March 12, 2004 - 12:24
Correcting mutual historical mistakes    

EDITORIAL- 12 March 2004-

The people of Somaliland lived under the Union Jack for 84 years from 1884 to 1960. If the British administration did its part correctly during these long years, Somaliland might have been a little more careful with its destiny and not have committed the historical mistake of rushing into the infamous union with the Italian South.

However with the historical mistakes committed by the British colonial administration, Somaliland was destined to complete the circle and commit its own. Now, with Somaliland rectifying its own mistakes and trying to reclaim its lost sovereignty and its place among the world community, the British government has a moral obligation to also revisit its past and show its willingness to right it wrongs to Somalilanders.

To start with the British follies, which could all be described as dereliction of duty more than anything else, one would notice that when the British finally left Somaliland on June 26, 1960, they left us with nothing tangible to show for their long stay. In a quick comparison with other African countries which have been colonized by the British in the same period, one could see that the British left us with no colleges such as Makerere College in Uganda (1949), Kings College, Ibadan College in Nigeria (1948), Achimoto College in Ghana (1924), Khartoum University College in Sudan (1951) and the Royal Technical College in Kenya (1956).

Somaliland was left with no railroads, no tarmac roads, no power stations, no agricultural development projects and no serious attempts on water development or minerals exploration such as petroleum and gems of which Somaliland is now proven to possess with commercial and sustainable quantities.

The capital Hargeisa was no rival to metropolitans like Nairobi, Kampala, Daresalam, Lusaka, Accra, Lagos and others. The only sign of nationhood that the British administration left behind was the port of Berbera which was almost primitive compared to its relatively advanced neighboring ports of Djibouti and Aden.

The British administration had even overlooked the introduction of cash crops to give the country a means of subsistence and economic sustainability in the future just as it did in other parts of Africa where it introduced cash crops like cocoa, coffee, tea and etc.

Although the main objective of the British colonization of Somaliland was to use it as a source of meat supplies for its garrison in neighboring barren Aden, the British have neglected to develop the export of Somaliland’s only hard currency earner- the livestock. One or two meat processing factories, few hygienic and modern slaughter houses and one or two veterinary schools and research laboratories would have turned Somaliland into the meat house of its traditional markets in Arabia including Aden at the time.

It is even astounding how the British, famous for their love of sunny beaches around the world, passed up the opportunity to build recreational resorts on the long shores of Somaliland, let alone erect fish factories and exploit the many varieties of Somaliland’s high quality fish.

Despite all this, it is remarkable to note how the Somaliland people relish recalling the good old days of the British rule and talk highly of the few good things they gave to them. These include a good and incorruptible civil administration, a fair judicial system, a few good boarding schools, a small but well trained and well disciplined military and police force, some scholarships, several civil centers in major towns, British style suburban bungalows, the Hargeisa club, which is still intact and functioning, and top of all an inimitable suffix in the name of our country - SomaliLAND.

Somaliland for its part has committed grave historical mistakes against itself including allowing the Mad Mulla, an alien Jihadist and a tyrant of modern style Talibanist with a slant of Wahhabism in his doctrine to exhaust the British colonial government’s resources in more than 20 years of an internecine and unwarranted religious war.

Mohammed Abdullah Hassan’s Dervish War cost considerable loss of life and wealth to Somalilanders but also distracted the British from developing the infrastructure of the country and improving people’s life. It also prompted the British to brand Somalianders as the Irish of Africa, thus distorting their image and portraying them as a bunch of violent and marauding nomadic tribes in an inhospitable land and brute culture.

Rejecting the British advice to delay their independence for a decade to enable them catch up with the South in infrastructural development was also another miscalculation on the side of Somaliland. Their thoughtless argument was that what the British could do in ten years that they couldn't do in 84 years.

The British foresaw the disadvantaged position that Somaliland would be in uniting with the Italian South that was not only more populous but was completely different from the north on cultural, political and economic aspects. They tried to forewarn the Somalilanders that they would lose their cultural particularity, their good civil administration and eventually their whole identity if they made a union with the South.

With Somaliland masses driven by patriotism and many of the northern politicians mesmerized by the cosmopolitan Italian life-style in Mogadishu with its night clubs, liberal culture, tarmac roads, abundant tropical fruits and cinema houses, it was almost next to impossible to stop the Northerners’ tryst with the union. Even the last salvo of the British to save the Somalilanders by advising them to increase the number of their parliament and ask for a power sharing system of government with the South fell on deaf ears.

Likewise, Mohammed Ibrahim Egal’s pleas to the Somalilanders for giving themselves a breathing space before they joined the South was repudiated while Michael Mariano’s NUF party with its visionary call for postponing independence was seen as an act of betrayal.

The Northerners’ outright condemnation of their military elites who made an attempted coup in 1961 to reclaim the lost sovereignty of Somaliland had put the final nail on any hopes for independence and even somehow trivialized the northern people’s absolute NO to the referendum of the country’s first constitution.

The Italian South-dominated Somali Republic finally cut Somaliland’s umbilical cord with its colonial past, when it severed ties with the British government on the cause of the NFD Somalis in Kenya, thus depriving Somaliland the benefit of getting 150 scholarships a year from Common Wealth countries.

It took the Somalilanders 30 lean years of destruction, desolation, isolation, massacres and mass migration to regain their independence from the mouth of a LION as the Somali adage says.

The Somaliland President’s visit to the UK in March 2004 is thus a good opportunity for the two sides, the British government and the Somaliland people, to correct their mutual historical mistakes and embrace each other in harmony and forgiveness.

It is time that Somaliland has to come back to its place among the Common Wealth nations and reclaim its common history and culture with the English speaking peoples of the world. It is also time for the British government to bring Somaliland from the cold and welcome it to the warm affection of the British crown.

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