Ibrahim Moh’d Mead
Political analyst
Hargeisa, Somaliland
1- The provocations and the intentions of the leadership of Somalia’s region of Punt land against peaceful Somaliland are reminiscent to the pretext of Nazi Germany when they attacked and occupied Czechoslovakia in 1938. The difference is that tiny Punt land can not occupy Somaliland unless Somaliland consents to be occupied!
2- It is also reminiscent to why and how Ex-Somali governments instigated the two wars of 1964 and 1977 against Ethiopia. The Somali regime’s intention was to create a grand home land for all the Somali speaking communities in the surrounding countries in the horn and in east Africa by means of Military force. Bosaso Jigjiga and Kismayo leaders have the same mindset and intention except that they are on a clan level; to their clan level. They strive to collect and occupy where ever their clans are and even were they are not as far as it is possible for them to do so!
Those who don’t know or disregarded history and those in Bossaso, Jigjiga and Kismayo who entertain this mindless clannish ambition of claiming and occupying where ever any of their extended clan lives are doomed to repeat the same mistake of the Nazi Germay’s annexation of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and what Somali Republic and Somali Democratic Republic did in 1964 and 1977 wars against Ethiopia!
We have seen that movie before and the end result was disastrous of monumental proportion. But why some people still want to try that disastrous experience!?
Well, go and ask the two guys (Punt land region and the Somali state of Ethiopia) who were dancing joyfully together in Jigjiga, lately! They seem they did not see that movie!
The Punt land region leader was repetitively threatening Somaliland that that he is going to occupy where ever any community which subscribes to his extended tribe live with out regard and with out respect of the international borders between his region and Somaliland Republic! He even requested for foreign forces to come to his region. It seems that the dance of the ‘due’ the Punt land leader and the Jigjiga leader was a tacit approval of their clan grandeur scheme of occupying where ever any of their clan lives and even where ever possible for them to do like they did in Kismayo and in Ex-‘Houd and Reserved Area’ of the Somali state of Ethiopia. The guy in Jigjiga seems saying that, “look I have already “Ogadeenized” the ‘Houd and Reserved Area’ and you have to “Hartiaize” Erigavo, lascaanood, Buhudle and where ever else possible, and put them in to your column! This scheme has happened before, and still happening in Somalia, particularly in the minority people’s regions in Hirran, lower Joba and Kismayo.
In all these, there is a Right way and a Wrong way of doing things. For sure the due mentioned above are doing their agenda in the wrong way and this is why.
a) First they did not refer history. The German occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1938-1945 began with Nazi annexation of Czechoslovakia’s Northern and Western border regions known as the Sudetenland. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s pretext for this effort was that ethnic German population suffered (alleged) privations by living in those regions therefore he has to occupy those regions. The occupation ended with the surrender of Germany following World War II
Where is Ethiopia and Somaliland in this new phenomenon?
1) As for Ethiopia, may be they are doing two things according to their strategic policy.
a) They want to please the Ogaden community as to entice the ONLF to lay down their weapons and enjoy the new found opportunities given to them in which they even transported Ina Abdilla Hassan to Jigjiga.
b) That they are sending a message of discontent to Somaliland government.
c) That they want the peaceful parts of the Somali Peninsula, Somaliland and the Somali state of Ethiopia not to trust each other and instead hate each other to keep them in check.
2- As for Somaliland well, Somaliland is MIA (Missing in action)! If some one sees them at all they see them fighting with their own, with the descending opinions and voices and with the conscionable people of the society!
Peace and prayers
Ibrahim Mead
