The appointment of a self-appointed Somali Dialogue Platform to recommend on the situation in Gedo as an appropriate venue for the election of MPs does not only violate the letter and the spirit of September 2021 electoral agreement, but it also gives many historically conscious Somalis an eerie feeling that the caretaker Federal Government of Somalia is breathing life
into 1990s inter-clan political alliances.
Roble is lending a political hand to Jubaland President Ahmed Mohamed Islam in what resembles the 1992 alliance between General Mohamed Farah Aideed and Colonel Ahmed Omar Jess. Aideed and Jess formed Somali National Alliance in an attempt to conquer southern Somalia regions. They single-handedly engineered the 1992 famine that cost lives of more than 400,000 Somalis. Somali National Alliance militias stole relief supplies and blocked access to areas affected by the famine.
In his 1992 speech before sending marines to Somalia, President George H. W. Bush clarified why USA was intervening in Somalia on humanitarian grounds. President Bush said that the marines would open access to areas affected by the famine to save Somali lives.
Thirty years ago today Aideed and Jess were planning what would turn out to be the first man-made famine in Somalia. The Roble-Ahmed Madobe alliance portends a destabilizing political alliance aimed at rigging the indirect elections whose outcome may be a diminished legitimacy of Somali federal institutions. No wonder the US government has decided to impose visa restrictions on spoilers whose names have not been disclosed so far.
Gedo has the same rights as other Somali regions where, under the electoral agreement, election of MPs will take place at two designated places. Roble is taking sides when he appointed a committee to usurp the role of Gedo administration in order to deny citizens the right to hold elections at Garbaharey, the administrative capital of the region.
Gedo is the constituency of the incumbent Somalia President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed whose political disagreements with Jubaland President and the Prime Minister remain unresolved.
We might be carried away by minor political considerations in the context of bigger and political changes unfolding. Those changes can further destabilize the fragile Somali political institutions if we do not learn from the history. Roble should not try to disenfranchize people of Gedo.
Awil M. Dini, Kismayo
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