Somalilandcenter.com: A harbinger of hate news

Amos Oz, the Israeli novelist has always called for the Israeli government to stop slaying intellectuals and people of ideas in Palestine. His magnanimity towards people some Israelis view as enemies bent on destruction of Israel is based a careful reading of history: Hitler did not acquire his genocidal powers before he executed people he thought of as free thinkers in the night of long swords. Pol Pot started to execute people he believed to have been a little bit enlightened so he could bring his bloody enterprise to fruition.
Having said this, I don’t discount the existence of intellectuals whose actions have led to brutal campaigns against innocents but to be selective or muzzle men and women of ideas is, to misquote Michel Foucault, be“a judge of abnormality”.
I have read an unsigned article on the somalilandcenter.com—I presume it is an editorial—on a book, Awdal Phenomenon, that Bashir Goth purportedly edited many years ago at the height of the civil war in Northern Somali cities of Burao and Hargeisa. Bashir Goth is the editor of a pro-Somaliland website, awdalnews.com. An article from the book that was skilfully scanned on to the website to share with the somalilandcenter.com readers is controversial in tone. It may sound as purely anti Isaaq piece if one adopts the hypocritical approach of 1970s revolutionary Somalia that demanded us to pretend that clans and clannism had been buried alive.
In that article the author—Goth?-- addresses issues in a tribal nature, calling a spade a spade when reflecting on events by a group who belong to a clan He generalises. In the unwritten methodology of Somali clannism, pinning the action of one person on the clan is not absurd. The assertion that is Isaaq clan was pro-British is debatable. The poetry of Sayid Mohamed Adulle Hassan can’t be cited as an evidence to prove that the British co-opted the Isaaq clan to fight the Sayid because the Isaaq were the target of the Sayid’s vitriol.
The somalilandcenter.com editorial has judged Bashir Goth to be an anti Isaaq chap solely on the basis of the article it attributed to him. As a writer Bashir has the privilege to interpret events provocatively. Events about the formation of NUF to forestall the impending independence in 1960 in the ex British Somaliland, formation of USP to counterbalance Isaaq dominated Somali National League can be subjected to various interpretations. One is bound to stick with Goth’s interpretations unless someone shows they are implausible. Somalilandcenter.com editorial fails to do so.
If Somalilandcentre.com is serious about the rights of Somaliland people, why didn’t launch a campaign on behalf of the oppressed Gaboye in Hargeisa? Fasial Ali Warabe, the chairman of UCID who recently met the Gaboye chief in Europe is on the record for displaying his contempt for minorities. In an interview with Josep Warungu of the BBC Focus on Africa, shortly after Colonel Abdullahi Yusuf was declared the president of the Somalia, argued that the president can not rule Somalia “ because he is from a minority clan.”. True, Abdullahi Yusuf is from minority reer Mahad clan. Instead of pointing out the colonel’s past foibles Faisal reinforced what many people believe about the natural supporters of the Somali National Movement: that they are very segregationist and intolerant of other clans with whom they don’t share blood ties.
Mine is no an article in defence of Mr Bashir Goth. He is able to defend himself eloquently and persuasively. It is to stimulate a healthy debate about what Somaliland centre.com believes to be the work of Bashir Goth and what is going on in Somaliland. I wonder why it is easy for some pro-Somaliland websites to wallow in an exaggerated victimhood.
They make the Somaliland project a vengeful enterprise through which many people aim to settle historical scores. If Somalilancentre.com and its ilk are impatient with alternative viewpoints, then it is time to stop pretending Somaliland has an inclusive system.
Ahmed Keyse Ali,
London
ahmedkeyse98@hotmail.com