Separatism versus Unity in Somalia’s Clan-based Society

Beginning with the 1930s, owing to the clan segmentary system, before there was a Somali republic, traces of separatism were feasible among Isaaq elites. But the surge of Somali nationalism in the 1940s, the unification of the ex-British and ex-Italian Somaliland regions on July 1, 1960, and the unconditional adoption of the “Act of Union” on January 1961, by sanctioning the creation of the Somali Republic seem to have created insurmountable challenges to the current secessionist sentiment.

With Somali nationalism taking full shape by the end of World War II, there emerged dual, yet contradictory, political views among the elite in the North vis-à-vis Somali nationalism (one separatist and the other unionist). The genesis of these contending views is found in the political environment surrounding the anti-colonial struggle mounted by the Somali nationalist leader, Sayyid Mohamed Abdulla Hassan who challenged British rule at the turn of the last century. The arming of 3,000 “tribal levies” by the British colonial administration to fight and pursue Sayyid Mohamed Abdulla Hassan and his Derwish army defined the battles of the two sides to the Somali question.28 Following suit and in the aftermath of the defeat of Sayyid Muhammad, the Isaaq Association in East Africa in the 1930s through the 1940s, most of whom were elements from the ranks of the so-called “tribal levies,” resisted any effort to forge an inclusive, all-Somali oriented movement to collectively pressure the British colonial government for a non-native status; the association rather emphasized the separateness and what a British colonial officer and an observer of the Somali question referred to as “chauvinistic”29 values. Parallel to this was, however, another strand of elites that espoused Somali national unity beyond parochial sectarian goals. A case in point is Hajji Farah Omar. Educated in India and an admirer of Gandhi-style nationalism, Haji Farah, among other things, was a factor in the transformation of the nativist movement (first started in East Africa as a movement to demand identity certificate for its constituents, and later on, expanded to the territories) into a movement for national independence and Somali unity.30

As the following excerpts from a long report written by the Nairobi colonial office on June 21, 1941 explains, the sectarian Association’s outlook both in East Africa and in the home front suddenly collapsed in 1941 in the face of a growing and expanding Somali nationalist movement:

It is evident from this report that, with the exception of a small number of the elite, the masses of the Isaaq have been patriotic and they were then in sync with the same ideals the rest of the Somali community adhered to, i.e., in search of its independence and reunification goals. The report goes on to state that “there was a considerable difference between Isaq tribal chauvinism and post Second World War Somali nationalism.”32

Separatists’ bid for a unilateral secession since reunification has been an on-again-off-again phenomenon, albeit always less thought-out and clan-driven. Right after the establishment of the Somali Republic, in December, 1961 (only a year and six months after unification), separatist sentiments within the ranks of the elites surfaced.33 Generally called the Hassan Kayd mutiny, a number of young and inexperienced junior officers in the unified national army took up arms and attempted an aborted mutiny. There are conflicting views on what exactly caused the mutiny, some claiming it to be a secessionist attempt while others suggesting that it was trade-based grievances. Nonetheless, the mutiny, with narrow appeal, was quickly put down by the unified government, although it has since then become a cause célèbre for secessionists. However, between 1961 and 1977, separatism in the north, although close to the hearts of an insignificant small minority, has been waning and had “increasingly muted as northerners in general, and Isaaqs in particular, gained more and more economic and political power.”34

Owing to multiple external and internal factors (e.g., the war with Ethiopia in 1977/78, the 1974/75 drought that had inadvertent impacts on the North and the suffocating political climate under the autocratic regime of Said Bare), the “muted” separatism re-emerged once again, leading this time to the formation of an armed separatist group, most importantly the SNM. Unlike other movements in the Horn of Africa region, the SNM movement was inclusive of all Isaaq sub clans, but exclusive of other clans who shared the region as cohabitants with the Isaaq clan. Why the SNM opted for an exclusive clan-based resistance is a matter of significant debate among Somalis of all persuasions. Nonetheless, the clan factor in the struggle waged by the SNM arguably served as a two-edge-sword. First, the lineage-based segmentary clan system in the Somali society is so powerful that founders and leaders of the SNM quickly seized on it to mobilize their clan members [only] to fight against Siyad Barre and his clan members. But, equally important is the refusal of other clans in the region to cooperate with the Isaaq, thus reducing the entire SNM, rightly or wrongly, to a single clan fighting against the government of Siyad Barre.35 Daniel Compagnon, who traveled with the SNM soldiers as they freely moved in Isaaq dominated villages in the north, succinctly and more poignantly captures this single-clan image of the SNM, where, in turn, clan and segmentary lineage system were deliberately utilized as a modern political resource: 36

In 1989, with the hope to articulate a non-clan based national front, Ali Jima’ale of the Hawiya-based United Somali Congress (USC) proposed to form a united front between his USC and Somali National Movement (SNM) forces against the Barre regime. But the SNM leadership, which by this time found a level of strength within its Isaaq clan members, turned down the offer.37 During the same period, writes Compagnon, the SNM was exhibiting a high level of animosity against non-Isaaqs, a position consciously promoted by the front’s leaders. Clan is seemingly utilized as a political resource in the same way that Robert Jackson and Carl Rosenberg described it in their book, Personal Rule in Black Africa38 when seeking political power. In other words, clan is a potent resource, just like Islamic fundamentalism, often used to achieve political objectives by a given interest group. Before we tackle the issue of whether secession is justified or not, a brief discussion on the time-line of the reunification of the two territories is due here.

Reunification of the Somali Territories: Myth vs. Reality

Technically speaking, prior to the advent of European colonialism at the turn of the 19th century, the term “Somaliland” applied to all Somali speaking regions in the Horn of Africa. The British carved out British Somaliland Protectorate, and since its independence in1960, was confined to the Northern region. The former British Somaliland Protectorate, with a total area of 137,600 sq. km. and a coastline of 850 km. is bordered by Djibouti (ex-French Somaliland) and the Gulf of Aden to the north, Ethiopian occupied territories to the west and ex-Italian Somaliland to the east and south.39 The region is home to about 2.540 million inhabitants comprising several major clans, notably the Isaaq, Daarood (Dhulbahante and Walsangali), Gadabursi, Issa, Gaboye, and a host of smaller clans. In the later parts of the 19th century, Her Majesty Queen Victoria of Great Britain signed individual and separate treaties with major clans in the region, excepting the Dhulbahante.41 Such treaties were signed in the latter half of the 19th century, and later on posed challenges to the nationalist sentiments of Sayyid Muhammad Abdullah Hasan and his Dervish movements. The British in turn used its treaties with separate clan leaders as the basis for their claim to provide protectorate status. Exception to this rule was, however, the Dhulbahante clan who never ratified an Anglo-Dhulbahante treaty. As such, territorial administrations were merely clan-based, and fiercely independent from each other, as if a prescriptive Lord Lugard’s “Indirect Rule” was implemented with precision.

By the 1940s, with the winds of change for independence sweeping the entire Somali-inhabited regions, clans established separate political parties along clan lines. The most globalist and inclusive party at the time was the pan-Somali Youth League (SYL); other smaller but equally nationalist yet clan-based parties included the Somali National League (SNL), National United Front (NUF)), and later on the United Somali Party (USP). Although Political reintegration among clans was achieved only at or after the reunification of the two ex-colonies, the political objective for reunification of the two colonies originated in earnest with the rise of Somali nationalism at the end of WWII, during which time “the question of the ex-Italian Somaliland and its future was raised at the Paris Peace Conference in 1946, at which point the British Foreign Secretary put forward proposals for the creation of a "Greater Somaliland "by the fusion of British Somaliland, Italian Somaliland and the Ogaden into a single administration under British trusteeship. This scheme found a wide measure of support among enlightened Somalis, who felt that it faced up to the economic, ethnical and geographical realities of the situation.”42

By 1956, Britain could no longer avoid, agreeing to a gradual introduction of a representative government and an eventual independence for its protectorate.43 As the independence of the Italian Somaliland approached, the British authorities facilitated and proceeded with speed for its Protectorate’s independence and reunification with the ex-Italian territory, thus prompting “The British government… in principle to end its rule in time for British Somaliland to reunite it with the Italian trust territory on the July independence date that had already been decided by the UN”.44 The reunification of ex-British and ex-Italian Somalilands, therefore, was not an overnight love affair, in which one side won at the expense of the other, but an evolving political consciousness of a people “in search of a nation,” thus hitting a high note with the British colonial Secretary (Mr. Alan Lennox-Boyd) stating in February 1959 that his government would facilitate the voluntary and unstoppable reunion of the two territories. In February 1960, Mohamed H. Ibrahim Egal, was elected a Premier, for 4 days, 45 by a wide unionist vote in the constitutional election. With the sponsorship and facilitation by the United Nation, Egal led a delegation to Mogadishu and met Southern counterparts at the convention that took place between April 16 and 22, 1960; the two sides agreed to reunify their territories without conditions in a unitary state under a single president who will be elected as head of state by a unified National Assembly with 123 seats.46 Thus, the creation

of a unitary Republic of Somalia on 1st July, 1960, was indeed the” icing on the cake” of a long struggle.
But such reunification would have been difficult to attain without the endorsement of the clan elders in the two protectorates. The role of clan elders in decision-making and their endorsement of reunification underscore the separateness of clans in the absence of unified government, as well as their “centripetal” role for the greater good, i.e., creating a unified Somalia. 47 Both colonial administrators and most Somali leaders, including Egal, strongly supported the reunification for the apparent need to engender a sense of governance out of the “humpty-dumpty” disparate clans, with each one clinging to its treaty with Her Majesty. In fact, the former British protectorate, a more clan-based society at the time with no known experience in self-administration, was keener in the reunification of the two; As such, it promptly put forth a text of a draft proposed “Act of Union” prior to the date of independence, which read as follows:48

As this text was only a draft proposed by the northern leaders, it served as the basis for future deliberation and modifications of the language on the reunification of the two territories. The ultimate union of the two was indeed a win-win situation for all, but mainly for the ex-British protectorate in that it had helped unite the Daarood with the Isaaq, with the Gadabursi, with the Issa, with Gaboye, who hitherto had a history of conflict and competition over scarce resources.49 The current declared “impromptu” and unilateral breakup of that unification could run the risk of easily plunging these clans into an unmanageable disunity, at best, and into an intra-clan conflict at worst.

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