How Somalia’s Envoy to the USA vindicated neo-cons on Somalia

Transitional Federal Government of Somalia’s new envoy to the United States Mr. Abukar Amran

Transitional Federal Government of Somalia’s new envoy to the United States Mr. Abukar Amran, writes op-ed pieces on Somalia for some newspapers and major websites such as Huffington Post.  In the past his views carried weight within the Somali community because he did not have a role in clannish politics of post-1991 Somalia until 2006 when the Union of Islamic Courts defeated the notorious warlords and captured many parts of southern Somalia. As a new envoy of Somalia to the US, Abukar Arman is keen to reopen a Somalia Embassy in Washington. “The transitional federal government under [President] Sharif has no legs to stand on, what then would an ambassador represent given that?" Professor Ahmed Samatar, Dean of the Institute for Global Citizenship at Macalester College told Associated Press. The professor’s remarks angered Abukar Arman who, according Associated Press report,  implied that professor Samatar is a lazy thinker. “We've tried that line for the last 20 years - it didn't get us anywhere," he said. "It's a tall order, but somebody has to do it, somebody has to march with confidence towards that goal.“

During 1980s Professor Ahmed Samatar’s views on Somalia under Siyad Barre regime put the spotlight on the clan based opposition groups. His 1988 book, Socialist Somalia: Rhetoric and Reality, is still the most reliable and well researched study critical of the Somali revolution. He foresaw the armed opposition movements’ inability to put Somalia on the road to democracy when Siyad Barre “regime falls”. His views on post-1991 Somalia   emphasize the need for an able leadership. Why has envoy Arman dismissed the Professor Samatar’s remarks knowing full well that the TFG is protected in some parts of Mogadishu by (The African Union Mission to Somalia AMISOM) forces?

Envoy Arman’s  2006-2010 writings on Somalia  can shed some light on his dismissive attitude. Frontpage, an online  magazine, published articles on Abukar Arman. Patrick Poole a contributor to the magazine, called Arman  “one of the most prominent public defenders of the al-Qaeda-backed ICU[ Islamic Courts Union]  terrorist organization in the West,…[who] published numerous articles in print and online defending the group prior to their violent takeover of Somalia last summer.” The ICU didn’t succeed in conquering all Somali regions; it ruled parts of southern Somalia where US financed warlords once regarded as their fiefdoms but Poole’s criticisms took their toll on Arman who “lost his teaching job”, according to a Columbus Dispatch story on the day Abukar Arman was cleared of any terrorism connection. In one of his pieces Arman called for the international contact group  for Somalia to support the ICU  because it is against “the abuses and exploitations of the warlords, and as such, the movement bears a profound historical significance to the average Somali, which is why it attracted “the good; the bad; and the ugly” as volunteers.” The defeated, CIA funded Alliance for Counter-terrorism made up of warlords was targeting members of Islamic courts  operating in some parts of Mogadishu. The warlords underestimated the power and support base of the Islamic Courts in Mogadishu. People in Mogadishu were tired of war; it was the religious men who took up arms and brought the warlords’s reign of terror to an end. The ICU leadership called for jihad against Ethiopia, prompting the intentional community’s moral support for Ethiopia.

The United States under Bush and now under Obama maintains “terrorists” have found a haven in Somalia. Al Shabab’s transition from a small group of men under the ICU into a full-fledged organization controlling many parts of Southern Somalia, and its link with the Al  Qa’eda says something about  Arman’s  judgment. In 2008 the United States killed Aden Hashi Ayro, a top Al Shabab leader, in Galugdud region. In 2009, the United States killed Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan near Barawe. The US was on the trail of Nabhan  for the 1998 bombing of American embassies in Nairobi and Darussalam. Abukar Arman was defending an organization of which the United States knew more than he knew about it. One can safely say that “moderates” in ICU were outnumbered by “extremists”. Arman’s uncritical support for the ICU was shared by many including the Somali-Canadian academic Afyare Elmi who, in 2007 wrote an op-ed in Boston Globe.  He criticized the US policy “for approaching the complex and multilayered Somali conflict in this simplistic way and linking it to the war on terror.” Afyare had to change his views in an Al Jazeera  TV interview  in February 2010 because “they [ Al Shabab ]  want to link al Shabab and  Horn of Africa  Jihad to the global network led by Osama Bin Laden . Americans were arguing that Al Shabab  was a proxy for Al Qa’iada. They seem to be vindicated.”

Then Against TFG, Now for the TFG

When  Sharif Sheikh Ahmed   was elected president of the  Transitional Federal Government of Somalia in January 2009,   Abukar Arman began to write articles in support  of the TFG although he described the TFG in the following  terms: “Many Somalis are generally skeptical of the authenticity of the TFG. To many, there is no difference between the TFG led by Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi and President Abdullahi Yusuf, on the one hand, and the Ethiopian regime led by Meles. They consider the first duo as self-serving charlatans and the latter as their master and puppeteer.” Now Arman  is the  TFG’s envoy to the United States. The TFG is the outcome of a reconciliation conference which, according to Arman , was “ micromanaged” by the Ethiopian prime minister Meles Zenawi, just like “ most of the 14 previously failed ‘reconciliation” conferences.” In another piece Arman argued:  “The ICU  leaders carry significant political credibility and clout that could help disarm Mogadishu, restore peace and order, and give credence to any future (mutually organized) intra-Somali reconciliation conference.” The founder of ICU sheikh Hassan Dahir Aweis is the leader of the Hisbul Islam,  a militant Islamist outfit  that is bent on getting rid of  the TFG;  Al Shabab is no longer a group of young men within the ICU.

Envoy Abukar Arman’s past Op-Ed pieces and columns  leave no one in doubt that he is a partisan  who has (unwittingly) misinformed the world about Somalia and its problems. Sadly, he vindicated the neo-cons on Somalia.

Liban Ahmad
E-mail: libahm@gmail.com