A lot of African, Cushitic and Somali people as well as international community high calibre politicians are all getting confuse with the real politics of President Ahmed Mohamed Mohmoud Silanyo. Before we jump into conclusion on Silanyo politics, let us first highlight his background, his influences on Somalia and his role in the African politics in general.
According to Mr Silanyo’S Wikipedia page, he was born in a small town called Dheryaley part of Balidhiig village in the province of Togdheer. During the British colony, he studied in both of the two major English Schools in the British Somaliland, Shiikh and Amoud. After he completed his secondary in 1957, then he immediately started his A levels and completed his first degree at Manchester University, as he graduated in 1965 with the bachelor of Economics.
After he graduated, then he was assigned in a high managerial posts in Somalia and he is being promoted to a general director level at the ministry of finance. After the military cue led by General Siad Barre in 1969, Mr Silanyo is being promoted to the minister of planning and later on being appointed as the minister of commerce and he continued working in that post until early eighties approximately up to 1982. After serious of conflicts and political misconceptions between Siad Barre’s regime and Mr Silanyo’s hidden political ideologies, he fled to London in 1982, then he immediately led the SNM first office in East London, four years later he was elected for the post of the leader of SNM and he continued this post up to late 1989.
After SNM, USC, SSDF, SDA movements gained strong support from Somalia as well as Mingestu’s support, who once told them, never catch a tiger’s tail, then the moment of truth or the show time got closer, then SNM particularly appointed President Abdirahman Ahmed Ali (tuur) to lead the civil wars in NW-Somalia.
Mr Silanyo played a vital role during the peace and reconciliation processes which was held in Borama and in Burco and he also dominantly played a silent tiger’s move for an important events in that particular moments i.e. during the declaration of Somaliland to be a sovereign and independent state as well as during the election of President Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal in Borama against his political rivals Abdirahman Tur and Omar Arteh Ghalib.
After an authority conflicts ended between Egal and Abdirahman Tur’s, then from 1993 to 1997 Mr Silanyo was appointed to act as an MP in Hargaisa, from 1997 he was appointed to act as the minister of finance, then the minister of planning (the same posts held in Siyad Bare’s military Regime) he continued these posts until the year 2000.
As minister of finance, he played an important role on printing a Somaliland currency notes as well as formation of money transfers and exchange rate scaling strategies. With these experiences then Mr Egal mirrored him as a strong political opponent and as a rival for the leadership seat. Then Mr Egal who was familiar with old proverbs, attacked Mr Silanyo with demoralising statements. The same as before, then he resigned from the post and moved to UK with the loss of appetite in politics, as he has been challenged twice and lost hope for presidency twice with broken heart and with few friends.
During that bitter times, some people called him unlucky politician, while others called him non courageous and rumours of failed politician has been spread inside and outside the country. But some call him tactical and hardliner politician, because Mr Silanyo knew well when to escape, how to regroup his strengths and when to attack. He also knew he could not challenge a battle on the ground with Egal, who has won the hearts and the minds of the people at that times, who was also one of the sharp toothed tigers with full of political tactics. But wisely, Mr Silanyo made his calculations and saved his energy for the successors of Egal who was sharp young whelps who was not yet a tiger. He also knew and took into account the medical degradation and the age of President Egal.
With the same scenario as before (forming SNM in London), he formed an opposition political party called Kulmiye with the same organisational charter’s route but different ideology which based on multiparty politics and he immediately launched a huge campaign against UDUB party which was led by the old and tired tiger Egal.
After the death of president Egal and succeeded the seat to his Vice President, Dahir Riyale Kahin, who was much younger and less experienced than Silanyo, then the dream for the crown returned and he restored hope by campaigning against the young whelp Riyale who surrounded himself with old tigers. This challenge with Riyale was uncertain and a new battle for Silanyo, because his previous opponents were older and wiser, but now, his opponent was younger and calmer. But overall and unexpectedly he challenged and lost the election with 80 votes less. He tried to reject the outcome in a peaceful manner with high tone of threat, unfortunately the supreme-court adjourned and verified his loss.
With regrets, suffering of betrayal and back-staping from his close relatives, with limited hope for recovery, then he flew-back to London and prepared huge resources for his final battlefield such as financial resources, media coverage i.e. universal TV, key figures allocation, tribal alliances, contributions from active diaspora individuals and character assassination campaigns against President Dahir Riyale’s regime.
In 2010 his long journey and appetite for presidency has ended, as he won the title of president and finally settled on the seat by multiparty election and with the death of all the old and systematic tigers in Somalia including Siad Barre, Ceydid, Abdillahi Yousuf, Adam Isaq, Awale Bustaleh, Jama Rabileh Goth etc.
After leading a victory for his party and sitting on the driving seat, unexpectedly and most surprisingly, he appointed government officials with no political record, with no economical states, no educational entity and he applied a system that is not balancing the tribal demands as well as adopting a strategies against the capitalism and multiparty politics and finally a footsteps that could create an internal conflicts between the clans residing in the British Somaliland territory.
With this long review of the political and economical career of Mr Silanyo, we are sure he knew a lot about capitalism, communism, federalism and spiritualism ideologies, he surely observed or indirectly involved in the independency ages, the cold war ages, the current globalisation age etc. We can also assume that he was economist, exchequer and politician. But several issues such as ideological and hidden agendas analyses will remain uncertain, based on his political ideology, his successors, his desires and his wishes etc. We can also assume that he is old and lost judgement in some instances and took steps that contradict his political footprints i.e. centralisation of powers to his close relatives, allocation of major posts to a people with no intellectual nor educational records etc.
Nevertheless, we can not deny that he accomplished a tremendous achievements during his term in the office including the formation of statehood policies i.e. Awdal Sate, Khatumo state, Puntland state, Juba state, south-central Somalia state, South East State e.t.c. He manoeuvred the opening of dialogue or communique with Somalia and after decades of silence communication and in some instance he contributed the application of free market economy by constructing roads, sea and air transport routes. Finally and most admiringly his tactical entrance of Las Qorey or the gates of Puntland analytically by cooperation and for a reason.
Based on his track records, we cannot deny, That Mr Silanyo is the last remaining tiger of the 21st century political system in the region which is about to end, although some of his government crew members have history of violence, but we can assure that he is not a violent man, as he stepped back several occasion previously were he could ignite tribal wars.
Overall all we can conclude, that a new era of political turmoil is about to occur and a long lasted system driven by him will be buried with him. But Cushitic people’s inheritance depends on his ruling today as well as his approaches to transfer his knowledge and his life experiences.
Nowadays the whelps in Somalia, the international community politicians and the diaspora intellects are all murmuring is he fit enough to rule or not? Finally people will only understand his true intentions, and its up to the Cushitic nation to ask him his previous aims and objectives, his current orders and his wishes for tomorrow. His answers will be his memoir and remembrance. This memoir will reflect and scale upon his political weight forever.
Brief Analyses Report Of Silanyo’s Politics
Written by :
Saturday, 22 March 2014
Director of International Trade Advice Bureau
AbdiRahman Hamud Alel
MSc, PGCE, LLB, BSc, BSc, Eng
Notice: Although the writer do not support the existence of so-called Somaliland as a sovereign and independent country, and view Somaliland as a member of Somali States in the short run as well as Cushitic State in the long-term. But, the writer is dedicated to return an old favour and to submit a comprehensive analyses on politics in general, which could be useful to certain local and international academic institutions as well as to certain individual analysts.
Any error omitted on this brief analyses, on the characters e.t.c. Please do not hesitate to communicate with thewriter by e-mailing abdirahmanalel@gmail.com also the writer is glad to correct mistakes for future reference.
