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In Africa, What Does It Take To Be A Country?
Washingtonpost.com — USA — 02 January, 2004
At least a small part of the future of Africa is being played out in
Somaliland, the northwest portion of Somalia that declared its independence
in 1991. In its bustling but impoverished capital of Hargeysa, the most
striking contrast with most African cities is the sense of order. Police --
who, given their salaries, are almost volunteers -- stand in the hot sun
and direct obedient drivers. Money-changers sit on the side of the street
with huge piles of cash visible, waiting for customers.
Order is supposed to be the defining characteristic of a state, but
Somaliland is recognized by no country in the world as a sovereign entity.
Instead, the world insists on clinging to the fiction that Somalia has a
government that rules over a united territory. Understanding why the world
pretends that Somaliland does not exist tells us much about the foibles of
the international politics of recognition.
Somaliland was a British protectorate during the colonial period. In 1960,
during the rush to decolonization, Somaliland was independent for five days
before joining with former Italian Somaliland to create the Somali
Republic. In 1989 the government of thug-President Mohamed Siad Barre
declared war on Somaliland because of fears that the Somalilanders wanted
to go it alone. Government fighters, taking off from the Hargeysa airport,
systematically bombed the city, destroying just about every building. In an
event all but unnoticed by the international community, 50,000 people were
killed and approximately 500,000 of the population of 2 million became
refugees in neighboring Ethiopia.
For several years, strife and conflict continued, but Somaliland
persevered. Order was gradually restored and a government formed; the
refugees returned and embarked on a long process of rebuilding. In 2001, 98
percent of voters opted in a free and fair election for a new constitution
that boldly proclaimed the case for independence. Somaliland then had
successful, internationally monitored, local council elections in 2002 and
a free and fair presidential election in April 2003. The presidential
election was most notable because the ruling UDUB party, led by President
Dahir Rayale Kahin, won by only 217 votes out of almost 500,000 cast. The
opposition party KULMIYE challenged the tally but, in a moment of
extraordinary responsibility given Somalia's history of having weapons
resolve almost every conflict, eventually accepted the results. Somaliland
is planning parliamentary elections this year (the legislature is currently
appointed). At that point, it will have a far more impressive democracy
than most African countries.
One would think that the natural response of the outside world to the
extraordinary accomplishments of the Somalilanders would be respect and
recognition, especially because Somalia still does not have a government
and is still in absolute ruins a decade after one of the most expensive
humanitarian interventions in history. That is not the logic of the Horn of
Africa. About the only thing that the southern Somalis can agree on is that
they do not want Somaliland to secede. The rest of Africa has not been of
any more help. One of the decisions that African leaders took at
independence was to retain the irrational boundaries they had received from
colonialists, because they could not think of anything better and because
they thought that any credence given to self-determination would cause the
continent to descend into chaos. The permanence of boundaries has become a
major asset for African leaders who do not have to prove that they control
their territories or even that they are a legitimate government in order to
be granted international recognition and sovereign equality.
The Somalilanders made their own peace without the benefit of international
mediators and conflict resolution experts. Of course, they still face
extraordinary problems. Literacy may only be 30 percent; education for
girls is left to Koranic schools; significant parts of the government are
corrupt; just about all men have weapons at home and a good many of them
spend much of their income and afternoons chewing kat leaves, an addictive
stimulant imported from Ethiopia. In addition, the recent killing of an
Italian nurse and a British couple raised concerns across Somaliland that
it is still vulnerable to terrorist attacks from those who are determined
not to let secession go forward.
Nevertheless, recognizing Somaliland would be a strong signal to the rest
of Africa that performance matters and that sovereignty granted in the
1960s will not be an excuse to fail forever. Few regions of any African
country actually want to secede; thus the world could recognize the
achievements and legal idiosyncrasies of Somaliland without experiencing
massive disruptions of Africa's map. The Somalilanders, almost unanimously,
ask what more they can do when the international community continues to
recognize Liberia, Sierra Leone, Democratic Republic of the Congo and other
anarchic, violent places as sovereign units. It is time to give them an
answer.
Jeffrey Herbst is chairman of the department of politics at Princeton
University.
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