Why Somaliland’s Hard-earned Peace And Stability Is At Risk?

[Deeq A.]

Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli, an
Italian diplomat, author, philosopher and historian who lived during the Renaissance, wrote in his best known book, the prince, “A prudent man should always follow in the footsteps of great men and imitate those who have been outstanding. If a man’s prowess fails to be compatible to that of great men, at least it must have an air of greatness. Man, if he is prudent, should behave like those archers who, if they are skilful, when the target seems too distant, know the capabilities of their bow and aim
a good deal higher than their objective,
not in order to shoot so high but so that
by aiming high they can reach the target.”

The above quote reflects how oldgenerations, particularly men who born ito lead and those who were kingmakers, viewed and valued the prerequiste skills of leadership.

No one can ever become a leader without talents. Becoming a leader depends much upon the capacity to convince people to l
agree with his or her viewpoint and vision, especially when we are talking about the developed world.

The way Somalis view leaders doesn’t rely on one’s capacity to gain people’s hearts through his or her vision and viewpoints. Skills, talent, competence, capability, and knowledge are not totally the identified criteria by which
S/land people choose their leaders. Tribalism
just plays the role.

S/land people are still unconcerned about the qualities that leadership requires.They don’t even mind if the leaders they elect don’t care for them. They don’t care about who a leader has become even after being elected. They just care for who one is and which tribe he hails from.
But, all in all, Somalis never seem to understand that being arrogant is not a skill that makes a good leader. If a leader doesn’t care for the people he leads, he is useless, and even worse than useless. The true test of any leader is whether or not the people the
leader is in charge of have become better off under his leadership.

Having said that, it is wrong if we always expect perfection from leaders. Leaders are humans and are not infallible of mistakes. But what do people generally expect from their leaders?

As teachers expect from students to arrive punctually, attend regularly, behave appropriately, and be well prepared in order to have the books and materials necessaryfor assignments and examinations, people expect honesty and integrity from their leaders in the first place. That is, a leader should come up with a sincere interest and concentrated effort to do and manage all pressing issues, preserve and protect the supreme law of the country and be considerate of the rights of all, both friends and foes.

The most important message in public expectations is a desire to see leaders’ unwavering attention and honest initiatives to lead society with aspirations that can keep all of them together. This desire or expectation means what people want and hope to happen and can only be achieved when people themselves persistently weigh and watch
what leaders actually do.

The best way to measuring what leaders do is to evaluate their performance in four areas in which all good leaders always excel at: a) Clarity of vision – the ability to see the future and create the path to get there; b) Capacity-building – the position a leader takes in improving and developing the skills, abilities, and resources that communities need to
survive, and thrive in this fast-changing world, c) Consideration of common voice, which means that a leader should not impose his opinion on the people but understand the collective aspirations of the people and work to make them a reality, and d) Situational awareness – knowing what is going on around at any given time, which is the ability to see, articulate and analyze the living conditions of the people in the context of what the leader is trying to do.

In sum, good leadership consists of three fundamental aspirations and
availabilities: creating vision, embracing commitment to that vision and managing progress toward the realisation of the
vision.

How leadership development be
monitored?

One way of monitoring if government high ranking officials, they be presidents, parliamentarians, or ministers, are maturing and developing as good leaders, is to check whether or not they have the instincts to understand that they should be more mindful of pacing themselves to take the time to
self-evaluate and learm from their mistakes.

When leaders self-evaluate themselves, they come to find out in where they are weak and where they are strong. Self-evaluation enables leaders to admit their mistakes, which in turn enables them to learn new experiences that show something they didn’t do it right, reveal somethings they haven’t done, discover the true level of their skill, and
make them know what matters most
to the public and what doesn’t. That is,
knowing where one is right or wrong, sounds to be the most important experiences that any leader can acquire and accomulate in leadership role.

Oddly enough, S/land leaders don’t have a learning behavior of that sort, whether they are the mujahids (the two Colonels), the ministers, the parliament memvers, the Guurti, or the judicial authorities, the three most powerful branches of S/land government. They neither follow in the
footsteps of great men, nor they are able to demonstrate that their leadership skills have even an air of worthiness to lead.

In view of this weakness in S/land current
government instititions, writing on today’s
incumbent leadership character is like
trying to make something out of nothing.

The common vice of today’s S/land leadership is the disregard for the difference between who builds up S/land and who destroys it; who divides its people and who unites them; who stirs up conflicts in the communities and who has the concern to calm and cure conflicts before they turn into clashes and confrontations; who leads S/land with naive outlook and attitude that
might put the nation in irresistable
troubles and who has clearly identified
vision and the plan to achieve the vision
that can get S/land to where it has never been; who alway has the agenda that devices wicked plans and who has the heart that sows harmony among S/’land societies; who has the feet that are quick to shed blood of innoncent people and who has the spirit for healing the wounds people suffer from, without distinction and discrimination.

Having an open mind that can seek other people’s opinions is one way of knowing if an individual can be a leader. Having problem-solving skills like the late great elder Haji Abdi Warabe is also a sign of being a leader. Showing positive attitude is still another trait that displays the eligibility of being a leader. Referring back to one’s background, as to who one is personally, and how are his skills towards changes and challenges, his approach to handle conflicts, and his behavior with regard to social and political role and responsibility is provingly the best way to figure out if a person could be a responsible leader.

It is unlikely that a person who lacks those leadership qualities can become a leader at any rate, for any nation, where people refer to a person’s level of knowledgeability when choosing a leader.

Somaliland is not a country where a person’s knowledgeability is respected or recokned with. The person who is respected and whose manliness is reckoned with is the one who doesn’t get lazy at being not only a prominent
figure, but a predator of every kind and
shape.

The disregard for leadership qualities mostly comes up when communities fail to check and make sure the true character of the person who can be a leader and who can’t. Of course, failure by S/land communities to give attention to elect the right person into the position of public trust has put our nation into leadership and political crisis.

In fact, leadership and political crisis that
S/land people suffet constantly include poor judgement, poor leadership preparation, incapacity to predict the future, resistance to listen to public voice, lack of learning behavior, inability to manage differences that arise when two sides disagree on certaian issues.

The two Colonels in power are not really
above those weaknesses in today’s S/land leadership role. They are below those crises, without doubt.

Contrary to how some people think, S/land leadership crisis is not only when those who are in control show the tendency to run and rule the country according to their own outlook, but it is also when those in power become unfit for the job they have for the
people and become unable to lead the country in the right and required way. More importantly, S/land poor leadership turned out to be a disaster as the two Colonels took the decisions that threaten S/land’s peace and stability.

Most people say that the two Colonels and their cronies have failed in leading this nation aright; a thought that simply shows the fact that leaders cannot be prefect. In that people may have a point, but there are points that most people fail to notice.

The points which need to be clear to everybody are such that the two Colonels
and those that always rally behind them have already made up their little minds and determined to stay in power at any cost, even if the consequnces of their staying in power might ultimately result in an irreversible catastrophy that will, in turn, cause S/land”s sudden crumble and collapse.

The two Coloneĺs and their cronies have succeeded in formulating a chain of conpiracies that enabled them to stay in power as long as they want, without public consent.

The two Colonels believe that S/land people can be governed by force and that use of power is only what really works well, when it comes to ruling nations. They think that goverance is being scoped always by brutality. They don’t know that persuation is better than use of force. Punishing and brutalising people instead of treating them fairly and paying attention to what they need or say is totally what the Colonels have grown to accustom.

The two Colonels and their father of tribalism, Saleebaan Geel, never shy away to keep S/land people in crisis and conflicts; they never shy away to create what pulls S/land people apart; they never shy away to divide S/land people into foes and friends; they never shy to do what even women shy away to do.

Muse Bihi and his collegues in his administration never shy to arrest citizens
who speak In their minds like Bushaare
Baanday, the freelance journalist, who had been caught by S/land security forces in Wajaale, and every other body who tries to tell something about the Colonels’ conspiracy theories to prolong their pennicious ruling behavior.

The two Colonels never shy away to detain any citizen who uses to criticis their foollish actions for a considerable time, without taking into account the fundamental principle of our system of justice that every person accused of a crime is presumed to be innocent unless and until his or her guilt is established beyond a reasonable doubt.

How did the Colonels set out their strategy, the roadmap to prolong their rule?

The Colonels’ first conspiracy began with the initiative to open new political associations even though Somaliland election system doesn’t accummodate a process in which new political parties election can be held separately from local council elections.

But Muse Bihi did not see that the lack of consolidated election laws for presidential and newly registered political parties will create a conflict over holding the election without a law. Muse Bihi and his hotch-potch administration decided to be out of legality and proceeded to form the committee for registration of new political organizations and approval of political parties.

Of course Muse Bihi had three main goals in opening new political parties. The first goal was to make Waddani’s growing popularity to gain more fans and votes from H/J less powerful and less effective. The second goal was to eliminate Ucid party out of the political scene. And the third aim was to replace both parties, Waddani and Ucid, with
the new parties, an option still standingto be utilized by the ruling junta, should things go as planned.

Paralleĺ to this unconstitutional move, Muse Bihi secretly intervened in the former National Electoral Commission Members headed by Riyo Raac and influenced them to resign individually in return of undisclosed reward, bribery to put it in its proper context. The NEC resignation prompted the need to form new NEC that required a considerable time to learn election formalities and acquire the
skills for holding elections and voter registration process.

In fact, Muse Bihi’s initiative to open new parties and pressure the already existed
NEC to quit was a conspiracy to undermine the timeline in which presidential election that was supposed to be held on 15 Nov 2022.

After that mission was successfully fulilled, the parliament’s upper house, the Guurti, proceeded to extend Bihi’s mandate by two years without prior agreement between opposition parties and ruling party. The extention was absolutely undemocratic, not
authorised or approved by S/land’s
suprene laws. The extention can be also interpreted probably as a collusion between Muse Bihi and Saleebaan Gaal, that only meant that no more presidential election will take place in S/land in the years to come.

The argument over the constitutionality of opening new parties between Muse Bihi and opposition parties escalated peaceful demonstrations in which S/land police forces killed armless protesters in Eerigabo, Burco and Hargeisa; a well organized assault at opposition supporters which would have been escalated to civil war if the leaders of parties didn’t show up to cool down the peoples’ anger and agony.

On the other hand, the war in Lasanod is believed to be a project that meant to manipulate Muse Bihi’s chances to stay in office. The warring strategy which keeps
S/land forces to be stationed in and around Goojacade and controls their strength to recapture Lasanod city while they are under constant attack by the local armed militias and their allies just proves thatvLasanod war is a conspiracy to prolong Muse Bihi’s term.

If those who are in power, at their own discretion, disregard the elements of what basically structures shared values, the building blocks that protect and preserve the nation’s constitution; if those who are in power abandon and ignore the nation’s suprem laws whenever they want and no other legal institution has the power to return them to the nation’s social contract, what
else can set out how all the elements of government are organised and how power is carved up among different political units?

S/land suffers effects of lawlessness. The laws that are made and meant to regulate how democracy deals with political conflicts are no longer in use. The reason for this to happen is that the head of the incumbent administration is tempted to take the law into his own hands, since other institutions that are supposed to protect national law are not doing their jobs.

All above versions show that S/land people see two different attitude in the ruling party leadership and opposition parties leadership: Belligerent attitude and pacifist attitude.

All of us know that Muse Bihi always takes belligerent attitude towards political conflicts and refuses to ngeotiate with opposition parties over the form of any joint decision which they might take to manage and resolve the dispute between them.

The question is: Who is a threat to S/land’s hard-earned peace and stability? Who wants to lead this nation into war? Who wants to go by his own little mindset and be out of legality? Muse Bihi or Abdirahman Cirro or Faisal Ali? Who cares? That is what the lack of public outcry means.

Failure to stop the wrongdoers, the useless Guurti that always endorses whatever the arrogant and ignorat Colonels suggest, from taking furthet actions that will surely put
S/land’s hard-earned peace and stabimity into risk, will mean the end of S/land state.

By:Jamafalaag
Somaliland, Hargeisa.

jamafalaag@gmail.com

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