Ciaran’s Peculier [sic] Blog

Somalia’s capital has witnessed some of the heaviest fighting since the country descended into anarchy. On one side were the forces of the “transitional” Somali government, backed by Ethiopia and the Ugandan army (the only soldiers to have so far volunteered for the African Union’s Peace-keeping force), with the tacit backing of the US, or at least those people in the American administration who know where Somalia is; and on the other the remnants of the Islamists who controlled the city for six month’ last year plus elements of the Hawiye clan. The fighting has now subsided, with the government forces apparently coming out on top.

Some of the desperate souls who fled the fighting have begun to trickle back and there are attempts to install some form of normality in the city. This appears to be a very Somali form of normality.

Infrastructure has been non-existant for years. Mogadishu is like a lesson in what happens in the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries when government stops. Those who could afford protection bought it, either in the form of b0dy-guards or weapons. Businesses, which had apparently more to lose, did have more to pay and so they acquired small arsenals of weaponry: machine-guns, RPGs whatever was available (and anything is at the right price). Anyone who couldn’t afford these “must-have” accessories just survived as best they could. I don’t like ethnic stereo-typing, but the Somalis have a great propensity to trade. Many people went into the service sector, maybe offering tea and beverages in buildings no sturdier than lean-too shacks. For many this was the only hope of survival. For a while a handful were able to get remittances from relatives working abroad through Islamic Cash transfer bureaux, but these were all decried as money-launderers for Al-Qaeda by the Americans and so this outlet soon dried up.

But what does this new spirit of normality mean in practice? The city is now ruled by a mayor and his chief of police, both former warlords with gallons of blood on their hands. They have ordered the handing in of weaponry, including that held by businesses for their own protection. They’ve also ordered the demolition of illegal buildings, including those lean-to structures that offered many a lifeline to survival.

I don’t know what is going to happen in Somalia. I fear the worst though. One thing that may happen fairly soon is that President George W. Bush will say that the solution to the country’s ills is democracy and a democratic election. Now there’s a recipe for disaster.