Communicating Arts - Main Web Site"BOSSASO is an exit point from the Horn of Africa and it is bursting. This port in northern Somalia already has 300,000 people, up from 50,000 in the 1990s," reads the lead of "The path to ruin: Bossaso and Nairobi," an article appearing in The Economist, August 19, 2006. [3]
From a slightly different vantage:
"On 18 May 2006, the self-declared Republic of Somaliland marked fifteen years since it proclaimed independence from Somalia. Although its sovereignty is still unrecognised by any country, the fact that it is a functioning constitutional democracy distinguishes it from the majority of entities with secessionist claims, and a small but growing number of governments in Africa and the West have shown sympathy for its cause. " [5]
The International Crisis Group report and another like it, hopeful and positive in outlook, that is the "Somali Reconstruction and Development Framework" [6], a draft 2006 report out of the United Nations and World Bank Secretariat, belie the odd reality in areas subject to irregular conflict-related violence that two perspectives maintain together: that of living in a developing and revolutionary society in which the momentum of modernity elsewhere pushes through the population gathering (even in desparation) for it; and that of living in a war zone where an horrific and unnatural death awaits all impersonally and indefinitely, such is the nature of bombs detonated among otherwise disinterested, unarmed, and unprepared men, women, and children.
The quasi-independent states of Somalia, which undeniably operate with virtual autonomy from the beleaguered Transitional Federal Government in Mogadishu, harbor their own internecine conflicts. At least one or two, Sool and Sanaag Provinces, host civil conflicts over land, with the one in the Sool between Somaliland and Puntland exacerbated by Somalian TFG President Abudhullahi Yusuf Ahmed hailing from Puntland as a former state president. Whether or not he meddles, there is suspicion, and out of suspicions come hostilities.
One may try to avoid the trite reference to Somali tribalism as a cause of all that goes wrong or right, depending on where one stands, but it is a certainty that in Somalia both family--"who are your people?"--and related "who you do know" trump for individuals attempts by states and ideologues to organize populations in their totality.
"Out of Many, One" suits the overwhelmingly colonized and immigrant heterogenous society of the United States.
"Out of Many, Mine," may well suit the reversion to factionalism and withdrawal along clan lines that lead to, for example, the recent declaration of autonomous statehood on the part of the Maakhir State of Somalia, another "self-proclaimed autonomous state", this one, according to Wikipedia, "mainly inhabited by the Warsangali clan . . . ." [9]
Not that such as Maakhir's declaration of independence happens without fair reason:
"Maakhir State proclaimed autonomy at a 1 July 2007 ceremony in Badhan in response to overlapping claims of both Somaliland and Puntland over the western Sanaag, which has led to several conflicts over control of the territory between Somaliland and Puntland. Puntland and Somaliland have both signed oil concessions in this part of Sanaag, without the consent of the local leadership,[4] which also contributed to the desire of the local Warsangali to administer their own affairs, as well as resolve disputes with Mohamud Muse Hersi, the current President of Puntland. In addition to most of Sanaag, Maakhir is also claiming western parts of the Bari region from Puntland."
For references excised from the above paragrapher, please refer to the Wikipedia entry for Maakhir.
So whodunit with a bomb this week in Bossaso?
According to Voice of America, "the attack targeted two Ethiopian restuarants." [10]
Of course, that's not an answer.
In this age, the contemporary guerrilla or terrorist strikes as if a god himself, beyond all human judgment and reckoning, or, if motivated for some other cause, strikes without claim, essentially transforming political expression into a far more mysterious, even ineffable, expression of nature.
1. Legg, Sonia. "Ethiopians die in Somali port blast." Reuters, February 3, 2008.
2. Abdiquani, Hassan. "At least 20 killed in Somali port blast: Governor." Reuters, February 5, 2008.
7. "Sool." Wikipedia, as experienced February 6, 2008.
8. "Sanaag." Wikipedia, as experienced February 6, 2008.
9. "Maakhir." Wikipedia, as experienced February 6, 2008.
10. Kilner, Derek. "Blasts in Somalia's Puntland Region Kill 20." Voice of America, February 6, 2008.
Correspondence: James S. Oppenheim
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