was a food collecting area. hat is, there were undoubtedly fishing villages at the
coast (for which we have as yet no evidence), and certainly hunter-gatherers in the
preponderance of the lowland areas of the Northern Horn and southern Somalia.
here were three major centers of food production: a Northern Horn cattle-raising
area, a similar lowland, a southern Somalia settlement, and at the far west a band
of cool, rainy highland grain-cultivating lands, where the crops were finger millet,
teff, wheat and barley. From the linguistic evidence, the Northern Horn popula24
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
tions spoke a language only loosely specifiable as North Lowland East Cushitic,
and the pastoral southern lowland communities were Dahaloan Southern Cushitic
speakers. he proto-Soomaali lived then at the southern extremity of the highland
zone which lay just east of the Rift Valley.
By the early first millennium ad, the proportion of Horn residents practicing food production probably had grown. his growth would have come about in
part through the migration of Soomaali-i and Soomaali-ii speakers, in search of
increased foraging for their cattle. When these peoples settled in the less rainy
lowland areas of Southern Somalia, their grain crop appears to have been the more
suitable sorghum.
In the course of Soomaali peregrinations, the Jiiddu followed the Jubba River
southward into areas populated by Dahaloan livestock-raisers, while the protoSoomaali-ii expanded south as far as the edges of present northern Kenya, where
they encountered Nilo-Saharan people he Jiiddu, at least, absorbed the Southern
Cushites they met. he question to be asked is: why did the Soomaali come to
predominate in those areas they penetrated, which already hosted food-producing
populations? Both the lexical evident and the geographical indications, i.e., the
greater aridity of these new climes, point to the possibility that more intensive
livestock-raising might have had a part in enabling the Soomaali ethnic identity
to prevail in such encounters.
he follow millennium was characterized by one special development, the
advent of camel culture. While the presence of the camel may date to before 500
ad, the critical role that the camel played in Soomaali expansion is not evident
until after 500 ad, when Soomaali-iv speakers, particularly the Banaadir-Northern
subbranch thereof, progressively trekked northward into drier and/or more soilpoor areas of limited potential for anything but camel raising. Other, Soomaali-iii,
groups that benefited from the new adaptation included the Garree, who began
at the end of the millennium to settle dry regions of northern Kenya and drier
portions of the interriverine regions.
Other than camels the first millennium of the present era saw the spread of
two additional domesticated animals – chickens and horses. hey may have arrived
via long-distance trade which came to the Horn from Southern Arabia and Egypt
via the Red Sea and developed Indian Ocean connections, probably as part of
wider networks that ran from the Mediterranean into the Indian Ocean. here is
documentary evidence of important trading sites along the northern Somali coast,
but the linguistic evidence is lacking to carry this indication much further.
With the onset of the present millennium (1000 ad), successive episodes of
northern Soomaali migration completed the spread of Soomaali language in the
Eastern Horn. In the northwest, whish is an agricultural area typified by Highland
crops, we seen an ethnic commingling similar to that which took place in south25
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putting the cart before the horse
ern Somalia: the Northwestern Soomaali interacted with Hararis and Northern
Lowland East Cushites. In the northeast Horn, a drier area where the camel predominated, we see the progress of a relatively unimpeded northern Soomaali out
migration, across very lightly uninhabited lands.
A second notable development in the southern Somali region involved the
emergence and the expansion of a sub branch of the Jubba group, the Tunni, from
the middle Jubba southward to the car lower Shebeele, into territories already
inhabited by Jiiddu. his movement dates probably to very early in the second millennium; later movements spread Tunni into areas of Banaadir-Northern speech
into the immediate coastal hinterland of southern Somali, between the lower
Shebeelle and Baraawa on the coast.
Later in the first half of the second millennium the proto-Maay populations
expanded widely across the interriverine areas of southern Somalia, he northwestern sub branch of Maay must have moved into areas often previously settled
by Garree and by Jubba speech communities. he Southern Maay migrated into
Southern Cushitic, Tunni, Jiiddu and Banaadir regions, and the Northeastern Maay
cam to occupy middle Shebeele-Northern tongues.
he ninth and tenth century trade resurgence as well attested to through
various kinds of evidence. his trade led to the rise of towns on the Indian Ocean
coast and distinctive town cultures and eventually in language from the people of
their immediate hinterland. he first three centuries of the present millennium were
a period of religious change, when Islam spread along the Banaadir Coast. his
process started in the towns through their commercial contacts with the Muslim
Middle East world. In the Northern Somalia, Islam also spread, though it was
perhaps not tied as directly as in the south to the town, bus was still mediated
through trade contacts with the Arabs as the oral traditions indicate.
By the second have of this millennium (1500 ad), Islam had become the religion of most or much of these Somali regions, though not without incorporating
aspects of earlier beliefs. Islamization involved adjustment from one worldview
into another, and syncretism between the new religion and the earlier Soomaali
religious belief. he whole Eastern Horn is likely to have a common pre-Islamic
religion since the word “waaq,” which survives in toponyms, ethnonyms, personal
names and proverbs, is an old Eastern Cushitic word that meant “God.”
Prospects For The Future
he work has not touched on local history, leaving to others the analysis of more
extensive research of local dialect vocabularies. In these, word-borrowings unique to
one dialect or a sec of dialects will reveal past contacts. Specialized vocabularies will
contain evidence of economic, material or cultural developments limited to certain
areas. Another dimension to be pursued in future historical study is oral tradition,
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
which must be collected in more detail and depth. he objectives of fleshing out
the evidence and discovering the linkages, and the overlaps, and the correlation of
this sort of documentation with that provided by linguistic evidence, remains to be
done. here are as well vast opportunities for archaeology in Somali which need to
be encouraged and pursued with vigor. Somali is a region with exceptionally good
preservation of archeological remains of all kinds. And the archaeological correlations, once better knows, can be tied to established linguistic reconstructions.
his history has concentrated on economic aspects, and specifically on domestic food production, but collection of further lexical and comparative ethnographic
evidence will allow reconstruction of the cultural practices, beliefs and other elements of material culture for different sub-regions and for more specific periods
of time. Topics that remain to be treated include ancient Soomaali age structure
practices, residence patterns, and kinship relations, among many others. Only the
beginnings have been made here toward uncovering the early eras of history of
the Eastern Horn of Africa.
References
Bender, M. Lionel. “he Languages of Ethiopia: A New Lexicostatistic Classification and
some Problems of Diffusion.”Anthropological Linguistics 13 (1971): 165–288.
Ceruili, Enrico. “Gruppi etnici ne&,ri nella Somalia.” Archivio per I’Antropologia e la
Etnologia lxiv (1934): 182.
Ceruili, Enrico. Somalia-scriti vari editi ed inediti, 3 vols. Rome: Istituto Poligrafico della
Stato, 1957, 1959, 1964.
Ehret, Christopher. “Cushitic Prehistory.” In he Non-Semitic Languages of Ethiopia, edited
by Lionel Bender, 85–96. East Lansing; Michigan State University, 1976.
Ehret, Christopher and Mohamed All. “Soomaali Classification.” Paper presented at the
Second International Congress of Somali Studies, Hamburg. 1983. In Preceedings
of the Second International Congress of Somali Studies, edited by homas Labban,
1:201–69. Hamburg: Helmut Buske Veriag, 1984.
Fleming, Harold C. “Balso and Rendille: Somali Outliers.” Ressagne di Studi Etiopic 20
(1964):35–59.
Heine, Bemd. “he Sam Languages: A History of Somali, Rendille, and Boni.” Afroasiatic
Linguistics 99 (1978):1–93.
Lewis, I.M. “he Somali Conquest of the Hom of Africa.” Journal of African History 1
(1960): 21:1–3 0.
Lewis, I.M., ed. Islam in Tropical Africa. London: International African Institute at the
Oxford University Press, 1966.
Turton, er. “Bantu, Galla and Somali Migrations in the Horn of Africa: A Reassessment
of the Juba/Tana Area.” Journal of African History xvi (1975):519–37.
Sasse, Hans-Juergen. “he Consonant Phonemes of Proto-East Cushitic (pec): a First Approximation.” Afroasiatic Linguistics 8 (1979): 1–67.
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Appendix
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Somali History: Linguistic Approaches To The Past
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Chapter hree
he Somali Political Economy in Eastern
Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.¹
Cedric Barnes,
British Academy Post Doctoral Fellow,
SOAS, University of London.
S
Treturn to pre-1936 territorial arrangements and divisions of the Somali lands
he history of the British Military Administration (bma hereafter) and the
has been presented either as the triumph of Ethiopian independence²; or the
betrayal of the hopes for Somali unification and the repartition of the Somali nation by the very same forces of imperialism.³ Most authors have focused on high
politics while overlooking the political and economic circumstances of the local
populations concerned.⁴ his is unfortunate since these politics were complex, had
deep historical roots, and not as clearly divided as nationalist historians and their
sympathizers have depicted.⁵
he purpose of this chapter is not so much about the activities of the British
Military Administration, nor about that of the Ethiopian government, but rather
about the changing political economy of the region and how that in turn affected
the every day politics of the people and their reactions to the restoration of Ethiopian rule in the region. he empirical evidence presented in this chapter⁶ suggests
that the idea of a priori Somali nationhood was not enough to convince the majority
of Somalis in the Jigjiga and Reserved Areas to resist the restoration of Ethiopian
rule after a period of British Military Administration following the defeat of the
Italian Empire in Ethiopia. While it is true that Somali nationalism in the form
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putting the cart before the horse
of the Somali Youth Club and League prompted significant political awakening in
the Jigjiga region of eastern Ethiopia, nationalist politics only unified local Somalis
as long as it served their political and economic interests to do so. When the tide
turned and the return to Ethiopian rule looked certain, the Somali population was
quick to realign themselves within the Ethiopian political structures. To be sure
nationalist sentiment did not go away, and most likely went underground, however
it remains the case that nationalism, as a political force, was somewhat ephemeral
and quickly subsumed under the imperatives of the local political economy of
Jigjiga. Local politics involved a great deal of shifting and crosscutting alliances
and enmities. Unlikely alliances were made and old understandings broken. For the
Somali populations who lived through this period, local society and economy was
far more relevant than abstract concepts of national citizenship and nationalism.
However, the latter was of increasing interest to some, and the following decade
saw a greater participation in heated debates surrounding the future of the Somali
lands and modern Somali nationality.
War and Post-war Economy in the ‘Ethiopian’ Somali-lands
Ethiopia’s occupation by Italy (circa 1936–41) and the British Military Administration (circa 1941–48) of Ethiopia and the Somali lands considerably altered the
political horizons and expectations of Somalis. For the mainly non-Christian
groups incorporated into the Ethiopian empire in the late nineteenth century, the
Italian occupation of Ethiopia and uniquely in the Somali case, the continued
British Military Administration of their region, had been a liberating experience.
his period marked a watershed for the region’s history, and this was especially true
for Somalis in the east of the Ethiopian Empire. Indeed the historical aftermath
of the end of the Italian East African Empire in Northeast Africa is particularly
important since it marks a turning point in the region’s political history and the
start of the decolonisation process.⁷
By the mid-forties Ethiopia, Eritrea and the colonial Somali lands had been
involved in large-scale modern war for the first time in their history. he impact
widened as the war gathered momentum in the early forties. In Ethiopia, it is difficult to discern the impact of Italian rule⁸ from that of the Second World War.
However, the Italian period had left some important legacies, not least of which
was the determination to modernise Ethiopia’s economy and infrastructure. he
increased demands for imports and the Italian government’s efforts to articulate
Ethiopia with its two coastal colonies saw the slow improvement of roads, particularly in the east where Italian Somalia was joined to Eastern Ethiopia. he
roads between Harar and Dire Dawa, Harar and Jigjiga, Jigjiga and the border
with British Somaliland, and Jigjiga towards Mogadishu, were much improved.⁹
During the Italian occupation a transit-trade agreement was concluded with the
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
British Somaliland Protectorate to transport goods from the Protectorate port of
Berbera via Harar since the volume of trade was too much for Djibouti and the
Italian Somaliland ports were too distant. he British were accommodating towards
transit trade hoping that the Italian government would be co-operative with regard
to grazing and water rights for Somali clans from the Protectorate who crossed the
border into the then Italian controlled eastern Ethiopian borderlands – the areas
known as the Hawd and Ogaden.¹⁰
he roads and trade agreements suddenly improved communication between
Somali speakers previously divided by clan politics and colonial boundaries that
separated them. Furthermore, for many Somalis, the increase in transit trade carried by motor lorries through their lands represented a considerable opportunity for
economic gain through participation in expanded trade. For example the up-country
settlement of Hargeisa in the British Protectorate benefited considerably from
the increased trade with Italian controlled eastern Ethiopia, and profits made by
local Somali there were invested in urban property and permanent stone buildings.
In the British Protectorate in 1933, there were 6 private cars and 49 commercial
vehicles. By 1937, there were 51 private cars and 316 commercial vehicles, at least 150
of which were owned by Somalis.¹¹ he British Somaliland Annual Report for 1936
noted that ‘many who have never thought of trading previously are taking caravans
over the border and doing very well’.¹² Inter-territorial connections through war,
administration, trade, and transport significantly altered Somali politics and this
new form of politics was especially apparent in the growing urban centers. he new
political economy quickly spread to the urban areas of the Ethiopian Somali lands
among the Somali populations of Jigjiga, Harar and Dire Dawa.
For the first year after the Italian defeat in 1941, the former Ethiopian Empire
was administered as Occupied Enemy Territory since the Italian conquest had been
legally recognised by the British in 1938. After the remaining Italian forces have
been defeated and cleared from the country the political relationship between the
returned Ethiopian Emperor and the British were revised and changed. he result
was the 1942 Anglo-Ethiopian agreement¹³ that handed back a certain amount of
administrative control to the Emperor. However, under the agreement the bma
retained control over the railway line to Addis Ababa, the municipality of Dire
Dawa, and the borderlands with French Somaliland (later Djibouti) and British
Somaliland and the growing town of Jigjiga. his area became known as the Reserved Areas (ra hereafter), which included the farmed plains around Jigjiga and
the important wet season grazing lands of the Hawd. he Ogaden, formerly part of
the Ethiopian Empire, which the Italians had invaded and absorbed into the Italian Somaliland administration, was also retained by the bma for strategic purposes.
he Ogaden was administered as part of ex-Italian Somaliland, but the ra had its
own administration. Although the British did not deny Ethiopian sovereignty of
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putting the cart before the horse
the ra and the Ogaden, by virtue of its continuing separate administration from
Ethiopia, their future became implicitly bound up with the disposal of ex-Italian
Somaliland to be decided at the end of the war.¹⁴
On his restoration, Hayla-Sellasse soon resumed his halted attempts to
transform Ethiopia into a modern centralised, bureaucratic, and above all ‘national’
state. Territorial integration and political centralisation was high on his agenda.
Furthermore, the arrangements which the British created for the Emperor’s return
to power promoted a national spirit, partly due to continued foreign ‘occupation’
and partly encouraged by the national infrastructure wrought by the Italians and
the peculiar economic boom that fed off the Second World War. Domestically, the
post-war situation in Ethiopia encouraged the already strong ‘nationalist’ resentment that Hayla-Sellasse and his Ministers felt under the terms of the AngloEthiopian agreement.¹⁵
In 1944, the 1942 Anglo-Ethiopian agreement was terminated and replaced
by a treaty that reduced British involvement in the internal government of Ethiopia, though the Ethiopian government did not secure the return of the ra and
Ogaden.¹⁶ Because of the 1944, agreement the Ethiopian government took more
control over its revenues and territorial administration. Despite this fiscal control,
the outlook on the internal taxation and budgetary front in Ethiopia was gloomy.
However unexpectedly high earnings from cereal exports (and to a lesser extent,
coffee) due to wartime conditions, helped augment the Ethiopian government’s
meagre coffers.¹⁷
he 1942 export trade figures, the bulk of which was made up of cereals, had
quadrupled by 1943.¹⁸ In early 1943, the purchase of cereals (mainly for British
and American customers) was centralised in the hands of the joint allies’ civil and
military Purchasing Commission in Addis Ababa, to which the Ethiopian Government initially agreed to grant a monopoly. However, seeing an opportunity for
increased government revenues, the Ethiopian government began to take the view
that this arrangement was earning large profits for foreign agencies at Ethiopia’s
expense. After the British Government had released $3 million for the purchase of
cereals during 1943 and 1944, the Ethiopian government announced that its own
Ministry of Agriculture would assume the monopoly of purchasing cereals and
would sell to the British and American buyers (such as the United Kingdom Commercial Corporation) at the railhead instead. he system meant that the Ethiopian
government could fix prices for wheat, maize and sorghum at much higher levels
than previously realised.¹⁹ During 1944, the price of grain had increased threefold,²⁰
which exacerbated the already general effects of the world food crisis.²¹ In 1947 the
price of wheat was still climbing and stood at 200 percent above the already inflated
1946 figure, but in spite of this the volume of cereals exported continued at high
levels, which even the imposition of an export tax did little to reduce.²²
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
he Italian occupation and Second World War had changed the character of
the Ethiopian economy. Money wages had become widespread, as had the production of crops for cash. Italian rule, despite its own economic problems had made
cheap consumer goods more widely available, and the demand for luxury goods
increased with exposure to the Italian way of life. Before the Italian invasion, the
level of trade and production in the old Ethiopian Empire was at an extremely low
level (in part due to the world-wide depression). Although the Italian government
poured vast amounts of money into the country, the export trade was not developed.
However, imports, crucially, escalated to thirty times their previous levels. Italian
road building – even though it amounted to only a third of what had been planned,
and half of those completed roads were damaged by the war – made a considerable
difference to the ease of trade, as did the amount of motor lorries left behind by
the Italians. After its restoration, the Ethiopian government, while apparently ill
equipped to restore territory-wide government, was, with British concerns for supply routes, able to reopen communications and commerce. In a matter of months,
trade and commerce reached far higher levels than pertained before the occupation.
Moreover the unprecedented level of demand for Ethiopian grain from the Allied
military forces created a lucrative market for cereals which had not been exported
in any significant quantities before then.²³
In view of the economic conditions prevailing during the forties, especially
the sudden value of cereals, the continued separation of the Reserved Areas around
Jigjiga was particularly galling for the restoration government in Addis Ababa. By
the 1940s Jigjiga had become an important grain-basket for the eastern region following the expansion of agriculture into the plains below the Harar plateau and
the conversion of Somali pastoralists to farming. he grain price boom had thus
made farming in the Jigjiga region extremely profitable since it was close to export
markets in Berbera on the British Protectorate coast. However, the area was out
of the reach of the ‘nationalist’ government monopolists in Addis Ababa. Instead,
Somali farmers and traders were able to realise profits from high grain prices denied
to their neighbours and kinsmen who had been returned to Ethiopian rule and
who were subject to the Government monopoly. In Jigjiga, these unique economic
circumstances set the Somali inhabitants and the Ethiopian government on a collision course that increasingly took on the aspect of competing ‘nationalism’. However,
contrary to nationalist historiography Somali society was by no means united.²⁴
On top of the usual clan divisions, the economic and political circumstances of
the Jigjiga and the Reserved Areas made local Somalis keenly aware of internal
inequalities. Clannish calculations were compounded by advantages of alliances
with external power and the possibilities of self-government.
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putting the cart before the horse
Farms, trade and chiefs – Jigjiga and the Reserved Areas
Farming in Jigjiga was intimately linked with the history of Ethiopian rule in the
western Somali-lands. From the late nineteen-tens Jigjiga and its environs had
been subjected to more direct rule and stringent tax collection by the Ethiopian
government. he Ethiopian government appointed a number of Somali chiefs to
facilitate rule and revenue collection – revenue that was vital for the Ethiopian
centralist project.²⁵ hese factors demanded an increase in farming in traditionally
pastoral areas, since grain was initially used to pay Ethiopian ‘taxes’. Increased grain
supplies encouraged settlement and attracted Somalis to the Jigjiga markets, leading in some ways to an ‘Ethiopianisation’ of Somali life. However, it also resulted
in the greater Somalisation of the town of Jigjiga.²⁶ Oral informants report that
even before the Italian occupation the early thirties had seen a notable increase in
farming and sedentarisation of the Somali population.²⁷ Indeed, before the Italian
invasion, there had also been an increase and improvement in the ease of trade by
virtue of the new and improved road connections and faster motor transport that
had stimulated the market for grain, especially from the British Protectorate.²⁸
hese local developments were continued and expanded upon during the Italian
occupation after 1936 and during the British period for most of the ’forties.
During the ’thirties the Ethiopian government had claimed large areas of
land in and around Jigjiga and further out on the fertile Marar plain (northeast of
the town).²⁹ he first Ethiopian actions towards land and leadership dated back to
the governorships of Takla-Hawaryat (1917/8–20/21?) and Gadla-Giyorgis (1921–
27/28?).³⁰ Although it is difficult to discern the exact nature of land policy in Jigjiga
from the available records and oral interviews,³¹ it appears that Takla-Hawaryat had
established a taxpayer system, which recognised taxable units and local leadership
by grouping together a few farmers and the land that supported them.³² he main
purpose of the system was a form of indirect rule primarily to get the Somali to
pay taxes to the state and help maintain the local garrison. he Jigjiga district was
different from much of highland Harar, since most of these Somali taxpayers and
their Somali office-holding ‘chiefs’ were directly accountable to the local governor
and were not subordinated to soldier-settler estates, the system that operated in
the highlands.³³ However, from the 1920s, (during Gadla-Giyorgis’ governorship)
Takla-Hawaryat’s system was gradually replaced and land was ‘measured’ by qalad.
he primary object of measurement was to maximise the number of taxpayers.³⁴
As a local informant had it, ‘when the Somalis first started to farm grain was given
to soldiers as hirto (tithe), then after we began farming properly we paid geber
(monetary tax)’.³⁵ Another informant put it, ‘the Amhara were colonisers – what
they wanted was taxation’.³⁶
Land measurement began initially near the garrison centres and only later
was it applied to areas further a field. For example land measurement and registra38
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
tion only affected the more distant lands east from Jigjiga in the ’thirties. Indeed it
was not until the ’thirties that the Yaberre clan who inhabited these areas turned
to farming, a shift that they put down to livestock losses after the bad drought of
1928. he Ethiopian government measured and registered land into units known as
garad, consisting of about six families, each of who were gabbar (tax-payers). Each
unit put forward one of its number as a garad (a kind of ‘headman’). he garad
were responsible to damina or akiil (‘agents’) who oversaw a large amount of garad
units and collected their taxes for the suldaan, who was ultimately responsible for
his clan’s taxation and representation to the Ethiopian government (in the person
of the Deputy-Governor of Jigjiga).³⁷
Land measurement was targeted most in the good agricultural lands near to
Ethiopian garrisons centres e.g., around Jigjiga and Qochar to the northeast. Each
resident Somali taxpayer had a piece of land, but office holders were apportioned
extra land according to their status as government functionaries. After land had
been apportioned to the Somali tax-payers and office holders, the remainder was
held by the government, which it might redistribute, sell, or retain³⁸ Some of this
‘excess’ land was sold or granted to ‘outsiders’ and was registered as qalad (as opposed to garad). Qalad was sometimes carved out of existing garad units, and was
equal to half a garad.³⁹ Qalad owners are remembered as ‘Amhara’, which probably
designates their external origins and religious beliefs rather than ethnicity. However,
since few ‘outsiders’ wished to farm the areas themselves – often because they feared
to farm among hostile Somali – they brought in tenants, most often local Somali
or Oromo.⁴⁰ Much government land remained unsold and continued to be used
as grazing by local Somalis in return for a nominal fee.⁴¹
Before the Italian occupation qalad ownership and tenancy, which was by no
means widespread, was most common in the better agricultural regions, in particular
the Gerri-Jaarso regions in the foothills of the highlands to the northeast of Jigjiga.⁴²
During the Italian period, however, all the land reverted to Somali ownership and
there were no direct taxes, a situation that continued under the bma. For the agricultural areas around Jigjiga that made up the ra the return to Ethiopian government
threatened the restoration of qalad ownership and reintroduction of tax. ⁴³
Sorghum was the main crop produced in the ra and was the staple grain
food for the majority of the population. he tree-less Jigjiga plain, inhospitable
to grain-eating birds, was favourable to the cultivation of sorghum. he soil in
depressions formed by the undulations of the plains was very fertile and, if rainfall
was sufficient, yielded well. he Jigjiga district was self-supporting in sorghum
through much of the forties, and surplus was exported to British Somaliland.⁴⁴ In
the good growing conditions of the forties, encouraged by the healthy market for
grain and the tax-free status of the ra,⁴⁵ large quantities of grain were produced
and brought to the market at Jigjiga and exported to British Somaliland and be39
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putting the cart before the horse
yond. he restored Ethiopian government protested against this unrestricted export
of grain, much of which emanated from the Harar area under Ethiopian control,
presumably to avoid the government monopoly.⁴⁶ here was also a healthy export
trade in pastoral products of cattle, hides, skins and ghee. In addition to buying
local grain, the British Army, which maintained a significant presence in the region,
was a good customer for slaughter cattle. Along with grain sales, ghee, hides and
skins were useful ways of acquiring cash and had the highest export value.⁴⁷ his
healthy export market represented a considerable loss of potential revenue to the
Ethiopian government.
However, despite the free market conditions, the economic boom was not
without problems for the relations between the local Somali clans. It was soon
obvious that in what had once been a relatively complimentary economy of
agro-pastoralism, the two parts of the economy began to rival each other in the
heightened market conditions. From as early as 1942, conflicts are recorded between clans over land rights, and between farmers and pastoralists and the various
groups of traders. he focal point of the trade was Jigjiga, and it was often in the
market that tensions spilled over. One of the foremost tensions was between the
local Darood ‘Jidwak’ (primarily Bartirre and Yaberre) clans of the district and the
Isxaaq clans from the Protectorate whose presence had increased during the war
thanks to the British administration of all the Somali lands and increased trade
with the Protectorate.⁴⁸ In the seasonal river valley of the area, Darood (Bartirre)
cultivators were at loggerheads with Isxaaq (Habr Awal) herdsmen who objected
to the restrictions laid on the grazing of their sheep and camels by the spread of
Bartirre cultivation in Jigjiga,⁴⁹ and around wells along the great stock routes from
the British Protectorate.⁵⁰ he murder of Xaashi Cilmi, an important Isxaaq (Habr
Awal) trader and land-owner in late 1942, allegedly by a Darood ‘Jidwak’ directed
assassin, was put down to jealousy over the Isxaaq dominance in trade – although
the most immediate cause was revenge for a road accident involving a member of
a Darood ‘Jidwak’ clan killed by an Isxaaq lorry driver along the now very busy
road from Jigjiga to Hargeisa in the Protectorate.⁵¹ he market place in Jigjiga was
the scene of several other violent incidents of intra-clan rivalry, sometimes with a
hand-grenade lobbed in for good measure.⁵²
Concomitant with agricultural (and economic) expansion was a growth in
clan identity with certain areas, and disputes in land became more common.⁵³ he
upheavals of the last decade brought about splits, even within clans and sub-clans
themselves, as alliances crumbled in the face of new uncertainties. One example
was the Oromo element of the mixed Oromo-Somali (Gerri-Jaarso) clans who
tried to break free of their Somali (Gerri) association. Earlier, when the Ethiopian
government reoccupied the Hararge province to the limit of the Reserved Areas
in 1942/3, the imposition of taxation on those excluded from the Reserved Area
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
occasioned dispute and led to the arrest of clan-leaders (who were of Gerri ‘Somali
lineages’). he removal of Gerri leadership gave Jaarso elements (of Oromo lineages) the chance to break free of their subservient role to Gerri.⁵⁴ Such fissiparous
tendencies were present among the large Isxaaq Habr Awal clan also. When the
clan suldaan of the Ethiopian sections died in Jigjiga his son succeeded him. But
the appointment of the new suldaan was seized upon by a powerful lineage of the
Habr Awal clan, the Jibril Abokir, themselves primarily agriculturists, who saw it
as an opportunity to secede from the overall Habr Awal clan leadership, which was
still mainly concerned with pastoral politics.⁵⁵
he agricultural boom also encouraged the Yaberre – one of the Darood ‘Jidwak’ confederation of clans – to emerge from the traditional dominance of their
kin of the Bartirre clan. Bartirre and Yaberre were generally thought to be of the
same clan since their villages usually contained persons of both tribes. However,
as cultivation increased division beset their confederational relationship. By the
mid-forties, in areas that in 1941 had little or no cultivation, Yaberre disputed land
rights with Bartirre and with the agricultural Jibril Abokir section of the Isxaaq
Habr Awal clan. he British noted that this assertive Yaberre claim to exclusive
land ownership was attributable to their revered clan leader, Sheekh Xasan. British reports note that Sheekh Xasan was particularly alert to the importance of
bureaucratic proof and could produce any number of documents (of Ethiopian, or
Italian origin and some of his own manufacture) that laid claim to the disputed
lands. Sheekh Xasan had also imported Oromo farmers, most probably from the
Harar highlands – areas that had, by then, been handed back to Ethiopian rule.
hese Oromo farmers, described as industrious and skilled, were able to augment
the clan numbers, and increase land under cultivation claimed by the Yaberre. hey
were probably rewarded with light tenancy agreements and acted as a buttress to
the Isxaaq and other rival clans, including the Yaberre’s close kin, the Bartirre. A
British officer in the ra reported that although Sheekh Xasan was unpopular with
other clan leaders, who complained against his ‘malpractices’, it was found that the
Yaberre clan he led ‘were prosperous and industrious, well-behaved and likeable,
and that they respected and admired their leader’.⁵⁶
Another clan to emerge with locally defined presence and identity during
the thirties and forties, and which owed much to the process of sedentarisation
through agriculture and changing administrations, was the Akiishu. According to
oral informants, the Akiishu were Oromo clans and lineages that had been subsumed by Somali clans after Oromo lost ground in the region in the eighteenth
and nineteenth centuries. Most of the Oromo lineages that eventually coalesced
into an Akiishu identity were scattered among primarily Isxaaq (Habr Awal) clans
in the Protectorate, but other Oromo clans were present in Somali clans all over
the western Somali lands.⁵⁷
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putting the cart before the horse
Oral tradition claims that the originator of the Akiishu ‘unification’, Sheekh
Cumar, came from one of these subsumed Oromo lineages. he sheekh was originally a member of a tariiqa, most likely a jamaaca settlement (a Muslim religious
community), which cultivated the land in one of the river valleys descending from
the Harar highlands into the Jigjiga plains. He was reportedly a good farmer and
a noted Islamic scholar. When the region was incorporated into the Ethiopian
empire earlier in the century, Amhara’ destroyed the jamaaca and Sheekh Cumar left
the area.⁵⁸ During the late twenties, Sheekh Cumar settled in the border area with
the British Protectorate. his was about the same time that Isxaaq clans there were
taking up cultivation. his process often provoked dispute and division within clans.
It is claimed that Sheekh Cumar became involved in mediating one such dispute
that arose in a local Habr Awal clan that contained subsumed Oromo lineages. Oral
testimony recounts that the more senior ‘Somali’ lineages of the Habr Awal had
attempted to make a junior ‘Oromo’ lineage of the clan pay a blood money claim
for which they denied responsibility. Sheekh Cumar challenged the Habr Awal’s
own sheekh and succeeded (by close reference to the Qur’an and Sharia) in showing
the Habr Awal sheekh’s decision to be flawed. Embarrassed by this failure, the Habr
Awal clan decided to let Sheekh Cumar and the Oromo lineage live separately from
the clan in land west of Hargeisa in Gebele.⁵⁹
When the Italians took over the area in the mid-thirties, they registered all
the clans present in the district. his process was used by the exiled Oromo ‘Akiishu’
lineage⁶⁰ to claim complete independence from the Habr Awal, who as British
subjects, could not register with the Italian authorities. Over time and during the
agricultural boom of the forties Akiishu identity grew and members claimed exclusive rights to land and attracted other subsumed Oromo lineages from surrounding
Somali clans. Akiishu informants remember that bma officials recognised their
claim and demarcated Akishu land between the lands of Darood ‘Jidwak’ clans of
Yaberre and Bartirre. Furthermore, some of the Oromos whom Sheekh Xasan had
attracted to Yaberre land wanted to join the Akiishu, but Sheekh Xasan would not
allow it. Finally, the British decided that the Yaberre chiefs had too many ‘Oromo’.
hese Oromo later allied themselves with the Akiishu.⁶¹
he agricultural expansion continued throughout the forties. he quantities of
sorghum arriving in Jigjiga were higher than at anytime in a generation, so much
so that there was insufficient storage in the town. Most parts of Gerri and Yaberre
land to the northeast of Jigjiga had been turned over to agriculture, and large tracts
of Bartirre land had been enclosed for agriculture. Even the Abasguul, traditionally
the least agricultural of all the Darood ‘Jidwak’ confederation, were enclosing land.
At the border with the British Protectorate, the Jibril Abokir sub-clan of the Habr
Awal (Isxaaq) clan extended their cultivation westward to land they had previously
used for grazing. British policy deemed it necessary to demarcate ‘tribal’ cultivation
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
areas with boundaries that intended to allow for ample expansion in agriculture.
However this plan was frustrated by the fact that the Protectorate clans took up
cultivation only at the periphery of their clan areas, suggesting that sometimes
cultivation was purely for political and territorial reasons.⁶²
During the nineteen-forties agriculture was playing an ever more important
role in the lives of Somali living in the Reserved Areas. he majority of the local
clans (Gerri-Jarso, Yaberre and Bartirre) lived in permanent villages and farms.
Others were at a transitional stage, but all the major clans had cleared considerable areas for cultivation. By the mid ’forties, about five hundred square miles was
under the plough and was increasing every year. Many Somalis had already sold or
disposed of their camels, and the bulk of their other livestock, to make room for
crops. By 1946 of the 300,000 population present in the ra, half were thought to
be completely dependant on agriculture. British officials expressed worries about
the long-term sustainability of cultivation, which was neither directed, nor did they
think, prudently undertaken.⁶³
During 1944, there was much nervousness among the Somali population who
thought that the end to the 1942 Anglo-Ethiopian Agreement would result in the
handing back of the ra to the Ethiopians, making all Somalis subject to taxation,
as sections of the Gerri-Jarso clan had been in 1942–43. However, the arrangements
for continued British administration of ra were kept under the 1944 agreement.
Nevertheless, it seemed likely that Ethiopian rule would eventually return. his
uncertainty helps to explain the ill-tempered jostling among the local clans to farm
and stake a claim on land whilst the grain price boom and freedom from taxation
lasted. Furthermore, the Somali chiefs and their clans were conscious that their
political positions might not last when the Ethiopians returned, especially those
who had benefited during Italian and British rule such as the emergent Yaberre and
Akiishu clans. Moreover, the Ethiopian government, despite being denied control
of the ra, had made sure of a quasi-governmental presence in Jigjiga soon after
the restoration of Hayla Sellasse. Even under the bma, ‘outsiders/Amhara’ who
formerly owned qalad land in Jigjiga and who were dispossessed by the Italians, were
beginning to return to the Reserved Areas. Indeed, soon after the establishment of
the bma, an Ethiopian Vice-Governor was installed in the town and an Ethiopian
court functioned, much to the annoyance of the British. Despite the presence of
the British administration, the Ethiopian Vice-Governor undertook the sale and
exchange of land and registration of properties in the ra, and issued eviction orders
against the Somali occupants of qalad, land that had been abandoned or confiscated
during the Italian occupation. Former landowners’ claims were recognised, as were
the positions of those Somali clan leaders appointed before the Italian invasion.⁶⁴
he Somalis in the ra were in the difficult position of having to keep in with
both the Ethiopian and British authorities. Prudently, and no doubt profitably,
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putting the cart before the horse
some of the local Somali clan notables were often in the pay of both the Ethiopian
government and the bma.⁶⁵ he Ethiopian government in Harar kept up its contact with important Somalis, and the marriage of the Emperor’s son, the Duke of
Harar, brought an opportunity for Somali notables (64 from Jigjiga and 76 from the
Ogaden) to be entertained and awarded presents and honours.⁶⁶ It was a peculiar
situation in which Ethiopia moved to exert its authority and succeeded in creating a
dual authority. his had been summed up very early on by an Ethiopian policeman
who, on attempting to arrest a Somali in Jigjiga with the words ‘By Haile Sellasie,
I arrest you’, received the reply ‘By King George, I will not be arrested’.⁶⁷
The Somali Youth League in Jigjiga
During 1946, the bma withdrew from Dire Dawa, leaving only the Jigjiga district
and the Hawd still in the so-called ra. he Ogaden continued to be ruled under
the bma of ex-Italian Somaliland. However, within the stipulations of the 1944
agreement the Ethiopian government could give the bma notice to quit the ra,
and in theory the Ogaden, within three months. he Ethiopian government did
not do so for another two years, but in this period, Somali uncertainty began to
express itself in more formal, political ways.⁶⁸ By the mid-forties, tension arose
between elements of Somali society in the ra and the Ogaden, and Ethiopian
administration in waiting. he return of the ra to Ethiopian rule became a highly
politicised issue. Some Somalis, such as the Yaberre chief, Sheekh Xasan, who had
flourished under British and Italian rule, viewed the return to Ethiopian rule with
considerable suspicion. Even before the arrival of an organised Somali political
body in Jigjiga, the Yaberre leader, Sheekh Xasan, was overtly anti-Ethiopian and
seen as a great protagonist of Somali unity.⁶⁹ He later became a leading member
of the Somali Youth Club (later League) in Jigjiga.⁷⁰
he Somali Youth Club – locally known as kulub – was founded in Mogadishu
on 15t May 1943, primarily as an urban self-help organisation, and to begin with, a
large percentage of its membership was drawn from Mogadishu. From Mogadishu
and other urban centres in ex-Italian Somaliland, Club branches extended into the
small garrison, market and well centres in the Ogaden – then still administered
from Mogadishu, but also to Jigjiga in the Reserved Areas, and to Dire Dawa and
Harar in Ethiopia. As its name suggested, most of the members were aged between
18 and 32 and were exclusively Somali. Membership was drawn from what a British report described as the newly emerged ‘middle class’ of Somali, in particular
private traders and those from monthly salaried groups such as government clerks,
servants of Europeans, medical dressers, and members of the Somalia Gendarmerie (approximately seventy-five percent of the Somalia Gendarmerie stationed
in Mogadishu were members of the Club). By 1947, certain headmen and notables
had also joined.⁷¹
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
he aims and objectives of the club were summed up in a British report as
‘fraternity, liberty and progress’, and in the expression ‘Somalia for the Somalis’.
he Club encompassed a very wide range of opinion and motives, but its primary
objective was the furtherance of the interests of the Somali people by breaking
down clan barriers, ending tribal disputes, and by providing educational and social facilities for its members. Its earliest role was as a social welfare club, against
a background of high prices in wartime Mogadishu and other urban centres.⁷² In
order that none of its members did anything that would bring the Club’s name into
disrepute with the British authorities, the Club even appointed its own internal
‘police’ whose duty it was to bring to account members of the Club found breaking
the law.⁷³ he Club did much to aid the young, inexperienced bma that had been
so hastily established after the unexpectedly rapid collapse of the Italian armies in
the Somali lands in 1941.⁷⁴ his accounts for the unusually cordial and close relations between the ‘nationalist’ Club and the British administration of the ex-Italian
and Ethiopian Somali lands. Many of its members came from the Gendarmerie
established under the bma and the bma did as much as it could to afford assistance
to the Club without being seen as partisan by non-Club Somalis.⁷⁵
In early 1946, the Club’s benign and modest aims shifted as the future of the
ex-Italian colonies began to be discussed in an international forum by the Peace
Conference powers, to which the British Foreign Secretary Bevin proposed the idea
of a Greater Somalia. By early 1947, its membership increased from approximately
1,000, mainly in Mogadishu, to around 25,000 members throughout Somali-speaking lands.⁷⁶ Although Bevin’s idea of a Greater Somalia – the unification of all
the Somali territories under one administration, preferably British, under United
Nations Trusteeship – was almost immediately opposed by the usa and ussr,⁷⁷
the idea continued to have adherents among British administrators on the ground
and was quickly picked up by the Somali Youth Club.
he implicit inclusion of the Ethiopian Somali lands in Greater Somalia was
particularly contentious, not least because the 1942 and 1944 British agreements
with Ethiopia explicitly recognised Ethiopia’s sovereignty over the Ogaden and
Reserved Areas. Moreover, the Four Power Commission, appointed in April 1946
to decide the future of the ex-Italian colonies, would not directly consider the
Greater Somalia idea, but only the future of ex-Italian Somaliland. Yet, despite the
overwhelming odds against the United Somalia idea, the Club continued to hold
on to the hope of its attainment, a belief that the British did little to dispel, and
probably discreetly encouraged for the sake of political expedience. Against this
background of international politics and hopes for unification of the Somali lands,
the Somali Youth Club changed its name to the Somali Youth League (syl).⁷⁸
Until early 1947, the League was not anti-Ethiopian. Abdulqadir Saqawa Din,
the first President of the then Somali Youth Club, had even gone to Addis Ababa
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putting the cart before the horse
in August 1946 for an interview with Emperor Hayla-Sellasse. An interview was
granted and the Emperor professed himself in sympathy with the Club and offered
them any assistance in his power, adding ambitiously that the flag of Ethiopia was
the banner of all Africans.⁷⁹ Later in the same year, a petition had been presented to
the Chief Military Administrator in Mogadishu requesting union with Ethiopia.⁸⁰
However, by May 1947 the cordial attitude towards Ethiopia had changed markedly.
One oral informant from Jigjiga claims that it was opinion from there, at one of
the furthest outposts of the Club that helped change the agenda of Somali political
activity. he informant, a member of the Club, remembers that the Jigjiga syl were
horrified at the Mogadishu Committee’s petition to join with Ethiopia and wrote
letters to Mogadishu exclaiming: ‘the Ethiopians are colonisers, they are stronger
than us, they are barbarous and arrogant, they will consume you, they want to cheat
you, to take the land – never allow them [to do this]’.⁸¹
On 17 May 1947 during a ‘tea party’ in Jigjiga to celebrate its fourth anniversary, a religious and nationalistic speech was made by one of the syl members.
he speech made clear that the League was against the return to Ethiopian rule,
although an ‘inspector’ visiting from the syl headquarters in Mogadishu assured
the British that nothing would be done to embarrass them.⁸² In June, a deputation
of local syl supporters went to the British Senior Civil Affairs Officer in Jigjiga
and reminded him that the European powers that had administered the neighbouring territories had done so by treaty, but that the Ethiopians occupied the ra and
Ogaden by force and against the will of the tribesmen. he delegation also claimed
that the Ethiopian government had never made any real attempt to administer the
territory and was not at present capable of doing so.⁸³ his call for greater administration and, in effect, ‘development’, was not voiced before the war. In earlier times
light administration and little interference had suited many Somali clans.
According to British sources, the syl membership in Jigjiga drew support
largely from those who had benefited from the Italian occupation, the war and
the continuing British occupation. Whilst they were drawn from different clans,
the majority were Darood. Many were increasingly urban-based and dependent on
wage labour and were employed as policemen, soldiers, drivers, clerks, and servants.
here was also a preponderance of traders. he commodity boom and price rises
brought together traders and wage earners, who found that they had common interest against the traditional dominance of trade by Arabs, Indians (and also Somali
traders of the Habr Awal clan from the Protectorate). he other important area of
support was the agricultural entrepreneur Sheekh Xasan, ‘headman’ of the ‘junior’
Yaberre clan (described ‘as the brains behind the syl’), who had done well from
the bumper harvests, high grain prices and tax-free conditions.⁸⁴
All of these interests were, to varying degrees, threatened by the return to
Ethiopian rule. his threat helped coalesce the interests of the new urban wage
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
earning sector with the more conservative agriculturist Somali, who were not
natural supporters of the syl’s aims but who feared claims by former landlords
and backdated taxation. A list of prominent syl individuals in the ra compiled
by the British authorities reveals those most at risk from a return to Ethiopian
rule, both politically and economically. hese included the Yaberre chief Sheekh
Xasan; Hussein Liban, an Akiishu trader and a relative of the Akiishu Suldaan,
whose livelihood and identity had flourished since the Ethiopian defeat; and Osman Ali Garad, who was the acting garaad of the Gerri, whose brother had been
arrested in the local disturbances in the area during 1942 and whose clan land
was threatened by returnee qalad owners. Less inherently threatened by a return
to Ethiopian rule, but of great influence in the Ogaden was the President of the
Harar syl branch, Garaad – sometimes Suldaan – Makhtal Dahiir, an Ogaadeen
chief who had been sporadically loyal to the Ethiopian government and who was
notoriously anti-British.⁸⁵
he spread of the syl to Harar and Dire Dawa (outside the ra and Ogaden)
was most alarming from the Ethiopian point of view. hey were towns which
were now under full Ethiopian control, but which were of considerable historical,
political and strategic significance to the Ethiopian centralists. Towards the end of
1947, the anti-Ethiopian feeling in Harar and Dire Dawa had stiffened. his was
in part a religious revival directly linked with the demotion of Amhara ‘Christian’
political dominance and the end to the stranglehold over trade that the foreign
merchants had enjoyed in Harar, during the Italian occupation. he Italian regime
had given Harari townsmen employment in government albeit in a minor capacity.
Furthermore, the departure of foreign ‘British’ Arab and Indian trading concerns
enabled Harari to increase their involvement in trade. In the same way, local Somalis in Jigjiga had in the years during and since the Italian occupation, gained
salaried employment and a foothold in trade. Nevertheless, after three years since
the British restoration of Harar to Ethiopia, Harari townsmen saw that they had
lost social and economic gains made under the Italians. hey lost opportunities in
government, in salaries paid to Muslim functionaries, and in terms of education.
Where the Italians had promoted Arabic as a language of administration that
many educated Muslim Harari regarded positively, the restoration Ethiopians
promoted Amharic, a language intrinsically linked with Christian Amhara rule.
Partly because of these grievances a Harari association was founded sometime in
1945 or 1946, which is remembered with two Arabic titles, the jam’iya al-wataniya
or jam’iya hurriya al harariya, translated respectively as ‘the nationalist society’ or
‘the society for Harari freedom’.⁸⁶
Garaad Makhtal Daahir (who also held the Ethiopian title Balambaras)
established the Somali Youth Club in Harar sometime in 1946 and soon after the
Harari; societies allied themselves and merged with the Club. When Makhtal first
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putting the cart before the horse
arrived in Harar he was well received by the Ethiopian government, which saw him
as an important historical ally in the Ogaden. British sources report that while he
was in Harar the Ethiopian government paid him a healthy monthly allowance.⁸⁷
Indeed, Makhtal’s first visit to Harar after the Italian defeat was to complain against
the British Military Administration and its disarmament campaign in the Ogaden
during 1943–44.⁸⁸ At that time, the Ogaden clans were anti-British because the
disarmament campaigns left them vulnerable to raids by Isxaaq clansmen from
the British Protectorate, and unable to defend water and grazing rights in the
Hawd. By the second half of 1947 however, Makhtal was a leading campaigner
against return to Ethiopian rule and for the unification of the administration of the
Ogaden and ra with ex-Italian Somaliland under United Nations trusteeship – apparently against the wishes of some of his clansmen. A British source suggests his
change in attitude happened when he asked for an audience with the Emperor to
bargain for conditions for his support for a return to Ethiopian rule. Makhtal was
sent to Addis Ababa and kept waiting for a month without gaining an audience.⁸⁹
However, during his stay in Addis Ababa, Makhtal met several Eritrean Muslims
who influenced his attitude to the restoration of Ethiopian rule.⁹⁰ He then returned to Harar and went back to the Ogaden to encourage the League to claim
full independence.⁹¹ However there are several conflicting accounts of Makhtal’s
activities – his own included⁹² – and it does seem that Makhtal and other Somalis
vacillated between sides.
he Ethiopian government was quick to react to the radicalisation of the
League within territory restored to rule from Addis Ababa. In June 1947, several
prominent Somalis from Jigjiga and the Ogaden were called to Harar, where pressure was put on them to dissociate from the syl. Some, if not all of them, signed
documents in which they agreed to resign from the syl.⁹³ As 1947 progressed the
Ethiopian government’s line towards the syl hardened because the syl activity
in Harar was too direct a threat to Ethiopia’s sovereignty. Moreover, the religious
side to the syl had latterly become more pronounced. Placards calling on Moslems
to unite against their enemies were posted on Ethiopian government buildings in
Dire Dawa. In response, the Ethiopian police in Jigjiga arrested the Qadi (Islamic
judge) of the Somalis (illegally since the ra was still under British administration)
during August 1947.⁹⁴
In Harar, the Ethiopian authorities forbade open meetings of the syl. he
Ethiopian Vice-Governor Blatta Ayelle Gabre, whose record of collaboration with
the Italians made him suspect in the eyes of many Ethiopian nationalists, took
an extremely unyielding attitude towards the League.⁹⁵ In early September, after
Makhtal had returned to the Ogaden, the Ethiopian authorities in Jigjiga attempted
to arrest the Vice-President of the Harar branch of the syl, Haji Kalile Ahmed, but
large numbers of syl members prevented him being taken to Harar.⁹⁶ Later in the
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
same month, Jigjiga was visited by the then President of the Mogadishu branch of
the syl, Haji Mohamed Hussein, who had travelled by car from Mogadishu with
the syl flag flying on the bonnet.⁹⁷
In a bold move signalling the Ethiopian sovereignty of the Ogaden, the
American Sinclair Oil Company gained a concession from the Ethiopian government to prospect for oil in the Ogaden, but without the consultation of local
Somali clans.⁹⁸ It caught the British off-guard and underlined the fact that the
1944 agreement had run its course and the return of the Reserved Areas could be
requested by the Ethiopian government at any time. Furthermore, in the face of an
increasingly belligerent syl and in anticipation of regaining control of the ra, the
Ethiopians appointed a more vigorous Ethiopian representative in Jigjiga, Major
Demeke Retta, whom the British officials described as ‘a senior official of strong
anti-British persuasion to check the growth of the syl in Jigjiga’.⁹⁹
Makhtal Daahir meanwhile continued to play a double game, but other
important Ogaadeen chiefs (Suldaan Bihi and Ugaas Mahomed), although still in
the pay of the bma, made it known that they were in favour of the reoccupation
of the Ogaden by Ethiopia.¹⁰⁰ here followed several attempts in December 1947
to woo Makhtal back into the Ethiopian fold and he visited Jigjiga (as a British
protected person) where he had interviews with the Ethiopian Governor of Jigjiga,
and Director General of the Harar Province. Meanwhile, a syl ‘Inspector’ from
Mogadishu arrived in Jigjiga with the intention of taking representatives of all the
ra clans to meet the Four Power Commission in Mogadishu in January. However,
only the chiefs of Yaberre and Gadabuursi attended – the chiefs of the Gerri, Bartirre and Abasguul decided it was inadvisable to compromise themselves so deeply
in their support for the now anti-Ethiopian syl at this stage. For their part the
Ethiopians dispatched their old Somali ally, Balambaras Abdullahi Farah ‘Cagoole’
to Dhagaxbuur in the Ogaden, liberally provided with funds to propitiate Ogaadeen
support.¹⁰¹ One informant remembers that at this time Somalis were pro-Ethiopian
during meetings with the Ethiopian representatives in the day, whereas at evening
meetings with the British officers they were pro-British and pro-League.¹⁰²
By late 1947, it was clear to the British and Ethiopian governments that it no
longer served a useful purpose for British to hold on to the Reserved Areas and the
Ogaden.¹⁰³ Moreover, the failure of the bma to effectively restrain the Ogaadeen
clans from harassing representatives of the Sinclair Oil Company present in the area
brought the general efficacy of the bma as the guarantor of Ethiopian sovereignty
of the Ogaden into question.¹⁰⁴ In anticipation of their resumption of government
in the ra and Ogaden, the Ethiopian government moved first to put an end to
opposition in Harar, arrested and imprisoned all suspected syl members and others besides – many of whom escaped capture by fleeing to Jigjiga.¹⁰⁵ In February,
the local syl delegation to the United Nations ‘Four Power’ Commission on the
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putting the cart before the horse
future of the Italian colonies in Mogadishu returned after having failed to get even
a hearing. Nevertheless, on their return a syl flag was paraded about Jigjiga and the
bma quickly received complaints from the Ethiopian authorities.¹⁰⁶ After the move
against Harari opposition in January, in March 1948 meetings were held between
senior Ethiopian officials and, by now, the far more compliant Somali notables
including Makhtal (who unlike many of his Harari syl supporters remained free).
hese Somali notables were taken to Harar for interviews with the Vice-Governor
and to Addis Ababa to meet with the Emperor.¹⁰⁷
On 18 March, leading Somalis were informed of the early withdrawal of
the British from the ra. On 20 March, the flying of any flags other than those of
Great Britain and Ethiopia was forbidden. he official syl activists removed their
flag and substituted it with a Union Jack but this too was taken down on advice
from the bma. However, on the 23 March a party of ‘young’ Somalis newly arrived
from the Ogaden, took possession of the syl offices and illegally hoisted the syl
flag contrary to the League’s official wishes. he young radical syl men threatened
British officials and a party of senior moderate League activists who attempted to
lower the flag in compliance with the British authority’s orders. Finally, the police
supported by an armoured car proceeded to the League’s offices and removed the
flag, which the young Ogaden group resisted. A grenade was thrown, killing one of
the ra policemen; and fighting ensued and over 20 Somalis were estimated killed,
along with two Police and several more Somalis wounded.¹⁰⁸ his was the only
violent incident directly linked to the return of the Reserved Areas to the Ethiopian Government, and when the Ogaden was returned later that September there
were only isolated problems. Only Makhtal Dahiir rejected outright the Ethiopian
government and led a small shifta band for two years after the hand-over, but his
activities were not widely supported.¹⁰⁹ Many of the Ethiopian Somali (mainly
Darood) clans valued their pre-war de facto autonomy under Ethiopia. Indeed life
under the British who used the Ethiopian Darood clan’s chief rivals the Isxaaq as
their local auxiliaries had often proved humiliating. As many Ethiopian Somali saw
it the return to weak Ethiopian rule was better than unification under the British
who they saw as strong rulers – ‘if you give your stick to a blind man you will be
able to take it back later’.¹¹⁰
Conclusion
Ultimately the syl in eastern Ethiopia struggled to maintain a united front. here
were too many divisions and differences between clans, and clan leaders, between
the agricultural and pastoral Darood, traditional leaders and the young radical
townsmen influenced by the Mogadishu syl. Moreover, the British alliance with
the acquisitive Isxaaq of the British Protectorate made the prospect of continued
British rule unpalatable to the majority Darood in the Ethiopian Somali lands.
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
here was therefore no stomach for the continued resistance to restored Ethiopian
rule, particularly after the repression in Harar in January 1948. As before the occupation, the Ethiopians were now able to dilute Somali solidarity through the
manipulation of older networks of power in Jigjiga and the Ogaden.
Indeed, once it was clear that the gains made by certain individuals and
clans would not be jeopardised by the return to Ethiopian rule – at least not in
the short term – former firebrands like Sheekh Xasan were gradually co-opted by
the Ethiopian government. he Akiishu became an important prop to Ethiopian
rule in Jigjiga and the surrounding areas;¹¹¹ their suldaan Odoowa is remembered
as particularly close to Hayla-Sellasse despite the syl connections of his brother,
Xasan Gerri.¹¹² he Bartirre clan leader Dool Xirsi, who had also benefited from
Italian rule, was quick realign himself with Ethiopian rule, continuing the tradition
of Bartirre dominance in Jigjiga supported by Ethiopian patronage.¹¹³
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
his paper is drawn from Cedric Barnes, ‘he Ethiopian state and its Somali periphery, c. 1888–1948 (Ph.D. dissertation, University of Cambridge, 2000). he research
benefited from grants from the ahrb, Trinity College, the Smuts, Prince Consort
and hirlwall, and Worts Funds. I would like to thank my research assistants Bashiir
Xaaji and Bashiir Abdullahi for their help in interviews and translation in Jigjiga. Tim
Carmichael also afforded me a great deal of assistance in Ethiopia, and has continued
to give me help and encouragement. he interviews cited were conducted by the author
in Jigjiga, Region 5, Ethiopia in 1998.
See for example the accounts in Bahru Zewde, A History of Modern Ethiopia (London,
1991), pp. 178–182; and a fuller account in Harold G. Marcus, Ethiopia, Great Britain
and the United States, 1941–1974 (Berkeley, 1983), pp. 8–78.
I.M. Lewis, A Modern History of The Somali (London, 2002), Pp. 129–131; John Drysdale,
The Somali Dispute (London, 1964), pp. 65–73
Two studies that do concentrate on local circumstances but which are somewhat partisan are Tibebe Eshete, ‘A history of Jigjiga town: 1891–1974’ (Unpub. ma thesis, Addis
Ababa University, 1988) which has a distinct ‘Ethiopian’ bias; and Charles L. Geshekter, ‘Anti-colonialism and class formation: the eastern Horn of Africa, 1920–1950’,
International Journal of African Historical Studies (Vol. 18) No. 1, 1985, pp. 1–32, who is
sympathetic to the Somali nationalist version.
Two accounts which look deeper into the background are Saadia Touval, Somali Nationalism, International Politics and the Drive for Unity in the Horn of Africa (Cambridge,
Mass., 1963), who is sensitive to the complexities of local politics; and Tim Carmichael,
‘Political Culture in Ethiopia’s Provincial Administration: Haile Sellasie, Blate Ayele
Gebre, and the Harari Kulub Movement’, in M. Page et al, Personality and Political
Culture in Modern Africa: Studies Presented to Professor H.G. Marcus (Boston, 1998)
whose work concentrates on the interaction of Harari and Somali politics.
he following abbreviations will be used below: bdfa – British Documents on Foreign
Affairs: Reports and Papers from the Foreign Office Confidential Print, General Editors,
Kenneth Bourne, D. Cameron Watt, and Michael Partridge, (University Publications
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putting the cart before the horse
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
of America, 1997); bma – British Military Administration; bsp – British Somaliland
Protectorate; fo – Foreign Office; pro – Public Records Office, uk; ra – Reserved
Areas; {s}cao – {Senior} Civil Affairs Officer; wo – War Office.
See Saul Kelly, ‘Britain, the United States, and the end of the Italian Empire, 1940–52’,
Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, Vol. xxvii, No. 3 (2000), p. 51.
he Italian period itself is not well served by published material. Alberto Sbacchi
has sketched out the main events in his Ethiopia Under Mussolini (London, 1985),
and Legacy of Bitterness: Ethiopia & Fascist Italy, 1935–41 (Lawrenceville, 1997) – both
studies concerned with the political problems of the Italian adventure at various
levels in Ethiopia, Italy and the wider world. Haile Mariam Larebo’s The Building
of an Empire-Italian Land Policy and Practice in Ethiopia 1935–1941 (Oxford, 1994), is
grounded in the specific economic difficulties of the Italian regime in Ethiopia and
the gap between the grand plans and their actual implementation in Ethiopia. he
accounts suffer from the incomplete documentary record that has much to do with
the brevity of the Italian occupation and its quick demise at the hands of an invading
army.
‘Memorandum – Road Making in Harar District’, Eldon Ellison to Consul Gen.
Addis Ababa, Harar, 2 November 1937, pro: fo 371/20929/j5028.
Hargeisa District Quarterly Intelligence Report, Hargeisa [bsp], 30 June 1937, pro:
fo 371/20925/j3819.
Cited by Geshekter, ‘Anti-Colonialism and Class Formation’, p. 24.
Cited by Patrick Kakwenzire, ‘Colonial rule in the British Somaliland Protectorate,
1905–39’, (Unpub. Ph.D., London, 1976), p. 530
For an overview see Harold Marcus, Ethiopia, Gt. Britain and the United States,
pp.10–12, and for details see Lord Rennel of Rodd, British Military Administration
of Occupied Enemy Territories in Africa, 1941–47 (London, 1948), pp. 88–92.
Rodd, British Military Administration., pp. 74, 201, also see Drysdale, The Somali Dispute,
p. 69. For an admirable summary on the complex diplomatic situation see again Kelly,
‘Britain, the United States, and the end of the Italian Empire’.
‘Enclosure in No. 57 – Ethiopia: Political Review for 1943’, Foreign Office, 13 June 1944,
(j1864/1/1), bdfa, Part iii, Series G, Vol. 4, pp. 243–255.
For an overview of the negotiations and content of this agreement see Harold Marcus,
Ethiopia, Great Britain and the United States, pp. 33–39.
Rodd, British Military Administration, pp. 82–92
Cook to Eden, Addis Ababa, 17 May 1944, (j1915/6/1), bdfa, Part iii, Series G, Vol. 4,
p. 236.
‘Enclosure in No. 57 – Ethiopia: Political Review for 1943’, Foreign Office, 13 June 1944,
(j1864/1/1), bdfa, Part iii, Series G, Vol. 4, pp. 243–255.
‘Enclosure in No. 21 – Commerce in Ethiopia, A.D. Bethell, Advisor to Ministry of
Commerce, Addis Ababa, 18 July 1944’, Howe to Eden, 2 September 1944, (j3238/2/1),
bdfa, Part iii, Series G, Vol. 4, pp. 464–499.
‘Enclosure in No. 44, Economic Report (A)’, Cook to Bevin, Addis Ababa, 10 April
1946, pro: fo 371/403/469.
Ethiopia, Annual Report for 1947’, Weld-Forester to Bevin, Addis Ababa, 4 June 1948,
pro: fo 401/40.
‘Enclosure in No. 21 – Commerce in Ethiopia, A.D. Bethell, Advisor to Ministry of
52
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
Commerce, Addis Ababa, 18 July 1944’, Howe to Eden, 2 September 1944, (j3238/2/1),
bdfa, Part iii, Series G, Vol. 4, pp. 464–499.
I believe, for example, that I.M. Lewis overstates the case when he wrote, “Nevertheless,
the general character of opposition to Ethiopian control was indisputable”, in Lewis, A
Modern History of the Somali; and in general see Charles L. Geshekter, ‘Anti-colonialism
and class formation: the eastern Horn of Africa, 1920–1950’.
‘Memorandum of General Information on Harar Province’, Dodds to hesiger, Harar,
27 June 1917, pro:fo 371/2854/159303; and oral informant, Dool Ableele, Interview 5,
Jigjiga, 19/6/98; and generally Barnes, ‘he Ethiopian State and its Somali Periphery’,
pp. 93–126.
Oral informants, Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98; Ustaad Axmad Maxamad Boore, Interview 10, Jigjiga, 21/6/98; Dool Ableele, Interview 5, Jigjiga,
19/6/98; Maxamad Cabdullahi Farah, Interview 6, Jigjiga, 27/6/98.
Oral informant, Dool Ableele, Interview 5, Jigjiga, 19/6/98.
Barton to Henderson, Addis Ababa, 26 March 1930, pro: fo 371/14593/j1386, and
Barton to Simon, Addis Ababa, 18 January 1932, pro: fo 371/16098/j734.
scao R.H. Smith, bma, ra, Ethiopia, 6 August 1947’, pro: fo 1015/41; for Harar
province as a whole see Ezekiel Gebissa, ‘Consumption, Contraband, and Commodification – A History of Khat in Hararge, Ethiopia, c. 1930–1991, (Unpub. Ph.D.
hesis, Michigan State University, 1997).
See Barnes, ‘he Ethiopian State and its Somali Periphery’, pp.100–113; also see Tibebe
Eshete, ‘A history of Jigjiga town: 1891–1974’ (Unpub. ma thesis, Addis Ababa University,
1988), pp.45–62.
I was unable to consult Italian archives, which I presume would have the most detail
on the subject, although probably subject to bias and omission. But see sketchy information on Jigjiga in Enrico Brotto Il regime delle terre nel Governo del Harar (Harar,
Governo del Harar, 1939), pp. 50–51, 55–56.
See Tibebe, ‘A History of Jigjiga Town: 1891–1974, pp. 49–60; also see nj Cossins, J.C.
Bille, and K.E. Flattery, ‘Land use study of the Jigjiga area, Ethiopia’, ( Joint ilca/rdp
Ethiopian Pastoral Systems Programme, Addis Ababa, 1984) p. 6
For comparison see Ezekiel Gebissa, ‘Consumption, contraband, and commodification’,
pp. 59–64; and see Enrico Brotto Il regime, pp. 55–56.
See Tibebe, ‘A History of Jigjiga Town: 1891–1974, pp. 49–60; also see Cossins, Bille,
Flattery, ‘Land use study of the Jigjiga area, Ethiopia’, p. 6; and Enrico Brotto Il regime,
pp. 55–56
Oral informant, Suldaan Nimcaan Sheekh Xasan Sheekh Ismaaciil, Interview 8, Jigjiga,
13/6/98
Oral informant, Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98.
Oral informant, Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98.
See Tibebe, ‘A History of Jigjiga Town: 1891–1974, pp. 49–60; also see Cossins, Bille,
Flattery, ‘Land use study of the Jigjiga area, Ethiopia’, p. 6; and Enrico Brotto Il regime,
pp. 50–51.
Oral informant, Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98.
Oral informant, Suldan Xasan Cabdi Cumar, Interview 9, Jigjiga, 17/6/98.
See Tibebe, ‘A History of Jigjiga Town: 1891–1974, pp. 49–60; also see Cossins, Bille,
Flattery, ‘Land use study of the Jigjiga area, Ethiopia’, p. 6.
Oral informant, Maxamad Cali Xuseen, Interview 7, Jigjiga, 15/6/98.
53
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putting the cart before the horse
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
Oral informant, Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1944’, pro: fo
1015/41/3a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1943’, pro: fo
1015/41/2a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1944’,
pro: fo 1015/41/3a.
Ibid.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1943’, pro: fo
1015/41/2a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1944’, pro: fo
1015/41/3a.
Report by Capt. Flower Acting cao, Jigjiga, ra, 20 April 1945, pro: wo 230/63.
Oral informant Xassan Xaashi Cilmi, Interview 11, Jigjiga, 25/6/98.
Report by Capt. Flower Acting cao, Jigjiga, ra, 20 April 1945, pro: wo 230/63
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1943’, pro: fo
1015/41/2a.
Ibid.; oral Informants, Adam Hasan, Mangistu Dilnassaw, and Kasahun Charkose,
(Group) Interview 20, Gersum/Funyanbira, 1/6/98.
Report by Capt. Flower, Acting cao, Jigjiga, ra, 20 April 1945, pro: wo 230/63
Ibid.; oral informants Xaaji Faarax Cumar Celi, Interview 17, Jigjiga, 2/7/98, Farah
Dhamel Daahir Husen, Interview 16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98; and Jirde Ismaaciil Aadau, Interview 18, Jigjiga, 26/6/98.
See Tibebe, ‘A history of Jigjiga town: 1891–74’, pp. 8–10; and also on the pre-Somali
populations of this area see I.M. Lewis, ‘he Galla in northern Somaliland’, Rassegna
di Studi Etiopici, 15 (1959), pp. 21–38, and oral informant Jirde Ismaaciil Aadau, Interview
19, Jigjiga, 26/6/98.
Oral Informants, Xasan Cabdi Raxmaan Sheekh Muxamad [Descendant of Sheekh
Cumar], Interview 3, Jigjiga, 1/7/98, and Jirde Ismaaciil Aadau, Interview 18, Jigjiga,
26/6/98.
Ibid., (oral informants); Gebele was one of the first agricultural areas in the Protectorate on the border with Ethiopian territory.
By now led by a Suldaan Oodowa who had been nominated by Sheekh Cumar before
his death and to whom the Sheekh’s son, Muxamed acted as a spiritual guide, Ibid.
Ibid., (oral informants); and also see ‘bma-ra Monthly Notes for September 1947’,
scao, Jigjiga, 7 October 1947, pro: fo 1015/41; and ‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the
cao for the year ending 31 December 1947’, pro: fo 1015/49.
Ibid.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1946’, pro: fo
1015/90/2a.
scao Smith, bma, ra, Ethiopia, 6 August 1947’, pro: fo 1015/41; Report by Capt.
Flower Acting cao, Jigjiga, ra, 20 April 1945, pro: wo 230/63.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1944’, pro: fo
1015/41/3a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1946’, pro: fo
1015/90/2a.
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67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
80.
81.
82.
83.
84.
85.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1943’, pro: fo
1015/41/2a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1946’, pro: fo
1015/90/2a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1944’, pro: fo
1015/41/3a.
‘bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December 1946’, pro: fo
1015/90/2a.
‘Memorandum on Native Clubs in Somalia’, [n.d. probably late 1946], pro: fo
1015/51/8b.
Oral informant, Yassin Mussa Ahmed, Interview 12, Jigjiga, 28/6/98
‘Memorandum on Native Clubs in Somalia’, [n.d. probably late 1946], pro: fo
1015/51/8b.
For evocative accounts of the makeshift and shoestring British military administration of the ex-Italian Somali lands Gerald Hanley’s novel A Consul at Sunset (London,
1951), and his Warriors (London, 1993) – the reprint of the half of his book Warriors
and Strangers (1971) which dealt with Somali lands – are particularly good reading.
‘Extract from Brigadier Stafford’s Fortnightly Report No. 2, 26 November 1946’, pro:
fo 1015/51.
‘Memorandum on Native Clubs in Somalia’, [n.d. probably late 1946], pro: fo
1015/51/8b
For details see Kelly, ‘Britain, the United States, and the end of the Italian Empire’
[?] Nairobi, 7 March 1947, pro: fo 1015/51/2a, and also hq East African Command,
Monthly Intelligence Review, April 1947, pro: fo 1015/51.
‘Memorandum on Native Clubs in Somalia’, [n.d. probably late 1946], pro: fo
1015/51/8b.
Periodical Intelligence Report No. 1, hq East Africa Command, 1 January 1947, pro:
fo 1015/51/2a.
Oral informant, Dool Ableele, Interview 5, Jigjiga, 19/6/98.
Smith to cao Middle East Land Forces, Jigjiga, 17 May 1947, pro: fo 1015/51.
‘bma: ra, Monthly Notes for June 1947’, scao, Jigjiga, 6 July 1947, pro: fo 1015/41;
bma – Annual Report by the cao on the Administration for the year ended 31 December 1947’, pro: fo 1015/49.
Smith scao, bma, ra, Ethiopia, 6 August 1947’, pro: fo 1015/41; and Smith scao, to
hq, Middle East Land Forces, ra, Ethiopia, 19 June 1947, pro: fo 1015/51.
Ibid. Balambaras (an Ethiopian title) Makhtal Daahir of the rer Haroun rer Delal
Ogaadeen sub-clan was a Garaad and had considerable power in the Ogaadeen around
Dhagaxbuur. His name is mentioned in the reports concerning the Dhagaxbuur
agreement in 1928 and in those of the Boundary Commission. he British thought
him ‘an appalling liar’, and who was notoriously anti-Isxaaq despite being married to
a sister of one Abdi Warsama, a Habr Awal Isxaaq and ‘leading citizen of Hargeisa’.
From a notable Ogaadeen family with large camel herd, Makhtal’s family were ‘like
a government with its own army’, and he inherited the title Garaad from his brother
at the age of 13. It seems that he was first recognised by the Ethiopian authorities
during Lij Iyyasu’s time who gave him guns and horses in return for his collaboration
and tribute of livestock. He was a long term although expedient collaborator with
Ethiopian government and helped to found Dhagaxbuur in the interest of ‘getting
55
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putting the cart before the horse
guns’ and trade in general. He was obstructive whenever the British tried to get grazing rights enforced for the Isxaaq in the Hawd and Ogaden, in particular during the
Anglo-Ethiopian Boundary Commission hearings. He alleges that the British offered
him a salary if he would support British claims to the Hawd and Ogaadeen, which he
thought poor recompense for the territorial concessions to the Isxaaq that the British
had requested. [Somaliland] Fortnightly Intelligence Report, Lt. Col. Bennet, Burao
[bsp], 30 September 1935, pro: fo 371/19156/j7003; and oral informants Cali Adan
Maxamad, Interview 15, Jigjiga, 6/7/98; Farah Dhamel Daahir Husen, Interview No.
16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98; and Makhtal Daahir, Interview 14, Addis Ababa, 13/7/98.
86. his account is taken from Tim Carmichael, ‘Political Culture in Ethiopia’s Provincial
Administration’, p. 201.
87. British Legation to Foreign Office, Addis Ababa, 27 September 1947, pro: fo 1015/51.
Makhtal was thought of as something of an Ethiopian patriot and had resisted
Italian rule for a time. On the Ethiopian collapse he tried to escape via the British
Protectorate, but the authorities there were not well disposed to him because he had
been so obstructive in the 1930s border demarcation. Not wanting to offend the new
neighbouring Italian colonial regime in Ethiopia, the British handed Makhtal over
to the Italians. he Italians took him to Mogadishu where he was imprisoned for
three months after which a court there sentenced him to death, but then transferred
him to Harar where he was imprisoned but released eight months later. He spent the
rest of the war ‘quietly’ near Dhagaxbuur. See oral informants: Cali Adan Maxamad,
Interview 15, Jigjiga, 6/7/98; Farah Dhamel Husen, Interview 16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98, and
Makhtal Daahir, Interview 14, Addis Ababa, 13/7/98.
88. Oral informant, Farah Dhamel Husen, Interview 16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98.
89. British Legation to Foreign Office, Addis Ababa, 27 September 1947, pro: fo
1015/51.
90. Telegram – British Legation to Foreign Office, Addis Ababa, 25 October 1947, pro:
fo 1015/51.
91. British Legation to Foreign Office, Addis Ababa, 27 September 1947, pro: fo
1015/51.
92. Oral informants: Cali Adan Maxamad, Interview 15, Jigjiga, 6/7/98; Farah Dhamel
Husen, Interview 16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98, and Makhtal Daahir, Interview 14, Addis Ababa,
13/7/98.
93. ‘bma-ra, Monthly Notes for June 1947’, scao, Jigjiga, 6 July 1947, pro: fo 1015/41.
94. bma-ra, Monthly Notes for August, 1947’, Senior Civil Affairs Officer, Jigjiga, 4
September 1947, pro: fo 1015/41.
95. hm Consul to hm Minister, Addis Ababa, 27 August 1947, pro: fo 1015/51, and see
Carmichael, ‘Political Culture in Ethiopia’s Provincial Administration’.
96. bma-ra, Monthly Notes for September, 1947’, scao, Jigjiga, 7 October 1947, pro: fo
1015/41.
97. Ibid.
98. bma-ra, Monthly Notes for August 1947 scao, Jigjiga, 4 September 1947, pro: fo
1015/41, and see bma-ra, Annual Report by the cao for the year ended 31 December
1947’, pro: fo 1015/49.
99. bma-ra Monthly notes for October 1947’, scao, Jigjiga, 1 November 1947, pro: fo
1015/41.
100. Ibid.
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The Somali Political Economy in Eastern Ethiopia, Circa 1941–1948.
101. ‘bma-ra Monthly notes for December 1947’, scao, Jigjiga, 2 January 1948, pro: fo
1015/41. ‘Cagoole’ Cabdullahi Farah of the rer Ali Ogaadeen clan spoke both Amharic
(unusual for an Ogaadeen clansman) and Arabic, and the British considered him ‘dangerous schemer who is always making trouble’. He was disabled from birth and could
only move about on his hands and knees. Oral informants remember that although
from an Ogaadeen clan he was brought up in the Harar highlands around the katama
of Gersum where he attended Quranic school – perhaps on account of his disability,
Here he may have come to the notice of Ethiopian officials since Gersum was one of
the garrison centres for the Ogaden. he nickname ‘Cagoole’ referred to his disability
which had great significance for Somalis who feared the great ‘spiritual’ power they
believed disabled people to possess, and consequently treated such individuals with
great respect. See [Somaliland] Fortnightly Intelligence Report, Lt. Col. Bennet, Burao
[bsp], 30 September 1935, pro: fo 371/19156/j7003; and oral informants Maxamad
Cabdullahi Farah (Cagoole’s son), Jigjiga, Interview 6, 27/6/98; Yassin Mussa Ahmed,
Interview 12, Jigjiga 28/6/98; Xassan Xaashi Cilmi, Interview No. 11, Jigjiga, 25/6/98.
102. Oral informant, Xassan Xaashi Cilmi, Interview 11, Jigjiga, 25/6/98.
103. ‘Ethiopia, Annual Report for 1947’, Weld-Forester to Bevin, Addis Ababa, 20 July 1948,
pro: fo 401/40.
104. ‘Ethiopia, Annual Review for 1948’, Lascelles to Bevin, Addis Ababa, 9 February 1949,
pro: fo 401/41.
105. Ibid., and ‘bma-ra, Monthly Report for January 1948’, scao, Jigjiga, 1 February 1948,
pro: fo 1015/41, for the story in Harar which was far more dramatic than events in
Jigjiga see Tim Carmichael, ‘Political Culture in Ethiopia’s Provincial Administration’.
106. ‘bma-ra Monthly Report for February 1948’, scao, Jigjiga, 10 March 1948, pro: fo
1015/41.
107. ‘bma-ra Monthly Report for March 1948’, scao, Jigjiga, 10 April 1948, pro: fo
1015/41.
108. Ibid.
109. Oral informants: Cali Adan Maxamad, Interview 15, Jigjiga, 6/7/98; Farah Dhamel
Husen, Interview 16, Jigjiga, 4/7/98, and Makhtal Daahir, Interview 14, Addis Ababa,
13/7/98.
110. Oral informant, Cali Adan Maxamad, Interview 15, Jigjiga, 6/7/98.
111. Oral informants: Ustaad Axmad Maxamad Boore, Interview 10, Jigjiga, 21/6/98.
112. Oral informant, Jirde Ismaaciil Aadau, Interview 18, Jigjiga, 26/6/98.
113. Oral informants: Dool Ableele, Interview 5, Jigjiga, 19/6/98; Maxamed Cali Xuseen,
Interview 7, Jigjiga 15/6/98. Interestingly, Dool Xirsi was not considered the rightful
garaad of the Bartirre, but had kept his position with Ethiopian support and his
own patronage network. Oral informant, Yassin Mussa Ahmed, Interview 12, Jigjiga,
28/6/98.
57
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Chapter Four
Pithless Nationalism: he Somali Case
Hassan Mahaddala
Southern University
S
A nation’s existence is, if you will pardon the metaphor, a daily plebiscite,
just as an individual’s existence is a perpetual affirmation of life.
– Ernest Renan
Ovoting behavior. Renan’s central thesis is that a nation – a collectivity over and
bviously people do not change their nationality as often as they do their
above the tribe – is a subjective phenomenon. According to the French publicist,
nationality is a voluntary association subject to one’s perception of incentives or
disincentives.¹ his being the case, the whole literary arsenal that lend credence to
“natural nation” – i.e., history, anthropology, politics, philology, etc. – must also be
subjective. To the extent that these are so, the task of the researcher is not only to
investigate the accuracies of these “meta-narratives,” to borrow Lyotard’s term, but
explain how they inspire national formation or spark nationalism.²
In this study, we will examine the existing literature on Somali nationalism
under a new light. Although we will not concern ourselves with the correctness of
the literature, we will dispute some of its findings. In particular, we will question the
validity of the dominant ethnicist perspective and challenge the foundational myth
on which Somali nationalism was constructed. In order to do so, we will closely
scrutinize those “natural features” – i.e., race, language, history, religion, common
habitat, etc. – that are often cited in the literature as the “legitimating elements”
of the Somali nation. As we shall demonstrate, although Somalis possess many of
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putting the cart before the horse
these objective characteristics in common, they do not owe their national formation
or sentiment to them. As a traditional society, Somalis did not develop or cultivate
these “national” peculiarities enough to emit those transcendental values that cause
people to coalesce and gel together as a nation. To this day, they exist in the mind
of the average Somali as empty shells devoid of contents and meaning. Hence, our
apt use of the term pithless nationalism in their regard.
Literature Review
he literature on Somali nationalism is limited both in volume and in scope. Most
studies on the subject are written from a single perspective: an historical one.
Accordingly, they present the Somali nation as an historical community with an
age-old feeling of “oneness”. Somali nationalism, the historians maintain, springs
from this ancient sentiment. In this section, we will examine how these historical
expositions led to the “ethnicization” of Somali nationalism.
To arrive at an ethnicist conception of Somali nationalism, the historians focus
on three areas of monumental implications for national formations:
•
•
•
he migration of ethnic Somalis from the Arabian Peninsula;
heir conversion to Islam about the first century of the faith;
heir endless feuds with their regional protagonists, the Christian Abyssinians.
Mass migrations, profession of common faith, and inter-ethnic wars constitute some
the most potent factors that can cause “an alignment of values” among peoples. After
an extensive examination of these events, the historians offer a chronological and
spatial account of the Somali people’s history. Aided by an accident of nature that
bestowed on Somalis a number of common natural traits, the historians postulate
an ethno-cultural nationalism.³
Typical of these studies is I.M. Lewis’s work entitled A Modern History of
Somalia: Nation and State in the Horn of Africa. In this book, the author aims “to
provide a sociologically and anthropologically informed history of the Somali
people.” To this end, he delves deeply into the description of the physical and social
environment, which, as he sees it, had over the centuries molded and hemmed the
Somali people together as one nation. To him, Somali nationalism springs from
this ancient natural environment. He remarks:
Somali cultural nationalism is a centuries old phenomenon and not something
which has been recently drummed up to give credence to political claims. It is
the source rather than the product of nationalist aspirations.⁴
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Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
he dictating logic behind Lewis’ proposition seems to be this: an objective environment can only produce an objective nation. Probably this is why the author and his
fellow historians are magnetically attracted to the physical and social settings of the
Somalis. Elsewhere, after discussing these features, the prolific author observes:
Although the Somali did not traditionally form a unitary state, it is this heritage of cultural nationalism which, strengthened by Islam, lies behind Somali
nationalism today.⁵
Saadia Touval, author of Somali Nationalism: International Politics and Drive For
Unity in the Horn of Africa, takes a similar approach as Lewis’. Like the latter, he first
discusses the history of the Somali people, adds an entire catalogue of primordial
qualities shared by Somalis, and from this extrapolates an ethnicist sentiment. As
he put it:
Somali nationalism stems from a feeling of national consciousness in the sense
of “we” as opposed to “they” which has existed among the Somali for many
centuries. It was nurtured by tribal genealogies and traditions, by the Islamic
ties and by conflicts with foreign peoples.⁶
In another study, Touval repeats these assertions. In his words: “here are strong
cohesive ties – tradition of common ancestry, common language and cultural
heritage, and Islamic religion – which bind Somalis, and form the basis of their
national consciousness.⁷
Another author who defines Somali nationalism in similar terms is Rupert
Emerson. Writing a foreword note for Touval’s book, the eminent professor
stated:
One of the distinctive attributes of the Somalis…is that they possess a good
measure of the elements, derived from the example of the classic Western
European prototypes, which have in the past been assumed to be the essential
ingredients of the nation.⁸
After making this assertion, Emerson cited the “essential ingredients” of the
Somali nation as common language, religion, descent, and territory. In his opinion,
these constituted the sources of Somali nationalism.⁹
Likewise, E.A. Bayne, editor of the Northeast Africa Series, views Somali nationalism in ethnicist terms. According to him, unlike other Sub-Saharan Africans,
Somalis share “a deeply felt sense of nationhood.” his sense of nationhood, as he
sees it, is not limited to an elite class of people nor instilled by them. Rather, it is
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a sentiment that pervades the whole collectivity and derives from “an emotional,
cultural, and historical experience shared by all Somalis.¹⁰
Without arguing with the obvious fact that Somalis constitute an objectively
definable community, one may question, however, the validity of the proposition
that equates their nationalism with cultural nationalism. As we will see in the
following section, the literary and the artistic materials that are required for the
development of such a “romantic” enterprise were not available to Somalis.
Ethno-Cultural Nationalism and The Genesis of Somali Nationalism
As an offspring of Romanticism, cultural nationalism, in order to take effect, requires
a certain degree of cultural development and political sophistication, which the
Somalis of the pre-World War ii era did not possess.¹¹ It is built on the literary
and artistic materials produced by cultural nationalists, such as the “L’Illuminati”
of Europe, who not only praised the uniqueness and special characteristics of their
nations – i.e., race, language, literature, territory, history, religion, etc. – but portrayed them as living organisms, which, if left unprotected or continually nurtured,
were capable of dying. Cultural nationalism exalts all the natural features of the
nation.¹²
Before embarking on their nationalist campaigns, most political nationalists
study these works and frame the ideological charter of their movements around
them. hus, after the idea of an organic nation took hold in the psyche of the European masses, ethnic nationalism developed.¹³ Now let us see whether a similar
trend existed in the Somalian environment before the twentieth century, when
Somali nationalism began.
Race and The Development of Somali Nationalism
he role of race in the development or vigor of Somali nationalism is extremely
limited. Although Somali nationalists occasionally spoke of their nation in ethnicist terms and, at times, demanded independence on the basis of that, unlike their
European counterparts, especially the Germans, they never made any reference to
their people’s ethnic purity or stressed the need for protecting it from adulteration.¹⁴ Unlike their European counterparts, who preferred smaller and ethnically
homogeneous states over the polyglot empires of their era, the post-War Somali
leaders were rarely concerned with race. Apparently, they lacked the literary and
artistic treasures from which to construct such a racialist conception to inspire and
mobilize the masses.
Moreover, prior to the twentieth century, when Somalis first began to coalesce
as a nation, they were divided into antagonistic clans who raided and pillaged one
another,¹⁵ in the same way that Stalin stated the Georgians treated one another
before their absorption into the Russian Empire.¹⁶ Given these facts, one may con62
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clude that racial affinity and ethnic considerations did not inspire the development
of Somali nationalism or sustained it, for that matter. his is why Somali political
leaders rarely employed them as reasons for separate political existence.
The Role of Somali Language in Somali Nationalism
Another factor that comes to mind when dealing with cultural nationalism is the
issue of philology. For most cultural nationalists, the national language holds a
certain aura of beauty (as in the case of the French) or possesses a certain level of
purity (as in the case of the Germans), which requires protection and continuous
nurturing. In the Somali case, however, the available evidence suggests that the
Somali language, although nation-wide, never acquired the aura of the French
language; and, since it is heavily indebted to Arabic, unlike the German language,
it could not have been considered a candidate for protection from adulteration.¹⁷
Additionally, the majority of the Somali nationalists were proficient in Arabic,
and revered the language of the Koran more than the “vernacular” Somali; and this
is why they pressed the colonial governments to institute Arabic as the official
language of the country.¹⁸ By the same token, this is why the Arabic alphabets
became the first try of those who were trying to develop a script for the Somali
language in the nineteen-fifties.¹⁹
Furthermore, the Somali language was not written until 1972, twelve years
after independence, and, therefore, could not have inspired among the Somalis the
kind of sentiment that, for instance, printed Spanish instilled among the Spanishspeaking peoples of the Americas and Europe, as Benedict Anderson had elegantly
elaborated.²⁰ For all these reasons, one may be led to believe that the Somali language did nothing to inspire the development of Somali nationalism.
Language is also important to cultural nationalists for another reason, namely
as a medium by which national literature is composed and dispensed. Here, the
main interest lies in the national literature itself, which is revered for at least three
reasons. First, the national literature is the best artistic tool to record and communicate national glories and failures for posterity. Second, it praises the nation
and paints a vision of national grandeur for all its members. And third, being an
artistic accomplishment itself, a national literature is a source of national pride,
which can attract and gel diverse communities together. In these ways, the national
literature can hold a nation together when other transcendental values are either
weak or non-existent.²¹
Now let us turn to Somali literature and see if it performs these functional uses
for the Somali people. Although Somali literature is vast and captures most of the
national experience, this experience was, before the Second World War, parochial at
best and divisive at worst. It was an experience that was shaped by clan rivalries and
inflated clan ego; and Somali poetry, which is the single most important category of
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literary and artistic works in the country, catered to these sectarian (as opposed to
national) interests. Accordingly, it celebrated and exalted local symbols and figures,
who often made their name at the expense of other rival Somali clans.²²
For these reasons, before the Somali independence movement began in the
nineteen-forties, there was no pre-existing repository of “national literature” that
the political nationalists could use to rally the nation. In other words, the Somali
literature did not have a transcendental value and therefore did not hold the nation
together in the same way that, for instance, national literatures held the Italian and
German principalities together before their final merger in the nineteenth century.²³
Due to this fact, Somali literature contributed little or nothing to the development
of Somali nationalism.
The Effect of Common Territory on Somali Nationalism
Another objective factor which is often touted by students of Somali affairs is the
Somali people’s possession of a common territory. Both John Drysdale’s and Louis
Fitzgibbon’s books, cited above, place particular importance on the territorial aspect
of Somali nationalism. However, for most Somalis of the early twentieth century,
this territory was devoid of sentimental (as opposed to economic) value that could
inspire a cultural movement. As Lewis had observed, for most Somalis “land has
no mystical or ritual value” and “political ascendancy is not conferred by or symbolized in mystical ties to the earth but derives from superior fighting potential.²⁴ It
is for these reasons that Somali nationalists did not develop a territorial concept
comparable to the German Lebensraum;²⁵ and, throughout their career, never spoke
of their country in such glowing terms as, for instance, the Germans spoke of the
Black Forest or the Italians of their side of the Alps.²⁶
Most of all, for the Somalis of the nineteenth century, this territory was vague
and undefined. As a matter of fact, the Somali chiefs, like the Sultans of Morocco,
did not rule over territorially defined tribes but rather ethnically defined ones.²⁷
“he barren terrain in which nomadic pastoralism is the prevailing economy does
little to foster, and indeed actively militates against the formation of stable territorial groups”²⁸ and, one may add, territorial sentiment.
Perhaps this is why in their protection treaties with the British government
in the eighteen-eighties, the Somali elders were satisfied with the extension of
British protection to the people and did not press for equal protection for the land.
In fact, according to Judge D.J. Latham Brown, who studied the subject, when
the Somalo-British protection treaties were being devised, the Somali leadership
did not bother to define the confines of their country; and, in his opinion, this is
why London was legally justified in ceding Western Somaliland to the Abyssinian
Empire in 1897.²⁹
In this sense, Somali nationalism was not motivated by a territorial sentiment.
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Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
As a matter of fact, as late as 1957, at the height of Somali nationalist fervor, the
Provincial Assembly in Southern Somalia expressed its willingness to accept “any
borderline” with Ethiopia, “regardless of its location,” as long as that arrangement
would take into account the security of the emerging state and the socio-economic
interest of the Somali people.³⁰ For all these reasons, one may conclude that Somali
nationalism was not inspired either by the beauty of the “national land” or the loss
of it to foreigners.
The Concept of Common History and Somali Nationalism
Another feature of a nation that is often expressed in connection with cultural
nationalism is the possession of “common history.” Cultural nationalists always
claim that their nation was molded by common historical events and institutions;
and that it once enjoyed political unity and led an independent life. For these
intellectuals, therefore, nationalism is a mere re-arising of a historic nation and
a legitimate undertaking to regain its past unity and political independence. It is
along this line of thought that students of Somali nationalism often discuss the
life and times of the Awdal Sultanate (1528–1543) and its leader, the Imam Ahmed
Ibrahim Al-Ghazi (1506–43).³¹
Did Somalis really possess a common history before colonialism? Or, to put it
in another way, was Somali nationalism a mere re-awakening of the Somali nation?
he answer to these questions is simply no. For one thing, the Awdal Sultanate
was founded on postulates of religion not of nationality.³² Although the bulk of
the population of the Sultanate was ethnic Somalis, the Sultan and his ministers
appear to have been non-Somalis. Even the army of the state was multi-national
and included Somalis, Oromos, Afars, and even Turks. Second, the Sultanate was
too territorially limited and ephemeral to leave any lasting memory in the collective
mind of the Somali people. Finally, the Somali, being independent-minded and
anti-authority, could not have looked back at an autocracy with admiration and
could not have been inspired by it almost five centuries later.
Besides, there is always the difficult of deciding when a common history
becomes common. According to Professor Karl Deutsch, a common history is not
always perceived common to all. People who are affected by the same historical
processes and events do not always share these experiences. Instead each community
would accentuate that part of history that fits its particular aspirations. Take, for
instance, the Czechs and Germans of Bohemia. hese peoples had long inhabited
the same territory and were exposed to the same historical events and incidents.
Yet, these experiences, instead of molding them into a single nation, made them
bitter enemies.³³ he same may be said of the Somali people. As Lewis and Andrzejewski had observed:
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In the past the Somali have never formed a single political entity and have existed as a loose cultural grouping of various distinct and often opposed political
units. Each of these clans and lineage groupings – often bitterly opposed to
others by feud – has its own particular history.³⁴
In light of these facts, one might contend that Somali nationalism was not aimed
at recapturing a past history; and, in my opinion, this is why Somali nationalists
did not demand independence on the basis of a common history.
Religion and Somali Nationalism
he role of religion (Islam) in the development of Somali nationalism must not be
over-emphasized, either. Even in countries (such as England and France), where
religious ideals contributed to the development of nationalism, the latter was
derived mainly from socio-political factors that over the centuries slowly seeped
into the national faith. Take, for instance, the medieval concept of “corpus Christi
mysticum,” which envisioned a Christian nation, whose members were equal before God. When in the eighteenth century, the state apparati were secularized, the
religious concept was also supplanted by the latent concept of “popular sovereignty,”
which envisioned a nation, whose members were equal before the law and entitled
to political rights. It was only after this juncture that the mobilization of the whole
“nation” along religious lines became possible, and the political nationalists in these
countries were able to “nationalize” religion.³⁵
In the Somali case, however, a similar fusion of religion and culture is not
discernible. Although Somali religious leaders, beginning with the Imam Ahmed
Al-Ghazi, made considerable use of Islam for mass mobilization, their religious
sermons were devoid of any aesthetic cultural values; and to this day, the Somali
saints are “venerated for their own personal piety and religious efficacy rather than
for sociological reasons.”³⁶ Furthermore, the teachings of Somali clerics did not
include nationalist principles – which, for instance, would have proclaimed the
equality of the Somali people or extended political rights to the individual – that
could inspire cultural nationalism.
For all these reasons, the contribution of Islam to Somali nationalism should
not be exaggerated. Both Somalia’s colonial leaders and intellectuals are guilty of
doing that. Perhaps they were misled by the fact that the origin of the entire Somali nation is traceable to a few Muslim saints – a phenomenon to which Lewis
had aptly referred to as “cult of the saints.”³⁷ In reality, though, the contribution
of religion to Somali nationalism was limited to adding certain veracity to the
nationalist message and conferring added credibility on the messenger himself.
Accordingly, one may conclude that Islam may had reinforced the political nation-
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Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
alism of the Somalis, but did not cause or define it, as Lewis and Samatar would
have us believe.³⁸
The Sources and Nature of Somali Nationalism
In terms of source and inspiration, Somali nationalism stemmed from two main
“isms,” namely traditionalism³⁹ and anti-colonialism.⁴⁰ Although they originated
from two separate sources, both phenomena were stimulated by the peculiarities
of the “colonial situation” of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.⁴¹ Consequently, both were opposed to the colonial system and therefore posed alternative
socio-political formations to the prevailing state of affairs. In this regard, Somali
nationalism owes its origin, and its strength as an idee-force, to the two phenomena
we conveniently call traditionalism and anti-colonialism.
In general, traditionalism – or traditional nationalism, as it developed later –
was a “counter” movement. When it rose in Europe, in the eighteenth century, it
appeared as an anti-Jacobin enterprise. Its advocates – i.e., Edmund Burke, Vicomte de Bonald, and Friedrich von Schlegel – feared and detested the excesses
of the French Revolution and its rationalist philosophy. In reaction to these, they
propounded and publicized conceptions that reverenced traditional political institutions, cultures, religion, and even languages. hey argued that these were divinely
ordained and enjoined the Jacobins not to violate them.⁴²
In the colonial areas of Africa and Asia, traditional nationalism was also a
“counter” philosophy. It rose in reaction to the destructive effect of European colonialism. In their attempts to institute imperial regimes, the colonialists trampled on
native political institutions, culture, and religions, and, as a consequence, aroused
popular interests in these matters. It was in this regard that B.G. Tilak, an Indian
traditional nationalist, sought to popularize the past greatness of the Mahratta
Empire and revived its most prominent religious symbol, the elephant-headed
goddess Ganesh; and Edward Blyden, a black nationalist from the West Indies,
studied the ancient civilization of the Negro, and exhorted blacks outside Africa
“to betake themselves to their ancestral home, and assist in constructing a Christian
African Empire.”⁴³
he purpose of these traditional nationalists, said Elie Kedourie, “is to transform the ‘heap of loose sand,’ which is the traditional society battered and pulverized
by Europe, into something solid and powerful, into a battering ram….”⁴⁴ he efficacy of “cultural gospel” in this regard was obvious. he colonial peoples needed only
to be reminded of the cultural achievements of their ancestors – i.e., the gargantuan
empires they found, the majestic temples they erected, and the divine scriptures
they left behind – to stimulate their consciousness and spur them to action.
Like its counterparts in Asia and other parts of Africa, Somali traditional
nationalism was a popular reaction to the pulverizing effect of European colonial67
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ism. At its incipient stage, it consisted of a welter of ideas and sentiments that
reverenced local institutions. However, during the colonial imposition – a period
of inordinate pressure and intensified collective action – the constitutive ideas
of Somali traditionalism took shape and gave rise to a new popular attitude that
reverenced the shared ideals.
his observation can be explained with two examples. Take Islam, for instance.
Before the colonial onslaught, Somalis viewed Islam in spiritual terms only, and
therefore imputed no socio-political value to it. Also Somali religious figures were
venerated for their personal piety and possessed little or no extra-religious status
in society. With the onset of colonialism, these matters changed. Islam became one
of the defining characteristics of the Somali nation; and Somali religious authorities, hitherto uninterested in worldly affairs, assumed the task of defending this
Islamic/Somali nation.
he existence of a common religion and a conscious Muslim leadership who
vowed to defend it did not guarantee the success of traditional nationalism. It
required the existence of a popular language with which to express the new conceptualization of Islam. his function fell, of course, on the Somali language. Having
served this purpose well, the latter soon gained a new socio-political significance
for the Somali people. It became the language with which they expressed their
world views and political aspirations.⁴⁵ It was in this regard, it seems, that the
Somali language acquired a “sentimental value” for the Somali people and became
the linchpin of national solidarity in the nineteenth century.
In sum, traditional nationalism sparked interest “in all things Somali.” By
late nineteenth century, most Somalis became conscious of their common national
features and soon imparted “a congregational character” to them, to use a borrowed
phrase. henceforth, it became possible for the foes of colonialism to mobilize
Somalis along socio-cultural lines. It was in this regard that the great Sheikhs, the
Sheikh Hassan Barsane and the Sayyid Mohammed Abdulla Hassan, conceived the
existence of a “Somali nation” and resolved to liberate it from colonial rule during
their sojourn in Hijaz (Saudi Arabia) in the late nineteenth century.⁴⁶
In addition to traditionalism, Somali nationalism was also inspired by the difficulties of the colonial situation. he colonial regimes, as soon as they established
themselves, employed the power of the state to deprive their subjects of liberty,
property, and even life. he disruption and violence attendant on these activities
aroused a common feeling of deprivation and degradation among Somalis. his
popular resentment gave rise to an anti-colonial feeling among Somalis who soon
coalesced as a community under this common condition of oppression.
Although it benefited from the national conception of traditionalism, Somali
anti-colonial nationalism was not built on the objective characteristics of the Somali
nation. Rather, like its counterparts in other colonial areas of the world, it was built
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Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
primarily on concrete grievances against the colonial regimes, and was, as such,
expressed in anti-colonial terms. In this regard, this aspect of Somali nationalism,
although indebted to the ethno-cultural characteristics of the Somali nation, was
not akin to an “organic” nationalist conception. Rather, it was, in large measure, an
anti-colonial phenomenon, whose ultimate aim was to overthrow an unjust system
of government.
Conclusion
We have shown that Somali nationalism was not an ethno-cultural enterprise. In
order to be regarded as such, a nationalist conception must conform to at least four
requirements. First, its tenets must be derived from the primordial characteristics
of the nation. In Africa, where the traditional state consisted of a conglomeration
of tribes and ethnic groups espousing a collage of belief system and ways of life,
this was not readily achievable. he African ruler, as one Abdul Said put it, “sought
to form and maintain functional relationships with groups which could provide
arms, men, money, and goods. In return, he served as their spiritual authority and
protector from alien tribes in times of war.”⁴⁷
Second, it must be expressed in “organic” terms. In countries where organic
nationalism took hold, the ensuing rhetoric equated the nation with a living organism that needed, not only nurturing and protection, but with one that could
not thrive under foreign rule. hird, it must praise the nation or paint a vision
of national grandeur in the mind of the average member of the nation. Fourth,
demands for political independence must be made on the basis of the objective
characteristics of the nation.
As I have demonstrated above, this was not the case with Somali nationalism. here are three main reasons for this. First, the literary and cultural materials
required for the construction of cultural nationalism were not at the disposal of the
Somali leadership before the colonial era. Somali nationalists were not intellectually sophisticated people, who were able to construct such a romantic enterprise as
cultural nationalism. Second, given the international atmosphere of the post-war
period, propagating such a discredited ideology as cultural nationalism would have
been political suicide, and the Somali leaders seem to have understood that.
Finally, nationalism is an illusive subject. Because it straddles several areas of
studies – i.e., history, politics, sociology, psychology, philology, economics, etc. – it
defies all boundaries of research design. Studies which begin in one field of study
often end up in another. his inherent fluidity of the subject is most pronounced in
the new countries of Africa and Asia, especially those possessing a certain measure
of ethnic and cultural homogeneity as the Somalis. his is why all historical studies
of Somali nationalism became entangled with the ethnography of the nation and
hypothesized an ethno-cultural nationalism.
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his study has attempted to steer away from these pitfalls. Instead of using
the common qualities of the Somali people as an indication of nationhood, we
have used them as veritable subjects of our examination. By scrutinizing them, we
have exposed their ineffectual role in the development of the Somali nationalism
and the baselessness of the ethnicist perspective. By starting with the erroneous
premise that Somalis are “not of Africa,” the proponents of this view have arrived
at an equally erroneous conclusion. Contrary to their stance, we hold that Somalis
are “of Africa” and that their nationalism is akin to the continental variety.⁴⁸
Nationalism in the Continent lacks the ingredients that say, European
nationalism contains. Ibrahim Abu-Lughod had convincingly demonstrated the
“emptiness” of African nationalism. According to the eminent professor, African
nationalism managed to grow without religious, linguistic, historical, territorial or
ethnic contents.⁴⁹ In their stead, it derived its vigor and contents from the dictates
of the map, a shared label of Africanness, colonial legacy and a common cause of
political independence.”⁵⁰
With the exit of the colonial powers, Somali nationalism lost its twin pillars
of anti-colonialism and traditionalism. Somalis, who did not live under “white
oppression” anymore, could not fathom “external differentiation” except in relation to other Somalis. his had the effect of reversing the orientation of Somali
nationalism – i.e., from outward – to inward-looking. Inward-looking nationalism magnified political and social relations among Somalis. he outcome was the
“retribalization” of national politics.⁵¹
he retribalization of politics had another negative effect on Somali nationalism. It had conditioned what Herbert Spiro had referred to as the “primacy of
politics.” In less developed societies like the African nations, there is no distinction
among the many different aspects of politics. “Hence they pour everything into the
pot of politics.”⁵² his is why in Somalia, as in the rest of Africa, every social good
and value became contestable. Kwame Nkrumah’s oft quoted aphorism, “seek first
the political kingdom, for all else would be added unto it,” acquired an internal application. In post-colonial Africa, if power was to be wrested, it was to be wrested,
not from foreign rulers, but from other Africans.
As every ethnic and tribal community sought the “political kingdom,” traditional nationalism in Africa had also suffered. In post-colonial Somalia, where some
clans had long appropriated national values (at the exclusion of others) and others
feigned disclaim of them, traditional nationalism lost both its national significance
and political luster. With the demise of Somali traditionalism, the politicization
of local culture and symbols began in ernest. he ensuing social agitation had
exposed many hidden social contradiction and spawned new ones. In due course,
the outlook of every community reverted back to its pre-colonial position. Soon,
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what constituted national tradition became highly disputed. hus began the end
of Somali traditional nationalism.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
Ernest B. Hass, “What is Nationalism and Why Should We Study It?,” International
Organization, vol. 40, no. 3 (Summer, 1986), p. 713.
Jean-Francoise Lyotard, The Post Modern Condition (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1984), pp. xxiii–iv.
See, for instance, I.M. Lewis, A Modern History of Somalia: Nation and State in
the Horn of Africa(Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1988); Saadia Touval, Somali
Nationalism: International Politics and Drive For Unity in the Horn of Africa (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1963); David D. Laitin and Said S.
Samatar, Somalia: Nation in Search of a State (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press,
1987); John Drysdale, he Somali Dispute (New York and London: Fredrick A. Praeger,
1964); and Louis Fitzgibbon, he Betrayal of Somalis (London: Rex Collings, 1982).
I.M. Lewis, “Introduction,” in I.M. Lewis, ed., Nationalism and Self-Determination in
the Horn of Africa (London: Ithaca Press, 1983), p. 9.
Ibid., pp. 16–17.
Touval, Somali Nationalism, p. 84.
Saadia Touval, “he Somali Republic,” Current History (March, 1964), p. 156.
Rupert Emerson, “Foreword,” in Touval, Somali Nationalism, p. v.
Ibid., p. vi. Here the author discusses Somali nationalism in connection with the irredentist goals of the Somali Republic.
E.A. Bayne, “he Somali Political System,” In Christian P. Potholm, ed., Four African
Political Systems (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1970), p. 190.
According to Hans Kohn, cultural nationalism was inspired by romantic ideas that
praised and fancied folk culture, language and environment. It was a reaction against
the ethnically heterogeneous empires of the era. Its adage was “small is beautiful.”
See Hans Kohn, Nationalism: Its Meaning and History (Princeton: D. Van Nostrand
Company, 1955), pp. 29–37.
Cultural nationalists are high-level intellectuals, who study the history, language, art,
literature, geography, and even the genetic makeup of their nations. In their works,
they fancy and exalt the objective characteristics of their nations, and insist that, in
order to preserve these “natural qualities,” they need a state of their own. See, for
instance, John Hutchinson, “Moral Innovators and the Politics of Regeneration: he
Distinctive Role of Cultural Nationalists in Nation-Building,” International Journal
of Comparative Sociology 33, no. 1 & 2 (1992), pp. 101–107.
Political nationalists are high-level politicians and technocrats, who study, and are
inspired by, the works of cultural nationalists. With the exception of few, who, for one
reason or another, may drop out of the movement, they are the ones who rally the
masses and lead their countries to independence. For the activities of these nationalists,
see L.B. Namier, 1848: The Revolutions of the Intellectuals (London: Oxford University
Press, 1944).
See, for instance, the Somali Youth League’s statement on the ethnic homogeneity
of the Somali nation in The Report of the Four Power Commission (London, 1949), pp.
10–11. he Four Power Commission consisted of the representatives of the United States,
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15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
Britain, France, and the Soviet Union, which took over the colonies of the defeated
powers.
I.M. Lewis, A Pastoral Democracy: A Study of Pastoralism and Politics Among the
Northern Somali of the Horn of Africa (London: Oxford University Press, 1961),
chapter 8.
Joseph Stalin, Marxism and National Question (New York: International Publishers,
1942), p. 11.
For the influence of the Somali language on political thought, see David D. Laitin,
Politics, Language, and Thought: The Somali Experience (Chicago: he University of Chicago Press, 1977), p. 25; and Hussein Adam, “Language, National Consciousness and
Identity – he Somali Experience,” in Lewis, ed., Nationalism and Self-Determination
in the Horn of Africa, pp. 31–42.
Petitions concerning the subject are numerous. For a sample of these, see un Doc.
t/pet. 11/617, p.4 ; un Doc. t/com. 11/l. 77, p. 3; un Doc. t/com. 11/l. 81, p. 1; un Doc.
t/pet. 11/86, p. 2; and un Doc. t/pet. 11/171, p. 2.
Jeanne Contini, “Somali Republic: A Nation of Poets in Search of an Alphabet, “Africa
Report (December, 1963), p. 17. According to Contini, since the turn of this century,
some thirty-three scripts which have been devised for the Somali language were
in Arabic alphabets. See also Denis Herbstein, “he Alphabet War,” Africa Report
(May–June, 1991), p. 68.
Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origins and Spread
of Nationalism (New York: Verso, 1983), chapter 4.
W.B. Pillsbury, The Psychology of Nationality and Internationalism (New York: D.
Appleton and Company, 1919), p. 237.
See, for instance, see B.W. Andrzejewski and Muse Galaal, “A Somali Poetic Combat,”
Journal of African Languages, Vol. 2, Part 1 (1963), pp. 15–28. hose who are interested
in Somali literature may consult the following works: B.W. Andrzejewski and I.M.
Lewis, Somali Poetry: An Introduction (London: Oxford University Press, 1964); B.W.
Andrzejewski, “he literary Culture of the Somali people,” in Katherine S. Loughram
et al., ed., Somalia in Word and Image (Washington dc.: he Foundation for Cross
Cultural Understanding, 1986), pp. 3566; and Said Sheikh Samatar, “Somali Verbal
and Material Arts,” in Loughram et al., ed., Somalia in Word and Image, pp. 27–33.
Pillsbury, he Psychology of Nationality and Internationalism, p. 236.
Lewis, A Pastoral Democracy, pp. 2–3.
Lebensraum is a German territorial concept which holds that a great nation requires
a great space (land) to fulfill its world destiny.
his author is aware of Mohammed Warsame’s (Hadrawe) poem which praises and exalts the beauty of the Somali country, but this was written long after independence.
Herbert A. Gibbons, Nationalism and Internationalism (New York: Fredrick A. Stokes
Company, 1930), p. 3.
Lewis, A Pastoral Democracy, p. 2.
D.J. Latham Brown, “he Ethiopian-Somali Frontier Dispute,” International and
Comparative Law Quarterly (London), vol. 5, part 2 (1956), p. 248. he lands in question
include the Haud and the Reserved Area, both now part of Ethiopia.
See un Doc. T/1344, p. 30.
See, for instance, Harold D. Nelson, Somalia: A Country Study (Washington, dc: he
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Pithless Nationalism: The Somali Case
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
American University Press, 1981), pp. 10–12; Touval, Somali Nationalism; Lewis, A
Pastoral Democracy, p. 17.
Awdal was a theocratic state and cared little about nationality. Besides, nationalism is
a modern phenomenon, appearing more than two centuries after the collapse of the
Sultanate.
Karl Deutsch, Nationalism and Social Communication (Cambridge, Mass.: mit Press,
1966), p. 19.
Lewis and Andrzejewski, Somali Poetry, p. 7.
See Jurgen Gebhardt, “Religion and National Identity,” paper presented at the Conference for the Study of Political hought, sponsored by Tulane University’s Murphy
Institute of Political Economy and Department of Political Science (March 25–27,
1994), pp. 7–10.
Lewis, “Islam in Somalia,” in Loughram et al., ed., Somali in Word and Image, p. 140.
Lewis, A Pastoral Democracy, p. 129.
For the role of Islam in Somali Nationalism, see Lewis, “Islam in Somalia,” in Loughram et al., ed., Somalia in Word and Image, pp. 139–167; Laitin and Samatar, Somalia:
Nation in Search of a State, pp. 44–47.
By traditionalism we mean popular attachment to ancient institutions and cultural
ideals, whose perpetuation people feel necessary for their survival. In the colonial areas
of Africa and Asia, traditionalism consisted of three main parts: a general admiration
of ancient institutions and way of life, a belief in the possibility of recapturing these
ideals in the future, and militant activities designed to achieve that end.
Anti-colonial nationalism refers to a popular reaction (military or political) to the
destructive effects of colonialism – i.e., political oppression, economic exploitation,
and cultural domination. For the anti-colonial perspective of Somali Nationalism, see
Hassan Omar Mahadallah, “he Origin and Essence of Somali Nationalism” (Ph.D.
diss., Tulane University, 1997).
he term was coined by Georges Blandier. It refers to the novel setting – i.e., social,
economic, and political – which developed as a result of European conquest of Africa
and Asia in the nineteenth century. his colonial setting was sustained by rules and
regulations which were invented and enforced by the colonial powers at the expense
and over the objections of the indigenous peoples. Nationalism in these areas was,
therefore, one of the many consequences of this situation.
Carlton Hayes, The Historical Evolution of Modern Nationalism (New York: Richard R.
Smith, 1931), pp. 84–119.
As quoted in Kedourie, Nationalism in Asia and Africa, p. 54.
Ibid., p. 66.
See Douglas Jardine, The Mad Mullah of Somaliland (New York: Negro University Press,
1969), p. 33. his book was first published in 1923 by Herbert Jenkins, Ltd., London.
his point was shared with me by Sheikh Mohammed Haji Abdullahi Sheikh Hassan
Barsane, a grandson of Sheikh Hassan Barsane. According to Sheikh Mohammed,
although his grandfather and the Sayyid agreed to cooperate in their struggle against
the colonialists during their stay in Hijaz, they soon parted ways after the Sayyid began
killing Muslim Somalis, who had fallen out of favor with him.
Abdul A. Said, The African Phenomenon (Allyn and Bacon Inc., 1968), p. 31.
For the African origin of the Somalis, consult Richard Leakey, Herbert Lewis, Mohamed Noah and Abdi Kusow. Although the literature is significant in volume it did
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putting the cart before the horse
49.
50.
51.
52.
not expand into related areas of Somali studies. As a result, it escapes the view of many
scholars.
Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, “Nationalism in a New Perspective: he African Case,” in
Herbert J. Spiro, ed., Patterns of African Development: Five Comparisons (Englewood
Cliffs, nj: Prentice Hall, 1967), pp. 38–61.
Ali Mazrui, “On the Concept of ‘We Are All Africans’,” American Political Science
Review, vol. 57, no. 1 (March, 1963), pp. 88–91.
he term is Ali Mazrui’s. See his article, “Violent Contiguity and the Politics of Retribalization in Africa,” Journal of International Affairs, vol. 23, no. 1 (1969), p. 89. He
defines it as “the resurgence of ethnic loyalties in situations of rivalry in the arena of
resource allocation and domestic power politics.”
Herbert J. Spiro, ed., Africa: The Primacy of Politics (New York: Random House, 1966),
p. 8.
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Chapter Five
Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation
(he Inter-Riverine Case)
Mohamed Haji Mukhtar
Savannah State University
S
ne of the ways in which the national master narratives have constructed
Oand characterized Somali historiography is nowhere clearer than in studies
of colonial resistance and nationalism. hese narratives uncritically equate the history of colonial resistance, and therefore Somali nationalism with the Darwiish
movement, and ignore the contributions of the largely peasant, and urban populations, particularly, the population of the Inter-riverine regions in the forging of
the modern Somali nation. here are a number of reasons for the existence of such
lopsided historiography. First, this narrative depicts the Somali people as primarily,
though falsely, as a country of nomads, and both the agricultural and urban cultures
of the region as marginal to the perceived majority of nomadic-pastoralists.¹ Second,
Touval, and other influential scholars, ignore totally the possible involvement of
the Inter-Riverine region in the forging of the modern Somali nation.² hird, the
Inter-Riverine clans and sub-clans did not proportionally participate in the political administration of the country, from the colonial occupation to the present, and,
thus, they were not properly documented historically.³ Fourth, post-Independence
Somali scholarship neglected Italian, French and Arabic sources. Indeed, in the colonial era, Italian was paramount, because southern Somalia was colonized by Italy,
and primarily Italian scholars conducted research in that region.⁴ Finally, in 1972,
the Far Somali script adopted for the national language was based on Af-Mahaa, the
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putting the cart before the horse
language of the pastoralists-nomads. his, of course, led to greater scholarly focus
on the literary and poetic traditions of the north, leaving the south in general and
the Inter-Riverine region in particular as a secondary field for the study of Somali
language, history and traditions.⁵
In this chapter, I propose to explore some of the hitherto hidden and ignored
accounts and resistance movements of the people in the Gosha, Banadir, and in
general the Inter-riverine regions of Southern Somalia. I specifically intend to provide a more inclusive picture of the different ant-colonial movements and, therefore,
a more global understanding of Somali history, culture, and of the making of the
modern Somali nation.
Colonial Occupation of The Inter-Riverine Region
he Anglo-Italian agreements of March 24, 1891 and April 15 of the same year, gave
Italy the triangle of land, known as the Horn of Africa, as part of her colonial
“Sphere of Influence.”⁶ Italy’s attempts to build a colonial empire failed, however.
All attempts, both military and political, to consolidate control over the Horn, were
in vain, partly because of Italy’s inept colonial administration but, mostly, because
of active resistance from Somalis in the south and Ethiopians in the north.⁷
The Gosha Rebellion 1890–1907
he Inter-Riverine region of Somalia is unique because of its non-ethnic revolts
against European colonialism, rather unlike what one finds elsewhere in Africa.
From the late 19t century onwards, the region was the center of jama’a uprisings
against colonial suppression of certain traditional religious, cultural, and economic
institutions. he Gosha Rebellion⁸ led by Nassib Buunto⁹ was a non-sectarian
struggle against slavery. Nassib Buunto was successful in establishing one of the
most powerful confederations in Goshaland, incorporating Somalis of Bantu origin
as well as others. His diplomatic skills engaged both European and African powers
in the region to sign peace treaties that recognized as the sole ruling authority in the
Gosha region. hus, Zanzibar, Egypt, Germany, Italy, and Great Britain recognized
him as the Sultan for all Gosha. By 1892, Nassib Buunto was declared as the sole
authority over 46 villages of the Gosha on both banks of the Juba River, extending
from Yoontoy at the mouth of the river in the south to Mfudu in the north.
In addition to his diplomatic skills, Nassib Buunto was also a charismatic
military leader. He recruited the bulk of his fighters from freed slaves who fled
from Italian, Zanzibari, and Somali Abans or masters. Colonial reports estimated
that from twenty to forty thousand organized militias were under his command.
He possessed up to 1,000 guns, and most of his troops were armed with bows and
poisonous arrows and spears.
He established what was later called the Nassib Buuto Center for freed slaves
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Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine Case)
which offered the escaped slaves not only refuge and freedom but a better way of
life by promoting and developing communal ways of farming and cattle herding
and training them in new skills for building houses and for manufacturing necessary tools and weapons.¹⁰ It was in this center that the army of Nassau Bunt fought
against the Italians and delayed their penetration into the fertile hinterlands of the
region for decades. Nassau Bunt was celebrated as the African Sparta us, for his
fight for the freedom of slaves. In 1931, Umber to Bargain published a book entitled,
Nell Terra did Nassau Bunt, lo Spar taco Della Somalia Italian (In the land of Nassau
Bunt, the Sparta us of Italian Somaliland).
The Banadir Resistance 1888–1924
he “Bandar Resistance,”¹¹ though religious in origin, was also based on economics
as the Bandar ports played a significant role in the region’s internal and external
trade, supplying the hinterland with imported commodities as well as providing
markets for livestock and major local products. Moreover, it was only in these
coastal towns where significant commercial life existed and cottage industries
like the production of Banadiri cloth and the manufacture of utensils and other
indispensable tools flourished. It was, therefore, essential to defend these vital
economic resources.
he Banadiri traders of the interior were also concerned that foreign occupation of the ports would not only mean they would be put out of business as
independent agents, but indeed that internal trade would be completely dislocated
because inevitably farms and grazing lands whose coastal pastures and wells the
nomads used during the dry season would also be occupied. he Banadiris ambushed the Italians at Lafoole, in 1896, when the Wa’dan clan attacked the first
Italian expedition on the Shabelle River led by Antonio Cecchi, the Italian general
consul in Zanzibar. Cecchi and all, but three members of his expedition were killed:
he Italian media dubbed it La Strage di Lafole, Massacre at Lafoole! For Banadiris,
Lafoole was as glorious a victory as the Ethiopian triumph over the Italians at Adowa in the same year. Banadiris call 1896 Ahad Shekki, the Sunday year of Cecchi.
he Italian colonial advance was halted for the next ten years.¹²
In the early 1890s, another Banadiri group, the Biamal, joined the resistance.
Italy occupied Marka, the center of Biamal culture, but in 1904, the Markans assassinated the first Italian resident of the city, Giacomo Trevis. his action triggered the
Italian occupation of another port town, Jazira, about 30 miles south of Mogadishu.
Biamal leaders called for a shir, “clan assembly,” mobilizing the Banadiri clans,
mainly Biamal, the Wa’dan, the Hintire and other clans of the Geledi confederacy,
against the Italian advance and decided to isolate the ports from trade with the
interior.¹³ he ma’allims “Qur’anic school teachers” and imams “religious leaders” of
Marka led the war of resistance to colonial occupation of the interior, but they and
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their followers paid dearly. A local lashin poet who attacked those who refused to
take up arms said: Reer Janna waa jid galeen, Reer Jahima iska jooga: “those who resist
are heaven bound. hose who submit can stay home in Hell where they belong.”
Italian garrisons in both Marka and Jazira were under siege and barely survived.
hough Italy sent support troops, they suffered considerable losses. In February
1907, at Turunley, also known as Dhanane, north of Marka, some 2,000 Banadiri
warriors, led by Sheikh Abdi Abiikar Gaafle¹⁴ fought 1000 Italian troops, assisted
by some 1,500 Arab, Eritrean, and Somali mercenaries led by Lieutenant Gustavo
Pesenti. he attack started after midnight, February 9, 1907 and lasted to the noon
of the 10t. he Banadiri warriors retreated, leaving behind several hundred dead
and as many wounded. Although the Italians had high casualties, they considered
Turunley a major military victory, one which Lieutenant Pesenti, the commander of
the regiment, celebrated in an eyewitness account, Danane (Dhanane).¹⁵ Turunley
marked the end of the of the mighty Banadir resistance. On July 1908, at Finlow,
the Biamal avenged Turunley defeating some 500 Italian troops. However, by
1908, major centers such as Afgoy capitulated to the Italians. However, the Italian
conquest was not complete, and from 1910 to the 1920s, under the leadership of
Sheikh Abdi Abikar Gaafle, the Banadiri coalition remained the leading opponent
of Italian rule in the Riverine region.¹⁶
The Fascist Era and The Policy of Disarmament
he Fascist administration began in December 5, 1923, with the appointment of
Cesare Mario De Vecchi di val Cismon as governor of Somalia. Only the Banadir
coast was under direct Italian control, but with the elimination of the Banadiri in
1908 and the dervishes in 1922, Italian colonial dreams were sure to be fulfilled.
De Vecchi, flushed with military ardor, sought to eliminate all who stood
against what Fascist propaganda called la Grande Somalia “Greater Somalia.” De
Vecchi knew that after the fall of the dervishes, Britain would no longer support
Italian colonial interests in the Horn. Meanwhile, Somalis were heavily armed and
well trained for combat in the Great War. An estimated 16,000 rifles were in Somali
hands, more than what was available for the Italian colonial forces. hus, after the
war, the governor’s first task was to disarm and confiscate arms and ammunition
from all Somalis, but particularly from the clans in the Inter-Riverine region. To
this end the governor, reconstituted the old Somali police corps, known as the Corpo
Zaptie, and trained them to act as an effective force for carrying out the new colonial
policies. Fresh cadres were recruited, and the older and less effective elements were
suspended. New barracks were built. Young Italian officers from the Carabinieri
trained and supervised the new forces.¹⁷ In early March 1924, De Vecchi ordered
leaders of the Upper Shabelle¹⁸ clans and Jama’a¹⁹ Sheikhs to hand over all arms
and ammunitions to the Corpo Zaptie within forty days.²⁰
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Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine Case)
In mid-March 1924, Sheikh Hassan Barsane, the leader of Jiliale Jama’a ²¹
condemned the new Italian colonial policies. Barsane invoked a shir, where the
participants, inflamed with millenarian zeal, denounced the Governor’s order: “In
the name of Allah, most Gracious, most Merciful… I have received your letter and
understood its contents, but must advise that we cannot your orders and join with
you in a covenant… Your government has its laws, and we have ours. We accept
no law other than ours. Our law is the law of Allah and his prophet… We are not
like other people, none of us has ever enrolled in the Zaptie (colonial force), never.
Not even one…²² and if you come to our land to fight against us, we will fight you
with all possible means, just as we fought the dervishes and the Ethiopians. Allah
said: “Few can defeat many with Allah’s will” (Sura 2, verse 249)… he world is very
close to its end, only 58 years remain. …²³ We do not want to stay in this world. It
is better to die while defending our Muslim laws. All Muslims are one.²⁴
As a continuation of Riverine resistance, the Jiliale Jihads resisted and defeated
early Fascist attacks along the north and middle of the Shabelle Valley, defending
the north and central Banadir region. Unfortunately, however, Barsane fell into
the hands of the Italians and was imprisoned and died in a Mogadishu jail in
1928, causing a major setback. From 1925, the Jama’a suffered from a shortage of
ammunition. Finally, the Jama’a was forced to surrender and hand over its guns to
the colonial forces.
De Vecchi’s problems, however, were not over. Further resistance emerged
from the Qadiriyya settlements, a Sufi order. In 1922, Sheikh Faraj, known also as
Sufi Baraki, launched a campaign against Italian colonial activities on the Banadir.
He united several Jama’a settlements: Buulo Marerto, Golwiing, Muki Dumis and
others scattered in the Lower Shabelle region, and set up his headquarters in Barawa,
the birthplace of Sheikh Uways Ibn Muhammad al-Barawi,²⁵ the founder of the
movement. Sheikh Faraj’s akhwaan “brotherhood” were trained religiously as well
as militarily to protect the farmlands from the Italians penetrating the fertile Lower
Shabelle region. In 1923, the above centers were attacked and mostly destroyed by
Italian colonial forces. Sheikh Faraj traveled to Tiyeglow town in Upper Juba to
coordinate with another movement that emerged there, the Tiyeglow Jama’a led by
Sharif Alyow Issaq al-Sarmani.²⁶ Tiyeglow, where earlier the dervishes had suffered
a serious defeat was the headquarters of the movement, for it resisted early waves
of Italian occupation. he town was also located in between the two holiest places
in the Reewin territory, Sarmaan (the headquarters of Asharaf ) and Bioley (the
headquarters of Uwaysiyya and where the shrine of Sheikh Uways is located).
To consolidate the power of the movement resisting the “infidel” Italians, the
two leaders agreed to put more emphasis on defending the port towns of the Banadir and the farmlands of the Lower Shabelle. herefore, forces from the Tiyeglow
akhwaan led by Sharif Alyow went with Sheikh Faraj to support the akhwaan in
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putting the cart before the horse
Buulo Marerto and other Lower Shabelle centers. he movement sought internal
unification and reform, to counter divisive clanism and those officials, salaried chefs
and qadi’s it labeled hypocrites, actually collaborators in the pay of the Italians. he
movement constructed defenses in preparations for the resistance.
Fulfilling the new strategies of the movement, the construction of two secure
fortresses was finished in early 1924 in Dhai-Dhai, later known as Jama’a DhaiDhai, and in Qorile, later known as Buulo Asharaf, after Sharif Alyow. he Italian
authority was troubled by these developments. De Vecchi warned Sheikh Faraj to
give up what he called “unhealthy activities.”²⁷ he two fortified camps dispatched
delegations throughout the Inter-Riverine region to recruit more supporters. hey
also contacted Sheikh Murjan, a prominent Qadiri holy man in the Lower Juba,
who not only blessed the movement, but also supported it materially. he colonial
authorities felt endangered and, as a preemptive measure sought to negotiate with
the leaders of the movement to prevent a rebellion. his move failed and a Zaptie
force was sent to strike against Sheikh Faraj and his allies, but defeated.
On October 20, 1924, more Zaptie forces attacked Dhai-Dhai Center. he
akhwaan defended their camp and forced the colonial troops to retreat and leave
behind some of their dead and injured. Sheikh Faraj considered these victories
a miracle and it reinvigorated his jihadic movement. In early November, more
colonial troops attacked the strongholds of the movement; many centers were
burned and the akhwaan fought bravely, but were overwhelmed by superior troops
and weaponry. After many losses, they retreated towards the north and northwest.
Sheikh Faraj and a small number of the akhwaan remained in the Lower Shabelle
region, introducing guerilla tactics to fight the enemy. On May 31, 1925, colonial
troops surprised Sheikh Faraj in his hiding place and defeated his akhwaan. He
was wounded, captured and sent to Barawa, where he died from his injuries soon
after.²⁸ Meanwhile, Sharif Alyow, having survived death or capture by colonial
troops, was able to retreat to Tiyeglow, his hometown and continued the struggle
there. he defeat of Jama’a movements and the death of both Sheikh Faraj and
Sheikh Hassan Barsane and the retreat of Sharif Alyow al-Sarmani cleared the way
for the Italian dream of establishing the Impero Coloniale Fascita (Fascist colonial
empire) in 1936.
Characteristics of The Inter-Riverine Resistances
In dealing with Somali resistance towards European colonial powers, much attention has been given to the Northern Somali resistance, particularly the movement that was launched by Sayyid Muhammad Abdulle Hassan known as “the
Dervish Movement”.²⁹ Southern Somali resistance is not often discussed in the
Somali scholarship. here were a number of reasons for this. Perhaps the most
important was the fact that Somalia’s history, culture or otherwise has been seen
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mainly through the eyes of what some scholars call the “Orientalist scholarship,”³⁰
which classified southern Somalis as Bantu, culturally inferior to the northern
more Arabic oriented nomads. In addition, Somalia’s post-independent historiography and its obsession of pastoral monolithic culture contributed a great deal
of generalization that diverted scholars from examining other important themes
of Somalia’s past.³¹
Current scholarship however, is pointing out the significance of anti-colonial
resistances in southern part of the country, particularly the Inter-Riverine region.
It is necessary to point out scholars whose interest and attention in the field has
vigorously renewed. his list include among many others, Lee Cassanelli,³² Virginia
Luling,³³ Bernhard Helander,³⁴ Herbert Lewis,³⁵ Catherine Besteman,³⁶ Kenneth
Menkhaus,³⁷ and Abdi Kusow,³⁸ and myself ³⁹. he list of scholars, Somalis and
non-Somalis who contributed to this endeavor could go on and on, but I would
like to mention those who contributed to Ali Jimale⁴⁰ and Catherine Besteman’s
edited volumes: The Invention of Somalia (1995), and The Struggle for Land in Southern
Somalia: The War Behind the War (1996). All contributors have been engaging their
studies in aspects of the Inter-Riverine region of Somalia from late 1960s.
What I have highlighted above is a brief outline of some of the Inter-Riverine resistances towards the colonial administration. It needs thorough study. My
intention is to sketch out as many movements emerged in the region and lay out
the ground for further research leading to offer broader picture of the Somali anticolonial resistance. Nevertheless, I would like to offer several characteristics that
Southern movements might differ from the Northern ones.
pan-clanal
he Inter-Riverine society, unlike its northern counterpart was more diversified.
During the advent of colonial powers, it was divided not only along clan lines, but
also on Sufi order affiliations. hey were divided between pastoralists and agriculturalists. Moreover, the region absorbed people from the neighboring countries,
Arabs, Persians, Polynesians, Oromos, and Bantus.
One would wander how a society of this complex could forge a meaningful
resistance against colonialism. Nevertheless, the region produced successful movements that transcended from defending particular clan interests but fighting for
the protection of broader regional political and economic interests. he economic
sectors of the region were interdependent, where any threat to one sector will undermine the other. In fact, the early Italian blockade of the Banadir ports was a threat
to not only a particular clan or trader, but it damaged the sophisticated network
of the hinterland with the coast. he caravan routes started to fade, and the value
of goods dropped sharply. he oral tradition of the time indicates sufferings from
the inflation caused by the blockade.⁴¹ Indeed, this triggered the emergence of the
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early inter-riverine resistances that involved numerous clans of the coast such as
the Biamal, the Tunni, the Geledi, the Wa’dan, the Abgal, the Shikhal and others.
A coalition of these forces prevented the Italian penetration to the hinterlands of
the Inter-river region for over two decades 1886–1925.
anti-colonial work ethics
From 1893 to 1905 when the Italian government assumed direct administration of
the southern portion of the Inter-Riverine region, the two succeeding companies:
Filonardi Company 1893–1896, and Benadir Company 1896–1905 introduced new
laws on customs and tariff regulations which were alien to the Inter-Riverine society. Most of the early responses were provoked by these measures. Italian colonial
records of the time indicated a great deal of the Inter-Riverine discontent towards
the new ordinances.⁴² With the introduction of forced labor during the penetration
of the interior and the toleration of slavery in the newly established plantations,
the Inter-Riverine resistance took a new dimension. he Nassib Buunto movement
represents a good example of resistance against slavery and forced labor. he effects
of forced labor on the consciousness of the Inter-Riverine people during this period,
as well as, the Fascist era was indeed the seeds of southern Somali resistances and
the foundation of the their modern political parties in the 1940s. Stories of the
anguish and bitter memories of the period can still be found in the oral tradition
of the Inter-Riverine people. Terms like cologno (corvee labor) and teen (shift labor)
are reminders of a tragic period of the Inter-Riverine history. During these eras, the
Inter-Riverine people were forced to work on plantations, roads, canals and other
construction projects. Workers in the plantations were treated harshly, and many
died from overexertion and disease. Many whom I interviewed in 1976–1979 still
recalled the tragedies involved in the shift working conditions, what they call locally
“beed.”⁴³ he tragedy of Keli Asayle “he Canal of Mourning” is well remembered
in the Dhooboi villages.⁴⁴
religio-political
Islamic belief normally included metaphysics, a cosmology and a moral and political
theory. It is understandable that, in the conditions of late 19t century Somalia, the
sense of oppression by colonial authority, and the moral crisis accompanying the
disruption of the Inter-Riverine society should lead to the emergence of movements
of Islamic basis. he Jama’a movements played a leading role in raising the political
consciousness of their communities. he sheikhs who led them were considered as
the educated elite in the middle of the high proportion of illiterate people. Most
of the Jama’a centers were located in the agricultural area of the region where the
colonial plantations were also developed. hus, the Jama’a centers became very
threatening to colonial activities.
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he Jama’a centers became safe heavens for runaway slaves and others of low
social status, giving them a fresh start and helping integrate them into the religious
and economic life of the region. he centers were also, the means by which many
individuals who had lost land and livestock in the early years of the penetration
could require land and earn a living while also practicing their faith. Moreover, the
Jama’a centers were actually a means by which the Somalis could avoid serving the
colonial forced labor regime. hus, the Jama’a communities played a tremendous
social and economic role and led most of the southern resistance of the time.
As we have seen, the Jama’a were scattered throughout the entire Inter-Riverine region, and the colonial authorities failed to suppress their activities decisively.
Italian frustration is clearly manifested in their reports to Rome. Governor Riveri
(1920–1923) noted in 1921, that the multiplication and extension of Jama’a communities might be a cause for concern, since they were acquiring more land and
more political adherents along the Shabelle Valley. “By substituting the universal
ties of religion for strictly ethnic ones,” Riveri added the Jama’a communities
“could constitute, sometime in the future, a real danger to the political tranquility
of the colony.”⁴⁵
As the examples cited above of Sheikh Faraj and Sharif Alyow, reveal, Riveri’s
warning was prophetic. he Jama’a communities were playing a central role not
only in organizing the Inter-Riverine agricultural production but also in uniting
Inter-Riverine people socially and politically.
No wonder that during the Fascist era the Italian policy toward the Jama’a
communities had moved full circle. Although, by 1926, the most powerful Jama’a
resistances were defeated and their leadership were either killed or detained, the
Fascist administration remained suffering from constant sporadic disturbances and
severe sabotages from the akhwaan “followers of martyred Sheikhs.” In a secret
report, Governor Rava (1931–1935) instructed his District Commissioners not to
authorize the establishment of any new Jama’a and to direct all petitions to him
for a “case by case review.” hen he articulated the new policy, one which would
have tremendous significance in the years to come: the colonial government should
avoid encouraging a unitary Islamic solidarity but should instead work toward a
new concept of “positive unity: All Somalis under the Italian government.” hus,
the idea of La Grande Somalia had been put in motion.⁴⁶
millenarian
It is evident that the oppressive laws imposed by the Italian colonial administrations
and the forms of exploitations followed the implementation of colonial policies
forged the emergence of the Inter-Riverine movements. It is also clear that millenarianism is reflected greatly on the directions and attitudes of these movements
towards both in opposition to the colonialists and to rally their followers.
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putting the cart before the horse
Barsane’s letter to the Fascist Governor cited above and his foretelling the
end of the world within 58 years is a clear illustration. he statement that “we are
living in a time of unparalleled woes,” provides an empirical basis for most 19t
and 20t century’s African anti-colonial movements. It is principally, the millenary
aspects of the doctrine, and its implications, that tend to produce a clash between
the prophetic power and the colonial power.
he early followers of Sheikh Uways al-Barawi also believed that he would
be murdered by the Dervishes of the north, and that would be one of the signs
of the end of the world. Sheikh Ibdille Issaq, another millenarian, from Bardera
predicted, “When we are close to the end of the world, captains and commissioners
will conquer our country.”⁴⁷
From this attitude springs the refusal to cooperate with the infidel colonial
authorities. Similar movements inspired by messianic or millenarian doctrine
sprung all over Africa during the colonial time, such as Kimbangu in the Congo
who believed that the world would end on October 21, 1921,⁴⁸ and Adamawa in
Northern Cameroons who believed that the Mahdi “the God-guided one” era has
already lapsed, and it was now the epoch of the Dajjal “anti-Christ.” he necessary
preliminaries for the end of the world are already taking place, and it would in
fact come about 1400 years of the death of the Prophet Muhammad.⁴⁹ hus, the
believers Muslim and Christians alike had nothing to loose in this just struggle. If
they die for the cause, they become martyrs, and if they win, they are heroes. Nassib Buunto, the leader of the Somali anti-slavery movement was hanged in 1907.
Sheikh Uways al-Barawi was also murdered in 1907. Sheikh Hassan Barsane, who
was sentenced to death in 1924, had his sentence commuted to life imprisonment
and died in jail in 1929, while Sheikh Faraj was killed in 1925.
his, indeed, was the fate of many messianic leaders in other parts of the
continent. Mwana Lesa (meaning “son of God”) was hanged in Rhodesia in 1926.
Simon Kimbangu was sentenced to life imprisonment and died in detention in
Elizabethville in 1950. Mulomozi wa Yezu of the Belgian Congo was also hanged
in 1944. here were hundreds of political prisoners during the Italian colonial administration in Somalia, of whom many were declared “dangerous” by the colonial
authorities. Ideas of martyrdom and resurrection found strong ground in the InterRiverine anti-colonial movements.
Conclusion
What I have tried to do in this paper is to briefly introduce one of the themes
neglected in the modern scholarship of Somali studies. he historical experience of
this region offers some instructive lessons for historians accustomed to the standard
image of Somalia as an intolerant, nomadic culture, whereas, indeed, the whole of
the southern mostly agrarian region is and was remarkable for its tradition of in84
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Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine Case)
corporating and assimilating diverse people and cultures. he Inter-Riverine people
felt the burden of colonial oppression as much if not more than their northern
counterparts did through their experience of forced labor during the Fascist regime.
In this struggle, many cross-clan resistance and religious movements emerged to
further the cause of Somali unity. he region’s history may also offer a tradition of
tolerance for cultural and social diversity no less patriotic than a tradition of proud
exclusiveness. It was in this region that the founding fathers of modern Somali
nationalism were born: Abdulkadir Sakhawuddin, the founder of the Somali Youth
League (syl); Haji Mohamed Hussein, the founder of the Somali Democratic
Union (sdu); Sheikh Ali Jimale, the founder of the Somali National Congress
(snc); and Sheik Abdullahi Boghodi, the founder of the Hizbiya Dastur Mustaqil
al-Sumal (hdms) (the Somali Independent Constitutional Party).
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
Leading studies in this aspect, see Lewis, I.M., A Pastoral Democracy (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 1961), Burton, Richard, First Footsteps in East Africa (2 Vols., London:
Tylson and Edwards, 1894), Samatar, Said S., Oral Poetry and Somali Nationalism: The
Case of Sayyid Mahammad ‘Abdille Hassan (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1982).
hese scholars thought that the Inter-Riverine region had been far less important than
the dramatic events led by Ahmed Gurey and Muhammad Abdulle Hassan, which
forged the modern Somali nation. See Touval, Saadia, Somali Nationalism: International Politics and the Drive for Unity in the Horn of Africa (Cambridge, ma: Harvard
University Press, 1963), Lewis, I.M., “he Somali Conquest of the Horn of Africa,”
Journal of African History, vol. 1, no. 2, 1960 and Trimingham, J.S., Islam in Ethiopia,
(London: Franc Cass, 1952).
Colonial administrations employed more nomadic Somalis in their colonial forces,
such as Corpo Zaptie in the South and the Camel Corps in the North. Similarly, in
the civil services, the majority of the turjuman “translators,” Karani “clarks,” and even
wardie “watchman,” were preferably selected from the non-Riverine communities. his
preference is clearly reflected in the formation of the early national armed and police
forces. From 1956 to 1991, there were 26 Somali governments all led by the Darood,
Hawiye and Issaq clans. For further details on clan and sub-clan representation in
the Somali governments, civil servants and police and armed forces, see Haji, Aves
Osman and Abdiwahid Osman Haji, Clan, Sub-clan and Regional Representation in the
Somali Government Organization 1960–1990: Statistical data and Findings. Washington,
dc: 1998.
Colonial archives are essential in this regard. For Italian colonial records, see Archivio
Storico del Ex-Ministero dell’ Africa Italiana (asmai), for French, see the Centre des
Archives d’Outre-Mer, just to mention two important Italian and French sources. In
Arabic, the best archival collections are kept in Dar al-Kutub al-Misriyyah. For bibliographical details, see, Carboni, Fabio, Bibliografia Somala. Studi Somali, no. 4. (Rome:
Il Bagatto, 1983), and Mukhtar, Mohamed Haji, Historical Dictionary of Somalia, New
Edition. (Lanham: Scarecrow Press, 2003).
85
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putting the cart before the horse
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
Prior to 1972, no Af-Somali “Somali language” was as dominant as Af-Mahaa, because
it became the language of the media and instruction in schools and was called Afka
Hooyo “the mother tongue” much offending those whose mothers did not speak it, thus
marginalizing the use of other Somali languages such as Af-Maay the lingua franca
of the Riverine peoples. he culturally alienated non Af-Mahaa speakers particularly
the Af-Maay speakers opposed the 1972 script and developed their own script known
as Alif-Maay “Maay Script” adopted since 1994. See Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary,
Ibid. pp. 30, 31, 84, 142.
his triangle is located in the east of a line of demarcation in eastern Africa between
the “Spheres of Influence” reserved to Great Britain and Italy, which follow from
the sea, up the midchannel (halfway) of the river Juba to a latitude 6 degrees North.
hus, Kismayu, with its territory on the south bank of the river, was left to England.
he line then follows the 6t parallel of north latitude up to Meridian 35 degrees east
of Greenwich, following up to the Blue Nile. See: Hertslet, E.,The Map of Africa by
Treaty, 3rd edition, vol. ii, (London: hmso), p. 918. According to this agreement, most
of the Somali territories were included in the Italian “sphere,” with the exception of
Jubaland and the Northern Frontier District, nfd, which remained part of British
East Africa.
In 1896 Somalis at Lafoole defeated Italy in the south and Ethiopians at Adowa in
the North. For details about the Lafoole defeat, see Mukhtar, Mohamed H. “Taariikh
al-Isti’mar al Itali fi al-Sumal Hatta 1908,” (M.A. hesis, Al-Azhar University, Cairo,
1973), pp. 91–93, and for Adowa, see Del Boca, Angelo, Gli Italiani in Africa Orientale
dall ‘ Unita al Marcio su Roma, (Rome: Editori Laterza, 1976), pp. 649–741.
Gosha is the thickly forested territory of the middle and lower Juba river valley.
Makanjira Che Zamani is the real name of Nassib Buunto. It is believed that he came
to Gosha leading reinforcement forces from Che Mataka, Sultan of Kulijenda, in East
Africa to support Gosha’s struggle against the Werday and Ogaden clans. According
to Sheikh Mukhtar Sheikh Yusuf Nassib, a grandson of Nassib Buunto, it was the
people of Gosha who requested the support of Che Mataka. (Interview with Sheikh
Mukhtar, Mogadishu, 1976.) For interesting information about the life and rise of
Nassib Buunto, see Bargoni, Umberto, Nella Terra di Nassib Bunto, Lo Spartaco della
Somalia Italiana. (Livorno: Edizione Marzocco, 1931).
Sheikh Mukhtar, Interviews in Nassib Buunto Village 1977.
Italian sources very often refer to this resistance as the “Biamal Revolt,” as the Biamal
clan was the major element in the resistance. See: Gherardo Pantano, Nel Benadir: La
Citta di Merca e la Regione Bimal, (Leghorn: S. Belforta, 1910). pp. 41–77. Some scholars
tend to limit the area which the revolt covered and call it the “Merca Revolt” since
Merca was the center of gravity. See: Cassanelli, Lee. V. The Shaping of Somali Society:
Reconstructing the History of a Pastoral People, 1600–1900, (Philadelphia: University of
Pennsylvania Press, 1982), pp. 222–228. For the geographic meaning of Banadir, see,
Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary, ibid., pp.47–48.
For further details about Lafoole, see Del Boca, Angelo, Gli Italiani in Africa Orientale,
ibid., pp. 741–46; Cassanelli, Lee, V., The Shaping of Somali Society, ibid., pp. 204–8, and
Mukhtar, M., Historical Dictionary of Somalia, ibid., 33, 134.
See, Mantegazza, Vico, Il Benadir, (Milano: Treves, 1908), pp. 170–1. For information
about the Biamals and their role in the resistance against Italian colonialism, see
Pantano, Gherardo, La Citta di Merca, ibid.
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Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine Case)
14.
A Biamal warrior, ma’allin “teacher-sheikh” negotiated the clan alliances fighting
against the Italian colonial occupation. Gaafle was also responsible for allying the
Banadir resistance in the south with the dervishes of the north. For details about
Gaafle’s life, see Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary, ibid., p. 199.
15. Pesenti, Gustavo. Danane nella Somalia Italiana (Milan: L’Eroica, 1932). As the victorious commander at Turunley, Pesenti could provide an eyewitness account of the tactics
and military organization of the Banadiris as well as the weapons they used.
16. For further information about the role of Geledi and Hintire in these resistance, see
Cassanelli, Lee V., The Shaping of Somali Society, ibid., pp. 208–214, 218–22, and Luling,
Virginia, Somali Sultanate: The Geledi City-State Over 150 Years (London: haan Associates, 2002), pp. 207–19.
17. For further details about the nature of this force, see Vitale, M.A., L’Opera dell’Esercito
1855–1943, Vol. I, of L’Italia in Africa, Serie Storico-Militare, (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico
dello Stato, 1960), pp. 150–51.
18. he region has a strong economic and strategic importance for the Italians. he Shabelle valley region is the most fertile part of all Somalia, providing rich pasture for
livestock. Furthermore, it is on the main road connecting the southern parts of the
Italian East African empire, Somalia, with its northern portion, Eritrea.
19. Jama’a is an Arabic word for a group of people associating themselves under a given
religious order or political association. his institution emerged in Somalia as organized
religious farming settlements in the 18t century. he Jama’a institution spread widely
among the Inter-Riverine people. In 1950, there were over fifty Jama’a in Upper Juba
region; thirty in Banadir; four in Lower Juba; and eight in Hiran. No Jama’a were
established in both Mudug and Mijurtinia. See un Trusteeship Council Report on
Religious Settlements in Somalia, 1953. For some of these Jama’a that date back to the
18t and early 19t centuries, see Garmaghale (1789), Burgab (1810), and Bardera (1819),
see also Castagno, A.A., “Religious Settlements in Somalia,” (unpublished collection,
1953).
20. De Vecchi di Val Cismon, Cesare Mario, Orizzonti d’Impero: Cinque Anni in Somalia.
(Milano: A. Mondadori, 1935), pp. 25–26.
21. Barsane founded this Jama’a in 1890 at Jiliale in the Middle Shabelle Valley. he Sheikh
led his followers to oppose the followers of Muhammad Abdulle Hassan, the dervishes
and both the Italian and Ethiopian colonial forces during their advance into Somalia.
For more about Barsane’s life, see De Vecchi, Orizzonti d’Impero, ibid. pp. 24–27, and
Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary, ibid., pp. 209–10.
22. An indication that the riverine people unlike the nomadic clans refused to enlist in
the colonial troops and perhaps any colonial job.
23. According to Islam nobody can know, when the Day of Judgment comes, but Allah.
“Verily the knowledge of the hour is with Allah (alone),” (Sura 31, verse 34). However,
there is a Somali way to calculate the end of the world. hey believe time is divided
into five major periods. he time of the prophet Muhammad, which they allot for
an estimate of 1000 years, then a period of 100 years for each of the four orthodox
Caliphs (Abu Bakr, ‘Umar, Usman and Ali). hus, to the Somalis, the year 1400 ah
(the Islamic Calendar) represents the end of the world. Since Barsane’s revolt emerged
in 1342 ah (1924), it was true that only 58 years were left to the Day of Judgment, and
according to that calendar, the world ended in 1982. But the Somalis or believers of
such calendar made reservations if things were not accurate by saying, “he age of the
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putting the cart before the horse
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
world will last until 1400 ah and wa-shi “plus” and that wa-shi could last for a second,
a minute, an hour, a day, a week, a month, a year or even for hundreds, thousands and
millions of years.”
Sheikh Hassan Barsane signs this letter on the 5t of Sha’ban, 1342 of the Islamic
Calender (March 12, 1924). For the text and relevant detail of the letter, see: De Vecchi,
ibid., pp. 26–27.
For more details about the life and deeds of Sheikh Uways, See: Sheikh ‘Abd alRahman bin Sheikh ‘Umar, known as Sheikh ‘Abdi’Ili, Jala’al-’Aynayn fi Manaqib
al-Shaykhayn: al-Shaykh al-Waliyyi HajI Aways al-Qadiri wa al-Shaykh al-Kaamil ‘Abd
al-Rahman al-Zayla’I, (Cairo: Matba’at al Mashad al -Husayni, 1954). By the same
author, al-Jawhar al-Nafis Fi Khawas al Shaykh Aways al-Qadiri. (Cairo: Matba’at alMashhad al-Husayni. 1964).For substantial information about the spread of Uwaysiyya
to East and Central Africa, see: B.G. Martin. Muslim Brotherhoods in 19-Century
Africa. (Cambridge University Press. 1976), pp. 160–164. For an interesting account
for Uwaysiyya and its anti-colonial activities, see Christine Choi Ahmed, “God, AntiColonialism and Drums: Sheikh Uways and the Uwaysiya,” (Ufahamu: Vol. xvii, 1989),
pp. 96–116, and Mukhtar, Historical Dictionary, ibid., pp. 219–20, 257–58.
Details about Sharif Alyow’s movement see: Cerulli, Enrico, Somalia: Scritti Vari Editi
ed Inediti, vol. 2, (Rome: Istituto Poligrafico dello Stato, 1959), pp. 166–68.
De Vecchi di Val Cismon, Cesare Mario, Relazione sul Progetto di Bilancio della Somalia
Italiana 1925/26, (Mogadishu: Bettini, 1924), p. 38.
De Vecchi, Orizzonte d’Impero, ibid., pp. 44–45.
Literature on the Dervish movement are numerous in both foreign and Somali languages. See, Jardine, Douglas, The Mad Mullah of Somaliland, (London: Herbert Jenkins,
1923); Battersby, H.F. Prevost, Richard Corfield of Somaliland, (London: Edward Arnold,
1914); Touval, Saadia, Somali Nationalism, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963):
Lewis, I.M., The Modern History of Somaliland, (New York: Praeger, 1965): Sheikh Jama’
‘Umar ‘Isse, Taariikhdi Daraawiishta, (Mogadishu: Akadeemiyaha Dhaqanka, 1976) and
Samatar, Said, Oral Poetry and Somali Nationalism, (London: Cambiridge University
Press, 1982).
Choi, Christine A., “Finely Etched Chattel: he Invention of a Somali Women,” in
Ahmed, Ali Jimale, ed., he Invention of Somalia, (Lawrenceville: he Red Sea Press,
Inc. 1995), p. 158.
Mukhtar, Mohamed H., “Islam in Somali History: Fact and Fiction, “in Ahmed, Ali
Jimale, ed. The Invention of Somalia, Ibid. pp. 20–21.
Lee’s works remained the pioneering studies on the pre-colonial history of Somalia.
His publications on the area are numerous among which: The shaping of Somali Society,
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982) and “he End of slavery and the
‘Problem’ of Farm Labor in Colonial Somalia” in Puglielli, Annarita, (Rome: Proceedings of the hird International Congress of Somali Studies, 1986) currently working
on patterns of pre-colonial, trade, politics and population movement in the Eastern
Horn.
Luling, Virginia, Somali Sultanate: he Geledi City-State Over 150 Years, (London:
haan, 2002).
Helander, Bernhard, “he Slaughtered Camel: Coping with Fictitious Descent Among
the Hubeer of Southern Somalia.” (Ph.D. hesis, University of Uppsala, 1988)
88
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Somali Responsese to Colonial Occupation (The Inter-Riverine Case)
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
Lewis, Herbert, “he Origins of the Galla and Somali.” in Journal of African History,
Vol. vii, 1966.
Besteman, Catherine, and Cassanelle, Lee, The Struggle for Land in Southern Somalia:
The War behind the War, (London: haan, 1996), and Unraveling Somalia: Race, Violence,
and the Legacy of Slavery, (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999).
Menkhaus, Kenneth, “Rural Transformation and the Roots of Underdevelopment in
Somalia’s Lower Jubba Valley.” (Ph.D. dissertation, University of South Carolina, 1986),
and “from Feast to Famine: Land and the State in Somalia’s Lower Jubba Valley.” In
Besteman and Cassanelli, ed. The Struggle for Land, ibid., pp.133–53.
“he Somali Origin: Myth or Reality.” In Ahmed, Ali Jimale, ed., he Invention, ibid.,
pp. 81–106.
Most of my early studies remained in Arabic or Somali which most of the current
Somalists are not benefiting from it. See, Mukhtar, Mohamed H. “Taariikh al-Isti’mar
al-Itali fi al-Sumal Hatta 1908,” [he History of Italian Colonialism in Somalia until
1908,] M.A. hesis, University of al-Azhar, 1973; “al-Sumal al-Itali fi Fatrat al-Wisayah
Hatta al-Istifqlaal,” [Italian Somaliland from Trusteeship to Independence 1950–1960,]
Ph.D. Dissertation, University of al-Azhar, 1983. and Habka Cilmiga ee Baarista Taariikhda Soomalida,” [he Scientific Methodology of Writing Somali History, ] Lafoole:
1978).
Ahmed, Ali Jimale, “Tradition, anomaly and the wave for the Future: Somali Oral
Literature, Nuruddin Farah and Written Somali Prose Fiction.” (Ph.D. dissertation,
University of California, Los Angeles, 1989), and Daybreak is Near: Literature, Clans
and the Nation State in Somalia, (Lawrenceville, nj: Red Sea Press, 1996).
Mukhtar, Mohamed H. Fieldnote, 1975.
Mukhtar, Mohamed H. “Taariikh al-Isti’mar al-Italy fi al-Sumal Hatta 1908.” Ibid. pp.
137–40. More details about ordinances for the administration of the territory during
Filonardi Company, see, Filonardi’s report, no. 171, September 16, 1894, asmai, pos. 75/1,
f. 3.
he term “beed” in the Maay language literally means tribute, in this case it is a tribute
paid by force to the colonial concessionaries in the form of manpower. During the
implementation of the colonial model known as comparticipazione “share,” Italian
authorities in Somalia required each village or clan to provide a quota of workers to
the plantations and construction projects. he negative consequences of these policies to the Inter-Riverine society are well documented in their oral tradition. From
my interviews to the elders of Bur Hakaba in 1975, I was told a Weeryr (“type of
war poetry”) entitled “Beed” which starts as following: Bariigno liing kooye me Buur
beeda yaalle… (“Oh! Mighty mountain Bur Hakaba village… we won’t desert you, we
will always be back regardless of our suffering from tributes imposed on you. …”)
On recruiting farm labor and its legislation, see also, Cassanelli, Lee V. “he End of
Slavery and the ‘Problem’ of Farm labor in colonial Somalia.” In Proceedings of the
hird International Congress of Somali Studies, edited by Annarita Puglielli, 275–80.
Rome: Il Pensiero Scientifico Editore, 1988.
Mukhtar, Mohamed H. Fieldtone, 1975.
Riveri, Carlo. Relazione Annuale sulla Situazione Generale dellaa Colonia, 1920–21.
Mogadiscio: Ufficio del Governo, 1921, pp. 16–17.
Rava, Maurizio. Circolare Governatoriale, no. 160, 21 Aprile, 1932. Mogadiscio: Ufficio
del Governo, 1932. In fact the plan of unifying all territories occupied by Somalis from
89
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putting the cart before the horse
47.
48.
49.
Bandar Qassim to Kismayu along the Indian Ocean, then towards the hinterland to
the Southern frontiers of Ethiopia dates back to 1907. See details of the plan, as it was
proposed to the Italian Parliament in, Del Boca, Angelo. Gli Italiani in Africa Orientale,
dall’Unita alla Marcia su Roma, (Rome: Editori Laterza, 1975), pp. 815–19.
Mukhtar, Mohamed H. Habka Cilmiga ee Baarista Taariikhda. Ibid., p. 47.
Hodgkin, homas. Nationalism in Colonial Africa. (New York: New York University
Press, 1957), p. 108.
Hodgkin, ibid. p. 112.
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Chapter Six
Men Drink Tea While Women Gossip
Ladan Affi
University of Wisconsin, Madison
S
espite historical indications that women have been the backbone of
DSomali society, their political, cultural, and economic contributions have rarely
been acknowledged, and therefore, remain marginalized. hey remain absent from
most discourses on Somalia. his is due to the fact that it is primarily men who
write about the situation in Somalia, viewing male realities as that of the whole
society. By writing women out of the history of their society, Somali women have
not only been deprived of their rights, but the ramifications extend beyond political and economic rights, instead they encompass all aspects of women’s lives. As a
result, Somali women, like others before them, are beginning to debunk those views
as they claim the right to be heard, to participate and to contest male produced
Somali realities. his paper attempts to add to that nascent debate.
By employing the poetry and songs of Somali women, this paper hopes to
bring out the many voices and concerns of Somali women. It situates these poems
and song in their economic, political and social context. he issues addressed by
these poems and songs range from the struggle against the colonizers, to how to
deal with old husbands to being overworked. Sometimes, these poems and songs are
frank and confrontational, while in others they are indirect and appear in the form
of lullabies sung for children but intended for the ears of husbands or others who
are oppressing women. hat women have been somewhat successful in challenging
and altering the master gender narrative can be seen in the fact that some male poets
are beginning to recognize and praise the contributions of Somali women. However,
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putting the cart before the horse
women still have a long way to go in having their contributions recognized on its
merit. I specifically intend to articulate the narrative ways in which Somali women
have been historically oppressed and the counter-narratives they use in order to
resist it. he notion of the contested narratives is derived from what Kusow (see,
this volume) refers to as national versus empirical narratives. For the purpose of
this chapter, national narratives refer to the appropriation and super-imposing of
symbols and values that are purely mythical and legendary in nature and, which
above all, are selected from the values and norms of the masculine aspects of the
society which renders all that is female unappreciated. By empirical narratives, I
mean the actual economic and political contributions that Somali women make to
the well being of the nation. he contested and gendered ways in which the two
narratives define how, when, where, and whose contribution and participation is
legitimate create what I refer to as the emergence of gender crisis in Somalia.
Master Gender Narratives
In Somalia, poetry plays a vital role in the society and “interest in it is universal and
skill in it is something which everyone covets and many possess. he Somali poetic
heritage is a living force intimately connected with the vicissitudes of everyday life”
and in fact some scholars have described Somalia as a “nation of bards”¹ hus, in
order to assess the position of women within the Somali master narrative, it is appropriate to employ poetry as well as songs and proverbs about women.
One of the principal narratives that organize gender relations, and therefore,
the ultimate subordination of women-folk is derived from the popular Somali
proverb men drink tea while women gossip.² he ways in which this narrative subordinates women is based on the distinction between drinking tea and gossiping.
Drinking tea, according to the narrative, is understood as a masculine activity and
denotes hardiness, rationality, and pragmatic thinking. Gossiping, on the other hand,
is culturally interpreted as softness, emotionality, and lack of pragmatic thinking.
Other narratives liken women to animals, and in the case of the camel, they
are less valued than an animal. For example, in the following well-know proverb,
a man talks to his camel telling him about the negative consequences if he or the
camel died and the positive result if a woman does.
My death will bring ruin to the family
Your death, amel, will bring
Empty vessels and starvation;
But a women’s death brings
Fresh grooming and remarriage³
What is crookedly fascinating about the above poem is that women are not
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only positioned below camels and men, but in fact her death is a celebrated as a
joyous moment and the start of a new beginning. While the effects of the death
of the camel result in starvation and empty vessels, while the death of man will
bring ruin to the family.
Women are also likened to what some Somalis consider lesser animals – goats
and cows. Some proverbs claim, for example, that women and goats fight when
they are weak, or a woman who always argues and a cow that always moos, has no
advantage in winning a debate. Still other proverbs liken women to children with
the assertion that women are children with big feet or by pampering women and
children, one can get what one wants form them. Taken together, these narratives
locate women as lesser human beings, and in some situations, even beneath some
animals. In other words, women are mentally lesser than men and need to be dealt
with in that manner.⁴ he saying that a man is a man and women are his offspring
clearly demonstrates the inferiority of women to men. herefore, men assume a
paternal role and they can discipline women as well as cajole them to get them to
comply with their orders.
Another aspect of the master narrative relates to the assertion that what is
considered as moral virtues for men, are in fact, vices for women. his narrative
seeks to maintain the status quo by defining what is desirable and what is not. A
well-known proverb defines characteristics that are virtues for men as vices for
women: Three that are good in a man are bad in a woman – Bravery, Generosity and
Eloquence. If a woman is brave, she will want to fight with her husband; if she is
generous, she will squander her husband’s wealth; and if she is eloquent, she will
challenge her husband and thus diminish her husband’s prestige.⁵ herefore, the
master narrative prefers an obedient woman than one who is intemperate or intelligent
or from better family.⁶
he only proverbs that present women in a slightly positive light are those
in which women are of use to men. For example, there are three types of men you
will never surpass: A man with a better horse, you will not catch up to in a day; A man
with a better pasture, it will take you a year to accumulate as much wealth; And a man
with a better wife, you will never catch up to. In this case, women have been placed
higher than animals and other resources, but women are not valued for themselves
but for what they provide to men.
he perpetuation of the master-narrative regarding Somali women was assisted by what Choi-Ahmed characterizes as “colonial anthropology, orientalism,
and androcentric Western scholarship.”⁷ In turn, this has led to the creation of “the
myth of the Somali woman as chattel, commodity, and a creature with little power”⁸
Despite these scholars’ depictions of Somali women as “‘commoner,’ ‘slave,’ or lowcaste person,’” they are nevertheless forced to confront the real position of women
within the society.⁹ Contrary to the description of women as a “womb for rent,” the
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reality demonstrates that underneath the façade, women are quite as influential as
men and that although Somali women may have a low position in the society they
also may have considerable standing within it.¹⁰ However, many of these scholars
continue to depict women as powerless and inferior to men preferring to ignore
the counter-narratives confronting them.¹¹
Counter-Narratives
According to Berger and Luckmann, counter-definitions of reality and identity
emerge when individuals “congregate in socially durable groups.”¹² As these
individuals attempt to neutralize and then amend the national narratives, their
“counter-reality and counter-identity may be hidden from the knowledge of the
larger community, which still predefines and ongoingly identifies these individuals” in the same manner. herefore, although patriarchal society prefers an obedient
woman than one who is intemperate or intelligent, girls are nevertheless raised to be
assertive, witty and intelligent.¹³
However, the counter-narratives of women are seldom known nationally and
are often passed from grandmother to mother to daughter.¹⁴ In fact, if we examine
women’s poetry and songs, we will find that far from passively accepting oppression,
women “expressed their grievances, hopes and philosophy through poetry handed
from generation to generation, from grandmother to mother to daughter, bearers
and transmitters of the female cultural heritage.”¹⁵
Additionally, in line with Berger and Luckmann’s definition, Somali women
created their own socially durable groups in the form of “informal networks, kinship groups, work groups or religious association to strengthen themselves and
fight oppression.”¹⁶ hey used these groups not only to fight oppression but to
also provide economic and spiritual support. Women recognize the value of their
solidarity networks as demonstrated in the subsequent song where the importance
of collaboration among women is highlighted:
Women, join us, join us
Chorus: Here we join, lets aid one another
In war, men cooperate
And become brothers
Shall we aid each other or shall we separate
Chorus: We are ready to join, lets aid one another ¹⁷
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women’s ways of resistance
In order to counter the lessening of their contributions to their families, women
would often sing the following lullaby, which could be interpreted in a variety of
ways depending on the listener.
Oh my daughter, men have wronged us
For in a dwelling where women are not present
No camels are milked
Nor are saddled horses mounted¹⁸
Outwardly, the lullaby is intended to entertain female children, while simultaneously providing a connection between mother and daughter as women who
have been mistreated. he lullaby also addresses those who diminish women’s
work. In other words, no work gets done – no camels are milked nor are horses
saddled – without the presence of women. On another level, the lullaby is intended
as a challenge to those who suggest that women do not contribute anything to
their birth families. Horses and camels are often the brideprice paid to a woman’s
birth family by her suitor, and since this wealth is given in her name, a woman
clearly indicates her worth.¹⁹ In fact according to Adan, “he bride price is the
sole commodity in this society. hrough it, the woman asserts herself. After all, an
entire economic system depends on her.”²⁰
he life most Somali women faced was harsh and difficult; nevertheless women
protected and valued each other. Mothers, grandmothers, aunts and female relatives
looked out for younger women attempting to shield them while simultaneously
preparing them for the severity of life. his song, from a mother to a daughter illustrates the protective relationship that exists between women. It also demonstrates
that a mother’s approval is needed in order for a marriage to take place. Although, it
was only men who took part in the formal and contractual aspects of the marriage,
it was women who “often created the options on which men acted.”²¹
When you reach marriageable age
And if God keeps his approval
A wicked mean and evil man
A wife-beater and intimidator
To such a man (I promise) your hand won’t go.²²
he following bridal song by an older woman is intended to remind a young
woman getting married that the man that she is marrying is not her relative and
that she should be on her guard and her first priority should be to take care of her
own needs. In this way, women united against unjust patriarchal institutions and
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readied younger women for what life would hold for them and how to be prepared
for whatever may befall them.
he man you are marrying
Is not your father
He will chase you away tomorrow ²³
Women also support and assist each other in undermining the power that men
exercised over their lives. In the following poem, a young woman married to an
old man asks her aunt for advice on how to deal with an old demanding husband.
Oh aunt, how does one deal with an old husband
Oh niece, you deal with him the way I do
Oh aunt will you kindly tell me how?
Say niece – if he asks for milk
You milk an old goat for him
When he comments on the plentifulness of it
You help yourself to half of it
You supplement the rest with water
Remember to drink the first mouthful yourself
Also the unmilked are all yours
If he ask for meat
You slaughter a bony old goat for him
You roast the unskinned shin for him
When he asks for knife
Give him a sharpened dagger
(In the hope that) he cuts off his fingers
What if he asks for mat and a pillow
hrow him the Alool-mat
And if he complains about hard it is
He whose head is large like a python (You fling a hard one at him)
May God’s curse be on him
You snatch the Alool-mat from him
You make him lose his composure
And let the sand sprinkle his grey hair with dirt
While asleep you place a stick in his nostrils
And you torturously pull upwards.²⁴
In line with the previous poem, an older woman (an aunt in this case) counsels a
young woman not to treat her husband well. As well, a woman should lay claim to
whatever she is able to – whether it is milk or livestock – perhaps because an old
husband is more likely to die than a younger husband. It may also indicate that an
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old husband will be less likely to take a new wife and thus there is no competition
for the young wife. She is therefore free to treat him as she wishes.
In another story from a mother to a daughter, the mother tells her daughter
how to treat her husband depending on his age ranging from the twenties to the
eighties. he mother tells her daughter that if her husband “is in his eighties, do
whatever you want.”²⁵
Colonialism and The Condition of Women
Cultures are continually transforming themselves as they experience and react to
internal tensions as well as external influence and Somali culture is no different.
However, colonialism altered the nature of that transformation by speeding up
the pace of change due to the intensity of economic exploitation. So, when the
British, Italians and French arrived in the late 19t century, Somalia’s economic
networks and “cohesive ties of a subsistence economy were destroyed and Somalia
was integrated into the international mercantile system.”²⁶ In addition to these
economic exploitations, women suffered socially and politically under colonialism.
As such, the arrival of colonialism in much of Africa including Somalia diminished
women’s significant contribution to their societies and their sense of independence
due to the concepts brought by Christian missionaries and colonial administrators,
of women’s appropriate place in society.²⁷ he presence of foreigners in Somalia
has often played a part in viewing major economic players as being male and the
Somalis who went to the large towns “found that most of the new economic niches
were reserved for men. Somali men were expected and encouraged to engage in
exchange activities, and the lower rungs of the bureaucratic, political, and military
branches of the colonial administration were open [only] to them.”²⁸
he colonial authorities viewed women as objects and for the most part
left them alone to conduct their small businesses or work as laborers rather than
integrating them into the economy. In fact, the only time women came under the
scrutiny of the colonial state was “if women were loud and troublesome and not
clearly under the authority of a man, they might be accused of prostitution and
punished.”²⁹ hus, the colonial state “reinforced kin group and male authority over
women without making the men economically responsible for them and without
offering women alternative opportunities for economic survival.”³⁰ Even though,
the main item utilized by the colonial state – livestock – was for the most part the
responsibility of women. he Italians and the British weakened Somali women’s
power, legitimizing patriarchal control over women and codifying customary and
religious law from an orientalist perspective, hence making it more inflexible.³¹
hese economic and social restrictions on their lives put women at the forefront in joining the fight against the imperialist threat.³² Caught between colonial
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tures of oppression.³³ hey unconditionally took part in the struggle to free Somalia
from colonial powers and in the process liberated themselves. In many African
countries, it was primarily educated women who joined the fight for liberation,
while in Somalia; the majority of women who joined the liberation movements were
unable to access the colonial educational system. he outcome of this was that it
“prevented the development of any elitist groupings among women.”³⁴ Women from
different educational, economic, social and marital positions all became involved
in the struggle on an equal basis” and this created an environment of inclusiveness
and “increased awareness among women of their power as an identifiable group.”³⁵
In fact, this understanding is clearly confirmed by the following poem by Hawa
Jibrell, an activist in the struggle for independence and a well-known poetess:
We wanted to break away from our seclusion
We wanted to have the responsibility to express our feelings and our views
We wanted to show our concerns for our country ³⁶
Women hoped that independence would provide them with an opportunity “to
make a dramatic change in their own situation.”³⁷ hey joined the Somali Youth
League (syl) in the late 1940s in large numbers but despite their active participation, many regarded these women as “operating outside of accepted behaviour” and
they were reviled. Actually, pro-colonial supporters used this to condemn the syl
characterizing them as a party supported by “women with sharp tongues.”³⁸ As a
result, those women who opposed colonial imposition and joined the independence
movements such as Hawo Tako, Halima Godane, Barni Warsame and Timiro
Ukash “were severely criticized by family, friends and the general public. Some of
the married women who joined the liberation movement were divorced as a result.
hose who were unmarried at the time had to carry the stigma of being loose women,
and some were even disowned by their parents.”³⁹ However, women continued their
opposition to colonialism by providing economic support to the independence
movement by selling their jewelry, attending demonstrations, composing poetry to
encourage Somalis to resist colonialism and even conducting covert activities.
Despite their contribution and the heavy personal price that many of these
women were paying, they were not regarded as full members and encountered stiff
resistance in their campaign for full membership. It was only when the women
threatened to withdraw their support in 1952, that the syl’s Central Committee admitted women as full members.⁴⁰ A few years later, when women began to campaign
for representation within the committees of the syl, many male members within
the syl argued that women lacked the requisite “education and did not have the
necessary political consciousness” and therefore did not deserve full membership.
Ardo Dirir and Hawo Jibril, who were permitted to address the National Congress
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Men Drink Tea While Women Gossip
of the syl in 1959, responded in this poem on behalf of the women, by comparing
the arguments of the men with those of the colonizers.
Are you not really arguing as the Italians?
Are you not in fact supporting their contention,
As expressed in the United Nations, the Somalis are
Not ready for independence, because they
Allege that we have not sufficient education or
Political maturity?⁴¹
However, it was only when the women threatened to withdraw their support
that the syl recognized women as full members and they began to be represented
in the committees.⁴² Consequently, women were targeted by the colonial authorities, which responded by imprisoning many of the women. Some like Timiro
Ukash “served a number of years in a high security prison in Kismayo. She was
pregnant when she was arrested and she was one of several women to give birth
in prison.”⁴³
Despite their targeting by the colonial state and the lack of support from
the independence movements and other Somalis, these activist women refused to
accept colonialism and continued to encourage defiance. Faduma Hersi Abbane,
who was detained several times, composed the following poem to encourage others to be fearless in their resistance to the colonizers by pointing out the positive
aspects of imprisonment:
By God we are not afraid,
For we are used to jail
here is a blanket for cover,
Another to use as a pillow
Two sets of clothes to wear
A bath for washing, a big yard for walks
Plenty of warm tea
And millet meal to fill one’s stomach.⁴⁴
Hawa Tako, like many other women, paid the ultimate price when a Somali
man working for the Italians shot her with an arrow while guarding a warehouse
used by the independence movement. As the Italians and British prepared to leave
Somalia in the late 1950s, they made a half-hearted attempt to give women some
rights such as universal suff rage.
The First Post-Colonial State
he newly independent Somali government had to face many socio-economic
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development problems. Due to modernization and the policies of the colonial
government, women became even “more dependent on their husbands, brothers
and fathers [especially if ] they had no previous skills and opportunities to adjust
to modern life.” he new Somali government, like other African governments, left
the social and political structures of colonialism intact, ensuring that this ideology remained embedded in the socio-political strata, further contributing to the
marginalization of women.⁴⁵ he unwillingness of the post-colonial government
to dismantle discriminatory institutional barriers against women prompted Kaha
Ahmed Sar’ad to recite the following poem reminding the government the debt
they owed to Somali women and their disillusionment with their performance:
My skin hangs loose on my bones
My eyes are veiled with clouds
hose I have led I now must follow
To go forward without me
Let alone thanks, I have been forgotten
In the new scramble
he people dispersed
Grasping and shouting
Satisfying greed
And I waited
Let alone gifts, I have been ignored
Protested under the shade of our flag
My comrades shamed it
Ignored me, did not receive me
I was sent away from their homes
Let alone rewards, I have been threatened
And I had dreamed
Somalia as one
But no longer is Somalia one home
Now each keeps to his own
I had filled large “Hamo” with dreams
And shouted “do not loosen the ropes”
Hoping for one great feast
But I have been cast aside
So easily thrown over a cliff
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Let alone rewards, I have been threatened⁴⁶
In this poem, Kaha Ahmed Sar’ad explicitly denounces the behavior of the
post-colonial regime that was engaging in not only clannism but also stealing from
the state. She also acknowledges that women who had led the struggle against
colonialism were being relegated to the back and their contribution ignored and
unrewarded. She also seems to forecast the breaking up of Somalia due to the
behavior of male politicians.
Having been left out of receiving the rewards of independence, many women
continued to engage in income generating activities such as selling goods in the
market. Other opportunities were limited since the government showed a clear
preference for dealing with men. A few urbanized women worked as civil servants,
but the majority of women participated in the informal sector economy located
either in the home, neighborhoods or in the market. However, “women’s trade
generated little individualism or profit motive and added little to a woman’s status
or economic power.”⁴⁷
The Military Regime and Women
Once Siad Barre came to power in 1969 in a coup d’etat, it appeared that the government was committed to the political, economic and social advancement of women
in Somalia, so much so that many Somali men referred to it as the “Somali women’s
revolution.” Barre recognized that Somali women were indispensable to spreading
his Marxist-Socialist ideology because of their key role in raising future generations.
herefore, the focus of Barre’s government was on the reproductive roles of women
rather than their productive capabilities. Barre “declared that the objective of [his]
development policy was to create a society based on justice, equality and development. It also aimed to create an atmosphere for greater self-reliance.”⁴⁸ In turn,
women fully embraced Barre’s call for reshaping Somali society, as demonstrated
by this poem by Hawa Aaje Mohamed:
If we don’t neglect our prosperous land
If we are not afraid of hard work
If we join forces
If the collective farmers compete
he imported rice would grow
Onion and garlic will ripen
Potatoes and pumpkin will pile up
he flour we make pasta from will be available
We wouldn’t be able to finish the maize from
Bakaraha [a market in Mogadishu]
hen we will compete with half the world
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putting the cart before the horse
hen we will have our fill of property
hat is when we wouldn’t need to beg others
he party will assist so hurry up
And the community of socialists must join hands!⁴⁹
he poem above is indicative of how occasionally women would align themselves with the patriarchal institutions and ideologies. It also highlights women’s
political awareness and their desire to see Somalia compete and succeed in the
global market.
Under Barre’s leadership, “the Somali language was written, and a massive
literacy campaign was successfully launched increasing the literacy rate to 55 percent in 1975, from 5 percent prior to the adoption of a national script.”⁵⁰ Barre’s
government insisted that girls attend school, particularly beyond the elementary
level, leading to some positive changes for women and girls. In the same year, laws
were introduced making wage discrimination on the basis of gender illegal and
requiring equal pay for equal work.⁵¹ Working woman were also given the right to
“14 weeks’ maternity leave with half pay if she has worked with the same employer
for at least six months and after coming back a woman was entitled to two daily
paid breaks of one hour each in order to nurse her child.”⁵²
In 1975, Barre amended the Family Law Act changing the inheritance laws
by giving men and women equal share.⁵³ Some of the Muslim scholars criticized
these legal changes, because they contradicted the Sharia. Barre responded by
executing ten of the scholars, with the result that religious groups were silenced.⁵⁴
In order to harness women’s mobilizing potential, the government also founded
the Somali Women’s Democratic Organization. he aims of this organization
were in “safe-guarding of women’s interests, the promotion of their equality and
full potential awareness as participants in social, political and economic life.”⁵⁵ In
order to do more effective outreach, it had “branches not only at the national but
also at regional, district, town, and village levels.”⁵⁶ Somali women’s membership in
the Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party dramatically increased. As demonstrated
by the poem below composed by Halimo Ali Kurtin, women explicitly aligned
themselves with Barre’s militaristic solutions and deferred to his Barre regime by
portraying it as a savior.
hen there was lightening and clouds came above us
Our vigilant revolution was born
Siyaad was leading our charismatic army
Women congratulated them and gave motherly salutations
hey all sang revolutionary slogans
hey did not go home and rest but stood beside the revolution
May the revolution last longer
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May the revolution live forever is what they kept singing
Our revolution sorted out the following first:
he backward ones who stalled progress were sorted out
hose who squandered public resources were sorted out
he law that was abused is treated with respect
he mothers who were lost and neglected
hey were treated right and were given their inheritance
he heroes of the src have corrected it (the law)
hey know very well political issues
hey manage things through socialism⁵⁷
While Barre appointed several women to vice-minister posts, there were
no women given the influential portfolio of full minister, despite their years of
political experience and high education.⁵⁸ Yet, in the rural areas, women’s position changed very little; their involvement was restricted to the informal markets,
primarily because “other options for income-generation in this milieu [were] few,
especially for the large numbers of women without formal education.”⁵⁹ Despite
Barre’s apparent support for women’s rights, in the economic sphere, “government
gave itself a dominant role and actively restricted the development of the private
sector.”⁶⁰ Even the more lucrative import-export businesses were constrained by
the government, which controlled access to hard currency and licenses. Women
made up no more than 5 of those who were licensed by the government to take
part in the import-export business.⁶¹ Since other avenues were restricted, “women
came to dominate retail trade and the open market, where foodstuff and imported
consumables were sold, and many retail shops were owned by women.”⁶² Men on
the other hand, having taken over from the European commercial houses after independence controlled large-scale wholesale trade such as frankincense and livestock
trade as well as more capital-intensive shops such as construction.⁶³ Regardless of
the government’s neglect in promoting women’s economic participation, available
statistics on Somali women confirmed that that their level of labor force participation was relatively high compared to women in many African countries and that
33.65 of Somali women above the age of ten were in the labour force.⁶⁴ However,
closer examination of these numbers yields a more accurate picture. Two-thirds of
the working women were self-employment, while 15 and 20 were employees
and unpaid family helpers respectively.”⁶⁵ In the end, Barre’s regime did not significantly improve majority of women’s lives as this poem by a nomadic mother to
her daughter indicates. Women continued to shoulder most of the work ensuring
the family’s survival.
After a journey so long
And tiring indeed
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putting the cart before the horse
Like a fully laden camel
Tired as you are under the load
You at last set a camp
Beside a hamlet with no blood-ties to you
Your livestock will need
To be always kept in sight
Your beast of burden will need
To be tied to their tethers
he newly born baby sheep
Have to be taken out to graze
he house will always need
To be tidy and in shape
Your children always need
Your comforting care and love
Your man will always need
Your services in different ways
And may at times scold you
For services poorly done
And may at times beat you
For no apparent reason
So stop whimpering
And perform as best you possibly can
he responsibilities and the duties
Set out for you to do⁶⁶
Barre’s state-sponsored feminism, with its initial commitment to widespread
women’s advancement led to real change for only very few women. Instead, Barre’s
vision of a new communal identity resulted in the strengthening of the clan system,
further devaluing women’s role in society. In response to Barre’s increasingly oppressive policies, opposition movements formed and once again, women played a
crucial part. Mariam Haji Hassan was a founding member of the Somali Salvation
Democratic Front, the first movement to challenge Barre. She went into exile in Kenya, broadcasting her poetry to Somalia, on the opposition movement’s radio.⁶⁷
he committee let us down,
hey eliminated the strong and the intelligent.
hey detain the young as they reach puberty
he process of avenging these wrongs must begin
We must support those preparing to fight ⁶⁸
By the 1980s, many women including former members of the Somali Women’s
Democratic Organization “felt that women were used by the Siad Barre regime
just as they were used during the struggle for independence.”⁶⁹ Others felt that the
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regime had negative effects on women because, “the changes in the Quranic verses
about women by the government resulted in the great misunderstanding of the
situation of women. It also provided naturally prejudiced men with the ammunition needed to weaken women’s position in development.”⁷⁰ Once women realized
that Barre was not sincere in his promises to them, most women withdrew their
support and some even challenged his authority.
he well-known Somali author, Nuruddin Farah wrote of an incident that
clearly highlighted women’s opposition to Barre’s dictatorship when in 1989, in
Kismayo:
A few dozen women, defying the conviction that enjoins female sartorial modesty,
bared their breasts in public in front of a crowd of men. Fists raised, voices harsh,
they shouted “Rise, Rise!” challenging the men to action, reproaching them for
their failure to confront the excesses of the dictatorship. By challenging the men
in this manner, the women implied that they would not from then on defer to
them as husbands, fathers, or figures of authority.⁷¹
he security police responded by briefly detaining the women and their male
relatives. he women were let go as soon as the crowd dispersed, while the man
were held in jail and physically humiliated because the security police believed
women to be incapable of being defiant without the knowledge and support of
their male relatives.
By the late 1980s, “total development assistance constituted a stunning 57
of Somalia’s gnp.”⁷² As the end of the Cold War approached, Somalia’s relevance
as a strategic area was reduced and international aid was lessened or completely
withdrawn by Western countries. he justification given by the donors was the Barre
regime’s atrocious human rights record. he real explanation was the conclusion of
the Cold War and the decreasing importance of Somalia as a strategic location for
the us. he us reportedly told the Somali government that us bilateral assistance
would be suspended unless the government improved its respect for human rights.⁷³
Meanwhile, Somalia’s economic, political and social deterioration accelerated. By
1990, Barre lost power over most of Somalia and was sarcastically nicknamed ‘the
mayor of Mogadishu’. Barre fortified the presidential palace, and lost complete contact with the people. A group of elders, called the Manifesto Group, composed of
businessmen, intellectuals, and political leaders called on Barre to agree to a peaceful
power transition and a departure from politics. Barre refused and is rumored to
have said, if forced out, he would destroy Somalia in the process.
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The Civil War and Women
On January 1st 1991, armed opposition groups drove Barre out of Mogadishu and
although he attempted a return in the following months, it was never successful.
As soon as the detested center collapsed, a new vicious jostling for individual and
clanistic power commenced [and] an orgy of looting (partly by Barre’s fleeing
troops) of public and private property erupted, which culminated in anarchy
and chaos in most major urban centers. For many thousands of inhabitants of
Mogadishu and other areas in Southern Somalia, living became a nightmare as
more and more of them were terrorized by armed gangs.⁷⁴
Instead of bringing relief, the fall of Barre only brought more hardships. he Somali state and its institutions disappeared and the traditional social institutions,
undermined by decades of dictatorship and misrule, were ineffective to stop the
clan manipulations of power-hungry warlords who exploited clan affiliations and
friction.⁷⁵
With the collapse of Barre’s government, Somalia “detached itself into a
Fourth World Order by virtue of complete political and social collapse.”⁷⁶ he
disintegration of Somalia created horrifying human loss, desolation of infrastructure, the collapse of the health and educational structures and the death and
displacement of millions of Somalis. Like other conflicts, there is no denying that
the most vulnerable – minority groups, women, the elderly and children – were the
most severely affected. When television broadcasted images of starving children
struggling to suck a drop of milk from a mother’s shriveled breast, Somali men
were also on tv looking healthy, wearing sunglasses, toting weapons and chewing
Qat.⁷⁷ Although, some women did participate in the fighting or incited their men
to fight in the bloodbath that followed, this was a rare occurrence.
Violence and warfare establish, reinforce and exacerbate divisions within
communities.⁷⁸ Once such divisions are created, they cannot be easily undone
without the active participation of women. Since women are born into one clan
and often marry in to another, they are in an ideal position to bridge the gaps that
exist between these two clans.⁷⁹ Most “women are aware of the importance of the
multiplicity of connections the warring communities have, seeing themselves now
as mothers to children of one family, now as daughters of another, and on remarriage, as mothers to offspring from yet another lineage. [While] the men remain
true to their father’s ancestral identity, the women do not.”⁸⁰ hus, women should
be an essential part of any lasting conflict resolution.⁸¹
Contrary to Somali traditions and signaling the breakdown of Somali Xeer
and culture, women were targeted, raped, tortured and killed, not for themselves as
women, but as a means to humiliate their male relatives. Hundreds of thousands
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Men Drink Tea While Women Gossip
of Somalis became refugees fleeing to neighboring countries in search of peace
and safety. Many women braved the chaos and the killings, staying in Somalia and
feeding those who were dying of hunger, looking after children, the sick and the
elderly, and burying the dead. As conflict progresses, divisions develop between
men and women: men become pre-occupied with military or strategic issues while
women are often left to deal with the issues of subsistence and daily survival. While
the men were vying for power and defending the honor and the name of their clan,
Somali women effectively became the heads of households.
Transforming Patriarchy
A United States Institute of Peace report conducted in 1998 found that women
had established committees and ngos in Mogadishu and elsewhere. hese women
were playing a vital role in peacemaking where women were collaborating across
clan lines and supporting health, nutritional and educational services. Since women
were not expected to represent the clan who treated them as outsiders in public
and political decision-making events, women played a neutral role, transcending
the more destructive elements of Somali clannism. Since the civil war destroyed
earlier livelihoods and the men were called for militia duty, the women assumed
new commercial roles to support their children and relatives. he report finds that
the special adaptability and resilience of women and women’s groups have suggested a vital and generally overlooked role for women in bringing women about
reconciliation. he report recommends that women’s groups should be given support
so that they can assume prominent roles and continue their constructive influence
in rebuilding civil society.⁸²
To increase women’s earning potential, women’s ngos have also been vital in
conducting training by providing micro-credit assisting women in starting small
businesses. he breakdown of social norms allowed women to engage in activities that were considered male domains although women are still prevented from
participating in the more lucrative markets such as livestock and frankincense
trade. Other women have met their financial responsibilities by joining shalongo
or hagbad, in which a group of Somali women pool specific amounts of money to
be collected by each member in turn. Women then use this money to start up a
business or invest in jewelry to guard against future hardship.
Before the civil war if a family did not have a son, the mother was told that
she was gablan, implying that to have no son was a tragedy. Since the civil war,
gablan has been used to mean a family without a daughter.⁸³ his clearly demonstrates women’s central role in the survival of the family and that they have taken
over responsibilities associated with men. When families are immigrating abroad,
boys are often left behind because it is believed that women are much more likely
to send money home and to take care of the family. Women in the Diaspora also
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putting the cart before the horse
benefit more from educational opportunities and job training, and they are more
successful at locating and maintaining a job.⁸⁴ As such, women in the Diaspora
bear a tremendous burden in supporting relatives in Somalia who send money every
month to meet the needs of those who are unable to work in a devastated country.
Indicating women’s changed position, often the money is sent to female relatives
because of the fear that men will squander the money on their needs rather than
that of the family.
A major source of conflict in Somalia and the Diaspora, both within the
family and in the community, is the habitual chewing of a stimulant called Qat
(Cathis Edulis). Its impact on the Somali community has been devastating. Due
to widespread addiction, it has resulted in the diversion of income and the loss of
productivity and in many places has contributed to the prolonging of the conflict.
While their wives, mothers, daughters and sisters work, men prefer to sit around
drinking tea and gossiping for hours and sometimes for days on end. Despite this
reality, Somali men perceive their role within the household as that of the primary
income earner. his common misperception exists even though male unemployment
is high and women’s productive work actually provides the primary income.
Women have shown themselves to being a strong force in Somalia, but there
is unanimity in all circles in Somalia, regardless of other disagreements men might
have, to prevent women from encroaching on what is perceived as men’s domain.
If the clan is not effective in depriving women of their rights, then religion is used,
although Islam has no laws against women participating in the political sphere.
Yet men continue to use religious authority as an excuse to deny women’s rights,
despite the fact that Somali men have for the most part dismally failed to meet
their God-given responsibilities as providers.
Somali women have been excluded or marginalized in the dozens of reconciliation conferences held in the past ten years. Even in the last conference held in Arta,
Djibouti ending in the formation of a transitional government where women were
touted as equal participants, only 25 out of 245 parliamentary seats were allocated to
women and so far only one woman has been named as minister without portfolio
while 3 others have been named as vice-ministers. While in Somaliland, women
ran for the last two presidential elections as independents. It was only recently that
Somaliland included a woman in its cabinet as Foreign Minister but as of yet, there
are no women representatives in the parliament. In Puntland, although there a few
women in the parliament, real power remains concentrated in the hands of men.
Sandra Harding criticizes the notion of “adding women and gender” to existing social and political structures without questioning their hierarchical and politically regressive agendas.⁸⁵ Other feminist scholars like Rhoda Howard also deplore
the view that appointing special members of parliament, to represent women as “a
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means of incorporating potential political protests into a manageable forum.”⁸⁶ In
addition to Harding and Howard, Segers also
cautions feminists not to view affirmative action as a panacea to the problem
of discrimination and oppression reminding women that affirmative action is
a single policy… a lonely policy, a voice in the wilderness that can achieve little
without support of other policies directed at reducing disparities in wealth,
status and power⁸⁷
Although, affirmative actions may have limited impact, the alternative may be not
to have women involved at all.
At the beginning of the formation of the transitional government both the
prime minister and president made numerous public statements that women would
be visible in their government. When questioned about the dismal lack of women
representatives, they both resorted to the age-old excuse – no clan would agree
to women representing them. Recently, the transitional government ratified the
African Unity Treaty with the exception of two articles, one of which dealt with
gender equality. In the latest ongoing reconciliation conference in Mbagathi,
Kenya Somali women have refused to be marginalized and have actively attempted
to participate in all aspects of the conference. However, they continue to face an
uphill battle.
he international community has spent billions on Somalia and has very little
to show for it today. here are thousands of studies documenting the roles, contributions, needs, aspirations, perceptions and perspectives of women in the world.
he crucial question then becomes, what has been learned from all this activity as
Somalia attempts to reconstruct itself ?
In order to strengthen the position of women in Somali society effectively,
each economic, political and social barrier they face must be overcome. It is no longer enough to assume that men’s needs are identical or relevant to those of Somali
women. By working with Somali women to identify and implement policies that
promote gender equity, there is no doubt Somali society as a whole benefits.
For their greater contribution to the maintenance of households, Somali
women should be given credit – literally. Access to substantial loans would allow
Somali women a chance to compete in the more lucrative import/export business.
Established women’s ngos should be promoted and encouraged by providing
funding and training to meet women’s specific needs such as education and health.
“One of the most common problems in shaping development policies that affect
women is the assumption that such policies are gender-neutral whereas in reality they greatly favor men at women’s expense.”⁸⁸ Donor countries should make
women’s active involvement in projects a condition for giving aid.
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putting the cart before the horse
Women in Somalia, like women across Africa, have sought autonomy not
only to demand policy changes but more importantly, to fight for greater equality.
Women are at the forefront of struggles against patronage politics and corruption.⁸⁹
Nuruddin Farah writes that “to be a Somali and a woman fighting for equality and
social justice in these times requires an even greater deal of courage than in times
of peace. And yet it is more necessary than ever”.⁹⁰
here are however some positive signs that indicate that women’s sacrifices
and contributions are being slowly acknowledged. here are more people who are
now saying that we should give women a chance to see if they can bring peace to
Somalia, since men have only brought about destruction and misery.⁹¹ Male poets
have also paid tribute to women including one of the most renowned Somali poets
Mohamed Ibrahim Warsame “Hadrawi”, who in his poem Daba Huwan clearly
recognizes the life saving role of women and prays to God to give them the leadership, subordinating men to them:
And women are a bulwark
Half of your gift they are
What makes life possible
Is their tolerance
here is an obvious evil
hey were born in the hidden
hey dilute the sins of the man
Oh Lord, accept my prayers for them
Give the good (leadership) for us to women
And put men under their wings
What they destroyed, Oh Lord
If they don’t abstain from the wickedness
Oh Lord, the impending travails
A yet-to-be-seen accident
Oh Lord prevent us from it.⁹²
Jama Kediye, also a well-known poet, composed Siyaasad in which he also acknowledges that most women have met their responsibilities and asks God to
reward them:
And women are royalty
heir reputation is greatest
hey carry the children
hey raise the infants
hey take care of the old
Allah made it easy for them (to do their job)
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Ever hundred of them
here is a ninety
hat perform their job dutifully
Oh Allah, the saatir
Give them their reward
Conclusion
his paper has attempted to lay out how women challenge, often successfully,
patriarchal narratives. he gradual acknowledgement given to women’s positive
contribution to the society at large may be a product of this. Women create socially
durable groups as a way to create counter-realities and identities and in the process
defy patriarchy.
Unlike male poetry, a familiar theme within women’s poetry is their constant
concern for all Somalis and for Somalia. heir desire to see Somalia become successful in the world is also obvious. Somali women’s poetry clearly demonstrates
that they do not conform to the portrayal of the master narrative as inferior, incapable and unaware. heir poems reveal that Somali women have always played a
positive and active role in the affairs of their communities and that of their nation.
In fact, they have frequently challenged the men to confront tyrannical authorities whether external or internal. Due to their ability to bridge divisions within
the society because of their weak links to the patriarchal clan system, their focus
on meeting the needs of their families and creating an environment of peace and
stability, women can be the solution to Somalia’s problems. All that is needed is
for them to be asked them for their advice and as Hadrawi recommends to entrust
the leadership with them.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
Adan, 115
All proverbs will be italicized
Haji Dualah, 14
One proverb states that “reason and a chest that has produced milk do not go together”
See Kapteijns 1999, 45–46.
Ibid, 9
Ibid, 14
Choi-Ahmed, 158
Ibid, 159
In contrast, Somali men are described as “noble,” Ibid, 161
Ibid, 162
In fact, Choi-Ahmed’s article “Finely Etched Chattel he Invention of a Somali
woman” is littered with examples of these contradictions between master narratives
and the reality of women; for example, see p.161; p.162–3; p.166 etc.
Berger and Luckmann, 163–180
For example, the story of Huryo Ugaas clearly demonstrates this counter-narrative.
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putting the cart before the horse
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
When Huryo agrees to elope with Hersi, he brings along his cousin Kabacalaf to come
along. On the journey, Huryo decides to test Hersi’s intelligence. She finds him wanting and instead chooses to marry Kabacalaf who was able to answer all her questions.
See Haji-Dualah, 15.
In fact Berger and Luckmann note that children are socialized by the adults from their
gender and that male and female children “will know the version appertaining to the
other sex, to the extent that it has been mediated” to him/her by someone from the
opposite gender, “but he will not identify with this version” 168
Hassan, 167
Ibid 167
Haji-Dualah, 19. hat women valued these solidarity networks is also demonstrated
in this song, in which women call on each other to help those among them who are
less fortunate. Women why don’t you; Give the fatty tails of sheep; To the poor among
us? Ibid, 24.
Adan, 117 For the full lullaby see Kapteijns 1999; 58
Ibid 117
Adan, 6
Ibid, 59
Adan, 6
Haji Dualah, 17
Adan, 15
When he is his twenties, whenever he gets angry, just show him your thighs and he
will forget. When he is in his thirties, don’t ask him to divorce you, for he is already
ready to marry another wife. When he is in his forties, he is in his prime; avoid being
hit by him when he is angry… When he is in his eighties, do whatever you want. See
Kapteijns 1999, 45
Bryden, 2
Smock 1997 as quoted in Tamale, 9
Kapteijns 1993, 11
In one case were H. Rayne was the colonial officer in charge of the court, he asks his
interpreter to shut a Somali woman up, the interpreter responds “you cannot shut a
Somali woman up. Beat her, yes. Kill her, yes. But as long as she has an ounce of breath
left in her, she will talk”
Ibid, 13
Gordon, 64. For example, the British introduced a law called Nushuus laws, as part of
Islamic law in which disobedient wives were confined to remain in the marital home,
neither married nor divorced. Contrary to this, the Qur’an clearly states that men and
women are to live with each other in peace or leave one another in peace.
Steiner, 194
Tamale, 9
Haji-Dualah, 30
Ibid, 30
Ibid, 30
Ibid, 30
Ibid, 34
Jama, 7
Dualah, 31
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41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
80.
Haji-Dualah, 31
In 1951, a women’s section was set up within the syl and in 1959 in response to the
impending coming independence women organized themselves in to the Somali
Women’s Association in order to create a platform with which to present their demands.
Ibid, 36
Jama, 5
Ibid, 7
Tamale, 14
Haji Dualah, 38
Gordon, 63
Mubarak, 13
Jama, 189
Laitin and Samatar, 83
Somalia: Country Gender Profile, 3
Ibid, 3
See Lewis, 164. According to Islamic law, when inheriting from parents, women receive
half of what their brothers receive, because the brothers are responsible for the welfare
of their sisters from the portion that they receive (see Qur’an 4:7 & 4:11).
Ibid, 164
ilo, 75
Ibid
Translation by Zainab M. Jama and it is taken from a forthcoming doctoral thesis on
the poetry of Somali women
Jama, 190
ilo, 82
Mubarak, 14
Elmi, personal communication
Gordon, 63
Gordon 63; Elmi, personal communication
ilo, 79
Ibid, 80
Haji-Dualah, 59
Jama, 190
Ibid, 192
Jama, 190
Ibrahim and Adan as quoted in Jama, 190
Farah, 1996
Marchal, 11
Lyons and Samatar, 28
Ibid, 21
Mubarak, 17
Horsman and Marshall, 144
Osman, 1993
Ramsey Marshall, 27
Kapteijns, 1999 59
Farah, 2
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putting the cart before the horse
81.
82.
83.
84.
85.
86.
87.
88.
89.
90.
91.
92.
In fact, in order to cement truce agreements reached after fighting, clans would often
exchange women for marriage.
Adam and Ford, 21–22
Even though, women in the pastoral tradition tended to value daughter over sons believing that girls were more likely to take care of them in their old age. Women would
often pray “God save us from being a family without a girl” See Kapteijns 1999, 58
Adam and Ford, 22
Tamale, 23
Ibid, 23
Ibid, 25
Gordon, 138
Tripp, 2000
Farah, 1996
A novel titled “Has Anyone Asked Women for Advice” is part of this trend. his
book is a loosely fictionalized account of what happened in Somalia. In the beginning
of the story, a young boy is perched high on a tree, where the elders are meeting to
discuss how to bring about peace and stability between the Soofmaal. he elders are
unable to come up with a solution on how to recreate the peace that existed among
the Soofmaal, when the young boy’s question of “has anyone asked the women for
advice” is met with shocked silence. See Ali, Abdibasihr
I thank Said M. Shire for providing me with a copy of the poem and Mohamud H.
Khalif for the translation.
References
Adam, Amina (1989) “Women and words” Ufuhamu Vol. 10 (3): 115–142 Available at: http://
web.archive.org/web/19991010230319/srv01.anaserve.com/~mbali/ Retrieved: January
10, 2001 Adam, Hussein, Richard Ford et al. (1998) Removing Barricades in Somalia: Options for Peace and Rehabilitation. Washington, dc: United States Institute of Peace.
Ali, Abdibashi (2003) Dumar Talo Ma Laga Deyey – Women: he Solution to the Somalia
Crisis. Stockholm: Scansom Publishers 2ⁿd Edition
Berger, Peter L. and homas Luckmann (1966) he Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise
in the Sociology of Knowledge. New York: Anchor Books.
Bryden, Matt. (1998) Somalia between Peace and War: Somali Women on the Eve of the
21st Century. Nairobi, Kenya: unifem
Choi-Ahmed, Christine (1995) “Finely Etched Chattel: he Invention of a Somali Woman” The
Invention of Somalia. Ed. Ali Jimale Ahmed. Lawrenceville: he Red Sea Press, Inc.
Elmi, Zahra. (2001/02/14) Personal interview.
Farah Nuruddin. (November 15, 1996) “he women of Kismayo” The Times Literary Supplement (London), pp. Available: http://www.anaserve.com/~mbali/siteindex Retrieved
January 10, 2001
Gordon, April A. (1996) Transforming Capitalism and Patriarchy: Gender and Development
in Africa. Boulder, Co: Lynne Reinner Publishers, Inc.
Haji Dualah, Raqiya et al (n.d) Women’s Movements and Organizations in an Historical
Perspective. Research Project 1983–1985: Women and Development. he Hague, the
Netherlands: Institute of Social Studies.
114
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Hassan, Dahabo Farah, Amina H. Adan and Amina Mohamoud Warsame (1995) “Somalia:
Poetry as Resistance against Colonialism and Patriarchy” Subversive Women: Historical Experiences of Gender and Resistance Ed. Saskia Wierenga. Atlantic Highlands, nj,
usa: Zed Books.
Horsman, Mathew and Andrew Marshall. (1994) After the Nation-State: Citizen and Tribalism and the New World Disorder. London: Harper Collins Publishers.
ilo International Labour Organization. (1989) Generating employment and income in Somalia: Jobs and skills programme for Africa. Geneva: International Labour Organizations.
United Nations.
Jama, Zainab Mohamed. “Fighting to be heard: Somali women’s poetry” African Literature
and Cultures. London: School of Oriental and African Studies. Vol. 4 (1): 43–53. Available at: http://www.anaserve.com/~mbali/siteindex.htm Retrieved: January 10, 2001
Jama, Zainab Mohamed. Muted by culture: the poetic voices of contemporary Somali women From
the 1970s to the 1990s. University of London: Ph.D. Dissertation
Kapteijns, Lidwien. (1993). Women and the Crisis of Communal Identity: he Cultural
Construction of Gender in Somali History. Boston, ma: African Studies Center,
Boston University.
Kapteijns, Lidwien with Maryan Omar Ali (1999) Women’s Voices in a Man’s World: Women
and the Pastoral Tradition in Northern Somali Orature, c. 1899–1980 Portsmouth,
nh: Heinemann.
Lewis, I.M. (1993) Understanding Somalia: Guide to Culture, History and Social Institutions.
London: haan Associates 1993:
Lyons, Terrance and Ahmed 1. Samatar. (1995) Somalia: State Collapse, Multilateral Intervention, and Strategies for Political Reconstruction. Washington, dc: Brookings
Institution.
Marchal, Roland. ( July 1998). “Let’s Talk About Governance in Somalia” Written for undos.
Available: http://www.anaserve.com/~mbali/siteindex.htm Retrieved: November 11,
2001.
Mubarak, Jamil Abdalla. (1996) From Bad Policy to Chaos in Somalia: How an Economy Fell
Apart. Westport, Connecticut & London: Praeger.
Osman, Hibaaq I. (March/April, 1993) “Somalia: Will Reconstruction hreaten Women’s
Progress?” Ms. Magazine Available at: http://www.anaserve.com/~mbali/siteindex.htm
Retrieved: January 10, 2001. The Holy Qur-an with English translation of the meaning and commentary. Revised and Edited By: he Presidency of Islamic Researches.
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: King Fahd Holy Qur-an Printing Complex.
Ramsey Marshall, Donna. (2000) Women in war and peace: Grassroots Peacebuilding. Washington, dc: United States Institute of Peace. “Somalia: Country Gender Profile” (No date)
Washington dc World Bank. Available at: http://www.anaserve.com/~mbali/siteindex.
htm Retrieved: January 10, 2001.
Steiner, Martina (1997) “An Anthropological Outline of Gender relations and Politics in
Somalia” Pour une Culture de la Paix en Somalie Eds. Mohamed Mohamed-Abdi and
Patrice Bernard. Paris: European Association of Somali Studies.
Tamale, Sylvia. (1999) When hens begin to crow: Gender and parliamentary politics in Uganda.
Kampala, Uganda: Fountain Publishers.
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putting the cart before the horse
Tripp, Aili Mari. (2000) Women and politics in Uganda. Madison: University of Wisconsin
Press.
116
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Chapter Seven
Transformative Islam & Shifting Gender
Roles in he Somali Diaspora
Rima Berns McGown, Ph.D.
S
omen have been instrumental in keeping shattered Somali families
and communities together, both in the Diaspora and in the homeland. hey
have been at the forefront of the redefinition of Somalis’ practice of Islam as it has
occurred in the Diaspora in the years since mass migration, and in the transference
of ideas back into the homeland. As such, they have played, and continue to play, an
enormously influential role in the developing Somali sense of self and identity.
Catapulted into the Diaspora in the late 1980s with the breakdown of civic
society, Somalis in exile have tended to become significantly more religious than
they had been in their homeland.¹ heir practice of Islam has changed, however, and
been redefined in the process. And one of its most significant implications is that
gender roles have shifted: women increasingly hold more power within households
and within their communities as a result of their assumption of religious leadership
within the household.
W
More – and Differently – Religious
Almost all Somalis in Somalia are Muslims. Prior to mass emigration, Somalis were
depicted by I.M. Lewis and others as strong practitioners of Sufism.² However,
over the course of the 1970s, Islamist movements grew up in the urban centers of
Somalia – largely in response to the perceived ideological instability of the dictator
Siad Barre (1969–1991). hese movements have proven to be influential both within
Cart Horse 23 draft 3.indd 117
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putting the cart before the horse
Somalia in the aftermath of civil war and in the Diaspora, which has drawn the
majority of its exiles from urban centers.
he author’s research concluded that Somalis were forced to re-examine
their identity as Muslims upon migrating to the West in the 1980s and 1990s. his
re-examination occurred because they could not longer take their Muslim identities for granted, and because they and their children were faced, for the first time,
with an apparently bewildering array of competing faiths and practices, dominant
among them the West’s particular brand of Judeo-Christian-based secularism.
hese challenges forced immigrant Somalis to wrestle with their identities and to
answer questions for themselves about who they were and why. hey did not have
the luxury of time at their disposal. Even as parents hastened to secure housing, jobs,
English training, and sources of halal meat for their families, their children were
integrating – almost instantly – into schools and the world of their peers. Parents’
greatest fear in the Diaspora was of “losing” their children to an alien culture, one
that did not include Islam.
It was the immediacy of this fear, more than any other, that forced Somali
parents to re-examine their Islam and to begin to understand it in a new way. If they
were going to transmit it to their children, they could no longer rely on the wider
society to do it for them or to reinforce their values; they had to do it themselves.
herefore they had to grasp, in a more explicit way, what it was that they wanted
to transmit.
Exiled Somalis began to engage with the texts of Islam: to study the Qur’an
and the hadiths, and to form study groups to discuss their relevance to their lives in
the West. Women began to wear the hijab in a way that they had not traditionally
done in Somalia.
Because of the pressures of refugee life, and the fact that many families became separated during the course of the war or escape from it, single women often
found themselves at the head of families in exile. Sometimes their husbands were
dead, sometimes they were still in Somalia or in refugee camps in Kenya, hoping
to rejoin the family, and sometimes the couple had separated in the Diaspora, their
relationship unable to withstand the hardships of refugee life. But even in the cases
of intact families, the woman – taking traditional responsibility for the children
while her husband sought employment, would still be the one to cope with the
perceived ‘loss’ of culture among the children, and would therefore find herself
becoming more – and differently – religious.
Women in Somalia have not traditionally been segregated or kept in purdah.
heir work in the traditional pastoral society required that they be mobile. It was
they who cared for the family’s sheep, goats, and cattle, while the men took responsibility for the camels – considered the heart of a family’s wealth. In addition, it
was the women who struck and remade the family’s portable housing every time a
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Transformative Islam & Shifting Gender Roles in The Somali Diaspora
move was necessary. Somali head-coverings, such the gauzy melchabad, tended to
be worn to beautify the wearer rather than hide her features, and often displayed
her hair, neck, and breastbones.
A closer reading of the Qur’an on emigrating Westward, however, as well as a
perceived need to emphasize their adherence to ‘their’ religion, culture, and values,
has prompted many Somali women in the Diaspora to wear the hijab. his may
take the form of the traditional opaque garbasaar or other thick cloth, folded in a
triangle so as not to expose hair or neck. Or it may even be the jilbab (pl. jelaabib),
the garb favored by the Islamist movements. he jilbab is a two-piece garment: a
long, ankle-length gown, buttoned up the front, topped by al-qimar, the head-scarf,
which is sometimes long and sweeping itself, as far as mid-calf or merely over the
shoulders. It was designed to give women maximum flexibility and movement
while covered from head to toe, and, like other Somali dress, jelaabib are found in
strong, glorious colors in addition to shades of black and brown.
Many Somali women in the Diaspora participate actively in Qur’an classes
and study circles. hey pray five times daily. Moreover, they actively attend prayers
at their local mosques, especially the Friday noon prayer, something that they
were not wont to do – and that mosques were not built to accommodate – in their
homeland.
Changing Attitudes to Sexuality
he combination of a redefined practice of Islam and the accommodation to living
in the West has resulted in a re-evaluation of attitudes towards sexuality in several
significant regards.
birth-control
Almost all teenaged girls and women interviewed on the subject of birth control
indicated that in the West it is both acceptable and unavoidable. Men tended to
maintain that the number of children born to a couple was Allah’s wish, and that
the couple should not interfere, except to breast-feed babies for two years in the
hope that this would prevent conception.³
Birth control, or family planning, is not viewed uniformly by Muslim jurists.
Although large families have traditionally been encouraged in order to ensure a
strong Muslim community, economic and development issues have prompted legal
positions that allowed for family planning in many Muslim countries. he only birth
control mentioned in the hadiths is ‘azl (coitus interruptus), which was frequently
frowned upon in fiqh (jurisprudence) literature because it was seen to be detrimental to the woman.⁴ On the other hand, Basim Musallam maintains that there is
significant juridical support for birth control, based on hadiths which indicate the
Prophet’s tolerance of the practice, and on the writings of such respected jurists
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as al-Ghazali.⁵ Many contemporary ‘ulama rule that the use of contraceptives is
permissible as long as both husband and wife agree to it, and national family planning programs have been implemented in a number of Muslim countries. Many
Islamists, on the other hand, discourage the use of birth control on the grounds that
it contributes to immoral behavior such as pre- and extra-marital sexual activity.⁶
Pre-marital Sex
For most Somalis, this issue strikes at the heart of their fears for their daughters.
Pre-marital sex for girls is a taboo in traditional Somali society. Somali parents
frequently voiced fears that their daughters, in imbibing the ‘freedom’ of the West,
would forego their Muslim and Somali values in favor of Western ones, and engage
in pre-marital sex. (hey did not voice similar concerns about their sons.)
Not surprisingly, attitudes towards pre-marital sex were varied across generational lines. Parents, and other people over thirty, by and large, were horrified of
the possibility that they might not be able to keep their daughters’ virginity intact
until their marriages. Teenagers, too, were unanimous in their stated aversion to
pre-marital sex. Women and men in their twenties, however, were not so sweeping in their pronouncements. While there were unmarried women and men who
maintained that pre-marital sex was not acceptable to them as Muslims, others were
not so unequivocal. Some women, as well as men, said that their views had shifted
on this issue in the years since they had arrived in the West. hese people said that
they no longer believed it was wrong, as Muslims, to engage in pre-marital sex,
although they acknowledged that it would pain their parents grievously to know of
their views. he interesting point is that every person who held this view considered
herself or himself to be a practising Muslim, and each of them maintained that they
had grown more religious on moving to the West, rather than less so.
Extra-marital Sex
Similarly, many people – including adults who rejected the notion of their children
engaging in pre-marital sex – were less condemnatory on the subject of extra-marital sex, particularly in circumstances where one partner in a marriage was dead or
had been separated from the family for a lengthy period. Although considered not
ideal, even objectionable, people accepted that it was unavoidable, particularly in
times of societal upheaval such as the community in exile was experiencing. Again,
it is interesting that the people holding these views considered themselves to be
religious Muslims – more religious than they had been in their homeland.
Female Circumcision or Female Genital Mutilation
Both the terms ‘female circumcision’ and ‘female genital mutilation’ are problematic.
he former implies a procedure that is as uncomplicated and without repercussions
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as its male counterpart, which it is not, while the second implies an intention to
harm the victim, which is unfair and inaccurate.
Female circumcision has been expressly outlawed in Britain since 1985, and
this step was taken in Canada in 1995. In 1994, for the first time, a Somali woman
was granted refugee status in Canada due to the fear that her daughter would be
infibulated were she to return to her homeland.⁷ For Somalis, the particular issue
is that in their oral Muslim society, infibulation was historically understood to be
a requirement of being a good Muslim woman.
In her book Infibulation, Esther Hicks maintains that the practice, which predated Islam, served as a mechanism to ensure virginity among unmarried girls in
pastoral societies. hese societies developed a physical chastity belt which was meant
to perform the same function as seclusion because they were unable to separate the
girls physically from possible violation. he importance of virginity and chastity
outside marriage, the maintenance of family honor, and the perpetuation of patrilineal lineage were all values which found a solid echo in Islam when the religion
was adopted. As a result, the practice was maintained and reinforced,⁸ even once
the societies evolved into agricultural or otherwise settled communities. In closed
pastoral-originated societies, she argues, there has been little reason for change.
he essential point about female circumcision is that, as Somali women in the
Diaspora leave their ‘closed’ society, educate themselves about the texts of Islam,
and become more religious, they find that female circumcision is not the Muslim
requirement their oral society had taught them to believe it was, and they have
begun to speak against it, and to end the practice. hey have separated the religious
from the cultural, and decided in favor of the religious. he Islamist groups reject
the practice, and this is one area in which they have shown their influence.
here does exist a degree of backlash against the revulsion of the West to
the practice, a backlash against the barrage of health clinics and television shows
depicting the ‘barbarism’ of the practice and its practitioners. It is a backlash that
is articulated by people – both men and women – who declare with pride that
female circumcision is a Somali practice, and Westerners, who are guilty of their
own ‘barbaric’ assaults on women (in the form of inflicting the ideal of impossible
thin-ness on adolescents and subjecting them to a lifetime of dieting and such
life-threatening conditions as anorexia and bulimia) have no right to preach to
Somalis, and that Somalis alone will decide how and when to end the practice.
his backlash is more pronounced in London than in Toronto, for reasons that will
become apparent below. Nonetheless, it is but a minor phenomenon; by and large
women are retreating from the practice.
More Power to Women
he power and status of women within the Somali Diaspora communities has in121
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creased since exile. he Somali novelist Nurrudin Farrah remarked on the strength
of Somali women in a Toronto appearance in 1998⁹, both in having helped their
families through the war and its aftermath in Somalia, and in building the Diaspora
communities. His remarks are born out by my observations.
Often it is the women who have found work, even in two-parent families, and
support the families. hey have done so in single-parent families as well. hey have
kept families intact spiritually, frequently by leading the re-imagination of Islam
within the family. It is the women who have donned the hijab or even the jilbab,
enrolled their children in Qur’an schools, instituted hours of prayer and study at
home. hey have set the examples in the home of what they want their children
to be, and the children – although the mothers frequently decry them as lost – are
keen not to disappoint their mothers, and follow their examples in re-imagining,
even if that re-imagining happens in a way that distresses the mothers because it
is such a different re-imagining – their relationship with their faiths. he children
follow the letter if not the spirit of the mothers’ example, and endow their mothers
with greater household and community status as they do so.
his is particularly true given that the community has needed to adopt new
patterns of parenting since moving to the West. Within Somalia, authority was
traditionally assumed to flow from male to female and from elder to youth. Respect
was expected to stream in the other direction. Authority was expected to be reinforced by corporal punishment where necessary. Somalis, however, found themselves
in exile in societies which have witnessed their own debates over child-raising
over the past half-century, and corporal punishment is out of favor in Britain and
Canada. Parents are expected to respect their children as much as children respect
them, and to spank them rarely, if at all. For Somali parents to be questioned, as
many have been, on grounds of child-abuse, after enduring unendurable horror
and hardship in their homeland and in the leaving of it, has seemed to many the
ultimate insult. As one parent put it:
his society has seen a breakdown in the family system. We don’t have
the tradition of a Children’s Aid Society. his is an alien system. In Somalia if
you abuse your kids, society will alienate you. his is a terrible sanction so the
system corrects for people who would hurt their kids. Some kids use this system
[in Canada] to gain additional freedom. he major thing is if the institution is
there for the kids’ welfare, and the parents are there for the kids’ welfare, there
is one objective, so the major thing is to mediate misunderstandings between
parents and institutions.
he thing is, parents who have taken their kids 20,000 miles from a
war-torn country will never hurt their kids. Parents who have had to face danger – hunger, lions, fear, uncertainty, murder, the trauma of leaving everything
behind and braving immigration to a new country – these people have faced
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things that social workers in Canada will never begin to understand – all to
keep their children safe. Why would they then hurt their children? Of course
they would not.¹⁰
Nevertheless, parents have had to learn to accommodate themselves to new
fashions in child-rearing. Many parents mentioned a fear that one call from a
recalcitrant child to Toronto’s or London’s emergency services (‘911’ in Toronto or
‘999’ in London) would see the children removed from the home into the care of
(non-Muslim) child welfare agencies. he fear of the loss of their authority has
made it all the more important for mothers to set a good example for their children,
and has them all the more frightened when their children do not appear to follow
precisely in their footsteps.
Teenagers
Teenagers are a fascinating group, because they are so vulnerable and yet so bold. As
proud of their identities and their heritage as their parents, they must yet infiltrate
and live in the world of the school and their peers. It is not apparent to them – as
it is to many of their parents – that these factors are irreconcilable. he teens see
no reason why they cannot be Canadian or English, Somali, and Muslim, all at the
same time, although they have found this to be an easier balancing act in Toronto
than in London.
Parents cry that they have ‘lost’ their children. heir dress, their talk, their attitudes seem alien and unfamiliar, even unIslamic. However, the children themselves
are fiercely proud of their Islam. here were many Muslim children in Toronto
schools before the Somali exiles moved there, but it was Somali teenagers who
asked for a prayer room and prayed in the halls until they were given one. Every
teenager I interviewed had developed his or her own chart through the stormy seas
of adolescence, using Islam as a compass. To be sure, there were differences in how
they interpreted its signs, but in all cases they acted out of a belief that they were
being true to what they considered to be essential to their faith. In one teen’s case,
this might mean no parties and no movies; in another’s, this might mean parties
but no dancing, or dancing but no alcohol (in fact, not a single teenager thought
that drinking alcohol was acceptable). Some thought that no relations were possible
with the opposite sex until marriage. Others thought that relations were possible
as long as no touching was involved; for some touching was alright, so long as this
did not include sex. Almost no-one in this age group sanctioned pre-marital sex.
Similarly, although most teenagers said that their friends were mostly Somali, they
also said that they believed it was possible and acceptable to have friends who were
non-Somali, and non-Muslim. Almost all of them said that it would be important
to them to marry Muslims (not necessarily Somalis) and to bring their children
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up to be Muslim. hey identified their community – as did their elders – as the
community of Muslims, and not just other Somalis.
Teenaged girls varied widely in their views on the importance of covering their
hair. Some felt that it was extremely important, for the same reasons their mothers
did. Others felt that it was not. It was what was in their hearts, not on their heads,
that defined them as Muslims, they reasoned. And they were acutely aware that in
Somalia that would not have been asked to wear the hijab at this point in their lives,
and probably would not have covered their hair in any way until they married.
he question of praying was equally complicated for them. Many teenagers did pray five times daily, and declared proudly that they did so wherever they
happened to be when it was time to pray (including subway stops). Others said
that they found the five times daily requirement to be particularly onerous, and
said that therefore they prayed intermittently. Others did not pray at all, but said
that they thought about it frequently, and regretted that they did not, intending to
begin when they were older.
he point again, as elsewhere, is that – however they practice – these teenagers consider themselves to be ‘good’ Muslims, even if they envision themselves
practicing differently as they age.
London versus Toronto
Notwithstanding the facts that the Somali immigrant communities arrived in
Toronto and London at roughly the same time,¹¹ and that London and Toronto
are both large, multicultural cities, there are significant differences in how Somalis
have been integrating into the wider societies around them. Somalis in London
spoke continually of being isolated, distanced, and ghettoized by British society.
Somalis in Toronto – while noting that Canada is not as racism-free as its residents
might like to think – generally spoke of feeling Canadian, comfortable, ‘a part of ’
their adopted society. In both cities Somalis tended to become more religious in
exile: in London that change sometimes happened with a defiant and bitter twist;
in Toronto that defiant edge was lacking. In London Somalis frequently said that
no matter how long they resided in Britain, they could not see themselves ever
feeling British. hey envied relatives in Canada who spoke of Canadian politics
as ‘their’ politics. hey said that if there was an advantage to British prejudice it
was that it helped them keep their culture and religion. In Toronto they spoke of
a surprise at the ease with which their culture and religion was accepted by the
wider society. One woman – in Toronto for seven years – declared her intention
to learn French (she had barely mastered English) because, as a Canadian, she felt
it her duty to be proficient in both official languages. Toronto Somalis showed a
stunningly greater attachment to their adopted society than did London Somalis.
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Islamism in London has an unmistakably defiant edge; in Toronto, Islamism is
interpreted as a legitimate expression of culture and identity.
hese differences are important for two reasons. First, they are an indication
that, just as Islam is not a monolith, neither is the West. here are as many examples of ‘Westness’ as there are political cultures in them. Political culture is a key
determinant of how an immigrant-receiving society helps to integrate newcomers.
Integration, in the sense in which I use it, denotes an accommodation on both the
part of the newcomer and, significantly, of the wider society. I hold the view that
immigrant-receiving societies are as changed over time by the inclusion of the immigrants who are enfolded into their midst, as are the immigrant communities.
A society’s political culture describes how its political institutions are used in
its own context. In other words, both Britain and Canada are both constitutional
democracies, yet for any number of reasons their laws and institutions are used
very differently to enfold, welcome, accommodate, and integrate immigrants and
minorities into their midst. Britain has not been as successful as Canada in granting immigrants legitimacy to participate in the wider society, to feel that they are a
legitimate and welcomed part of it, and therefore, in turn, to accept their contribution to the self-understanding of the “imagined community”¹² that is a nation.
his creates implications for the commitment to the life of the community and the adopted society experienced and felt by the immigrant community.
Harmonious integration is bound to create more committed citizens, such as the
Toronto Somali woman determined to learn French, than is a distancing, ostracizing environment.
ijtihad
Two concepts are important for understanding the religious shifts that are occurring within the Somali Diaspora community. he first of these is ijtihad. Ijtihad
means independent reasoning, and it refers to the ability of individual Muslims to
interpret the Qur’an and hadiths for themselves, without requiring the intervention of the ‘ulama in these interpretations. Or, even if the ‘ulama are taken into
account, an ongoing diffusion of religious legitimacy within the Muslim world¹³
means that different ‘ulama might be heeded than prior to emigration. In other
words, as the Muslim Diaspora grows, and significant communities of Muslims
grow up in cities throughout the Western world, those cities become legitimate
and thriving Muslim centers. his is true of London and Birmingham, Toronto
and Markham. Mosques, imams, Friday qutba prayers, competing traditions from
different Muslim immigrant communities: all these factors combine to give the
impetus to individuals to read the texts and decide for themselves how to interpret
them. Somalis interviewed in London and Toronto took their religious cues from
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Somali and non-Somali imams in their midst, and not from the Middle Eastern
heart of the Muslim world or even from their Muslim-majority homeland. Toronto
and London have become centers of Islam in their own rights.¹⁴ Moreover, the
interviews were full of the views of women who asserted their rights as religious
Muslims to decide, sometimes with the help of imams as guides, how best to adapt
Islam to their needs in the West. A pertinent example of this is a quote from Deeqa,
a student in her twenties in Toronto:
For us when culture and religion coincide, that’s good, but when culture
contradicts religion, that’s difficult, because Somali culture has become so Arabized. It’s difficult to distinguish one from another.
I hope being here makes this process easier. As a woman if you argue
through Islam it’s more liberating than taking a Western stand. Men can’t
argue with the religion. And the religion says women, as much as men, must be
educated. So long as your position is in the Qur’an, there is no obstacle. I hope
other Muslim women read and learn to think this way.¹⁵
Hijra
he second term of importance is hijra. The Hijra refers to the movement of Muhammad and his followers from Mecca to Medina in 622 ce, and, following this,
hijra refers to migration from a territory hostile to the practice of Islam to one that
is accepting of it. Doctrinally, Muslims are not meant to remain in non-Muslim
majority lands, as these are taken to be the lands of unbelief and therefore hostile
to Islam (dar al-kufr). Good Muslims are meant, therefore, to move as soon as possible to Muslim-majority lands: dar al-Islam. However, this doctrine is increasingly
being turned on its head as religious Muslims declare that they are, in fact, able to
practice Islam as they see fit in the West and that sometimes they are better able to
practice it in the West than in homelands that allow only for narrow interpretations
of the practice of the faith. For many Muslims, the West has become dar al-da’wa,
the land of preaching, as described by Shaykh Faisal Malawi.¹⁶
his is a huge and critical shift, and has allowed for the rapid transformation
in the legitimacy of how Islam is imagined, and by whom.
Formal versus Informal Power Shifts
It is perhaps important to emphasize that the increase in status and power to which
I refer is an informal, as opposed to a formal, one. One will not – at least in the
short term – find women imams, or find women leading the work of the Islamists,
or even working among them. he shifts to which I have referred are significantly
more subtle. hey have to do with the role women are seen to play within the family, the household, the community. In socioeconomic terms (as providers) and in
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religious terms (as leaders of the re-definition/re-imagination of Islam within the
family) women are gaining esteem.
Somali women are playing – and are seen to be playing – significantly more
important roles than was their wont in their homeland. his is true in spite of the
fact that the religious orthodoxy itself assigns women a minor public role.
What is happening – beneath the formal surface of Diaspora Islam – is a
wider example of Deeqa’s creed. Muslim women are gaining strength, power, and
status through their use, and not rejection, of Islam.
his has huge long-term implications for the Diaspora communities and for
the development of what I have called ‘transformative’ – re-imagined Islam.
Two cautionary remarks are in order. he first is that this article has focused on
women, but it does not mean to imply that it is Somali women, and not men, who
have transformed their interpretation of Islam. Somali men have of course been
involved in the same process. It is they who have been at the forefront of the Islamist
movements, which have gained prestige in the Diaspora in large part because it is
in the Diaspora that the movements’ religious – as opposed to political – dynamic
gains in importance.
Secondly, the inference of this analysis is not that Canada’s is an ideal society from an immigrant/minority perspective. Far from it. As writers such as M.
Nourbese Phillips and Dionne Brand express with eloquence, Canada has trouble
admitting the extent to which racism – including systemic racism – exists within
its borders.¹⁷ Nor is it intended to cast an unreasonably rosy glow on the diasporic
condition. Times of resettlement are times of immense personal and community
stress. Moreover, in both Canada and Britain Muslims face significant anti-Muslim
prejudice. Cultural or religious racism is frequently not recognized for what it is.¹⁸
Interviews indicated that color was more of a barrier to integration for Somalis in
London than in Toronto, but religion was an issue in both cities.
In fact, the very source of strength for Somali women within their communities – the hijab that endows them with Muslim legitimacy and therefore greater status – often stigmatizes them within the larger community. Many women reported
that they have been refused employment because of their headscarves. One London
respondent said that she has taken to removing her hijab before job interviews, and
replacing it only three or four weeks after she has secured the position. By that
point, she reasons, her employers will see her as a competent employee, and the
hijab is more likely to be viewed as an irrelevant and legitimate personal choice. At
the job interview, however, it can be seen as anything from a political statement to
a sign of a woman’s submission to her male relatives.
Deeqa, for instance, argued with her religious future husband to ensure that he
saw her right to complete her education and work outside the home as Islamically
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correct and compatible. With the co-operation of an imam, she found it a much
easier argument to win than the one that she continues to have with feminists at
her university and her workplace, who insist on viewing her as an anti-feminist
because of her decision to wear the hijab.
he tools of women’s strength within the Somali Diaspora communities,
therefore, appear to undermine it in the larger society. Not until the larger society
understands that religious or cultural racism is as damaging to its victims as color
racism, and not until it is more widely understood – and accepted – that integration
is a process of change that involves immigrants and adoptive society both, is that
likely to change. Nevertheless, it is important to keep sight of the possibilities for
transformation and change that exist within the fluidity of life in the Diaspora.
Conclusion
Gender and power relationships have shifted within the Diaspora Somali communities, largely because women have been instrumental in leading the re-imagination of their practice of Islam. he communities have become more religious
in the West, not less so, and they have become differently religious. Somalis have
become Western, but not Westernized, Muslims, re-defining their definition of a
‘good Muslim’ and their practice of Islam in the process. Because women – in their
quest to keep the children grounded in their religion, culture, and values, and out
of a need to understand their own identities faced with the challenges of an alien
culture – have been key to this religious re-definition, their power and status within
the community has been, and will continue to be, enhanced. However stressful
resettlement may be, it offers immense opportunities for the re-imagination and
re-definition of both Islam, and the relationship between Muslims in the West
and the wider society around them. It also offers unprecedented opportunities for
a rebalancing of gender relationships in the homeland, as porous borders and the
transnational flow of ideas mean that phenomenon developed in the Diaspora take
root at home as well.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
Interviews for this article were drawn from a larger study by the author. Muslims in
the Diaspora: The Somali Communities of London and Toronto (Toronto: University of
Toronto Press, forthcoming, 1999).
I.M. Lewis, “Sufism in Somaliland: A Study in Tribal Islam”, in Akhbar S. Ahmed
and David M. Hart, eds. Islam in Tribal Societies (London and Boston: Routledge and
Kegan Paul, 1984), p. 159.
Breast-feeding has been shown to be an unreliable method of birth-control.
Donna Lee Bowen, “Family Planning”, in Esposito, ed., The Oxford Encyclopedia of the
Modern Islamic World, Vol. 1, pp. 464–465.
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Transformative Islam & Shifting Gender Roles in The Somali Diaspora
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
Musallam, Sex and Society in Islam (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983),
notably Chapter One, “Why Islam Permitted Contraception”, pp. 10–38.
Bowen, he Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, Vol. 1, pp. 464–465.
A similar decision was taken for the first time in the United States in June, 1996. New
York Times, June 14, 1996, p. 1.
Esther Hicks, Infibulation: Female Mutilation in Islamic Northeastern Africa (London,
uk and New Brunswick, usa: Transaction Publishers, 1993).
Harbourfront Reading Series, October 25, 1998.
Interview with Rashid, an outreach worker who solves intercultural disputes between
Somali parents and Toronto schools, Toronto, April 26, 1995.
Somalis were employed by the British merchant navy to work in the engine rooms of
steamships. While the ships were docked in London, the seamen stayed in lodgings
in the East End, where a small transient community gradually built up. Similar communities grew in Cardiff, Liverpool, and South Shields. Shamis Hussein, “Somalis
in London”, Nick Merriman, ed., The Peopling of London: Fifteen Thousand Years of
Settlement from Overseas (London: Museum of London, 1993), p. 163
in Benedict Anderson’s famous phrase, from Imagined Communities: Reflections on
the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London: Verso, 1983).
Dale Eickelman and James Piscatori, Muslim Politics (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1996), pp. 68–79 and 131–135.
Barbara Daly Metcalf, ed., Making Muslim Space in North America and Europe (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1996).
Interview, Deeqa, Toronto, March 24, 1995.
W.A. Shadid & P.S. Van Koningsveld, The Integration of Islam and Hinduism in Western
Europe (Kampen: Kok Pharos, 1991), p. 229.
See, for instance, M. Nourbese Philip, Frontiers: Essays and Writings on Racism and
Culture (Toronto: he Mercury Press, 1992) or Dionne Brand, Bread out of Stone, (Toronto : Coach House Press, 1994).
See Islamophobia: A Challenge For Us All (London: 1997, Runnymede Trust).
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Brand, Dionne. Bread out of Stone. Toronto: Coach House Press, 1994.
Breton, R., Isajiw, W., Kalbach, W., and Reitz, J. Ethnic Identity and Equality: Varieties of
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Commission on British Muslims and Islamophobia. Islamophobia: Its Features and Dangers.
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Dench, Geoff. Fighting with Numbers: Strategies of Somali Refugees in East London.
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Doi, ‘Abdul Rahman I. Woman in Shari’ah. London: Ta-Ha Publishers, 1989.
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Eickelman, Dale and Piscatori, James. Muslim Politics. Princeton: Princeton University
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El Dareer, Asma. Woman, Why Do You Weep? Circumcision and its Consequences. London: Zed Books, 1982.
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Esposito, John. The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality?, revised edition. Oxford and New York:
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Gallo, Pia Grassivaro. La Circoncisione Femminile in Somalia. Milano: Franco Angeli, 1986.
Gilroy, Paul. The Empire Strikes Back. London: Hutchinson & Co., 1982.
Gilroy, Paul. There Ain’t no Black in the Union Jack. London: Hutchinson & Co., 1987.
Glazer, Nathan, and Moynihan, Daniel Patrick. Beyond the Melting Pot: The Negroes, Puerto
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Glazer, Nathan and Moynihan, Daniel, eds. Ethnicity: Theory and Experience. Cambridge,
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Gordon, Paul. Citizenship for Some? Race and Government Policy 1979–1989. London:
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Haddad, Yvonne Hazbeck and Smith, Jane Idleman. Muslim Communities in North America.
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Halliday, Fred. Arabs in Exile: Yemeni Migrants in Urban Britain. London: I.B. Tauris,
1992.
Halliday, Fred. Islam and the Myth of Confrontation. London: I.B. Tauris, 1995.
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Chapter Eight
Landless Landlors, and Landed Tenants: Plantation
Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
“Murug Maahino ii Masiibo Aduunyo-Minaa Minin Keeyga Leegu Maamulaaiyo.” (Isn’t it disheartening and reflective of the unfairness of this world that
we are bossed around in our own abode). Mohamed Ali, a Jareer bard, 1988.¹
Omar A. Eno
York University, History Department
S
Introduction
ost studies of East African slave plantations have concentrated on Zanzibar
and Pemba, probably because they were the two most visible slave-holding
centers in the region. Consequently, research on plantation slavery along the rest
of the East African coast, in particular, the Benadir coast of Southern Somalia, has
been less critically scrutinized. What is more problematic, though, is that most
research projects carried out along the Benadir coast of Southern Somalia² operate from three epistemologically erroneous assumptions. he first suggests that
the overwhelming majority of the Bantu/Jareer population of Southern Somalia
were slaves imported from East Africa. his assumption has, in turn, created the
belief, both among scholars and lay people, that these people are essentially either
runaway or emancipated slaves, and therefore they have neither claim to full Somali
citizenship nor any right to the farming land they occupy. On the contrary, however, oral traditions as well as available archival records indicate that the majority
of the Bantu/Jareer people had occupied their present location as far back as the
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putting the cart before the horse
10t century. his is not to suggest that some slaves were not imported from East
Africa, but their numbers were very small in relation to the indigenous population.
he second suggests that the Somali people did not partake in the enslavement
of the Bantu/Jareer people, while the third assumption indicates that the reason
the Italian colonial administration abolished slavery in Somalia was mainly for
humanitarian reasons.
he purpose of this paper is to dispel these assumptions by (1) examining the
origin and the historical background of the Bantu/Jareer people; (2) to examine
the role of Somalis in the enslavement of the Jareer people; and (3) to examine
the mutually reinforcing political and economic interests of both Somalis and the
Italian colony in maintaining slave-like situations, so that they can retain the labor
of the Jareer people.³
he first section of this paper examines the origins, historical background,
and settlement patterns of the Bantu/Jareer people along both the Juba and the
Shabelle Rivers and their historical and contemporary social and economic interactions with Somali nomads. he second section focuses on the process through
which the Bantu/Jareer people on the one hand were enslaved by the Somalis and
on the other later by the Italian colonies. he third and the final section deals with
the political and economic conditions that hindered the implementation of the
abolition of slavery as articulated through the Belgian abolition act.
The Origin of The Bantu/Jareer People
Written as well as oral traditions indicate that the Jareer people of Southern
Somalia consist of three groups: (a) runaway slaves, (b) emancipated-slaves, and
(c) indigenous population. he majority of available scholarship, however, has
concentrated on the first two groups, possibly because of their lower social status
among Somalis, or their alleged distinctive physical features, that is, the so-called
“Negroid” look. he history and identity of the third group (indigenous) remains
unaccounted for. his problem, according to available research, resulted from the
difficulty of separating them from the Somali clan groups, with whom they were
culturally assimilated.⁴ his paper takes a different angle and divides the Bantu/Jareer people into two groups: (1) communities formed by runaway slaves, who were
later emancipated groups, and (2) descendents of the Shungwaya kingdom, who
today represent the Jareer indigenous population. he first group will be referred
to as the Wazigwa,⁵ (Gosha people of Juba River), while the second are Mjikenda.⁶
he latter are believed to be the remnants of the Shungwaya Kingdom and residents along the Shebelle River. his distinction is necessitated by the fact that some
scholars have often conflated them and broad-brushed them as one group of the
same historical background, while in reality they are from two different historical
settings and cultural backgrounds.
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
The Wazigwa Origins
he first group, the Wazigwa, consists of runaway and manumitted slaves. It seems
that Arab slave merchants originally brought them from Tanganyika, Zanzibar,
Pemba, and Mozambique into the coastal cities of Merca, Brava, Kisimayu, and
Mogadishu early in the 19t century.⁷ Some scholars suggest that they left Tanganyika, their country of origin (modern Tanzania), because of severe famines in
the 19t century. Another possibility is that Arab traders may have duped them by
promising to take them to work in a fertile land where famine and drought are
never experienced.⁸ Despite some of these suggestions, though, it is clear that these
people were initially brought as slaves and sold to Somalia’s coastal people, and later
to the Hawiya Somalis in the interior of Southern Somalia.
After some time, many of the enslaved Bantu escaped from their Somali masters with the intention of returning to their homes (modern Tanzania).⁹ hey failed
in this attempt and subsequently settled in the Gosha¹⁰ ‘Forest’ region along the
Juba River, where they established ‘maroon’ communities, erecting strong defenses
against re-enslavement. It is also likely that, at the time of their escape, the Wazigwa
found some indigenous Jareer population already dwelling in the vicinity of their
newly-established resettlement (Gosha), which later developed as a state. he new
state of Gosha became prosperous under the leadership of Majenderu, Wanakucha,
Mkomo Maliku, Shungor Mafula, Nassib Bunde (a local hero who fought against
the Somali slave-masters and the Italian colony), and Shaykh Murjan (a prominent
religious leader) respectively.¹¹ According to R. Bricchetti, an Italian anti-slavery
activist, the Wazigwa had sworn in the name of God and equality that they would
fight to maintain their freedom to the last person and would never submit/surrender
themselves to their ex-Somali slave masters. heir motto was “…vivere liberi e liberi
morire,”¹² (we live free and die free). Another important run-away slave community
was established in Avai near Barava. According to Barile, “…ex-Somali slave owners
such as Tuuni, Beghed[i], Giddu, and Biyamaal tried several times to destroy [Avai],
the new runaway slave settlement, but failed in their attempts.”¹³ As a result of their
military might, the Italian colonial authority recognized Avai as an independent
entity, and began to send fugitive slaves seeking protection under Italian authorities
to this new haven.¹⁴ It is also possible that Italy recognized Avai as an independent
entity because of their rich agricultural estates, and Avai remained as ‘free’ Bantu
communities until the imposition of Italian colonial authority.
The Mjikenda Origin
he second group of Bantu/Jareer people in Somalia are linked and believed to be
the remnants of the Mjikenda people, who migrated to the Tana River in modern
Kenya after being driven from Ethiopia by Oromo fighters in the 15t and 16t
centuries. hese Jareer people reside mainly along the banks of the Shabelle River
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putting the cart before the horse
in Southern Somalia. According to Cerulli, the Mjikendas could be the natives and
descendants of the ancient and controversial Kingdom of Shungwaya, located in
Buur Gaabo. Alice Werner and Cerulli suggest that Shungwaya is known to have
been an ancient Kingdom and the headquarters of the then-King, Mze-Sagawambe
Mkawma of the Bantu/Jareer people in Southern Somalia.¹⁵ Despite the need
for further research, it is safe to assume that Shungwaya was a well-established
Kingdom with rules and traditions generally respected by all its residents, who at
the time consisted of nine to twelve ethnic groups.¹⁶
Aside from those groups who migrated to the Tana River (in present Kenya),
there were those who remained behind, and continue to live in their present locations in Southern Somalia. hese are, according to oral tradition, the Pokomo, the
Shidle, the Shabelle, the Eile, the Bajuni, and others. Most of these ethnic groups
lived together,¹⁷ alongside the victorious Oromo, who invaded their territory in the
15t and 16t centuries, and who were in turn invaded by the Somali-Hawiya. At
any rate, the Mjikenda from the Shabelle River are believed to be the indigenous
stock that has resided in their present area for several centuries.¹⁸ A group of anthropologists have stated that “…we may reckon those [Bantu/Jareer] tribes in all
probability represent remnants of a pre-Somali population going back to the first
millennium of the Christian era.”¹⁹ Additionally, the Shungwaya Kingdom is also
known to be a point of dispersal of the ethnic Somali Bantu in modern Kenya.²⁰
We must also add here, it is likely that this second group of Jareer, the Mjikenda,
later absorbed some of the emancipated and runaway slaves (Wazigwa) from Somali
slave-owners. his absorption could be seen as an indication of their long existence
in the area. According to Luling: “Before the Somali [pastoralist] penetrated the
area [in the south] in the 16t and 17t centuries, a population of Bantu-speaking
cultivators inhabited the river lands.”²¹ hey are described as being “[d]istinctly
Negroid in physical type, whereas the [nomads] have the ‘Hamitic’ features typical
of the Somali in general…”²²
he Negroid features of the Bantu soon became a distinct identity where
people with such features were classified as slaves and subjected to a variety of
discriminatory practices²³ regardless of where they came from.²⁴ As a result, for
the majority of slave owning groups, Negroid features became synonymous with
inferior status, as Luling describes:
“Traditional Somali society is famous for its egalitarian character, and yet
it is known that some of its members were much less equal than the rest. [he]
category of people whose status was traditionally inferior was the farming villagers of inter-riverine [Bantu] area.”²⁵
It appears that the notion of inequality between the nomadic and coastal
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
peoples on the one hand and the Jareer on the other existed for centuries. hese
factors have further contributed to the creation of a strong and influential myth.
A myth perpetuated by Somali officials and by some scholars suggested that the
entire Jareer population in Somalia consists of a small number of imported slaves
from East Africa, an argument not supported by any historical or anthropological
evidence.²⁶
More importantly, though, this myth has forced both scholars and lay people
to put forward the claim that it is very difficult to separate the indigenous farmers
from the other two groups (runaways and emancipated slaves). Historians believe
that the difficulties in separating them are due to their physical resemblance, unrestricted intermarriage between the free and the emancipated, and their similar
ways of life such as subsistence farming. Cassanelli, for example, elaborated on
the difficulty of identifying and separating the indigenous Jareer people from the
runaway and the emancipated slaves by saying that “…scholars found it so difficult
to distinguish in this area between the remnants of prehistoric Negroid population
[Mjikenda] and the descendants of 19t-century captives [Wazigwa].”²⁷
he aforementioned difficulty in separating the ex-slaves from the indigenous
has apparently worked in favor of the nomadic Somalis, who pretend that every
Jareer Somali and their descendants are of slave origin. Although some scholars
have indicated the existence of an ancient and pre-Hamitic group of Jareer existence
along the Shabelle River, the dominant nomadic society seem to have downplayed
this research. he nomads claim that these scholars have a cursory knowledge of
the Jareer and their origins, and that further study was unnecessary.²⁸ Consequently,
it has become commonplace among scholars and students of Bantu/Jareer history
in Southern Somalia to conveniently label all Bantu/Jareer people as ex-slaves,
overlooking their authentic status as indigenous people of the inter-riverine area
in Southern Somalia. It is only recently that scholars such as Luling have claimed
that this portrayal of Bantu history regarding their origin and social structures has
no historical basis.²⁹
Moreover, according to Cerulli, although some freed slaves might have later
joined to dwell with the mentioned indigenous farmers does not mean they are all
of slave descent. Cerulli argues that these Bantu/Jareer groups are not imported
slaves but rather an ancient people. In one of his books, Cerulli suggests that at
times the well-established Jareer villages used to absorb and assimilate other groups
of non-Jareer origin.³⁰ It is therefore worth mentioning the relationship between
these groups. here were rules and conditions of coexistence between these two
groups (nomads and free Jareer). hese rules included exchange of trading items, a
tradition practiced until today in various locations in Southern regions. he nomads
sold meat, milk, oil, and animal hides to the Jareer in exchange for maize, millet,
and other subsistence products.³¹
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putting the cart before the horse
One way to distinguish imported slaves from the indigenous population is to
examine their cultural and social differences. For example, the first group, the Wazigwa, still maintain the languages and dialects of their country of origin (modern
Tanzania) and their traditions and cultural dances, which are very similar to those
in Tanzania.³² Another important characteristic of the Wazigwa is that they were
not absorbed by Somalia because they spoke and still speak a Tanzanian-related
language and lived in isolation from other Somali nomads. Furthermore, they still
maintain their cultural and genealogical links with the Tanzanian and Mozambique
ethnic groups such as: the Yao, the Nyasa, the Mushunguli (or Zegwa), the Makua,
and the Ngindu.³³ hese are the Bantu/Jareer people that were brought into Somalia
by the Arabs. One characteristic that both groups share, however, is that they are
not fully accepted as first-class Somali citizens by the majority of Somali society
despite the fact that the Mjikenda dwelling along the Shabelle River seem to have
lost the authenticity of their culture, language, and most of their traditions because
of their integration into other Somali ethnic groups.
Plantation Slavery in The Benadir Coast
In many African countries, plantation slaves were forcibly captured from different villages and locations regardless of ethnic affiliations. However, the situation
in Southern Somalia is slightly different. Along the Shebelle River area, only the
indigenous Bantu/Jareer communities were the targeted group for enslavement.
As mentioned earlier, the slave owners were the nomads (Hawiya) who originally
migrated from the Ethiopian highlands and the coastal people of Benadir from
Arabia and Persia.³⁴ hese slave owners (nomads and coastal people) had begun
the use of indigenous slave labor in the Benadir plantations around the 19t century
for economic gain.³⁵ Most of the Benadir plantations were privately owned by the
Somali slave-owners with the average of 1–15 slaves per plantation. Some of the
slave-owning groups most notorious for ill treatment of slaves are the Gaaljecel,
the Wadan, the Biyamaal and the Mobilen, subgroups of the larger Hawiya group.
According to Hess, citing materials from Italian colonial archives, “…slaves were
harshly treated, often kept in manacles and fetters, overworked, and underfed.”³⁶
Further, documents that are available in the Italian colonial archives suggest that:
he prosperity of the war-like Biyamaal…who settled in the area between
the Webi Shabelle and Indian Ocean and controlled the hinterland of Merca
and Brava, was dependent on grain grown by Bantu slaves to trade for imported
cloth and hardware in Merca. he Bimal, who possessed the nomadic Somali’s
traditional disdain for agriculture, would not have [subsisted] without Bantu
slave labor.³⁷
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
According to Lt. Christopher, a British naval officer who visited the Benadir
in 1842: “Slaves and their wives, being laborers, were housed miserably in small,
half-roofed huts, with their usual food [of ] parched Indian corn and fish from
the river.”³⁸
Apart from Somali nomads, there were other groups of slave owners in Somalia. hese Somalia-Benadir were considered to be of Arab descent. hese people,
having interacted with Arabs of Yemen, Oman and those along the East African
coast, spread Arab culture into Somalia.
By 1842, some Arabs along the Benadir coast were willing to put themselves
under the Sultanate of Zanzibar to gain supremacy through the Sultan by imposing
their authority upon factions operating along the Benadir coast of Mogadishu and
its vicinity.³⁹ here were three factions that struggled for control of Mogadishu and
control of the slave trade: the inhabitants of Shingaani area, the Hamarwein, and
the Sultanate of Geledi from Afgoy.⁴⁰ Hence, the Hamarwein elders invited the
Sultan of Zanzibar, Seyyid Said, to take control of the region and make the Benadir
as part of his Sultanate. Mogadishu-Benadir later fell under the protectorate of
the Sultan of Zanzibar.
While Arab influence was growing in Somalia, the Somali nomads from the
interior already controlled the riverine areas in Bantu land and had established
their supremacy.⁴¹ Lewis expanded on this point by stressing the importance of
the Somali alliance with the Arabs when he stated that: “he Somali [nomadic]
ethnic groups have often become powerful through alliance with immigrant Arab
‘Sheicks’, of whom in retrospect [they] consider themselves the [irir] descendants.”⁴² In the first decades of the 19t century, the Somali clans that lived along
the coastal cities of Benadir had increased their trade in ivory, cattle, hides, woven
clothes, gum, and other goods. he main product in demand was grain; therefore
the Somali coastal people, being the traders in the region, responded to this strong
regional demand.⁴³ As a result, early in the 19t century, huge slave plantations
were established along the Shebelle River to meet the increasing demand for grains,
particularly sorghum, maize, and sesame seeds.⁴⁴ By the 1840s, European travelers
were amazed by the large amount of grain produced along the Shebelle River for
the Arabian and Zanzibar markets in the south. he average number of slaves per
plantation in Somalia was very low. It was more or less equivalent to those small
plantations in East Africa, particularly in Mombasa and Malindi.⁴⁵ However, the
smaller number of slaves in the Somalian plantations should not detract from its
identification as a plantation.
he transformation of the Shabelle valley economy was facilitated by the
tapping of the large reservoir of non-free labor supplied by the resident Bantu
population.⁴⁶ Part of the profits generated by the exploitation of these lands were
used to purchase more slaves, who in turn led to a further expansion of cultivated
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putting the cart before the horse
lands.⁴⁷ Unlike in Mombasa, where production of grain in the plantations was
limited because of scarcity of arable land,⁴⁸ in the Benadir, cultivable land was
abundant. As a result, plantation workers were divided into two groups: cultivation and weaving were assigned to the men, and easier tasks of gathering the seeds
and cleaning the husks to the women.⁴⁹ Beautiful female slaves were often used as
household domestics and concubines.⁵⁰ It appears that during the Benadir slave
trade women slaves were more valued than men because women were used for both
domestic and plantation labor.⁵¹ his corroborates with the domestic slavery in
Africa, where female labor was extensively used in the farms and cottage industries.
Lovejoy has also pointed to this phenomenon, in which women were categorized
as major contributors in agricultural production in Africa.⁵²
Slavery and the slave trade in Southern Somalia lasted until early in the 20t
century, and subsequently were abolished by the Italian authority in accordance
with Belgium protocol. However, the same Italian colonial authority that initially
abolished slavery in Somalia, re-introduced coerced labor laws and the conscription
of the manumitted slaves and the indigenous Bantu people for economic purposes
in the Italian agricultural schemes.
The Abolition of Slavery in Southern Somalia
Around the 1890s, Antonio Cecchi, a popular Italian explorer and businessman, was
probably the first to succeed in drawing Italian attention toward the Somali coast of
Benadir. Based on his explorations in East Africa, he highlighted the importance of
the river valley region as a place with promising agro-based economic potential for
Italy. Based on this finding, late in the 19t century, the Italian government leased
Somalia Benadir from the Sultan of Zanzibar for various reasons, which will be
explained in the following section of the paper. he Italian colonial authority first
occupied the arable land around Juba River and then in the Shabelle valley, where
they soon appropriated the land for agricultural development.⁵³
herefore, the abolition of slavery in Southern Somalia by the Italian colonial
government was not only based on humanitarian grounds but also on the Italian
need for economic gains, and the search for legitimate commerce. As Robert Hess
stated:
Italian industry was insufficiently developed to absorb the vast number
of unemployed workers. he country lacked the raw materials necessary for
an industrial civilization, and there was little chance for improvement. [hus
necessitated] …finding overseas colonies in which to settle surplus population
under the Italian flag. [hat is why] in the second half of the 19t century more
than seventy Italian expeditions were sent to explore [economic opportunities
in] Africa.⁵⁴
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As a result, Italy exploited Somalia and Ethiopia’s fertile land and the labor
force of the indigenous and manumitted people. his led to the establishment of
immense Italian plantations, which were acquired by confiscating the indigenous
arable land in between the two rivers, Juba and Shabelle.
As I said earlier, in 1892, the Italian colonial government leased Somalia
Benadir from the Sultan of Zanzibar, Sayyid Said, and a few years later began the
process of freeing the slaves who belonged to the Sultanate.⁵⁵ At the time, other
European nations were also scrambling to colonize the African continent; Germany
was among those who set their eyes on Somalia. However, the Sultan of Zanzibar
did not want Germany to take over Somalia. According to an Italian official, the
Sultan “hated and feared the Germans…not only would he be pleased if Italy took
possession of the Somali region, but he would support it wholeheartedly.”⁵⁶ As a
result, Italy was able to acquire Somalia at a very low cost. he legal document for
the transfer of Benadir was signed by Mr. Gerald Portal, a British diplomat who
negotiated on behalf of the Sultan, and Mr. Cottoni on behalf of the Italian government.⁵⁷ On the strength of this agreement, the Sultan ceded all his sovereign
rights in Benadir for a yearly payment of 160,000 rupees. He also received the
sum of 40,000 rupees as a sign of good will for agreeing to sign the agreement.⁵⁸
Meanwhile, the slave trade between Zanzibar and Somalia continued intermittently,
under the aegis of Somali nomads from the interior, the Somali coastal traders, and
the Arab-slave importers. his trade was carried on through the Benadir coastal
cities of Merca, Kisimayu, Brava, and Mogadishu.
Although it was part of the Italian colonial obligation in the Belgium treaty
to abolish slave trade, Italy’s initial concern was to promote efficient colonial
administration in Somalia than to abolish slavery. As a result, some of the Italian
officials turned a blind eye to the ongoing slave trade. Like other colonial regimes
in Africa, the Italian administration acted with restraint on the abolition question.
Initially, the Italian officials often returned fugitive slaves to their former masters,
even though Italy claimed to be abolishing slavery. his appears to be a conflict
of colonial policy,⁵⁹ and a breach of the Belgium abolition act to free the slaves.
In this agreement, Italy was a member country among the signatories that agreed
to abolish slavery in Africa. Over time the abolition question acquired external
momentum because of the pressure from other European governments and the
ongoing slavery debate in the Italian parliament.⁶⁰ his problem was highlighted
by the revelation of Gustavo Chiesi and a lawyer Ernesto Travelli, who were sent
to Somalia by the Italian government to investigate the operations of the chartered
company, V. Filonardi, to abolish slavery. Chiesi and Travelli discovered anomalies
in the way the chartered company was being administered.⁶¹ heir investigation
also uncovered the existence of an extensive slave trade in Southern Somalia.⁶²
In 1894, there were over 2,000 domestic slaves in Mogadishu alone awaiting
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putting the cart before the horse
emancipation, without even taking into consideration those in other cities and
plantations, where most of the slaves were kept. he first 45 slaves were freed by
the Italian colonial authority under the administration of the chartered company, V.
Filonardi, in 1895. Massive emancipation of slaves in Somalia only began after antislavery activist Robecchi Bricchetti informed the Italian public about the practice
of slavery in Somalia. Bricchetti appealed to the Italian public through the media
in Milan, and exposed the lackadaisical attitude of the Italian government toward
emancipating the slaves and stopping the slave trade.⁶³ During Bricchetti’s short
stay in Benadir in 1903; he witnessed the emancipation of about 50 slaves in some
coastal cities. Bricchetti himself also bought freedom for two slaves.
In 1896 a new company by the name of the Benadir Company, which replaced
the V. Filonardi, administered Somalia until 1904.⁶⁴ When the new company
(Benadir) began to experience financial difficulties because of insufficient funding
from the Italian government, the colonial government decided to administer the
colony (Somalia) directly.⁶⁵ Upon assuming this new responsibility in 1905, the
Italian government acted vigorously to put an end to the slave traffic due to parliamentary coercion and incessant pressure from Italian anti-slavery organizations
such as “Anti-schiavista.”⁶⁶
As Italy progressed with abolition of slavery in Somalia, local slave dealers in
the Benadir coast embraced the Italian proposal with less resistance, but the Somali
nomads (Hawiya) in the interior tried to resist the Italian policy intensively. hose
who resisted the abolition included the Wadan, the Bimal, the Moblen, and the
Gaaljaal, just to mention a few. hese resisters described the Italian colonial government as infidels who were against the Islamic faith and who were trying to infiltrate
into the Somali society to convert them from Islam into Christianity.⁶⁷ Unlike the
nomads, the indigenous Jareer people and the emancipated slaves regarded the Somali nomad’s resistance as propaganda and as a means of maintaining slavery and
the status quo.⁶⁸ Resistance by the nomadic Somalis led to several confrontations
between them and the Italian colonial government. To note a few of the significant
combat locations between the Bimal and the Italian regiments in 1893, which was
mainly composed of locally recruited soldiers, are Merca, Danane, Jilib, and Jesira.
he Italian soldiers also encountered the Wadan combatants/warriors in 1897 at
Afgoy, Mallable, Audegle, and Barire.⁶⁹ One of the well-remembered incidents,
which occurred in 1896–1897 between the Wadan and the Italians, is known as ‘he
Lafoole Massacre,’ locally referred to as Axad Shekki (the “Sunday year of Cecchi”).
his incident took place on the road between Mogadishu and Afgoye, where Wadan
warriors ambushed a convoy of Italian travelers, including a top official, Antonio
Cecchi, who died in the ambush.⁷⁰ he Italians retaliated against the Somali
nomads, deploying heavy arms to the scene (Lafoole), bombarded surrounding
villages, and inflicted several casualties upon the local Wadan residents.⁷¹ In order
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
to overcome the nomadic resistance and slavery, the Italian government in 1906
issued an ultimatum ordering the Somali nomads of every region to surrender their
weapons within a short period of time. One of those who ignored the order was
Sheik Hagi Hassan, a religious leader of Gaaljeel nomadic clan, and a representative
of the larger Hawiya groups who argued that we would:
…not accept your [un-Islamic] order. We will not come to you at any cost
because you have broken our pact. All our slaves escaped and went to you and
you have set them free. We are not happy with the [abolitionist] order. We
abandoned our law, for according to our law, we can put slaves in prison and
force them to work. he [Italian] government has its law and we have ours. We
accept no law other than our own. Our law is that of God and the Prophet.⁷²
Surprisingly, the Islamic law that Sheick Hassan referred to did not allow or
accept any kind of violation of another Muslim’s basic civil rights. herefore, it seems
that the violation of the Jareer’s rights by the nomads was itself anti-Islamic.
Refusal to accept the ultimatum led to wars and hostilities between the Italian
government and Sheik Hassan and his followers. In the ensuing battle, the Sheik
was captured and disarmed while the total emancipation of slaves was decreed.
Most of the ex-slaves went to join with other Bantu/Jareer communities who were
already settled, while others moved away from the nomads to one of the safe havens
(Gosha or Avai) to establish a new life.
Around 1907, a new concern emerged among the indigenous groups after they
noticed a strong and willful effort from the Italian colony to exploit the agricultural
potential of the inter-riverine area.⁷³ Subsequently, the indigenous people’s fears
became a reality. When the Italian foreign minister Pasquale Mancini was asked by
the parliament about the delay of the agricultural progress in Somalia, he told the
Italian parliament that the popular explorer’s, [Antonio “…Cecchi’s] mission and
that of others would surely discover vast fertile areas awaiting peaceful cultivation
and commercial penetration [soon].”⁷⁴
Post-Abolition: The Italian Colony’s Land Confiscation
During the first quarter of the 20t century, the Italian government decided to hire
a young economist and agronomist by the name of Romolo Onor. He was sent to
the Juba and Shabelle region of Somalia to conduct feasibility studies regarding the
possible exploitation of the area’s agricultural potential.⁷⁵ He concluded his report
by recommending large-scale agricultural development in the area. However, Italian
officials had informed Onor that the local indigenous Bantu people preferred to
work on their own farms rather than work on the Italian plantations.⁷⁶ he Italians
considered importing workers from India, Arabia, China, and even Ethiopia, but all
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putting the cart before the horse
these alternatives were subsequently rejected.⁷⁷ Onor advised that unless the Italian
government was prepared to confiscate all Bantu farmlands and use forced labor, it
would not succeed in implementing their agricultural scheme. Another option for
Italy was to provide huge wage subsidies to attract farm workers or wean away the
Bantu from their own land; otherwise, the agricultural exploitation of the Benadir
plantations would be difficult. he Italian government rejected Onor’s suggestions
and opted instead for a settler-based plantation system.⁷⁸
Another Italian official, Carletti, suggested that villages be organized for
emancipated slaves, who would be classifiedinto labor brigades to work in the
Italian plantations.⁷⁹ In 1906, these villages were established with the help of a few
clan leaders (former slave owners) near the farm areas occupied by Italians.⁸⁰ In
view of the use of the forced labor of the former slaves by the Italian government,
in collaboration with ex-slave owners, the sincerity of the Italian government’s
abolition measures is questionable, herefore, one can conclude that Italy leased
Somalia Benadir from the Sultan of Zanzibar in order to exploit the indigenous
arable land and their labor force. In accordance with the Italian coerced labor and
exploitation, when the Italian government was pressured by the opposition party for
failing to show a tangible benefit from Somalia-Benadir, “…the [Italian] Foreign
Affairs Minister announced to the Chamber of Deputies, on February 13, 1908,
that exploitation of [the] alleged immense resources [in Somalia] could forthwith
begin.”⁸¹ In view of the Italian ill-intent in confiscating the native land in the interriverine area, Pankhurst described the Italian agricultural scheme as an initiative
“…to deprive the natives of ownership of the land and to compel them to work for
the Italian concession holders who were to replace them.”⁸² However, I must also
mention that there is a scholarly disagreement with Pankhurst’s views towards
the Italian land confiscation in Somalia. Cassanelli says, there is a possibility that
Pankhurst might be biased against Italy, since she is British, and the British too
had their interest and involvement in Somalia’s affair. However, Barile’s statement
seems to support Pankhurst’s view; he says, after confiscating the farmlands from
its native owners, Italy did not waste much time in establishing about 107 small
and large plantations.⁸³
In 1911, De Martino, the new Italian governor in Somalia, decreed that all
uncultivated lands within the vicinity of Italian government plantations would be
at the disposal of the government.⁸⁴ Before De Martino arrived in Benadir, the
first agricultural concession was 5,000 hectares along the Juba River. his had been
granted and leased to an Italian businessman by the name of Gustavo Carpanetti
in 1907. He had arrived in Somalia a year earlier and had conducted some experiments on how to cultivate cotton in the vicinity of Brava City.⁸⁵ Over the following years, many more concessions were approved and released to other Italians.⁸⁶
hese Italian concessions founded by Governor De Martino in 1912 included the
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sugar plantation (sais) in Jowhar ;⁸⁷ another one was aagg, which was the core
of a number of plantations that grew various products. One of the main products
grown in this plantation was bananas, for export, which was directed by Romolo
Onor until the year 1918. his plantation (aagg) was located within a reasonable
distance to the south of Mogadishu.⁸⁸ Another important and well-known plantation in Southern Somalia is called Avai, locally known as Asaili (Sorrow); where
many Bantu laborers were drowned in the irrigation canals.⁸⁹ Avai is not very far
from the other plantation at Genale (aagg).
All the above noted plantations were worked exclusively by emancipated slaves
and conscripted Bantu natives who were virtually expected to supply their labor to
the Italian colonial government. he Italian agricultural schemes would not have
succeeded without the collaboration of non-Bantu ethnic groups (the ex-slave
owners). he Bantu were forced to abandon their own farms in order to dwell in
the established villages around the Italian plantations.⁹⁰
It is also worth noting that before the Italians began the conscription of
the emancipated slaves, many of them had been assimilated by the local Bantu
population.⁹¹ herefore, they (the emancipated) too became landowners and had
access to the land that belonged to their respective and affiliated clan areas. Besides,
most of the emancipated slaves had already returned willingly to farm in their
areas.
hose who re-enforced the Italian forced labor against the Bantu/Jareer people
were the Somali nomads and the coastal people, who created slave institutions prior
to the colonial period and later, collaborated with the Italian authority to conscript
the very emancipated Jareer people for Italian plantations. he Somali nomads (the
ex-slave owners) still wanted to maintain a continuity of slavery after its abolition
by the Italians.⁹² he argument here is that the abolition of slavery in Somalia was a
mere exchange of masters only. After the abolition, slave-mastership was transferred
from the Somali nomads and the coastal people to Italian plantation owners. As a
British official in East Africa, Rennel, stated:
he conception of these agricultural enterprises as exploitation concessions
engendered under the [Italian] fascist regime a labor policy of considerable severity in theory and actual brutality in practice. It was in fact indistinguishable from
slavery.⁹³
he non-Bantu Somalis did not have the expertise for farming, and in fact they
held agriculture in contempt, so they were not conscripted. hat is probably why
the Italian authority saw the Somali nomads as the major factor limiting colonial
agricultural development.⁹⁴ As a result, the colonial authorities concluded that an
end to slavery would liberate a population that could help Italy build a new agricultural economic empire.⁹⁵ herefore, the colonial administration in Somalia was an
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putting the cart before the horse
imperial power that came claiming to be abolitionist, when in reality it sought to
impose its authority and exploitation upon the indigenous (Bantu/Jareer) people.
Conclusion
I have attempted to highlight the societal differences between the two Bantu/Jareer
groups in southern Somalia, namely, the Wazigwa or imported slaves from Tanzania
and the Mjikenda or the indigenous farmers in Southern Somalia. hese groups
have always been referred to by historians as one group of the same origin; on the
contrary, they are very different. I have also tried to indicate the uniqueness of the
type of slavery that took place in Somalia, which was unilaterally directed against
the Bantu/Jareer people only. Additionally, I have examined plantation slavery in
Benadir, its protagonists and the causes that created the need for plantation slavery,
as well as the emancipation of slaves in Somalia by the Italian colonies. I have also
shown the resistance the Italians encountered from the interior (Hawiya) nomadic
clans while implementing the abolition acts against slavery.
In this paper, I have also tried to elucidate the social difference between the
Wazigwa, runaway slaves who established their own independent entity within
Somalia, and the indigenous Mjikenda farmers who became culturally incorporated
within the milieu of the Somali nomads, which continue to discriminate against
indigenous farmers. Finally, I have underlined the implicit and explicit Italian
colonial objectives to confiscate and exploit the land and the labor force of the
indigenous and the emancipated slaves.
Notes
1.
2.
Although Mohamed Ali’s (1988) poem is an innuendo directed against the ‘land
reform policy’ of the late Siyad Barre’s military regime, it is also relevant in retrospect
to colonial land confiscation policies (see Ahmed Qasim, Land Rush in Somalia, in
this volume). As this Jareer poet’s complaint indicates, and as we shall see in the paper,
land appropriation has always been an unabated apprehension among the native Jareer
population. Because, the livelihood of the river valley people heavily depended on land
cultivation.
Enrico Cerulli. Somalia: Scritti Vari Editi Ed Inediti 3 Vols. Roma, 1957; Cassanelli, Lee.
The Shaping of Somali Society. Reconstructing the history of a pastoral people, 1600–1900.
Philadelphia; University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982; Cassanelli, Lee. “he Ending of
slavery in Italian Somalia,” in Miers, Suzanne and Richard Roberts, eds. The End of
Slavery in Africa. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988: 308–331; Cassanelli.
“he distant frontier as refuge,” in Kopytoff, Igor, ed. The African Frontier. Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, Indiana, 1987: 216–238; Besteman, Catherine. “he
Invention of Gosha: Slavery, Colonialism, and Stigma in Somali History,” in Ahmed,
Ali Jimale, ed., The Invention of Somalia. Lawrenceville nj: Red Sea Press, 1995: 88–99;
Besteman, Catherine. “Land Tenure, Social Power, and Legacy of Slavery in Southern
Somalia.” Ph.D. hesis, University of Arizona, 1991; Luling, Virginia. “he Social
148
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Structure of Southern Somali Tribes.” Ph.D. thesis, University of London, 1971;
Grotanelli,Vinigi. “I Bantu Deli Giuba Nelle Tradizioni Dei Wazigwa,” Geographica
Helvetica, 8, 1953: 249–60.
Besteman, Catherine L. Unraveling Somalia: Race, Violence, and the Legacy of Slavery.
Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1999: 120–21.
Grotanelli,Vinigi. “I Bantu del Giuba nelle tradizioni dei Wazigwa,” Geographica
Helvetica 8. 1953: 249–60; Cassanelli, Lee. The Shaping of Somali Society. Reconstructing
the history of a pastoral people, 1600–1900. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
Press, 1982; Cassanelli, Lee V. “he Ending of slavery in Italian Somalia,” in Miers,
Suzanne and Richard Roberts, eds., The End of Slavery in Africa. Madison: 308–331;
Cassanelli, Lee V. “he distant frontier as refuge,” in Kopytoff, Igor, ed., The African
Frontier, Indiana. 216–238; Luling, Virginia, 1971. “he Social Structure of Southern
Somali Tribes,” Ph.D. thesis, University of London.
Most scholars believe that the Wazigwa are the founders of Goshaland along the Juba
River-a safe haven for runaway slaves. Late in the 19t century, Egypt, Zanzibar, Italy,
and Britain recognized this haven as an independent entity. Although other communities like the gamas later resided in Goshaland and constituted the largest part of
their confederacy, the Wazigwas remained as an autonomous society with a distinct
political structure. hat is probably why the Goshaland people are generally known
by the name of their founders, the Wazigwa. Until the 1920s, the Bantu people of
Goshaland were divided into nine gamas groups, which constituted the core of their
confederation. hey are Makua, Nyassa, Yao, Mushongoli, Makale, Ngindo, Nyika,
Nyamwezi, and Molema. Later, a small number of this group has been assimilated to
the indigenous Bantu/Jareer of the Shabelle River.
According to Cerulli, the Mjikendas consist of approximately twelve tribes while
homas Spear and others assert only nine tribes. hese groups presently reside along
the Tana River in Kenya-while their remnants are scattered around the interior of
southern Somalia-the inter-riverine areas. hese remnants are believed to be the
Jareer groups that originally resided in Shungwaya in southern Somalia. According
to Spear, their location in Shungwaya is believed to have been near the contemporary
location of Buur Gaabo-southwest of Buur Hakabo. Also, other scholars have suggested that Shungwaya was the center where Bantu people autonomously exercised
their Kingdom up until the sixteenth century. Later that century the Jareer, who were
not experienced in warfare, were pushed by the warlike nomad “Galla” (Oromo) and
Hawiya tribes from the interior from northern regions, and lost control of the grazing
land between the rivers Juba and Shabelle. In the same century, the warlike Hawiya
Somalis attacked both the Gallas and the Jareer. However, the “Gallas” stayed behind
while most of the Jareer people decided to move away from the Somalis and ended
up in Tana River in modern Kenya. he Jareer who presently reside along the Shabelle
River in southern Somalia are therefore the remnants of those who left Somalia. For
more information about the Mjikenda, see for example: Spear, homas T., 1981. Kenya’s
Past: an introduction to historical method in Africa. Longman, London and New York.
Guilain p.537 cited in Virginia, Luling. 1971. ‘‘he Social Structure of Southern Somali
Tribes…’’ 116.
Grotanelli, Vinigi L., 1953. “I Bantu del Giuba nelle tradizioni dei Wazigwa,” Geographica Helvetica. Vol. 8: 249–60. Also, see Cassanelli, Lee V., 1987. “he distant frontier
as refuge,” in Kopytoff, Igor, ed., The African Frontier. Indiana: 216–238.
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putting the cart before the horse
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
Grotanelli, Vinigi. Geografica Helvetica. Vol. 8 (1953): 254.
he word Gosha in Somali language means forest. his word insinuates that the
inhabitants of Gosha-land are the runaway slaves who hid in the forest. he terms
Wazigwa and Gosha are interchangeably used, since they refer to the same group of
people. For more information about the Gosha people also-see Cassanelli, Lee V. “he
Distant Frontier as Refuge,” 214, in The African Frontier. Igor Kopytoff., ed. Indiana
University Press, 1977; Besteman, Catherine. Unraveling Somalia: Race, Violence, and
the Legacy of Slavery. 1999.
Menkhaus, Kenneth J., 1989. “Rural Transformation and the Roots of Underdevelopment in Somalia’s Lower Jubba Valley.” Ph.D. thesis, University of South Carolina.
p. 128.
Bricchetti, Robecchi L. Dal Benadir. Lettere illustrate all societa’ antischiavista d’Italia,
La tipografia societa’ editrice. Milano, 1904: 146.
Ibid. p. 125.
Bricchetti, Robecchi L. dal Benadir: lettere illustrate alla societa’ antischiavista d’Italia.
Milano: societa’ editrice, La Tipografia, 1904: 142–45.
Cerulli, Enrico, 1957. Somalia: scritti vari editi ed inediti. Roma. Vol. I: 254 & 255; Warner,
Alice. 1912–1913. “Some notes on the Wapokomo of the Tana Valley,” Journal of African
Society. 12: 359–384.
Warner, Alice 1912–1913. “Some notes on the Wapokomo of the Tana Valley”. J. Afr.
Soc., 12: 359–384. Also see: Prins, A.H.J., 1952. The Coastal Tribes of North-Eastern Bantu.,
London. Also, Introduction of Enrico Cerulli, 1957. “Il libro dei Zenji” in Somalia Vol.
i: 54 & 259. Also, Prins, A.H. 1972., “he Shungwaya Problem: Traditional history and
cultural likeness in Bantu northeast Africa,” Anthropos, 67:1/2–6. Luigi V. Grotanelli,
1976. ‘‘Una Metropoli perduta dell’Africa,’’ in Gerarchie etniche e conflitto culturale; saggi
di etnologia nordest Africana. Milan: Franco Angeli, Editore: 285–301; I.M. Lewis, 1988.
Modern History of Somalia. Boulder: Westview Press: 28; Steiner, Martina I., 1994. La
Grande Faida: I processi di etnicizzazione e di segmentazione in Somalia. Roma: Centro
Analisi Sociale: 68.
Ibid. 264.
Bulletin of the International Committee of Urgent Anthropological and Ethnical
Research: 28–29. n3, 1960, with the help of unesco.
Ibid.
Turton said, the Somali nomads from around the coastal city of Merca expanded and
occupied both the west and the south in order to gain total control over much of the
riverine area between the Juba and Tana rivers long before the Gallas (Oromo) from
Ethiopia came to the coast. In the process both the Somalis and the Gallas found
Bantu-speaking communities to be their main rivals for control over the grazing areas.
his is why it has been suggested that a constant Somali and Oromo pressure initially
caused the Bantu-speaking groups to retreat to the Tana river, towards the modern
Kenya, in the 16t century. Also see: E.R. Turton, 1975. ‘‘Bantu, Galla and Somali
migrations in the Horn of Africa: A Reassessment of the Juba /Tana area.’’ Journal of
African History, Vol. 16: 519. Also, Robert L. Hess made a similar argument, see 1966,
Italian Colonialism in Somalia. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Luling, Virginia., 1976. “Colonial and Post colonial Influences on a South Somali
Community,” Journal of African Studies, 3, 1: 491–511.
Ibid.
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
36.
37.
his information was obtained through personal communication with Mohamed Ali
Adan, a former student of Aligarn Muslim University, Bombay-India. 1988. Faculty
of Social Science.
Martina, Steiner. 1994. La Grande Faida, Centro Analisi Sociale: 79–81.
Luling, Virginia., 1983. “Studies in humanities and natural sciences,” in homas Labahn, ed. Proceedings of the Second International Congress of Somali Studies. Germany:
University of Hamburg: 39.
For more information, see, for example: Luling, Virginia. 1983. ‘‘Studies in Humanities and Science’’. Vol. iv, Paper presented in The proceedings of the Second International
Congress of Somali Studies. homas Labahn. (ed) University of Hamburg- Germany.
Cassanelli, Lee. 1987. “Social Construction on the Somali Frontier: Bantu Former Slave
Communities in the Nineteenth Century.,” in The African Frontier. Igor Kopytoff.,
ed. 233.
Eno, Mohamed A. 1993. his information was extracted from a ‘‘fact-finding’’ report
for the vulnerable groups in southern Somalia. he said study was sponsored by the
international organization-acord.
For more information, see: Luling, Virginia. 1994. “he origins of the ‘Jareer’ people
of the Shabelle: the implications of some rituals.” (Unpublished) Paper presented at
the Somali Inter-riverine Studies Conference, at Sidney Smith Hall. University of
Toronto.
Cerulli, Enrico. Somalia. Vol. 3 (1964): 86–90.
Cassanelli, Lee V. and Catherine Lowe Besteman. The Struggle for Land in Southern
Somalia: The war behind the war. Colorado, 1996: 124.
Declich, Francesca. “Identity, Dance and Islam among People with Bantu Origin, in
Ahmed, Ali Jimale., ed. The Invention of Somalia. Lawrenceville, New Jersey: Red Sea
Press, 1995: 191–222.
Besteman, Catherine L., 1991. “Land Tenure, Social Power, and Legacy of Slavery in
Southern Somalia,” Ph.D. hesis, University of Arizona, 1991. 129.
his information was obtained from Hassan Gumbow, a native of Dhajalaq village
along the Shabelle river. Gumbow is among the well respected village elders, and he
is 85 years old who still goes to work in his farm every morning. 1988.
Cassanelli, Lee V. The Shaping of Somali Society. Reconstructing the history of a pastoral
people, 1600–1900. Philadelphia, 1982: 147–150. For a similar argument of economic
enslaving in West Africa, see for example: Klein, Martin. 1992. “he Impact of the
Atlantic Slave Trade on the Societies of Western Sudan.” in The Atlantic Slave Trade:
effects on economics, societies, and peoples in Africa, the Americas, and Europe:. 25–41. Inikori,
Joseph E. & Stanley L. Engerman., eds. Duke University press, Durham & London.
Hess, Robert. 1966: 87–99.
Some of those nomadic tribes from the interior who wrested control of the Bantu
land and then enslaved them are from the Hawiya tribes, of which their sub-clans
are: the Moblein, the Biamal, the Waadan, the Abgaal, the Gaaljeel, the Baadiadde,
the Murusade, and some of the Digil & Mirifle. hese are the tribes that classify
themselves as ‘‘Bilis” (Nobles).
asmai (Archivio Storico del Ministero degli Affari Esteri, Rome, Italy) 1905. (position
75/6 f. 58.) – While the Biamal were busy making war against the neighboring tribes
for territorial expansion, often imbued with the belief that they should control the
whole South, Bantu slaves were used in the plantations to produce food for subsistence
151
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putting the cart before the horse
38.
39.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
and commercial purposes. For a similar argument and for comparative purposes see
for example: Cooper, Frederick. Plantation Slavery on the East Coast of Africa. Yale
University Press, 1977. Also see: Lovejoy, Paul. 1979. “he Characteristics of Plantations….” The American Historical Review. Vol. 84. 5. (1979): 1267–73.
Christopher, Lt. ‘‘On the East Coast of Africa’’. Journal of the Royal Geographical Society.
V.14. (1844): 80. For more comments of brutality against the Bantu slaves in southern
Somalia, see for example: Robecchi, Bricchetti. 1904. dal Benadir: 30–31
Alpers, Edward A. “Muqdisho in the nineteenth Century: a regional perspective.”
Journal of African History. 24: (1983): 441–459.
Afgoy is a small city located about 30 km from the capital city of Somalia (Mogadishu).
Afgoy was the head office of the Sultanate of Geledi (Geledi is the name of the tribe
led by Sultan Yusuf ). Yusuf was among the factions that were striving to gain control
of Mogadishu to put it under his Sultanate. He faced resistance from the Hamarwein
and Shingaani elders. he power struggle between these three groups resulted in the
intervention of Zanzibar’s Sultan, presumably to counterbalance the hostility of the
stronger Sultan of Geledi.
Robert, Hess. Italian Colonialism in Somalia. University of Chicago Press: Chicago,
1966: 1–12.
Lewis. 14.
Menkhaus, Kenneth. 1989. ‘‘Rural Transformation…’’: 103.
Cassanelli, Lee V., 1982. The Shaping of Somali Society. 166. Also, see Menkhaus, Kenneth. 1989. ‘‘Rural Transformation…’’ 102–105.
Cooper, Frederick. Plantation Slavery on the East Coast of Africa. Yale University Press,
1977.
Kenneth, Menkhaus. 1989. ‘‘Rural Transformation….’’ . 103–104.
Robecchi, Bricchetti. 1904. dal Benadir. p. 63 & 107.
Lovejoy, Paul E. Transformations in Slavery. A History of Slavery in Africa. Cambridge, 1983: 226.
Faay Muudeey Shongow and Madina Muddey Dhurow. Interview. 1989. hese two
women are of Somali Bantu origin.
Besteman, Catherine. ‘‘Land Tenure…’’ 1991: 69–78.
Faay Muudey Shongow, 1988. his information was obtained by interviewing an old
lady from Afgoy City in 1988. his lady is considered as one of the few living Jareer
persons who mastered the local oral history in her area, around the Shabelle River.
For a similar argument see: Lovejoy, Paul. 1983. Transformations in slavery: 12.
Hess, Robert. 1966: 15.
Hess, Robert. 1966. Italian Colonialism in Somalia. 2–3.
Robecchi, Bricchetti. 1904. dal Benadir. 45–50.
Filonardi report, Zanzibar, October 20, 1886, asmai, pos. 55/1, f. 4.
Ibid.
Robecchi, Bricchetti. 1904., dal Benadir. p. 48. For more information regarding the
involvement of both Italy and Zanzibar as protectorates in the Benadir colony, see
for example: Pankhurst, Sylvia E., 1951. Ex-Italian Somaliland. London.
For more information on this issue see for example Lovejoy, who made a similar argument about the European colony’ s conflicting policies in Africa towards abolition, see
Lovejoy Paul., Transformations in Slavery. pp. 246–268.
Pankhurst, Sylvia. 1951. Ex-Italian Somaliland. 46.
152
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Plantation Slavery In Southern Somalia (1840–1940)
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
80.
81.
82.
83.
84.
85.
86.
87.
Ibid.
Robecchi, Bricchetti. 1904. dal Benadir. 266–67.
Ibid. 72.
Cassanelli Lee V. The Shaping of Somali Society: Reconstructing the History of a pastoral
people, 1600–1900. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1982. For more
elaborated information regarding the Filonardi Company, see for example Hess, Robert.
1966. Italian Colonialism in Somalia. chap. 2.
Hess, Robert., 1966. Italian Colonialism in Somalia. Chap. 2. Also, see Cassanelli, Lee
V., 1982. The Shaping of Somali Society…. 183–207.
Hess, Robert., 1966. Italian Colonialism in Somalia. Chap. 2.
Ibid.
Faay Muudey Shongow and Madina Muudey Dhurow. Interview. Afgoy. 1989.
Hess, Robert. 1966. Italian colonialism in Somalia. 87–91.
Cassanelli, Lee V. 1982. The Shaping of Somali Society. 204–208.
Ibid. p. 208.
De Vecchi, De Val Cismo, Cesare Maria. Orizzonti d’Impero: Cinque anni in Somalia.
Milano, 1935: 25–27.
Onor, Romolo. La Somalia Italiana: l’esame critico dei problemi di economia rurale e
di politica economica della Colonia. Roma, 1925.
Hess, Robert., 1966: 13.
Cassanelli, Lee V. in The End of Slavery in Africa. Miers, Suzanne and Richard Roberts,
eds. University of Wisconsin Press, 1988: 308–331.
Guadagni, Marco. Xeerka Beeraha/Diritto Fondiario. Roma. 1981: 179.
Cassanelli. 1988., in The End of Slavery in Africa. Miers and Roberts, ed. 311.
Romolo, Onor. 1925. La Somalia Italiana: esame critico dei problemi di economia rurale e
di politica economica della colonia. Turin: Fratelli Bocca. For more elaborate information
see for example Cassanelli V. Lee. 1988. “he Ending of Slavery in Italian Somalia:
Liberty and the Control of Labor 1890–1935.” in The End of Slavery in Africa. Suzanne
Miers and Richard Roberts. (Eds): 308–331. Also, see Hess, Robert., 1966.
his information is from a confidential letter written by Gustavo Carletti to Italy’s
foreign ministry while he was in Brava. It was later filed in the asmai account. July 19,
1907. asmai pos. 75/6, f. 64. nb: he word ‘‘Webi’’ is a Italianized Somali language
which means river.
Ibid.
Pankhurst, Sylvia. 1951. Ex-Italian Somaliland. 90.
Ibid.
Barile, Pietro., 1935. Colonizzazione Fascista…166.
Royal decree No. 695. June 8, 1911. asmai, pos. 75/11,f.122. For more information on
land tenure by Italian Colonial Authority in Somalia-Benadir see for example De
Martino’s report, ‘‘ Report to H.E., the foreign minister: “he present and the future
of the colony”. Mogadishu. Oct. 10, 1910. asmai, pos. 75/12.
R.D. n. 334 del 19 Carpanetti, Luglio G. ‘‘il cottone nella valle del Juba.’’ Agricultura
coloniale, 1907. pp. 51–53. Also, see for example, Manassei, T. 1910. ‘‘\La ripartizione
delle terre concesse in Somalia. Rivista Coloniale, 1907: 67–69.
Guadagni, Marco. 1981. Xeerka Beeraha/ Diritto Fondiario Somalo. 145.
sais (Societa’ Agricola Italiana in Somalia). his is an exclusively sugar cane grower
plantation which was totally owned by Italian government and Italian investors. It is
153
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putting the cart before the horse
88.
89.
90.
91.
92.
93.
94.
95.
located about 150 km north of Mogadishu, (the present capital city of Somalia). Jowhar is the largest city near sais Jowhar also has the biggest and only sugar factory in
Somalia. he name Jowhar was given to that city after the independence of Somalia
in 1960; its original colonial name was Duca degli Abruzzi-(he Duke of Abruzzis).
Jowhar and its surroundings is known to be a Bantu area; along the Shabelle river. he
Italian colony had established small villages for the conscripted, coerced, and freed
Bantu slaves to work in this plantation. here were no workers from other non-Bantu
tribes. Jowhar, in the Somali language, means a stupendous place where you can grow
or find almost every product.
aagg (Azienda Agraria Governativa Genale). he word ‘‘Genale’’ in Somali language
means ‘‘Paradise’’; this refers to the fertility of that land along the Shabelle river. As
on any other Italian plantations, the workers are from Bantu people.
Awaile is a well-known plantation among Somalis, particularly in the Bantu community, because so many young men lost their lives at this plantation. Its famous
local name is ‘‘Kili Asaile’’ (the canal of sorrow and death). his was one of the worst
plantations in Somalia-Benadir: it was here where the Italian government gained a
very bad reputation with regard to death, brutality, and re-enslavement of the freed
Bantu slaves. he name Awaile (Asaile) still reverberates in the minds of many Bantu
families in Somalia because it was at Awaile that many Bantu brothers died. Most
of the death on this plantation occurred during the period when they were manually
digging huge and gigantic canals for irrigation. hese canals diverted water from the
main river; most of the time the water was uncontrollable: workers were trapped in
the depth of the canals and drowned. he name Awaile carries a strong negative connotation among the Bantu community in Somalia. he reason why the locals named
this plantation as Asaile (sorrow), is because anyone who was conscripted for Asaile
was considered dead by his family. Other brutalities include when Italian officials came
to visit or to survey the progress of the plantations, in order not to dirty their shoes
with the mud soil, they used to lay down the Bantu workers on their chest so that the
Italian official could walk on them.
Cassanelli, Lee V., 1988, in The End of Slavery in Africa. Miers and Roberts
eds. 308–331.
Enrico, Cerulli. Somalia. Vol. 3 (1964): 86–90.
Cassanelli, Lee V., 1982,1987, 1988; Bricchetti.1899 & 1904; Luling.1964; Menkhaus.
1989; Besteman. 1991; Cerulli. 1957; Lewis. 1994; and Hess. 1966.
Rodd, Rennell. “British military administration of occupied territories in Africa.”
Londra, 1948: 162.
Foligno, Fazi. To colonial Minister, August 18, 1915. asmai, pos. 171/4, f 97.
Cassanelli. 1988. In The end of slavery in Africa. Miers & Roberts. Eds. 310–11.
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Chapter Nine
Land Rush in Somalia
Ahmed Q. Ali
S
he late dictator Mohamed Siad Barre, in his last address to the Somali
Tpeople on January 26, 1991, called on the people to refrain from the insane idea
of opposing the regime and to instead farm the land for the nation was blessed with
unlimited amount of agricultural land and water resources. he above statement
represents a long-standing master narrative that begun with the onset of the Italian
Colonial Administration, and continued throughout the successive post-colonial
Somali regimes and has its roots in a highly organized myth intended to dispose
land from its rightful owners. he implicit motive behind the narrative, however,
was to legitimize the expropriation of farm land form the less powerful and redistribute it to those clans that had political and economic connections with the slogan
that land belonged to all Somalis and all citizens of the country had the right to
acquire land wherever it was available. What the slogan, again, implicitly meant
was that Somalis of certain clans with the support of the state could confiscate
land without any due process.
he purpose of this chapter is to trace the historical and political misappropriation of land in the Riverine and Interriverine regions of southern Somalia.
he chapter specifically examines how tenure policies enacted by both colonial and
post-colonial regimes led to the total alienation of land from its original owners. he
chapter further agues that the current social and political crisis in Somalia owes its
source to the unjust land tenure processes that begun during the Italian Colonial
Administration, and adopted and later intensified by the successive post-colonial
Somali regimes and the activities of the masses to resist. I specifically argue that the
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putting the cart before the horse
collapse of the Somali social structure resulted from the contested ways in which
the above mentioned narrative defined and delimited the social boundary of land
ownership and the definition of land tenure.
Background
he total area of Somalia is 638,000 sq. km (246,000 sq. mi). Between 10 to 13 percent of the total land is classified as arable. A very small part of this area is irrigable.
he area under cultivation is estimated around 700,000 hectors (1.73 million acres).
About 80 of that is located in southern Somalia, mainly in the interriverine and
riverine regions. he main sources of irrigation water are the Shabelle and Juba
Rivers. he Shabelle is not a permanent river and normally dries up from January
to March, while the Juba is a permanent river with soil limitations. With normal
irrigation practice and cropping patterns, the Shabelle River can irrigate about
50,000 ha, while the Juba Valley can provide about 150,000 ha of irrigated land.
his situation makes irrigable land very valuable in Somalia. Water availability,
scarce precipitation, and soil quality are also limiting factors. Southern Somalia
is a semi-arid region with average maximum temperatures ranging between 30º c
to 40º c and minimum temperatures between 20º c to 30º c. Rainfall is far below
evapotranspiration; thus few crops can grow without irrigation. Most of the region
receives 500 mm of rain yearly; Jilib and Baidoa get 600 mm, while the western part
of the region receives 300 mm. Rainfall occurs in two seasons and the river peaks
are bimodal, approximately matching the rainy seasons. his situation allows two
farming seasons – irrigation and rainfed. In the irrigated areas, the most common
crops are maize (corn), sorghum, beans, sesame, cotton, rice, fruits and vegetables,
while rainfed agriculture provides mainly sorghum and beans. In the middle Juba,
farmers exploit the recession of river flooding from adjacent depressions called
Dhesheeg. Most of the farmers are small holders, relegated to marginal lands, who
employ mainly family workers and little hired labor. hese farmers produce for
subsistence with a small surplus to the market, but they provide most of the staple
food in Somalia. he average size of a small farmer’s property in the riverine regions
ranges from 0.5 to 3.3 ha (1.23–8.15 acres), but more and more farmers are becoming landless as larger estates spread out rapidly. Large estates account for about 90
percent of irrigated land. hese employ capital, hired labor and equipment, and
produce cash crops for profit.
The Italian Colonial Administration
he present condition of agricultural land and, therefore, the condition of the small
farmers in Southern Somalia, is the consequence of a long process of expropriation
of farmlands and eviction of farmers. his process began with the Italian colonial
administration and was aggravated by successive post-colonial Somali administra156
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Land Rush in Somalia
tions. It had two peaks, characterized by coercion and violence. hese peaks came
about during the Italian fascist era and during the Military Regime (mr) in the
1980s, but every other administration did its share.
his study is confined to the problems of farmlands in the Shabelle and Juba
Basins. he riverine region is linked to the larger region of the interriverine. In fact,
the land issue is among the factors that have generated great resentment among the
interriverine people and are at the root of today’s regional aspiration for autonomy.
he demand for a federal state in the 1950s had its roots in the agricultural land
problem.¹ Besides the sources cited in the endnotes and a long list of others not
reported because of space, the author, a native of the interriverine, has drawn on his
own experience as a hydraulic/irrigation engineer for about 20 years in the region.
he Italian colonialists affected the life of the farmers in the lower Shabelle
even before the conquest because they evoked fear of land expropriation among the
riparian farmers. hey expropriated and evicted farmers and pastoralists from their
lands for establishing plantations for a handful of Italian settlers. he small farmers
and the ex-slaves were the first to be used as forced labor on the plantations. Later
on, during the fascist era, compulsory work was extended to other social strata and
groups living in regions such as the interriverine.
Despite the atrocities perpetrated by the Italian colonialists who subjugated
these people with superior firearms, confiscated their lands, and burned their villages, colonial historians have not done justice to the afflicted people. Writers of
colonial history in southern Somalia instead minimized or totally concealed the
confiscation of farmlands, the eviction of farmers and pastoralists from their lands,
and all other related crimes. his issue is discussed in this chapter at some length
because of its relevance to the land reform in Southern Somalia. he denial by the
colonial historians of land confiscation, expropriation of farmlands and eviction
of peasants by the Italian colonialists justifies only the failure of the successive
Somali administrations to affect a land reform. hese administrations denied the
claims of the indigenous farmers and refused to reestablish justice through land
reform, i.e., to re-distribute land confiscated before and after independence. hese
administrations, in essence, asserted that land in Somalia was abundant; therefore,
there was no need for confiscation.
I.M. Lewis, for instance, based his account on Italian fascist sources, deliberately avoiding Somali sources and Italian sources, which were critical to the colonial
expansion. Instead, he preferred the official reports of the very governors (Carletti,
De Vecchi, G. Corni, and the like) who were responsible for such crimes. I.M. Lewis,
referring to the first 10,000 ha of land seized by Governor Carletti in the Lower
Juba stated, “his land had been formerly cultivated by the Tuni clan bondsmen
and serfs.” About forced labor, Lewis wrote, “…contrary to all expectations, [local
labourers] proved far from being easy to attract”. He continued, “his led …to
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putting the cart before the horse
force people – mainly former slaves and serfs – to work on plantations… Despite
salaries which were not low, voluntary recruits were hard to come by, and those
who were induced to work for the Italian farmers had to be supervised by guards
otherwise they simply stopped work or fled.”² First of all, the alienation of a land
belonging to others is called confiscation, but I.M. Lewis stops short of accusing
the Italians of this crime. Since Italians had no right to expropriate land, the act
deserves condemnation not an excuse. Second, historic records show that the forced
labor was not limited to ex-slaves and serfs; even if it were so, it would not lessen
the crime of the Italian administration who was a signatory of the Brussels’ Act
and who claimed to “civilize” Somalia. Lewis admitted later on that forced labor
was widespread and lasted for a long time, “his tradition of largely compulsory
labour recruitment, mainly from the sedentary Bantu tribes of the riverine regions,
continued throughout much of the Italian colonial period, although the conditions of service of plantation workers gradually improved, in theory at any rate, if
not always in practice.” It seems that Lewis can only sympathize with the “nomad
pastoralists” and not with “sedentary Bantu”. But forced labor was not restricted to
“sedentary Bantu” alone. Compulsory labor also affected Bur Hakaba and Baidoa.
Elders in Huddur, Bakool, have recounted that Italians ventured as far as Huddur
where there is evidence of a massacre of people who resisted abduction for forced
labor. hird, it is hard to believe that someone who practiced forced labor would
offer high salaries or “gradually” improve working conditions.
Sylvia Pankhurst described the domination of lower Shabelle and the Benadir
coast area as follows: “he tribes, who had been promised ‘protection,’ friendship
and trade were taken unaware and by superior arms and were overcome district by
district. Neither the Hague Rules, nor any other international convention designed
to mitigate the barbarism of war was applied in their case. Defense of their homes
and farms was punished as rebellion to a government in regard to whose advent
they had not been consulted.”³ But Lewis left out this author because, as he stated,
she is “anti-Italian” and “pro-Ethiopian”. Lewis carefully avoided not only Somali
sources, but also all Italian sources, which were not apologetic to the Italian conquest. He instead preferred to refer to British colonial sources.
Another defender of Italian colonialism is Robert. L. Hess who wrote a book
totally based on colonialist and fascist sources. “Official” colonial documents alone
cannot provide a clear picture of the colonial administration. he very existence
of an opposition to colonial expansion at home is but one of the many unreported
indications that the official documents did not tell the entire story. A historian
worthy of the name should have known more than that. Hess wrote, “Perhaps
because the Shabelle did not become Italy’s Nile in Somalia, the Somali[s] were
spared the hardship of being deprived of large areas of their land. Although the
Filonardi ordinances set a precedent for state seizure of all unoccupied lands, there
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Land Rush in Somalia
was no reason for the Italians to confiscate land.” he reason for this is that, “Only
one-tenth of the land area of Somalia was suitable for agriculture of any kind. A
Somali had more to fear from other tribesmen who coveted his clan’s grazing area
and water holes than he did from the Italians.”⁴ his would suggest that the land is
limited. In Somalia water is also limited and to irrigate the six million ha mentioned
by Mr. Hess, Somalia would really need a river as great as the Nile. Additionally,
it is very hard to explain how the Italians found all that unoccupied land near the
villages and along the rivers. A glance at the shapes of the plantations, all of them
precisely rectangular, does not suggest that the Italians avoided “cultivated farms.”
Leone Iraci, author of a critique of the book, commented on Hess’ statements as
follows: “It is absurd to hold that Somalis did not have to fear expropriation of land
because the Italians did not have reason to confiscate them. he land was indeed
confiscated, it certainly constituted a limited portion of the Somali territory, but
indeed it was the major part of the arable land…” Iraci also added, “In the 1930s
the fascist Italy used brutalities which were not common even in the Portuguese
colonies, such as a merciless expropriation of the little irrigable lands.”⁵
Catherine L. Besteman explained, that, “…the purpose of the colonial legislation was to eliminate tribal collective tenure and to set the conditions for individual
ownership, particularly by foreigners.”⁶ he Italians achieved this process through
what they called the Native Tribunals beginning in 1911. According to Hess, “he
Indigenato [tribunals for natives] enforced its decisions through confiscation of
goods or through collective punishment.” He added almost admiringly, “Both
methods were extremely effective because they were refinement of the Somali
custom of tribal and clan responsibility for the behavior of the individual.”⁷ his
shows that the Italians imposed private property to alienate the land and collective punishment to impose forced labor. A similar policy is reported in Eritrea by
Haile M. Larembo who pointed out that, “Land was appropriated for colonization
following the guidelines set by the Royal Commission which recommended that
settlement be directed towards better State lands, demanding that land legislation
should be enacted with the ultimate goal being ‘to facilitate the colonization and
the agricultural progress. In other words, to easy transfer of lands into the hands
of the Italians, and among the Italians, of those who could best cultivate it.” his
policy aimed at a gradual erosion of the traditional land system to serve the settlers’
interests. As a result, in order to ‘remove a great obstacle to colonization’, private
property among indigenes was encouraged at the expense of prevailing communal
or village ownership, as the latter hindered the sale of long-term concession because
of the need to secure unanimous consensus of the community.”⁸
In June of 1908, Governor Carletti ordered the occupation of the lower Shabelle (Afgoy-Malable), and by September the occupation was consolidated. he
occupation was achieved with military force and continued until the entire middle
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putting the cart before the horse
and lower Shabelle were totally subdued to Italy by 1914.⁹ Lee V. Cassanelli, in
his book, described and mapped the extent of the cultivated area along Shabelle
before and during the colonial occupation (1850–1911). According to this map, the
whole Shabelle Valley was cultivated.¹⁰ Most of that land was later on occupied
by the Italian colonial administration. Many villages were burnt solely for reprisal.
Immediately after that Italians began to clear the land to access roads using the
defeated as laborers. On the Juba Basin alienation of land started even earlier. By
1909 almost 50,000 ha were in Italian hands along the Juba.
In a second campaign in 1912, all fertile land between Balad and Mahadday
was occupied by 4,000 troops and “uncounted irregulars” (irregulars differed from
the regulars only by the length of the contract, which in their case was three years).
By 1914, the only portions of the interriverine not yet occupied by the Italians
were Bakol and upper Shabelle. During World War I, Governor G. De Martino
prepared a series of laws and decrees. Italy declared all land “Crown property” and
even land owned privately could be confiscated if not “cultivated on a permanent
basis.” In other words, most of Somalia became the property of the state. Land
was confiscated from any Somali farmland even those with standing crops. All the
laws (Law of 1895, Law of 1911, Law of 1912, Law of 1929, Law of 1932) made during
the Giolittian period and during the fascist era allowed the Italians to expropriate
farmlands at their pleasure. Riparian farmers claim that Italians not only confiscated
farmlands for concessions, for access and other roads, for military purposes, for
canals, drains, dykes etc., but they also moved entire villages for security reasons.
In the 1920s, the size of the Italian concessions on the Shebelle alone, as shown in
the following table, was considerable.
Table 1: Italian Concessions along the Shabelle River in the 1920s
City
Number of Hectors
Number of Individual Holdings
Afgoy
, ha
holdings
Genale
, ha
holdings
Jowhar
, ha (sais)
–––––––
Haway
ha
–––––––
Total
,
hus, the impact of colonial domination in the riverine area is characterized
by loss of land and forced labor in the very farmlands that were confiscated. But
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Land Rush in Somalia
this is not a novelty in the African arena. Most of the colonized African countries
have experienced a similar situation. A. Adu Boahen explained in his book, “All
the colonial administrators also ensured that land was made available to Europeans,
mainly through confiscation, expulsion and resettlement of the indigenous peoples.
In all such areas, compulsory labor was practiced on a very large scale, especially
during the early decades of the system, while migrant labor was provided and the
pass system was introduced to ensure the availability of labor.”¹¹ his is exactly what
happened in Somalia. Italy was not the exception that I.M. Lewis, R.L. Hess, and
Co. wanted to claim it was.
The Fascist Era
he advent of fascism in Italy rekindled the Italian dream of a “settlement colony.”
Cesare Maria De Vecchi, “a fascist head of the punitive squads who in the 1920s,
soiled themselves in Italy with bloody deeds against communists, socialists, and
other antifascist leaders”¹² was appointed Governor of Somalia Italiana by Mussolini,
in 1923. De Vecchi, who proudly defined himself as “a fascist and nothing but a
fascist and less than ever a liberal or democratic,” was as the Somalis remembered
him a ruthless fascist, a racist who permanently tied his name to the consolidation
of the fertile Jannale irrigation district.¹³
he implementation of the first phase of the fascist plan was completed in 1926.
It consisted of a barrage across the Shabelle at Genale ( Jannale) and a complete
irrigation system network for more than 20,000 ha. All the infrastructures were
implemented with compulsory labor. he major canal was named after De Vecchi.
Subsequently, a large canal for irrigation and flood relief was added on the right
riverbank. his canal was named Assayle because of the large number of women who
were widowed during its execution. he land was distributed to Italian settlers on
the basis of political merits rather than entrepreneurial skill or capital investment.
In this way, the administration founded an absurdly inefficient colonial agriculture.
he government guaranteed availability of local forced labor and a protected market
in Italy. he size of the “concessions” was large and each estate consisted of two parts:
azienda fiume along the river and azienda madre along one of the canals. Normally,
these parasitic settlers lived in sumptuous houses in the azienda madre and most of
them developed exceptional skills in how to keep “bankrupt” records and a life of
splendor. he colony had a rudimentary land registration system in which the settler
was to undertake the surveying of his/her land to be plotted on the “cadastral map”.
his meant that the settler decided on the boundaries between his/her property
and indigenous farmlands. he settlers were entitled to move farmlands and houses
according to their needs. In the 1930s, further racist laws were introduced to psychologically strengthen the perpetration of forced labor. Law 2590 0f 1937 forbade
mixed marriages while allowing Italians to keep concubines, and Law 1009 of 1939
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was introduced for “the defense and prestige of the race” granting the settlers more
abusive power. here were also ordinances allowing all sorts of injustices including
corporal punishment such as whipping natives. he local people remember settlers
such as Bufow and Abayle (Bufalo and Availe) for their abuses.
As the acreages grew the provision of compulsory labor also increased and was
extended to the interriverine region. In the Lower Juba area labor was imported
from middle Juba and also from Bay upland. Besteman stated that, “Colonial
land tenure laws did not affect land holdings in the middle Juba, as no European
settlers expressed interest in establishing plantation so far upriver.”¹⁴ here may
be some truth in this, but the author is demonstrating a colonial perspective on
Somali history. In the first place, World War ii unexpectedly interrupted the
colonial domination of the country, i.e., before the implementation of Italy’s plan
that included the regulation of the Jubba (with a dam upstream at Bardhere) and
the development of the Juba Valley. Secondly, indigenous land holdings may have
not been affected, but the landowners were indeed affected since the compulsory
labor affected the middle Juba. In addition, Dujuma-Bo’aale was a military zone
for both colonial powers until the Jubaland was ceded to Italy in 1924, with negative consequences to the local population and the agriculture. Both powers have
destroyed immense forestall wealth by clearing for military purpose one of the few
tropical forests of Somalia. he rest was done by the Military regime during the
resettlement in Dujuma in 1975.
The Duke of Abruzzi
Often pro-colonialist literature is consistent in exalting the Duke’s business in the
middle Shabelle. here, he founded an estate of 25,000 ha. Instead of seeking a
concession from the administration like other Italian settlers, he directly negotiated
with the local elders. hanks to the subjugation of the indigenous people, he could
count on their cooperation. In March 1912, Governor De Martino announced to
the inhabitants of Mahadday that from that date the region was to be subjected to
Italian authority. Colonial rule implies coercion, institution of a superior-inferior
relationship, dismantling existing authority and leadership and its substitution with
a docile, collaborative leadership, with whom “treaties” could be signed. It is not
surprising that the elders agreed to let the Duke of Abruzzi, a prince of the Italian
crown, seize 25,000 ha and establish a giant plantation.
Luigi di Savoia was nothing more than an ordinary capitalist whose methods
differed somewhat from those of the parasitic pre-industrial type of colonialism
carried out by Giolittians and Mussolinians. he Duke also reverted to compulsory
labor in times of crisis. He used a system of tying the farmer to the land of the
master with immoral criteria that were contrary to the ethics of a civilized society.
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For example, those practicing polygamy and heads of families with many children
were offered incentives or bonuses.
Colonial historians try to depict a totally different image of the Duke and
his colonial enterprise. Lewis wrote, “Unlike earlier attempts at plantation farming
in Somalia where settlers had obtained their land from the Administration of the
colony, S.A.I.S. acquired both its land and much of its labor by direct contract with
the local tribesmen (the Bantu Shidle)…” Lewis did not tell us explicitly why he
praised the Duke of Abruzzi for acquiring the land directly or what was wrong
with the administration’s acquisition. he colonial Administration confiscated the
land purely by force.
The Trusteeship Period (afis)
In 1949 at the un, during discussions on the trusteeship of the former “Italian
Somaliland,” the us representative proposed the inclusion of a clause on “Land
and National Resources” for the purpose of preventing Italy from continuing land
confiscation in Southern Somalia. he proposal did not pass. S. Pankhurst described
the proposal as “locking the stable after the horse is stolen” since all members of
the Committee knew “that the native people had been evicted from the best of the
land long before and that all natural resources believed to be capable of yielding
a profit had passed into Italian hands.” he Italian representatives Brusasca and
Cerulli were however able to include in Article 15 the following provision, “he
Administrating Authority shall not, without consent in each case of a majority of the
members of Territorial Council, permit the acquisition by non-indigenous persons,
or by companies or associations controlled by such persons, of any rights over land
in the territory save on lease for a period to be determined by law.”¹⁵
During the first five years of the Trusteeship, Italy administered Somalia
through use of colonial systems and military occupation. When the Italian endeavor
and repression could not curb the thrust of the independence movement after the
mid-1950s, Italy moderated its policy. In the meantime, the banana monopoly
was in place. Somali farmers and Italian consumers alike were penalized with this
anachronistic institution. All the attention and input were going to the banana
plantation, sacrificing the indigenous agriculture.
While the indigenous farmers who had lost their land were awaiting justice,
the Italian administration (Amminstrazione Fiduciaria Italiana della Somalia-afis)
drew up a new plan, which caused further harassment for farmers in the Shabelle
area. he aim of the plan was to safeguard the Italian properties and divert the attention of the emerging Somali leadership to new opportunities. hey were given
irrigated farmlands along the river and provided with infrastructures such as roads;
canals, drains and flood escape facilities. In essence, the Italian administrating
authority lured the new Somali leadership at the expense of the local farmers by
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distributing plantations to them, a fact that would have dramatic consequences in
the future agricultural development of the country.
Two barrages across the Shabelle River at Qoryoley and Falkero were built in
1958. Two main canals to irrigate “new lands” were diverted: Qoryoley canal (later
called Liibaan) on the right bank and Bulo Bokore canal on the left bank. Upstream
Jannale, beyond the Jannale barrage backwater, was provided with two smaller canals: Jiddo, to be used partly by the banana plantations, and Malable canal. Fornari
canal (called by the locals Madulow) was opened on the right bank but exclusively
for the existing banana plantations. All these works were realized in record time
without proper surveying and up-to-date design. hese works turned out to be a
very inefficient hydraulic system. In addition, they were responsible for a series of
adverse effects on the river, the consequences of which continues to be felt.
Liibaan canal has an average bed slope of zero and, therefore could hardly irrigate a small part of the claimed area. Falkero barrage paradoxically was located just
six km downstream from Qoryoley barrage because of the lack of adequate topographic surveying. In addition, Bulo Bokore canal has an insufficient bed slope and
is, thus, prone to excessive sedimentation. he designer also ignored the existence of
a flood channel, Far Fruqley, which was offtaking just upstream of the new barrage
and was able to divert about half of the river discharge into a swampy area.
All these works meant more expropriation of farmlands without compensation.
After completion, the land was distributed to the emerging political class. he list
of the new aziendas along B. Bokore canal resembled the roll-list of the Legislative
Assembly. None of these new owners had been farmers before or could claim land
in that area except for Hon. Ibrau Talassio. he poor peasants living in the villages
of Abdi Ali, Bulo Bokore, Jerow, etc., who all were directly or indirectly victims of
the previous Italian land seizure and compulsory labor, saw history repeating itself.
Some of these farmers moved downstream just to be harassed by floods for another
two decades until the expropriation for the resettlement of nomads stricken by
famine in the mid-1970s caused them further disaster.
During the British military administration after World War ii, many farmers
became squatters in the Italian plantations and became successful farmers when they
were allowed to farm the land. Others, joined by farmers from the Interriverine, who
had also provided compulsory labor for the Italian plantations in the past, founded
new villages further downstream on the river and collectively constructed small
hand dug canals. Some of these small hydraulic works deserve admiration. On the
middle Shabelle, small farmers moved upstream to found new farming villages. Also
religious communities, Jamea, old and new ones, were established. Floods became a
major enemy in all these areas, and until the mid-1970s, no administration provided
them with flood protection schemes. But these farmers lived with the hope that
better days of justice were on the horizon.¹⁶
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The First Republic
he First Republic (fr) was responsible for the absence of land reform and for the
deterioration of the conditions of riverine and interriverine farmers. But this will
hardly surprise anyone familiar with the formation of the leadership of the fr. he
fate of the fr was decided during the Trusteeship and its leadership was shaped
by the afis. he change of attitude of the afis after the mid-1950s worked very
well with the major independence movement, syl, which became very cooperative with Italy. he new leadership of the syl, led by the moderate Aden Abdulle
Osman, surprised the country by cooperating with the Italians. he major opposition party to the syl, the hdsm which was supposed to represent the interests of
its constituency, the riverine and interriverine (Digil and Mirifle), disappointed
everybody as well, and thus is equally responsible for the betrayal of the farmers
of these regions.
As far as the land question is concerned, the possibility of revisiting the past
land alienation effected by the Italians has become remote. he civilian regime,
which inherited the monoculture of bananas from the past, exhibited great determination to continue export of bananas as a source of foreign currency. In its first
Five Year Plan, bananas were at the top of the list in agriculture. Another intervention was the creation of adc (Agricultural Development Corporation), which was
supposed to alleviate the effects of cereal price fluctuations artificially created by
merchants. he farmers most hit were those of Bur Hakaba and Baidoa.
he leadership of the fr, because dominated by compradores (a social class
keen to speculative business with negligible interest in establishing the foundation
for a national economy) did not show sensitivity to the problems of farmers. High
officers, ministers and deputies themselves became plantation owners. Many Italians, in view of the future dismantling of the amb (azienda monopolio banane) in
Italy due to the conflict with the eec (European Economic Community) policy,
were ridding themselves of plantations by selling them or just appointing Somali
representatives. he government took over the majority of the shares and participated in the sugar estate sais of Jowhar.
For many poor peasants in the riverine area, squatting on abandoned plantations was the only way to get access to irrigated land. Squatters often had to
abandon plantations because of change of ownership or for other reasons, just to
squat on another abandoned plantation. Some owners established agreements with
the squatters to allow them to temporarily cultivate the land.
he fr was by no means the right government to solve the problems of agriculture in southern Somalia. It maintained the status quo and contributed to the
decline of production and consequent deterioration of farmers’ livelihood. It also
postponed land reform indefinitely.
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The Military Regime
he agricultural policy of the Military Regime (mr), if any existed, was undefined
from the beginning. he mr attributed the failure of agriculture to the generic
mussuq-maasuq (corruption) of the civilian regime and to middlemen and promised
the elimination of the latter. On the other hand, the mr – contradicting scientific
evidence that agricultural land is scarce in Somalia – asserted the thesis according
to which Somalia is blessed with unlimited quantities of land and water resources,
enough for those willing to tap them through hard work. he src (Supreme
Revolutionary Council) admitted there were some land problems and established
a “Justice Committee” to handle the matter. On the first anniversary of the coup,
the src declared the adoption of Scientific Socialism as a panacea for all problems.
Rhetoric about how to free the country of the evil of the exploiters (dhiigmiirad) and
the middlemen was unleashed. he famous Iskaa-wax-u-qabso (self-help) schemes
were launched. he riverine farmers were called to participate in a vast campaign to
clear silt sedimentation from canals, construct new canals (without proper technical
support), and fix mobile sand dunes, etc. Every type of soil was declared suitable for
cropping. he mr, abusing the initial enthusiasm of the masses, dissipated farmers’
energies in futile and gross schemes that became hal bacad lagu lisay and which will
be remembered for their lack of any scientific basis.¹⁷
he mr never admitted that banana plantations occupied the best soil of the
valleys and that most of these plantations were uncultivated. Instead it vowed to
boost the production of bananas. In fact, in 1970, a state banana board (Ente Banana)
was established to be in charge of its export. In 1970, the production was 146,000
metric tons; in 1972-it rose to 186,000 tons; and by 1973, it was 156,000 tons. he
contribution of banana to hard currency earning declined steadily from 1960 when
it accounted for 75 of the total country’s exports. Instead, livestock exports grew
fast until, in 1979, they made up 75 of total exports. Livestock exports rose from
19 million So. Sh. in 1970, to 160 m So. Sh. in 1972, 10,589 m So. Sh. in 1978, while
bananas were dropping to below 25 of the total export.
To improve crop production, the mr strengthened the adc (Agricultural
Development Corporation) by giving it the monopoly on cereal marketing. Farmers
were ordered to sell all their harvest to the agency. he new price was fixed arbitrarily by the agency and soon became inadequate. Farmers were re-buying their
products with tax added. his policy proved to be a real tragedy for food production
because it forced many farmers – especially middle sized farmers who employed
labor – to abandon farming.
With the adoption of “scientific socialism”, the state was in control of all
economic sectors. Agricultural Crash Programs were established on large areas of
land to absorb unemployed youth from the urban areas. As the ultimate solution
for agriculture the mr also identified the creation of large-scale state farms. State
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farms meant further expropriation of land, eviction of farmers, and drainage of resources. Besides these, state owned mega projects, several government agencies, and
military and para-military corps seized land to “increase production of food.” Land
appropriation by these agencies was the cruelest acts of land expropriation since
the colonial domination. Cooperatives Law No. 70 of 1973 was launched followed
by Land Law No. 73 of 1975. he creation of state farms and the two laws definitely
proved that the mr by no means was willing to undertake a land reform.
In 1973–74, the country experienced a severe drought. About 90,000 pastoralists were re-settled in the lower Shabelle and middle Juba, further expropriating
small farmers. he three sites chosen were Kurtunwarey (downstream of Qoryoley),
Sablale, (further downstream) and Dujuma in the middle Juba. At the first site,
expropriation mainly affected small farmers in Madulow, Baarow, Kurtunwarey,
and Iidow Guudow who lost their land. Baarow lost 300 ha. he land belonged to
a community of mixed farming. Madulow farmers had lost their land at the end of
the 1950s for Fornari canal, and now again they lost their land again. he majority
of Kurtunwarey farmers lost their land. he resettlement in Kurtunwarey with
“northern nomads” constituted a very cruel and shocking experience for the Jiiddo
community. he loss of land and the disruption of livestock routes and ranges were
combined with harassment by government officers and by newcomers who had no
understanding of the plight of this community. Communication and conflict resolution were impossible because the Jiiddu people speak Jiiddu language and use May
as a lingua franca. At the second site, Sablale, most of the land was not cultivated
because of flooding, but persons living in and around Brava claimed the land, and
no compensation was paid. Some farmers even had titles. In the 1950s and 1960s, Sablale was a swampy area. he biggest crime was committed against the environment
at Dujuma. he area was covered by one of the rarest examples of tropical forest
in Somalia with rare vegetation. In the 1920s, the British at Dujuma/Bo’aale had
affected a similar land clearing for military purposes. he land was cleared without
any plan or technical information and had to be abandoned. he only suitable land
for cropping belonged to local farmers who were eventually evicted.
After the long drought the mr became addicted to food aid, which grew from
only 5,000 tons in 1972 to 82,000 tons of cereal food in 1976. he figure grew to a
record of 330,000 metric tons in 1980/81, 186,000 in 1981/82, 189,000 in 82/83, 177,000
in 83/84, 262,000 in 84/85, and 128,000 metric tons in 85/86. Somalia received as
much aid as Ethiopia, a country with a population six to eight times larger. he
failure of the state farms further encouraged the regime to rely on food aid, and
this is believed to have had a negative effect on production because the food was
flowing from refugee camps to the markets. From the 1970s, cereal production
(sorghum and maize) increased, “but not fast enough to keep up with growth of
urban population and demand.”¹⁸
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putting the cart before the horse
In the 1980s, pressure to move to privatization came from western countries, the International Monetary Fund (imf ), and the World Bank. Instead of
distributing the land of the state farms to the original tillers, the mr prepared a
program named Ujahaynta Wax Soo Saarka (orienting toward production). he
land was distributed to government employees and other individuals. he program
was preceded by the liberalization of cereal prices in 1984, which made food grain
cropping attractive.
Land Law and Land Tenure
At the beginning, the regime allowed landless farmers to occupy abandoned or
uncultivated plantations. (In the previous period, plantation owners or their representatives had prevented farmers from occupying these lands.) he cooperative
law launched as the panacea for poor peasants did not help them, however. he
Ujeeddobadan (service cooperative) required the peasants to own land. he Tacabwadaag (labor cooperative) in which the Ministry of Agriculture was supposed to
provide land was not enforced. In some cases peasants were allowed to cultivate
abandoned plantations, and, in other cases, unsuitable land difficult to irrigate was
bush-cleared for cooperatives.
When the land Law No. 73 was introduced in 1975, it appeared to meet neither
the needs of small farmers nor those of plantation owners. Small farmers were for
no apparent reason required to own land and go through lengthy, expensive, and
discouraging procedures just to have their land registered. Plantation owners with
large areas often found that the law heavily trimmed their properties unless they
associated with other individuals to establish a company for which they were not
prepared. hus, they found Law No. 73 an attempt to confiscate their land. Article
8 of the Law limited the size of the land that could be granted to individuals or
families to 30 ha and to 100 ha for the banana plantations. However, these size
limitations were not applied to state farms, cooperatives, or private companies.
Practice showed small farmers that possession of ownership title had little
legal value and did not prevent expropriation by third parties or by the government.
here was also a technical problem. he government failed to establish a cadastre
system or an appropriate map to record and adequately plot farm boundaries of the
land registered. In 1976, a topographic map of the country to the scale of 1:100,000
were prepared which was unsuitable for cadastre purpose because of the scale. his
means that boundaries of registered farms were not plotted on the official map, thus
leaving the properties exposed to claims from whomever.
In the mid-1980s, an unprecedented race for land took place both in rural and
urban areas, especially in the capital. By the end of the 1980s, it is believed that there
was not a single piece of land along the two rivers that remained unclaimed. Law
No. 73, which could not be an instrument for land acquisition for small farmers,
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became a formidable means for upstarts and profiteers to become new owners of
land. Even traditional access to water livestock (hilo), stock routes, and village lands
were seized. Farmers who resisted and tried to protect their land were threatened
or imprisoned and lost their land.
In her survey in a village of the middle Juba, Besteman gave shocking details.
Only two out of 400 farmers were successful in achieving titles for their land. 217
farmers (60 of total) initiated the registration process without being able to
complete it for lack of funds. She explained, “Titles in the district are being issued
disproportionately to newcomers to the area and not to people who are permanently
settled farmers.”¹⁹ he Department of Land Use and Irrigation in the Ministry of
Agriculture was the most hostile office to the riverine farmers and after the mid1980s was the main instrument for the expropriation of their land.
State Farms and Planatations
Excluding farms seized by Crash Programs, cooperatives, and autonomous agencies,
the major irrigated state farms realized by the mr in the Juba Valley are:
Table 2: State-owned Plantation during the Military Regime
Project
Hectors
Juba Sugar Project (jsp)
, ha
Mogambo (Phase i and ii)
, ha
Fanole
, ha
Hoboy
, ha (planning stage)
Total
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putting the cart before the horse
Table 3: Shabelle Valley State Farms and Plantations
Location
Hectors
Afgoy-Mordile
, ha
Barirre (Gizoma)
, ha
Jannle-B.Marerta
, ha
Balad Irrigation
, ha
Jowhar Sugar Estate (snai)
, ha
Baarrow
, ha.
Shalambood
, ha
Farxaane
, ha (planning stage)
Total
Due to the size of these projects, each one affected several villages. he late Ibrahim
M. Abyan, in his study on the social impact of agricultural development in lower
Juba, showed how minimal the benefits of these projects were, compared to the
great harm they did. he Mogambo project affected villages such as Mogambo,
Mana Moofe, Bulo Yaaq, Koban, Mashaqo, and some banana farms. Abyan reported that most of the village farmland was taken over by the first phase of the
project without compensation, but only 40 farmers were offered land and only 20
persons were employed by the project. In 1979, the author, who was part of the
Mogambo irrigation design team, surveyed and plotted on the map the farmland
of these villages that fell inside the project boundary, which were more than 400
ha. Abyan reported that Juba Sugar Project (jsp) and Fanole affected about 56 villages in which “most of the peasants were expropriated of their land; others had
their sources of water diverted or blocked, or their fields deliberately flooded to
drain off the project farms.” At Fanole some of the farmers were offered land in
very poor soil, the “marine plain soil,” which is a saline, compacted soil with poor
drainability and therefore not suitable for farming. On Marerey, Abyan reported,
“he villagers are traditional peasants. hey used to farm 4,200 ha of land; all of it
was taken over by the Project.”²⁰
In the Shabelle flood plain, all state projects had expropriated farmlands
and evicted farmers without compensation. he Jannale Bulo Marerta project was
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developed not as a state farm, but when the land was distributed, many farmers
did not get land. Farmers with political connections had the lion’s share. Others
benefited without even being inside the project area. To the poor peasants who
were occupying abandoned plantations, an insufficient piece of land was given to
be cropped as cooperative.
Not only did farmers lose land to these state farms, but also they were not even
employed by them. he appointed managers and the officers were always strangers
to the area, unable and unwilling to communicate with indigenous people who
either spoke May or used May as lingua franca. Mogambo project headquarters
was located at Mogambo village where people spoke Chiziguli and used May to
communicate with outsiders, and the project officers spoke standard Maxaatiri
Somali. Communication often required a chain of interpreters. Often villagers were
expelled from government offices because they were not able to speak “Somali”, as
was the case in the interriverine regions where people speak May. his shows how
the cultural values of specific clans are imposed as the “real” values of the nation.
Abdi M. Kusow explains in detail in chapter one of this book how language and
literature are used to remove segments of the society from the social boundaries
of Somaliness.
In 1987, the Ujahaynta program was launched and state project lands were
distributed to “private farmers” and the villagers witnessed their land being given
away to “outsiders” who had never lived in the region. he effect was devastating.
he families became dismembered because the youth abandoned the villages. In
the late 1980s many young Chiziguli speaking were doing the most regarding jobs
in the capital. Similar fates befell other villagers who lost their land to state farms.
In the “locally financed projects” (Crash Program and farms of government agencies), the situation was similar. Afgoy suffered most from these projects because
of its closeness to the capital. Farmers who used to have farms near the river were
pushed to areas previously reserved for dry land farming.
Land Rush
Despite the fact that 10 to 13 percent of the total land is arable in Somalia, only a
small portion of this land is irrigable. However, the mr and, before it, the civilian
regime, insisted that there was an abundance of land and water resources in Somalia.
In fact, hydrological studies carried out in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s showed that
only 40 to 50,000 ha were irrigable by the Shabelle in Gu season, though a larger
area can be irrigated during Deyr season. Juba Valley suffers from limited soil availability rather than limited water.
he civilian regime was preparing a land law before it was ousted by the coup.
he law drafted in 1968 by the Ministry of Agriculture assisted by fao was similar
to Law No. 73. Somali entrepreneurs were limited in number in the 1960s, yet land
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acquisition took place during that period; land transactions however, were limited.
In the 1970s, the mr discouraged and interrupted land alienation. Clause (e) of
Art. 15, which authorized the government to confiscate any land which remained
uncultivated for two years – which was applied in several cases-constituted a real
threat to land owners in general. he provisions restricted land transactions. Art.
12, paragraph 1 and Art 14 paragraph 1, sub (c) forbade the transfer, the selling or
the leasing of agricultural land.
he political and economical situation of the country changed dramatically
in the 1980s. hese changes greatly affected the land tenure in southern Somalia.
It is hard to identify the factors that most contributed to the race for land after the
mid-1980s. he following paragraphs contain a review of some changes, which may
have paved the road to the land rush.
In 1983, Saudi Arabia stopped the import of live animals from Somalia for
health reasons. he decision dramatically affected the country and the trade balance.
Livestock exports had constituted 75 of the total export. he deficit of the trade
balance became huge and inflation climbed. In 1984, the foreign debt increased
by 143 and inflation rose by 92, while agriculture sector growth was 10.6. he
pressure from the imf and World Bank forced the mr to accept conditions that
according to imf were supposed to lead to a free market economy. he monopoly
on agricultural product marketing by adc was broken in 1984.
Despite the prevailing misery of the country, the mr allowed some social
groups to accumulate a great deal of wealth. A new class emerged from the bureaucratic clique who became rich by accumulating a fortune from the empire they
managed. Government contracts and supplies to the army, and easy bank loans
without guarantees became heaven for privileged businessmen and profiteers of all
kinds, especially if they had clan affiliations with the presidency. Before, the “pie”
was limited to the clan affiliation of the strong persons of the regime led by Siad
Barre, the sharing was somehow a cross-clan affair. After Siad Barre’s car accident
in 1986, the circle was restricted. However, for those in Barre’s family, getting rich
was made even easier as no rules or laws were observed in their case.
After the liberalization of crop prices in 1984, farming became profitable. he
internal fruit market also expanded due to changes in the transportation sector
and the diet of the town population. Transportation was partially left by the mr to
the private sector. In the 1980s this sector grew fast, alimented by the “import” of
vehicles and trucks from the gulf market. his had a great impact on the rural areas.
Light trucks and busses, sitey, xaajiya, caasi pushed by the competition, adventured
more and more onto rural roads, making possible the flow of commodities and
persons to markets. Crops and other commodities could be rushed to standard
and improvised markets.
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able exchange rates in the black market, contributed to the accumulation of capital.
Many emigrants rebuilt their family homes and started small businesses. Privates
also established a number of successful factories producing construction materials or
other goods without assistance from the government. he state factories, undersold
to persons with connections to the “ruling family” during Ujahaynta, did not show
any signs of life. Equipment and machines were idle until they were looted during
the civil war and sold abroad.
Cultivation of fruit trees expanded dramatically and was aided by the facilities
offered by the Grapefruit Project, as well as a sometimes-forced campaign, which
was launched by the Ministry of Agriculture to encourage planting of fruit trees.
he response of small farmers to the campaign was excellent because they hoped
to protect their farms in this way. New fruits and vegetables, such as avocado, cantaloupes, etc. were introduced and appeared on the market. Despite the disaster
experienced in state farms, farming bananas and other fruits was profitable for
private entrepreneurs. In the 1980s, Italy invested in the banana sector. Somalfruit,
an Italian-Somali joint venture established for the export of fruits, swallowed most
of the Italian investment in the sector.
In the 1970s and in early 1980s, land transactions were limited. hey never
stopped totally since transactions in which land values were declared zero and
the selling of farm facilities such as housing, infrastructures, fruit trees, etc. were
legal. After 1984 there was a drastic change in land transactions, land transfers and
registrations. A race for land started which reached its peak after the mid-1980s.
A similar “land rush” occurred in urban land in major towns and was massive in
the capital and major towns. During this period the city of Mogadishu expanded
enormously. In the late 1970s, the capital had 600,000 inhabitants, and in the census of 1986, the population was 1,200,000 inhabitants. “Land hunters” swallowed
the small farms, goof, for the production of fodder for livestock, located near the
capital, and their owners were forced to undersell and move to the interior. With
the expansion of the city, services also expanded greatly. What triggered the “land
rush” has not been fully understood and this subject deserves more attention by
researchers. Besteman reported that perhaps considering the high rate of inflation;
land offered certain security in maintaining the value. he task force “Land Tenure
Rearrangement” of the Somali National University in Italy asserted that cornering
land had a speculative aim since lack of irrigation water makes land limited. he
report also stated that by 1988, 65 of the irrigable land in Somalia was registered
as concessions.²¹ he figure is in agreement with those given by Besteman.
he data gathered by Besteman for the middle Juba show clearly that land
registration rose drastically in 1984.
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putting the cart before the horse
Land Registration from 1980 to 1987 ( of Farms Registered)
Year
Middle Jubba
Jilib
’
’
’
’
’
’
’
()
()
* Total registered farms nationwide: 13,561 – 256,000 ha – of which 75 irrigable.
** Adopted from C. Besteman.
*** 1881–82 was a flood year in Middle Juba.
Whatever the real cause behind the race to agricultural land, its violence
and speed were unprecedented. hose who were not willing to sell their land were
coerced. Small farmers who could not afford to buy pumps in areas where gravity
irrigation was not possible were stripped of their land and pushed further into the
bush. Farmers with farms close to the river and main roads were targeted. Fallow
and grazing lands were declared uncultivated. Luuq farmers lost their land (400
ha) in Halbo for a refugee settlement in 1978. Since that time, they have lost even
more land because the land race did not spare that region. he land race on Juba
reached the proposed Baardhere reservoir site. In the Upper Juba, the indigenous
people no longer have farms on the right bank. In the Upper Juba region (luuq
and Bardera) things were exasperated by the announcement of the Bardera dam
project. his unleashed a rush by the president’s clan to forcefully grab land and
disposes farmers in the region.
Government agency lands and states farms were not spared either. For instance, the Foreign Minister seized land belonging to the Agricultural Secondary
School that was adjacent to the main bridge of Afgoy. he Generalissimo’s son
seized farmlands at Barirre to make a large and fortified estate. He also obstructed
a traditional livestock right of way to the river. he access road and the farm were
implemented with government equipment. To meet the needs of the new land
holders, the mr implemented four bridges on the Shabelle which were financed
by the eec in 1989.
The Fall of the Military Regime
Except for the Bakol region, the people in the riverine and interriverine did not
engage in armed struggle although they opposed the military regime. After the
seizure of the capital they welcomed usc (United Somali Congress) in the hope of
defending their homes and farmlands. When the army of M. Siad Barre fled the
capital to seek refuge in the south, it looted crops and animals and killed hundreds
of interriverine inhabitants. Bay region, following the example of Bakol, organized it
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Land Rush in Somalia
and established the sdm (Somali Democratic Movement) knowing that the events
of January were only the prelude to a series of battles and a full-blown war.
A self-styled sdm leadership made headquarters in Mogadishu far from the
interriverine and detached itself from the riverine populations. Delegations from
the agricultural riverine and the coastal areas such as Jannale, Qoryooley and Brava
requested that local sdm leadership to be organized and trained so they could
defend themselves and their farms. But they went back disappointed. Later on,
the sdm leadership split into two factions. he faction allied to usc-Aydeed was
assisted and the interriverine region was liberated from the remnants of Mohamed
Siad Barre in May of 1992. However, the usc militia occupied the interriverine and
committed crimes against the masses.
During the civil war, not only were the riverine people killed and looted but
also the whole area was subjected to a total clean up. usc militia, followed by snf
(remnants of the regime) militia, took anything worth taking and the region was left
bereft of all goods. Generators, agricultural and construction equipment, machines,
etc., were taken away by a well-organized “looting incorporations.” he riverine
people saw their land again occupied by all types of factions, especially snf and usc.
When the usc elements were asked the reason for the occupation of farmlands, their
answer was that the farmlands they occupied belonged to the faqash (remnants of
the mr). he factions, in their reconciliation conferences, have included the land
issue and looted properties in their agenda of discussions. However, they are not
questioning the legality of the mr on the land issue at all.²²
Conclusion
he riverine and the interriverine people have lost their land and suffered from
the land rush. While they were being stripped of their land, they have been
emarginated, oppressed and humiliated. Appointees of the mr-individuals from
far regions and strangers to there culture and customs-administered their regions.
hese were “strangers” with whom they were not even able to communicate due
to the language barrier.
It is a common belief among riverine and interriverine people that a great deal
of the civil war was nothing but a continuation of the land rush at its highest stage,
i.e., one faction eliminating another in order to take possession of the fertile farmlands. All transactions, land transfers, concession grants, and all registrations, which
occurred under Law No. 73, must be reversed and declared illegal and invalid.²³
Notes
1.
For more information about this issue, see Mukhtar, M.H. “he Emergence and the
Role of Political Parties in the Inter-riverine Regions From 1074 to 1060.” Ufahamu,
18, no. 2 & 3, ucla Press, Los Angeles 1989.
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putting the cart before the horse
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
Lewis, I.M. A Modern History of Somalia, (Boulder, Westview Press, 1992) 92–94.
Pankhurst, S.E., Ex-Italian Somaliland, (New York, Philosophical Library, 1951) 88.
Hess, Robert. L., Italian Colonialism in Somalia, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1966) 186.
Iraci, Leone, “Per una demistificazione del colonialismo italiano: il caso della Somalia”,
Terzo Mondo Gen-Mar. (1969): 66.
Besteman, Catherine L., “Land Tenure, Social Power, and Legacy of Slavery in Southern Somalia, (Ph.D. diss., University of Arizona, 1991), 389.
Hess, Robert L., Italian Colonialism in Somali, 110.
Laredo, Haile M., the Building of an Empire, Italian Land Policy and Practice in
Ethiopia 1935–1941(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994) 16.
Hess, R.L., Italian Colonialism in Somalia, 91.
Cassanelli, L.V., The Shaping of Somali Society (Philadelphia: University of Philadelphia
Press, 1982)
Bohen, Adu A. African Perspective on Colonialism, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University
Press, 1992) 60.
Cremascoli, Bruno. Il Paese di Punt, (Milano: Edizioni Unicopli, 1987) 214.
De Vecchi, C.M., Orizzonti d’Impero, 323.
Besteman, C.L., “Land Tenure, …” 391.
Pankhurst, S.E., Ex-Italian Somaliland, 379.
he author in 1974–76 designed and supervised the execution of the first flood bund
in the Qoryoley area and a river cut-off project for the purpose of reclaiming the
swamps of Afgoy Yarey. None of the 5000 ha reclaimed land went to the local farmers.
Ironically, the land race combined with inefficient use of irrigation water has greatly
reduced floods in the lower Shabelle basin.
Literally: “A she-camel milked in the sand.”
Raikes, Philip, Modernizing Hunger, (Portsmouth, nj: Heinemann, 1988) 191–192.
Besteman, C.L., “Land Tenure, …” 404.
Abyan, I.M. , Development and Its Social Impact on the Local Community in the
Juba Valley, Proceedings of the third Congress of Somali Studies, Rome, 1986, 404–409.
Mohamed, Khalif S., “Riassetto Fondiario, in Programma per docenti dell’Universita’
Nazionale Somala, Sottogruppo: “Somalia-Emergenza in Campo Agro-zootecnico”,
Firenze, 1993.
For more on this subject see African Rights publication: Land Tenure and the Creation
of Famine, and the Prospects for Peace in Somlia, Discussion Paper no. 1, 1993.
An earlier version of this study was presented at the 37t Annual Meeting of the
African Studies Association (asa). In Toronto, Ont. Canada in November 5, 1994.
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Chapter Ten
he Collapse of the Somali Banking System
Abdulqadir Arif Qassim
S
his essay will explore the reasons behind the collapse of the Somali
TBanking system. he paper will establish that the legacy those colonial rulers
bequeathed the country contributed to its failure. It will explore how the monetary
policies and banking system pursued by the parliamentary regime continued that
legacy. Finally, it will analyze how the military regime’s shifting policies and nomadic management affected the Somali banking system.
Pre-Colonial Somali Currency
In ancient times, Somalia was well connected by sea routes with the eastern coast of
Africa, the Middle East, southern Asia and China. Sea travel was facilitated by its
geographic location and by the regular monsoon winds. Many studies confirm that
the coastal cities of Somalia had trade relations with the Ancient World, especially
with Egyptians, Arabs and Persians. A Greek guide for mariners of the Red Sea
and Indian Ocean, written about 150 ad, tells about regular trade between Red Sea
ports and East Africa (Somalia, Kenya and Tanzania).¹ Ibn Battuta, a Moroccan
traveler, visited Zeila, Mogadishu and other ports in 1331. He described Mogadishu
as a flourishing trade center with a large textile industry.
In the nineteenth century the Somali coastal centers not only exported commodities but also acted as an intermediary between the overseas traders and overland African traders. Long distance caravan trade flourished throughout regions
of Somalia and attracted Western and Arab merchants to its network system.² It is
not known when the bartering system ceased to exist in the coastal cities, but coins
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were used in the Benadir as far back as 1200 ad. here is a record of more than
seven thousand coins minted in Mogadishu. he mint operated between the 13t
and 16t century under 23 different rulers of Mogadishu. Also, Chinese coins dating
from 960 to 1279 have been found in the southern coast, while Egyptian coins of
the 1300s have been found in the Adal towns of the northern regions.³ he Maria
heresa haler coins, issued in Austria after 1780, were used widely in Somalia. he
rural and pastoral community of the horn of Africa esteemed the Maria heresa
not only for its intrinsic silver value, but also for its easily recognizable design. Also,
Mombassa and Zanzibar “besas” were used in Benadir as fractions of the haler. he
Indian rupee was also used in Somalia.⁴ In the pastoral communities, particularly
in northern Somalia, the traditional system of barter exchange remained until the
colonial occupation.⁵
The Colonial Economy
he opening of the Suez Canal in 1869 granted the Horn of Africa a new economic
opportunity. It created competition between European colonial powers desiring raw
material to feed their industries and markets for selling manufactured goods. In
Somalia, British middlemen took an interest in the northern regions, using them as
supply centers for fresh meat for their garrison in Aden. Meanwhile, Italians took
an interest in the southern regions, establishing huge plantations for export crops.
Both colonial administrations imposed taxes not only to increase their revenues
but also to drive Somalis from rural and pastoral activities. Somalis received very
few social services in return for their money. In fact, the first veterinary service in
the northern regions did not appear until 1924, after the United States of America
threatened to embargo skin imports from Aden and neighboring countries unless
provided with veterinary health certificates.⁶ In addition, neither colonial administration invested much capital for development. From 1901 to 1920, Britain devoted
its resources, grants and revenues, to military expenditures. Italians allocated 55
of their budget to military expenditure between 1931 and 1940.
he Italian administration was determined to promote foreign settlers’ interests at the expense of the native Somalis. he colonial policy focused on production
of cash crops. he consequence of that policy was confiscation of farmlands and
compulsory labor recruitment, which adversely affected the native economy.⁷ he
production of subsistence crops, which had been developed long before colonial
occupation in Somalia, received only negligible attention. herefore, food for local
consumption had to be imported. he colonial currencies caused a flood of imported
goods into Somalia, which jeopardized local output. hese colonial currencies facilitated tax collection and development of colonial banks, but the lending policy of
these banks excluded Somali traders and entrepreneurs. Somalis were also denied
job opportunities in the colonial banks. As A. Adu Boahen observed:
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“[Finally] the monetary policies pursued by all the colonial powers must
be held partly responsible for the present underdeveloped state of the continent. Under these policies, all the colonial currencies were tied to those of the
metropolitan countries, and all their foreign exchange earnings were kept in
metropolitan countries and not used for internal development.”⁸
The Colonial Impact
Until 1920, the Italian colonial effort was spent on the domination of Benadir and
the inter-riverine regions. he conquest of Benadir and the inter-riverine area
coincided with the time when in Italy the Fascist wind was blowing. he colonial
army completed its occupation of the northeastern portion of southern Somalia
in 1927, when it consolidated its power in Benadir and the inter-riverine regions.
he Fascist regime’s goal in the southern regions of Somalia was mainly to settle a
sizeable number of Italian farmers in the Shebelle and Jubba fertile lands. Before
December 8, 1910, the Indian rupee and Maria heresa coins were used for trade in
Somalia and the coastal cities of Aden, Mombassa and Zanzibar. On June 26, 1911,
the Italian Colony administration issued the Italian rupee in silver coins based on
a fixed nominal value of 1.68 lira.⁹ he new rupee replaced both foreign currencies
in circulation as well as the Italian “besa.” he Italian “besa,” issued in 1905 and
made of nickel and bronze, was used as a cent but failed to circulate after local
traders rejected it.
As World War i affected the Italian economy, the depreciation of the lira
posed difficulty for the colonial monetary system in Somalia. Besides, the high
cost of silver caused the rupee’s intrinsic value to exceed its nominal value. In September 1919, the Italian rupee was re-valuated. In 1920, Banca d’Italia established a
branch in Mogadishu functioning as a colonial central bank designed to promote
its interest in Somalia. he branch became the first foreign bank in Somalia, and
immediately issued the first bank notes of the Italian rupee.¹⁰ In June 18, 1925, the
Italian lira was put into circulation; meanwhile, the rupee, which had lost ground in
East African markets, continued as legal tender until July 1, 1926. he introduction
of the lira in southern Somalia served as a connection between local consumption
and Italian markets. When Italy gained Juba land from the British administration
in 1925, Banca d’Italia opened a second branch in Kismayo.
he fascist policy in Somalia, the availability of fertile land for agriculture,
and the introduction of metropolitan money instruments attracted many Italians to settle in Somalia. In 1932, the Cassa di Risparmio di Torino established in
Mogadishu the first commercial bank in Somalia. In 1938 Cassa di Risparmio di
Torino transferred its activities in Somalia to another Italian bank, the Banco di
Napoli. Before 1940, Italian bank lending to Italian firms amounted to 1,014,139,910
liras of which 22 was for agriculture. Although direct grants by the Italian gov179
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ernment to Italian firms are not known, two Italian companies enjoyed loans of
about 131,000,000 liras.¹¹ Private banks denied loans to Somali traders because
the lending operations were under the control of the colonial administration. he
Fascist administration was devoted to promoting the foreign settlers’ interests at the
expense of the native population. Moreover, they introduced a law that excluded
Somalis from competition with Italians. Para-state monopolies were created to
pass every profitable activity into Italian hands.
The British Currency and Banking
After the defeat of Italy in World War ii, the British gained control over all Somali
territories except the French protectorate. At that time (1941), the Italian lira was
the only money in circulation, and it continued to be used as a credit instrument
together with the East African Shilling. In 1943, Barclays Bank (D.C. & O.) started
to operate in Mogadishu, replacing the Italian banks. he Mogadishu branch of
Barclays Bank became the first British bank operating in Somalia. he Italian banks
were forced to close their Somali activities after the defeat. In the early stages of
British occupation in Somalia, the lira was exchanged with the East African shilling at the rate of 3.50 lira for 1 ea shilling. But the lira was losing ground day by
day until it lost market value and was no longer accepted as a means of payment.
As the Italian lira failed to circulate, the East African shilling became the sole
currency circulating in Somalia. he ea shilling had been issued after 1920, when
one currency board was established for the British East African colonies.¹² It had
been introduced into British Somaliland during the early 1940s. he East African
shilling was linked with the value of sterling in London and after the Italian defeat;
its circulation was expanded in Somalia, Eritrea and Ethiopia. he circulation of
the British colonial currency facilitated the penetration of British banking institutions in Somalia. Before the 1950s, banking business in British Somaliland was
conducted through an Aden branch of Messrs. Cowasjee Dinshaw Bros.¹³ In 1952;
the National Bank of India established a branch in Hargeysa and in 1954 in Berbera.
In 1959, the National Bank of India transferred its activities in British Somaliland
to National Grindlays Bank. Despite the fact that Britain dominated northern
Somalia for about a century, the colonial power and its banking institutions gave
negligible attention to the development of the infrastructure of the local market.
he British colonial administration lending policy was not much different than
the Italian colonial one.
Trusteeship – The Limited Program of afis
In the 1950s the former Italian Somaliland became a United Nations Trusteeship
territory. he obligation of the Italian Trusteeship was to administer the territory
for a transitional period of 10 years leading to independence. During that transi180
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tional period, the Italian administration (Amministrazione Fiduciaria Italiana della
Somalia) was requested to foster the development of free political institutions and
promote the economic advancement and self-sufficiency of the inhabitants.¹⁴ In
the early years of the trusteeship, the administration’s effort was primarily directed
toward suppressing the nationalist opposition. he afis invested much capital in
maintaining law and order. he limited programs of afis, incompetence, corruption and colonialist sentiments hindered the development of the economy.¹⁵ he
afis supported Italian plantation owners in regaining the land they had abandoned
during the British military occupation. he plantation owners emerged with a
speculative aim, leading to a banana monoculture in the best-irrigated land at the
expense of diversified agricultural production.
It was in 1954 that a Somali credit institution, “Credito Somalo” was founded
in Mogadishu. he new bank, Credito Somalo, was designed to provide short-term
loans to the private sector. In that year a seven-year development plan was instituted
for the first time in Somalia. he plan advanced by the United Nations and usica
(United States International Cooperation Administration, later us-aid), was mainly
concerned with the livestock and agricultural sectors.¹⁶ In the 1954–55 budget, a plan
was proposed to establish a credit institution for medium and long-term loans, but it
was rejected. Somali currency was issued as legal tender under the ordinance No. 14
of May 15, 1950. he new currency “Somalo” (commonly called the Somali Shilling)
was covered with fine gold of 0.124414 gr. and was convertible to Italian lira. One
Somalo was equivalent to 87.50 liras.¹⁷ he Somalo became the single monetary
unit of the country and replaced the East African Shilling circulating in Southern
Somalia. As the British, after the arrival of afis, withdrew their involvement in
Somalia, Barclays Bank closed its Mogadishu business. In the meantime, Banca
d’Italia and the Italian private banks (Banca di Roma and Banco di Napoli), which
had ceased their activities during the British occupation in Somalia, restarted their
business during afis. Later in 1957–58, 60 of the Somali currency was covered
with convertible currencies (Pound sterling and us dollars).
During the afis administration, the Credito Somalo opened branches in
Kismayo, Merka and Baidoa. Although banking institutions had been operating in
Somalia for about half a century, it was Credito Somalo which first recruited native employees. Previously, colonial banks had denied job opportunities to Somalis,
preventing them from acquiring training and experience in the banking field. he
Credito Somalo’s management was in Italian hands before independence. he low
level of staff training and lack of managerial knowledge and experience contributed
to the failure of the bank after independence. A Somali fund “Cassa per la Circolazione Monetaria della Somalia-Somalcassa” was created in Rome. Its first task
was to control Somali currency in circulation and to lend short-term credit to the
trusteeship administration. he Somalcassa was represented in southern Somalia
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by the Banca d’Italia branch in Mogadishu. In 1959, the function of Somalcassa was
further extended to issuing of banknotes and foreign currency exchange. he rate
of exchange between the Somalo and the Italian lira became subject to market.
Post-Colonial Era – The Beginning of The Crisis
he Somali National Bank was created on June 30, 1960, under the decree
No. 3/1678.¹⁸ he bank was designed to be an independent central bank and replaced
both the Somalcassa and the Banca d’Italia branch in Mogadishu. On July 1, 1960,
the northern and the southern regions (British and Italian Somaliland) merged
as one independent and sovereign state. Neither of the colonial administrations
had prepared skillful cadres to lead the banks after independence.¹⁹ As a result,
the bank’s executive management was in the hands of expatriates, even though
the president (who later became governor) was Somali. Until independence, each
region has had its own currency, trade, payment, and fiscal systems.²⁰ hese were
substantially different. he First Republic’s monetary policy focused primarily on
the unification of those systems left behind by colonial administrations. To achieve
that objective, the Somalo was introduced in the northern region, although the
East African shilling continued to circulate under an agreement with the British.
Subsequently a unified national customs tariff was established.
In August 1961, the Somali National Bank opened a branch in Hargeysa. he
head office of the bank as well as all its branches carried out both central and commercial banking operations. A special law authorized the Somali National Bank
to perform commercial bank business in order to compete with foreign banks
operating in Somalia. In the same year, the Somalo was substituted for the East
African shilling, and from that time on, the whole country had only one currency.
An Egyptian bank established a branch in Mogadishu in that year. he Bank de
Port Said became the first Arab commercial bank to operate in Somalia. After
1960, the management of the Credito Somalo was taken over by Somalis and a
branch was opened in Berbera. he Somalo was substituted, after a few years of
independence, with a new currency named “Somali shilling.” he new currency
had the same denomination of banknotes and coins as the Somalo, but the designs
were completely different.
In 1963, a credit section for medium and long-term loans was established
within Credito Somalo. he section, which later became the Somali Development
Bank, was designed to promote new economic activities. Collaterals as well as
personal guarantees secured these local and foreign commercial bank loans. Subsistence producers, farmers and pastoralists, however, did not possess the necessary
requirements (improved farm land or improved urban real estate) to qualify for bank
grants. his lack of investment capital hindered the small local producers’ attempts
to increase their production. In 1964, the government introduced an integrated sys182
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tem of trade and payment. Yet the monetary policy did not attempt to liberalize the
lending system restrictions. Moreover, the standardization of a national custom tariff
and the equalization of government salaries had an adverse effect on the standard
of living of the employees in the northern region.²¹ Neither of the development
plans launched by the civil regime granted appreciable attention to the production
sector. he leadership of the First Republic focused on export, which was the main
foreign resource of the country. he livestock industry was entirely in the hands
of private Somali producers and dealers, while Italian settlers owned the banana
plantations. After 1960, privileged bureaucrats and traders purchased some of the
plantations. Although the ownership changed hands somewhat, the banana crops
raised for export remained in the hands of the Italian monopoly.
In 1967, the Middle East War adversely affected Somali exports and the Somali
National Bank’s reserves. he closure of the Suez Canal doubled the length of the
sea route to Italy. As a result, Somali bananas faced more intense competition in
the sole importer market. he devaluation of the British pound sterling caused
another loss to the bank’s reserves.²² Despite the decline of foreign exchange earnings and bank reserves, the trend of import-dependence increased. Intermediaries
connected to the parliamentary arena dominated the importation business. he
State petit bourgeois was the major holder of private assets. Many politicians and
bureaucratic officers were directly or indirectly controllers of business activities.
he post-independence state inherited a chronic budget situation, which led it to
remain dependent on debits (internal and external) and foreign aid, not only for
development projects but also for budgetary support. he Somali National Bank
had standby arrangements with the International Monetary Fund in order to meet
the deficit in the balance of payments.
In 1968, the Somali National Bank absorbed the Credito Somalo, which was
on the verge of bankruptcy. he absorption of the bank was not caused solely by
debtors’ insolvency, marginal profit and competition. Lack of savings collection, lack
of awareness of market dynamics, and the colonial legacy (see page 8) also contributed to its failure. In the same year, the National Grindlyas Bank opened a branch
in Mogadishu. In the post-colonial government, the expatriate commercial banks
concentrated their business in the main urban centers. hey engaged in granting
medium and short-term credit to the elite farmers and traders. hese banks avoided
appointing Somalis to decision-making positions. he Somali National Bank,
however, carried out intensive training programs (internal and external), which
contributed to the formation of the bank’s professional cadres. he bank attempted
to extend its activities through the regional capitals, but poor communication appears to have deterred banking development in the remote districts. During the
colonial administrations, bank savings from small traders, urban working classes,
city dwellers, and rural and pastoral producers were almost nonexistent. In the First
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Republic bank, domestic savings strategies for attracting new domestic investors
were inefficient; also traditional financial practices and illiteracy may have prevented
some native customers from investing.²³ he Somali banking institutions underestimated or were incapable of soliciting grass-roots participation in the economy.
he vision of monetary policy of the country was based on nomadic thoughts
and practices, since pastoral folks dominated the policy-making positions. heir
tradition has limited saving tendency comparing with other local customs – city
dwellers and agricultural culture.
In March 1969, the constitution of the Somali National Bank was amended
and its functions, commercial and central, were separated. he bank’s lending policy
was also revised. he Somali National Bank and the Somali Development Bank
were allowed to extend medium and long-term credit, while the commercial banks
were limited to granting only short-term credit to the private sector, particularly
outside of the main urban areas. Before the civil government could implement this
reform, a military coup d’etat seized the country.
The Socialist Banking System
he monetary policy of the military regime primarily focused on the rehabilitation
of the banking system. he former government had suffered from economic instability, which partly explained the military coup d’etat. he new regime introduced
an austerity program to reduce budget deficits. he budget cut off affected mainly
the salaries and allowances of civil servants. hat policy was largely aimed at settling the external and the internal debts of the country, as Somalia had inherited
a chronic budget deficit situation from the colonial administrations. he regime
introduced Xisaabi xil ma leh²⁴ policy aimed to crackdown national resource looters
of civilian administration. his policy created perplexities among the business elite
connected with the former administration. he result was a banking panic, which
led to a shortage of the Somali shilling in circulation at the end of 1969.²⁵ On
May 7, 1970; the Government nationalized foreign banks, petroleum companies,
the Mogadishu Power Station and the Jowhar Sugar Factory. hese firms had
been criticized for exporting high profits out of the country instead of reinvesting
them in the further development of the country. he nationalized banks included
the Banca di Roma, Banco di Napoli, the National Grindlays Bank, and the Bank
de Port Said. he regime defined their act as being in the national interest. he
military junta believed that the seized assets could best be operated by the stateowned enterprises for the benefit of the country. In fact, nationalization facilitated
efficient exchange control measures, which considerably increased the reserves of
the Somali National Bank in 1970 and 1971.²⁶
he military government attempted to reduce unemployment through the
introduction of crash programs and self-help schemes. he implementation of these
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projects resulted in a considerable increase in domestic production. Nevertheless,
the regime continued its national public plan and took over the food importation
business and the banana export industry. On October 21, 1970, the first anniversary
of the coup d’etat, the military regime declared that the country would follow the
path of “scientific socialism.” he regime’s aspiration was to make the country selfsufficient through centralized planned economy. Under this system, a number of
programs were launched which brought the country’s economy under the control
of state-run monopolies and cooperatives. In January 1, 1971, the banking system
was again restructured and two commercial banks were established – the Somali
Commercial Bank and the Somali Savings and Credit Bank. he new banks, as
public owned institutions, were designed to promote the socialist economy. Nevertheless, the monetary policy of the regime also considered the need for a mixed
economy.²⁷ the commercial banks attempted to extend credit facilities to the private sector, particularly to the light industries, but the Somali Development Bank
lending policy continued to promote mainly state-owned industries and socialist
cooperatives.
In 1975, the banking system was further reorganized. he Somali National
Bank became the Somali Central Bank. he Somali Commercial Bank and the
Somali Savings and Credit Bank merged as one commercial bank, the Somali
Commercial and Savings Bank. he main objective of the unification was to rationalize the activities of the two state-owned commercial banks operating in a small
market in the same line of business. In the same year, Somalia and Libya agreed to
establish a joint bank for international trade development, which would be based
in Mogadishu.²⁸ However, the project was aborted before it was implemented.
After the failure of the trade development bank project, the Somali Commercial
and Savings Bank became the sole commercial bank of the country. Although
management was unified, the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank failed to
eliminate the superfluous staff inherited from the former banks. Moreover, the
banking institutions, as public-owned institutions, were required to annually recruit
a certain number of high school graduates without considering their staffing needs.
he regime adopted policy to maximize employment while ignoring cost reduction
strategies for state-owned enterprises. Besides, the Somali Commercial and Savings
Bank was required to further extend its domestic branches throughout the country.
he establishment of new branches was partly based on political reasons rather than
business opportunities. he Siyad Barre policy was devoted to promoting certain
clan’s interests at the expense of the remaining population.
In the mid 1970s, the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank credit instruments were expanding, in spite of the growing trade imbalance in some public
enterprises. he bank institutions attempted to resist requests for loans from stateowned enterprises’, but the government pressured it to cover their financial needs.²⁹
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putting the cart before the horse
he commercial bank’s credit system was periodically subject to the auditing control
of the central bank. he Central Bank of Somalia had power to regulate national
banking institutions and their credit system. But day to day operations in the banking institutions were conducted using obsolete methods which could not keep pace
with the rapid expansion of financial markets. he state owned enterprises were
inefficient and wasteful, placing a significant drain on the resources of commercial
banks. Military officers held the top management positions of publicly owned
enterprises. President Siyad Barre used to appoint his opponents to the executive
positions of the state monopolies to eliminate them from military headquarters.
he banking system of the socialist regime continued to grant funds to public
owned enterprises and tolerated their financial malpractice. he Somali Central
Bank issued new banknotes to replace those inherited from the post-colonial
government, while encouraging the socialist projects. he design of the banknotes
incorporated pictures of local agricultural and industrial production and Somali
script. his was aimed at encouraging the self-sufficiency production program.
he agricultural programs’ expenses were elevated from 10 percent to 29.1 percent
of the budget within a couple of years. Despite the regime’s attempts to increase
the self-sufficiency of the country, the introduction of state price controls (retail
trade and farm production) and periodic droughts created a severe food shortage.
A black market continued to develop at the expense of the grass-roots population,
particularly civil service workers with fixed salaries.
Although the regime was the largest employer in the country, the government
failed to readjust employees’ salaries.³⁰ Consequently, the high remuneration of the
oil boom Arab countries attracted Somali workers (qualified, skilled and unskilled
labor). As Somali workers in Arabia began to remit funds to Somalia, private hard
currency collectors started to operate in Saudi Arabian markets and later in the
Gulf countries. he Somali Commercial and Savings Bank, as a public monopoly,
failed to improve its networks sufficiently to compete with the private collectors.
Moreover, inefficient exchange control measures, lack of property rights and the
fixed exchange rate prevented workers’ hard currency earnings from channeling into
the banking system. his gave a comparative advantage to remittance collectors who
used to transfer money at some favorable rates. he workers earned enough money
to support their families and relatives in Somalia and their remittances, “Hawaalad”,
constituted the largest source of foreign exchange in the country.³¹
In 1976, the regime introduced the Franco Valuta system, despite the considerable foreign exchange reserves of the Somali Central Bank.³² he purpose behind
that policy was to stop underground trading activities and to cover the importation
of certain local needs with the remittances. his system allowed Somali importers
who had available foreign currency outside the country to import certain commodities under special license. he goods imported through the Franco Valuta
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The Collapse of the Somali Banking System
system were mostly luxuries and did not reduce the need for capital equipment for
development. While the workers’ remittances in foreign currency remained for the
most part outside the banking system, domestic savings increased as families and
relatives of migrant workers received Hawaalad in local currency.
In 1977, the regime mobilized the country’s resources for the Ethiopian conflict.
he war situation and clientelist politics of the regime (using public enterprises’
resources for recruiting and maintaining support) gave advantage to some loyal
speculators who easily enriched themselves. Ali K. Galaydh rightly observed:
“he special circumstances of the war gave Siyad Barre almost a free hand. At
the time very few suspected that he was diverting the funds for his personal use.
But Abdi Hoosh, among others, who had direct access to the president, became
wealthy members of the “merchants of the war.” he patronage horse was very
much out of the barn, and this obviously had an impact on the functioning
of the state institutions and the perceptions of the public.”³³ xiii, New Jersey
1990, p. 18.
In 1978, the demand for foreign currency increased and terms of payment for
workers’ remittances changed. he workers’ remittances were to be paid (in local
currency) to their families in advance or at least upon receipt of hard currency. he
new terms were not convenient for most businessmen’s local accounts (liquidity
position). he merchants and traders used to collect workers’ earnings on a promissory system based on trust, which allowed them a large volume of business activity.
Escalating inflation, however, influenced the market terms, and the high demand of
war speculators and public-owned enterprises that had a favorable financial position
compared to that of most merchants. Some businessmen took advantage of the circumstances and avoided the bureaucracy of the banking lending system by arranging
for illegal private transactions with some opportunistic bank branch managers.³⁴
It was then that certain branches of the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank
began to lend merchants underground credits through “Ok funds.”* Despite the
political orientations and the introduction of the death penalty, corruption, looting,
and nepotism within the apparatus of the government continued.³⁵
Uncoordinated Lending System – What Went Wrong?
he regime was reluctant to abandon its business culture, which had become a heavy
burden on the banking system, despite the economic and social consequences of the
Ethiopian war of 1977–78. Government finance was dominated by endless security
problems, which increased the dependence of the state upon the Central Bank.³⁶
Moreover, the increase in world oil prices adversely affected the weakening resources
of the country and fueled inflation. he economic instability and the impracticality
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putting the cart before the horse
of public-owned enterprises, among others, forced Siyad Barre regime to consider
the need for a market-oriented economy. In 1980, the regime, acting according to
its hidden agenda, undertook a stabilization program backed by the International
Monetary Fund (imf ) in the form of stand-by credit. he conditions of the imf
included devaluation of the Somali shilling and restriction of domestic credit.
In 1981, the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank prohibited the use of
the “Ok funds” as a credit instrument and enforced the use of draft check (money
order). In 1982, the regime prohibited the Franco Valuta System entirely in the
hope that the foreign earnings from workers and exporters would be channeled
through the national banking institutions. But the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank business was deteriorating because of its policy based on clan affiliation
and loyalty to the regime rather than customer relations and credit evaluation. he
implementation of a market-oriented economy increased the regime’s interference
and the politicalization of the banking business. he regime exhibited a growing
tendency to engage in policies, which aimed at using clan loyalty to manipulate
individuals and groups. As H. Adam has noted:
“Siyaad Barre was not interested in building a “state class” as some radical
analysts have argued; he [Siyad Barre] used every means necessary [banking
facilities and public enterprise’s resources] to establish a “state clan,” obviously
a contradiction in terms.”³⁷
his policy gave the decision-makers of the Somali Commercial and Savings
Bank a free hand to discriminate against its customers on the basis of clan affiliation.
While the decision-makers of the bank were granting loans on the basis of favoritism, the local and international auditors were obstructed in their efforts to examine
the bank’s records. his gradually jeopardized the Somali Central Bank’s power to
regulate the banking system and the imf’s intention to stabilize the economy.³⁸
he openly clan-based politics of the top management of the commercial bank
lowered the morale and job performance of the staff and increased discontent
among customers. Some senior officers of the banking institutions opted to retire,
and others were forced into retirement, due to their clan origins or their opposition
to clan business policies in the bank. In addition, inflation adversely affected the
most vulnerable part of society.³⁹ Absenteeism hit its highest level. Underground
credit revived and gained ground to develop. he financial institutions remained
stuck between the centralized economy and free market, because the government
was unwilling to dissolve some money-losing programs. In 1986, the Central Bank
of Somalia agreed with the imf to introduce an exchange rate system based on
auctions of available foreign currencies. he imf program increased the greed of the
privileged elite. Many of the state politicians and bureaucratic officers were at the
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same time major borrowers of the banks (commercial and development). hey were
directly or indirectly controllers of the lucrative import-export business and other
economic activities. he state-owned commercial bank was pressured into granting
loans on the basis of political favoritism, despite the imf domestic credit restrictions.
he top management of the commercial bank abused the grant of uncollectible
loans, and instead of tackling the problem of corruption advanced a clan recruiting
policy. he increasing nepotism contributed widely to the inefficiency of the bank.
he regime appointed loyal executives who had no knowledge or experience in the
banking business to the top management of the financial institutions.
When the foreign exchange auction was abandoned in 1987, uncertainty grew
among businessmen. Shrewd depositors, annoyed by the regime’s policy toward the
opposition and the bad business practices of the Somali Commercial and Savings
Bank, began to withdraw their money. he clan business and high interest rate
prevented real producers and the small business communities from accessing loans.
he central bank attempted to cover the incompetency of the Somali Commercial
and Savings Bank before its insolvency became public knowledge. However, the
Minister of Finance opposed the plan and insisted on continued financial support
for the bank. he eruption of the civil war in May 1988, in the Northern regions,
seriously affected the banking system. In addition to the looting of the Hargeysa
and Burao branches, military expenditures increased the budget deficit. he central
bank was compelled to cover the deficit of the regime. he continual borrowing
of the government not only fueled inflation but also increased the central bank’s
banknote printing cost.
No members of the top executive management of the Somali Commercial
and Savings Bank showed a willingness to heal the disease, which was threatening
the bank’s reputation. hey continued to grant unconditional loans, without paying attention to the financial position of the bank, to individuals and companies
without commercial bases or established credit records. he regime’s clan-based
politics openly endorsed the creation, the implementation and the development
of irregular lending systems. As a result, branch managers fraudulently granted
huge amounts of credit to non-customers of the bank without any collateral. he
branch managers perpetrated the illegal lending of Xisaab caseen (overdraft) and
issue of “jeeg-wareegga” circular checks (demand drafts) without corresponding
funds. None of the banking auditing systems and the regime’s anti-corruption organs had a mandate to investigate the mismanagement, despite public knowledge
of the scandalous affair. Abdalla O. Mansur has pointed out:
“[Also] nomadic segments of the population, moving into the cities and constituting the new ruling class, kept the worst aspects of there nomadic mentality,
which became, in my opinion, the major obstacle to the growth and development
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putting the cart before the horse
of modern state. hey are not easily satisfied and their desire is to get rich in the
shortest time possible, even if this means by illegal methods.”⁴⁰
he uncontrolled domestic credit of the Somali Commercial and Savings
Bank contributed to its bankruptcy. A banking panic created queues in front of the
bank’s branches as well as its main office. Consequently the Somali Commercial
and Savings Bank lost ground as local traders and merchants refused to accept their
credit instruments. he bank became unable to pay its depositors’ checks. In May
1990, the Somali Elders stated in their document the “Manifesto i” that:
“he Somali Commercial and Savings Bank has practically closed its doors to
all customers for the past eight weeks as of March 15, 1990. It is now widely
believed that the bank is totally bankrupt and in fact is thirty billion shillings
in the red. his has resulted from political, tribal interference and unbearable
pressures on the management of the bank from the highest circles of the government who facilitated easy credit to the tune of hundreds of millions of shillings
to the wives, sons, daughters, brothers and other relatives, as well as tribesmen
and other political favorites of the governing echelon. Most of these loans are
irrecoverable, since they were not guaranteed by any assets or equities.”⁴¹
he government hesitated to close the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank
officially, even though news of the bankruptcy was widespread. his undermined
the people’s confidence in the state-owned banking system. Uncertainty among the
people increased, and led to a shortage of the Somali shilling in circulation, despite
the continual money supply of the Somali Central Bank.⁴² Siyad Barre regime used
the state-owned banks’ loans and foreign currencies as “clientelist politics” to maintain support, oppress the opposition and destabilize clans. he Somali Commercial
and Savings Bank of Djibouti was a typical example of the politicization process
of the regime. his branch served as a clientelist politics-funding source for some
individuals and interest groups who cooperated with the regime in different ways.
he Somali Development Bank was not immune to mismanagement either. Most of
the bank’s investments did not go to development. A former Director General of the
bank, Mr. Osman Yusuf “Dhabarey,” voluntarily returned almost all the properties
he derived from bribery as religious repentance; this act, however, was uncommon in
the high circles of power. Despite the numerous scandals of the state owned banks,
Siyad Barre’s own family took control over the financial institutions (the Somali
Central Bank and the Ministry of Finance) of the country. Fanon writes:
“We no longer see the rise of a bourgeois dictatorship, but a tribal clan] dictatorship. he ministers, the members of the cabinet, the ambassadors [the bank
decision-makers] and local commissioners are chosen from the same group as
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The Collapse of the Somali Banking System
the leader, sometimes directly from his own family. Such regimes of the family
sort seem to go back to the old laws of inbreeding, and not anger but shame is
felt when we are faced with such stupidity, such an imposture, and such intellectual and spiritual poverty. hese heads of the government are the true traitors
in Africa, for they sell their country to the most terrifying of all its enemies:
stupidity. his tribalizing of the central authority, it is certain, encourages regionalist ideas and separatism.”⁴³
he failure of the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank necessitated the
establishment of a new bank. On July 1, 1990, a new commercial bank was established, the Somali Commercial Bank. Although the bank was totally invested by
the government, it was designed to sell 50 of its shares to the private sector immediately, while the remaining shares were designed to be transferred to private
hands after one year of activity. Siyad Barre and his entourage, however, remained
disinclined to liberalize the banking sector. here was little evidence that the regime
would properly implement the privatization of the adjustment program. In fact, the
regime offered as a candidate for a local privately owned bank a cooperative bank
owned by the Somali Cooperative Movement.⁴⁴ he Somali Cooperative Movement was a branch of the Government Party srsp, which was controlled by Siyad
Barre. In addition, there is doubt that domestic investors were willing to risk taking
over the inefficient public-owned banks without prior assurance of private property
rights and macroeconomic stability. he dictatorial regime’s refusal to undertake
any reform effort and the economic-political instability of the country contributed
to the collapse of the Somali state.
Conclusion
he collapse of the Somali banking system was caused by several factors. he
colonial legacy, mismanagement and clan manipulation lies at the heart of the collapse. First, colonial rulers imposed their banking systems without considering the
country’s financial tradition and Islamic heritage. Second, the colonial rulers, who
dominated the country for about half a century, neglected to prepare native banking
professionals. he lack of managerial knowledge and experience contributed partly
to the failure of the banking system.
hird, post-colonial monetary policy continued along the path laid down
by the colonial administrations. his policy did not identify and direct long-term
accumulation and underestimated the importance of the financial tradition of
the country as well as grass roots participation in the economy. he post-colonial
regimes’ policy making vision were based on nomadic attitude and practice, which
has limited saving tendency comparing with the rest of the Somali society customs – city dwellers and agricultural.
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putting the cart before the horse
Fourth, Somalia inherited a chronic budget deficit situation from the colonial
rulers. his made the post-colonial civil regime a state without the capacity to carry
out the basic functions of statehood that leaned heavily on debts, internal and external. he economic instability of the civil regime partly caused the military coup
d’etat. he monetary policies pursued by the military regime (Nationalization and
Franco Valuta System) were not sufficient to channel domestic savings and workers’
foreign currency earnings into the public-owned banks and domestic productivity investments. he clientelist politics of the regime indirectly allowed the use of
the state office for private gain. Consequently, mismanagement, corruption and
nepotism spread in all sectors. his created imbalance in public owned enterprises,
which became a heavy burden on the banking system.
Finally, the politicization of the banking business endorsed an openly uncontrolled lending system based on clan hegemony and political favoritism and denied
credit access for real producers and the small business communities. he bank decision-makers’ wrongdoing endorsed the creation and the development of an irregular
lending chain, which contributed to the failure. Moreover, the government abuse of
the debit limits of the central bank and lack of a genuine macroeconomic stability
policy finalized the collapse of the banking system and the state.
Future Prospect
he dilemma of the State-owned bank in the past decade suggests the need to
rethink the shape of the banking system in the future. What is the prospect of a
successful banking model in the future? It is conceivable that a competitive private
bank will provide the confidence needed. But can some private banks guarantee
an economic growth that will promote sustained development in Somalia? he
solution to the banking system in Somalia will depend upon the future reshaping
of the country and the role of the state. Future reforms, which guarantee a private
property rights and accountability, stabilized macro-economy and an independent
central bank institution are indispensable.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Davidson, Basil Africa in Historical Perspective, Africa South Sahara 1990, edition
No. 19, page 6.
Casanelli, Lee V. he Shaping of Somali Society, Philadelphia 1982, University of Pennsylvania Press, page 150.
Cremascoli, Bruno ii Paese di Punt, Milano 1987, Edizioni Unicopli, page 150.
Hess, Robert 1. Italian Colonialism in Somalia, Chicago 1966, he University of Chicago Press, pp. 36–120.
Samatar, Abdi I. The State and Rural Transformation in Northern Somalia 1884–1986,
Wisconsin 1989, University of Wisconsin Press, page 27.
Ibid. page 51.
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7.
Ali, Ahmed Q. Land Rush in Southern Somalia, Paper presented 37t Annual Meeting
of African Studies, Toronto 1994, page 2.
8.
Boahen, A. Adu African Perspectives on Colonialism, Baltimore 1987, he Johns Hopkins
University Press, page 103.
9.
De Vecchi, Cesare Maria Orizzonti d’Empero, Milano 1935, Mondadori, pp. 295–6.
10. Somalia Africa Orientale Italiana, Immagini di Storia, Campobasso 1993, Italia Editrice, page 22.
11. Pankhurst, Sylvia page 199.
12. Boahen, A. Adu General History of Africa, Berkeley 1985, Heineaman Educational
Books Ltd. Volume iiv, page 404.
13. Britannica Book of the Year, British East Africa, London 1938, Encyclopedia Britannica
Inc., page 611.
14. United Nations, Draft Trusteeship Agreement for the Territory of Somaliland Under
Italian Administration, Supplement no. 10 All294 19150, page 5.
15. Del Boca, Angelo-Gli Italiani in Africa Orienrale, Mondadori 1984, pp. 220–235.
16. Somalia a Country Study, us Government Printing Office, Washington, dc 1980,
p. 136.
17. Angelo Del Boca, page 225.
18. he decree was converted to law by the law no. 2 of January 13, 1961.
19. In 1959, for the first time, the afis administration sent 10 young staff to Italy for clerical
training for about 9 months.
20. Lewis, I.M. A Modern History of Somalia: Nation and State in Horn of Africa,
Boulder, Westview Press, page 170.
21. Raghe, Abdirahman O. Trade Union Movement in Somalia 1960–69, Proceedings of
the 3rd International Congress of the Somali Studies, I1 Pensiero Scientifico Editore,
Roma 1988, p. 315.
22. Africa Contemporary Record, Annual Survey and Documents 1969–70, Holmes and
Meir Publishers, New York 1987, p. b183.
23. Traditionally Somali non pastoral nomadic were mostly saved their wealth through
“Bakaaro” if their product is agricultural harvest, if they are in the urban area they save
through “Dukaanley” small traders unless they would like to invest or partner with
traders.
24. Xisaabi xil ma leh: Was anti-corruption campaign launched by the military regime in
the early days of the coup d’etat.
25. Ibid. Africa Contemporary Record, p. b182.
26. Somali National Bank, Annual Record, Mogadishu 1971.
27. Laitin, David and Samatar, Said - Somalia Nation in Search of State, Colorado 1987,
Westview Press, page 111.
28. Ibid. Africa Contemporary Record 1975–76, p. b312.
29. Siyad Barre used public-owned enterprises’ resources as nas-nuujin (funds for clientelist
politics) to reinforce loyalty to him.
30. In the early days of the coup d’etat, the military regime abolished the workers’ right of
strike and the trade union was under its control. When the black market and inflation
adversely affected the standard of living and the working classes remained helpless, the
great poet Abdi Muhumed Amin, performed a play called “Muufo” (bread). Muufo
was performed in 1978 and openly advocated the rights of the working classes.
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putting the cart before the horse
31.
32.
33.
34.
*
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
Somalia: A Country of Study (May 1992). he Library of Congress, Federal Research
Division. Edited by Helen Chapin Metz.
he author in 1972–81 was a member of the Foreign Department staff of the Central
Bank of Somalia. In 1978–80 he personally supervised the foreign reserves of the bank.
Although the regime introduced the Franco Valuta system, the decision-makers of the
Central Bank and Finance Ministry were against the measure.
Galaydh, Ali K. Notes on the State of the Somali State, Horn of Africa volume
Serious delinquencies began to occur when a check from a certain branch, which had
been cashed by anther branch, was returned to the original branch. he manager of the
original branch fraudulently excludes the check instead of allowing it to go through
standard accounting procedure. his practice led some branches of the commercial
bank to keep two sets of records, one for official scrutiny and one for illegal private
transactions.
Ok funds: Is banking terminology used to indicate that the drawee of a check does
have sufficient funds on deposit to cover the amount of the check issued. he bank
cannot dishonor a check with “Ok fund”. Two officers of an issued bank as guarantee
endorse the check.
Despite the mobilization of domestic resources, the state owned businesses were deteriorating because of mismanagement. In March 1975, a penalty law was introduced.
he law stated that anyone who misappropriated government funds would be subject
to death if the amount were over 100,000 Somali Shillings. A merchant, Mohamed
Abdi M. Siyad and two officers of the Health Ministry were accused and sentenced
to death. Nevertheless, the death penalty law was abandoned without being officially
abolished. his encouraged misappropriation of government resources. In addition, a
resolution was presented at the third general meeting of the central committee of the
Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party. he resolution stated that all personal property
owned by its members should be transferred to the Party. he confiscation was intended to discourage wealth accumulation by a privileged elite. he resolution failed.
hat drive endorsed the use of public office for private gain, looting and corruption.
Gray, Albert Jr. The Economy of the Somali Democratic Republic in the 1980s, Ufabamu
Volume xvii – No. ii, Los Angele 1989, p. 128.
Adam, Hussein M. Militarism and Warlordism: Rethinking the Somali Political Experience, Paper presented at 36t Annual Meeting of African Studies, Boston 1993, p. 9.
In 1982, for the first time, the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank was designated a
new executive position “President”. his created a power conflict between the central
bank and the commercial bank. he top executive position “President” of the Somali
Commercial and Savings Bank was covered between 1982 to 1990 by the following
executives: Said Mohamed Ali “Sheef ” 1982/85, Osman Haji Yusuf 1985/87, Ali Nuur
Isaaq 1987/89, Mohamed Ali Hirzi 1989/90, Abdirahman Duale Mohamed January
to December ‘90.
Awes, Maho A.H. and Bechtold, Karl-Heinz W. The Debit Crisis of the Developing
Countries and imf Conditionality. Potential Economic and Social Consequences in Somalia,
3rd International Congress of Somali Studies, 11 Pensiero Scientifico Editore, Roma
1988, pp. 481 -82.
Mansur, Abdalla O. Contrary to a Nation: The Cancer of the Somali State, he Invention of
Somalia, Edited by Ali Jimale Ahmed, New Jersey 1995, the Red Sea Press, pp. 113–4.
Somali Elders, Manifesto I, Horn of Africa volume xiii, New Jersey 1990, p.112.
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The Collapse of the Somali Banking System
42.
43.
44.
When the Somali Commercial and Savings Bank became unable to pay its depositors,
the Somali Central Bank presented a plan of repayment in order to restore the bank’s
confidence. he project was designed to repay each depositor Sh. So 50,000.00 per
day in order to reduce the insolvency. However, the regime was unwilling to repay the
claims of depositors. Consequently, the central bank’s project was short-lived due to
the absence of governmental support and an economic rescue plan.
Fanon, Frantz, he Wretched of the Earth, Grove Weidenfeld, New York, p. 183.
unido Regional Country Studies Branch, Somalia Industrial Revitalization through
Privatization, Industrial Review 1988, p. 61.
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Contributors
Ladan Affi is a Ph.D student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her interests lie in
failed nation-states, gender, and impact of the diaspora on their home countries.
Ahmed Q. Ali is a native of Bakol in the Interriverine region. He is a Civil-hydraulic engineer
and has worked in the Land & Water Department, the Ministry of Planning, and
the Ministry for Juba Valley Development. From 1986 to 1991, Ali worked for a major
local civil contractor in Somalia, Juba Enterprises. He participated in the engineering
design, execution and supervision of flood protection, irrigation, and land reclamation
works in the Interriverine region. Ali has lived in Phoenix, Arizona since 1992. He
taught mathematics at North High School and has published several papers analyzing
various aspects of Somalia. He currently lives in Zanzibar, Tanzania.
Mohamed Nuuh Ali is a lecturer in the Department of History at Carleton University,
Canada. He earned M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in history at the University California,
Los Angeles. He is also the former Dean of the College of Education (Lafoole) at
the Somali National University.
Cedric Barnes was an undergraduate and masters student in the Africa department of the
School of Oriental and African Studies (soas), University of London. He undertook
post-graduate research at Trinity College and the Faculty of History at the University
of Cambridge, and gained his Ph.D. (entitled ‘he Ethiopian State and its Somali
Periphery, circa 1888–1948’) in 2000. His British Academy funded post-doctoral project
is entitled ‘Poets, politicians and pastoralists – national and clan identity in the northern
Somali-lands’, hosted by the Department of Languages and Cultures of Africa, soas.
He has undertaken two periods of fieldwork (1998 and 2002) in the eastern Somali
speaking areas of Ethiopia, collecting oral and documentary material.
Omar A. Eno is a Ph.D. candidate in African history at York University. Currently, he is the
Director of the “National Somali Bantu Project” at Portland State University-Oregon.
He has extensively written on many aspects of Somali history and culture.
Abdi M. Kusow is a sociologist trained in international migration and racial identities.
His main area of research interest is the contemporary African diaspora in North
America. His recent work appeared in Symbolic Interaction, the official journal of the
Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction. His chapter on “East African Immigrants
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putting the cart before the horse
in the United States” will appear in Mary Waters & Ueda. Reed (eds.), The New
Americans. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. He has written on the social and
political disorganization of the Nation-State in Somalia. His works on those topics
appear in edited volumes and regional journals such as Northeast African Studies (1994),
ufahamu: Journal of the African Activist Association (1994), and in The Invention of
Somalia (1995).
Hassan Mahadallah is Assistant Professor of Political Science in the Nelson Mandela School
of Public Policy and Urban Affairs. He received his Ph.D. from Tulane University.
His interests lie in African International Relations, American Government, and
International Relations.
Rima Berns-McGown, Ph.D. is managing editor of the International Journal. She is the
author of Muslims in the Diaspora: he Somali Communities of London and Toronto,
as well as two novels.
Mohamed H. Mukhtar is Professor of African History at Savannah State University He
received his Ph.D. from al-Azhar University, Cairo, Egypt. Dr. Mukhtar has written
scholarly works on a number of topics: Historiography, “Arabic Sources on Somalia.”
In History in Africa, 14, (1987). On spread of Islam in Africa, “Islam in Somali History: Fact and Fiction.” In The Invention of Somalia (1995). On the social history of
modern Somalia, “he Plight of Agro-pastoral Society of Somalia.” In Review of
African Political Economy, 70, (1996). He co-authored with Mrk DeLancey, Somalia,
World Bibliographical Series (1988). Dr. Mukhtar is the author of the new Historical
Dictionary of Somalia (2002).
Abdul Qadir Arif Qassim was born in Mogadishu, Somalia. He has been educated in both
Somalia and the United States. He received a b.a. in Economics at Somali National
University in 1977. He was a member of the Central Bank staff from 1972 to 1981. He
had been a ceo at haplas, a limited private manufacturing company in Mogadishu,
from 1983 to 1990. Currently, he is the Refugee Programs Supervisor at Catholic Social
Service of Phoenix. He received his m.b.a. in Global Management at the University
of Phoenix, Phoenix in 2002. Presently, he is pursuing a Master of Nonprofit Management at Regis University, School of Professionals at Colorado, Denver. He is a
member of African Studies Association.
198
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Index
a
Abans, 76
Abdulqadir Saqawa Din, see also Sakhawadin, 45
Abolition, 136, 142–144, 146–148, 152
Abtirsi, 7
Adoon, 4
Afroasiatic, 20, 27
Agricultural Development Corporation, 165–166
Ahad Shekki, 77
Ahmed Gurey, xi, 85
Ammistrazione Fiduciaria Italiana della Somalia
(afis), 163, 165, 180–181, 193
Anglo-Ethiopian, 35–36, 43, 56
Antonio Gecchi *****
Assayle, 161
Azienda fiume, 161
Azienda madre, 161
b
Bajuni Islands *****
Banadir resistance, xv, 77–78, 87
Banco di Napoli, 179, 181, 184
Bantu Origin, 76, 136, 137, 139, 151–152
Bantu/Jarer, xvi–xvii, 2, 4–5, 9
Bantu-Speaking, 18, 138, 150
Bardheere *****
Bayso-Jiiddu, 22–23
Benadir Coast, 135, 140–142, 144, 158
Benadir Company, 82, 144
Bioley, 79
British Military Administration, 33–34, 48, 52, 55,
154, 164
Buulo Marerto, 79–80
Cart Horse 23 draft 3.indd 199
c
Canada, 12, 121–125, 127, 130–133, 176, 197
Canadian, 123–124, 130–131
Carabinieri, 78
Cassa di Risparmo di Torino *****
Caste, xiii, 3–5, 11
Cesare Mario De Vecchi, 78
Chat, see also Qat, 9, 106, 108
Class cleavages, xii
Colonial resistance, ix, xiv–xv, 75, 77, 80
Colonialism, xi–xii, xv, 65, 67–68, 73, 76, 81, 86, 89,
97–101, 115, 148, 150, 152–153, 158, 162, 176,
192–193
Compradores, 165
Conflict of Interpretations, xiii, xvii, 1–2, 5, 9–10,
13–14
Contested, iii–iv, ix, xii–xiii, xv, xvii, 1–2, 5, 10, 13,
92, 156
Contested Narratives, ix, xiii, xv, 1, 92
Corpo Zaptie, 78, 85
Counter Narratives *****
Cushitic, 16, 18–21, 23, 25–27
d
Dar-al-kufr *****
Darwiish, xi, xiv–xv, 75
Dhiigmiirad, 166
Diaspora, x, xv–xvi, 107–108, 117–118, 119, 121–122,
125, 127–128, 130, 197–198
Dire Dawa, 34, 35, 44, 47–48
Dujuma-Bo’aale, 162
e
Empirical Narratives, xii–xiii, 92
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putting the cart before the horse
Ente Banana, 166
Exclusion, 3–7, 9, 70
Expropriation, xii, 155–156, 157, 159, 164, 167–169
Ex-slaves, 139, 145, 157–158
Italian Empire, 33–34, 52, 55, 87, 176
Italian rupee, 179
j
Jama’a, 76, 79–80, 82–83, 87, 110
Jigjiga, xiii, 33–34, 35, 37–44, 46–51, 53–57
Jihad wars, 17
Jilab, (pl. Jalabib) *****
Jubba, xvii, 4, 18, 22, 25–26, 89, 150, 162, 179
f
Faqasah *****
Female Circumcision, 120–121, 131
Female Genital Mutilation, 120, 130, 132
Fornari Canal, 164, 167
Four Power Commission, 45, 49, 71
Fragelin Shisheeye, xi
Futuh-al Habasha *****
k
King Yeshaq, 17
Kurtunwarey, 167
g
l
Garad, 39, 47
Garbasar *****
Geledi Confederacy, 77
Gender roles, ix–x, xv, 117
Gibil Cad (white skin), 4
Giir-Giir, 7
Goof, 173
Gosha, xv, 4, 76, 86, 136, 137, 145, 148, 150
Gosha Rebellion, 76
Goshaland, 76, 149
Greater Somalia, 45, 78
Gumaysiga Madow, xi
La Strage di lafole, 77
Land Rush, x, 148, 155, 171–173, 175, 193
Legitimation Crisis, xiii, xvii, 2, 13
Lineage-based Narratives, 2, 8, 10
Lingua franca, 86, 167, 171
Lo-ma-oyayaasha, xi
London, ix, xvii, 14, 27, 33, 51–52, 55, 64, 71–73,
85–89, 114–115, 121, 123–132, 149–152, 180, 193,
197–198
m
Maandeeq, 1, 4, 7, 10
Maay, 22, 26, 86, 89
Malable, 164
Maria heresa coins, 178, 179
Master Narratives, xii–xiii, 75, 92, 111
Maxaatiri, 171
Merchants of war, 187
Midgaan, 2–3
Mohammed Abdulle Hassan, see also Sayid *****
More Power to Women, 121
Mudnaan iyo Asal, 10
Muki Dumis, 79
Muqadas, xi
Mussuq-maasuq, 166
j
Jurgen Habbermass, xvii, 13
H
Hal bacad lagu lisay, 166
Halal, 118
Harar, 34, 35, 37–38, 40–42, 44, 47–53, 56–57
Hayla-Selasse *****
Hijab, 118, 119, 122, 124, 127–128
Hijra, 126
Historiography, xi–xiv, 11–12, 16–17, 37, 75, 81, 198
i
Identity, xiii–xiv, xvii, 2, 7, 25, 40–42, 47, 72–73, 94,
104, 106, 115, 117–118, 125, 130–133, 136, 138,
151, 197
Ijtihad, 125
Imam, 6, 65–66, 128
Inclusion, 3, 5–7, 9, 45, 125, 163
Indian repee *****
Infibulation, 121, 129, 131
Iskaa-wax-u-qabso, 166
Islam, x, xiv–xvi, 13, 26–27, 60, 61, 66, 68, 73, 85,
87–88, 108, 117–118, 119, 121–123, 125–129,
131–133, 144, 151, 198
n
Narratives, ix, xii–xiii, xv, 1–2, 4–6, 8–10, 13, 75, 92,
93–94, 111
Nassib Bunto, 86
National Narratives, xiii, 75, 92, 94
Nationalism, iii–iv, ix, xii–xv, xvii, 1, 6, 14, 33–34, 37,
51, 59–60, 61–75, 85, 88, 90, 129
o
OK funds, 187–188, 194
Omo-Tana, 20–23
200
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Index
Social boundary of Somaliness, xiii, xvi, 1–13
Socially excluded *****
Somali Historiography, xi–xiv, 12, 37, 75
Somali Nationalism, ix, xii–xv, 6, 14, 33, 51, 59–60,
61–73, 75, 85, 88
Somali Youth Club, see also Somali Youth League,
34, 44–45, 47, 71, 85, 98
Somaliness, xii–xiv, xvi, 1–13, 171
Supreme Revolutionary Council, 166
Oromo, 16, 18–20, 39–42, 137–138, 149–150
p
Paradigms, xiii, 1–2, 9
Patriarchy, 107, 111, 114–115
Paul Ricoeur, xiii, xvii, 13–14
Plantation slavery, x, 135, 140, 148, 152
Power Shifts, 126
Priorities, xiii, 1, 6, 8–9, 11
t
q
Qur’an Schools, 122
r
Racialization, xii
Rajis, 9
Reewing, 5
Reewing-Speaking, 7
Reserved Areas, 33, 35, 37–38, 40, 43–45, 49–50,
52, 171
Tacb-Wadaag *****
Teenagers, 120, 123–124
Territorial-based narratives, 8
he Social Boundary of Somaliness, xiii, xvi, 1–13
Tolyn *****
Toronto, 10, 12, 121–133, 151, 176, 193, 198
Tumaal, 3
Tunni, 22, 26, 82
Turbulent Republicanism, 8
u
s
Scientific Socialism, 166, 185
Segmentary, see also segmentary stratification,
segmentary inclusion and exclusion, 7
Self-same hesis, xi
Shabelle, 4, 14, 77, 79–80, 83, 87, 136, 137–143, 145,
149, 151–152, 154, 156, 157–164, 167, 170–171,
174, 176
Sheikh Uways Ibn Muhammad Al Barawi *****
Simultaneous inclusion and exclusion, 3, 5–7
Siyad Barre, xiv, 10, 148, 185–188, 190–191, 193
Slavery, x, xvi, 76, 82, 88–89, 135–136, 140, 142–145,
147–154, 176
Ujeedabadan *****
‘Ulama, 120, 125
x
Xisaabi xil ma leh, 193
y
Yibir, 2–3
z
Zanzibar, 76, 77, 135, 137, 141–143, 146, 149, 152, 178,
179, 197
201
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