by:  M. M. AFRAH               afrah95@hotmail.com

 

The government you have been waiting for finally arrives, but NOT in the capital as was suggested by many, including Mr. Michael Bellamy, the American Ambassador to Kenya and Western benefactor countries. Now the question is: Are you ready to welcome a government that is frightened to relocate in its own capital? Prepare to ask them all the questions that have been lingering in your mind for quite sometimes. There can be an overwhelming amount of things to think about and to act upon, such as security, foreign troop deployment, your family needs, education for your children and grandchildren back home, health care and all the other daily basic necessities. Nevertheless, we must first transcend the tribal mentality, even though the Transitional Federal Government and Parliament have been concocted on tribal basis in a foreign country. For example, the thorny question is: what is the best way to disarm the gun-totting youths who control the string of makeshift roadblocks in the capital and elsewhere in the country? This question is still on the table and would continue to remain there until viable solution can be found in a country already saturated with blood and tears. I have been saying all along that changes must come within and not without. This is the hottest debate since the election of President Abdullahi Yusuf and his Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gheddi and I would not be surprised if it continues in the days to come, both at home and in the Diaspora. The overwhelming majority of those of you who cast their votes strongly disagree the deployment of foreign troops in Somalia. The same goes to the people at home. Your message is clear for anyone to read: No foreign troops on our soil. It is like putting the fox in charge of the henhouse. Victor Hugo has once written: "No army can withstand the strength of an idea when time has come." In Somalia, the moment had arrived: the moral support of the public had won the day at last. In the world we live today, we are often considered as ungovernable, unworthy of sympathy, if not talkative and disdainful. Let us prove them wrong. Let us prove that we can be our own boss without other people telling us what is best for us, period. Let us remind them that we are not the first people in the world who were entangled in a civil war imbroglio, though ours appears to be a never-ending one. The Confederate and Union soldiers had turned many parts of the cotton belt in South of the United States into a living hell, which seems to pale in comparison with the wholesale massacre and the looting spree in Somalia. The bleakness was so devastating that General George Washington put full energy into his military strategy to put an end to brother killing brother once and for all, and built the United States of America from the ashes of the civil war. Another example is the brutal Spanish Civil War-1936-1939. It was not only a battle against fascism, but social revolution. The result: around 25,000 people died during the first year of the civil war against the fascist dictator Franco, followed the death of about 3.3 per cent of the Spanish population with another 7.5 per cent being injured. After the war, it was reported that the fascist government of Francisco Franco arranged the execution 100,000 Republican prisoners. It was estimated that another 35,000 Republicans died in concentration camps in the years that followed the civil war. A huge number of civilian populations died of malnutrition and the lack of medical care and the collapse of sanitation, and other vital services. Uniting the cross-section of the fragmented Somali society can only solve the current Somalia conundrum, and as the delicate hope begins to blossom, we must move to the next hurdle-that is national reconstruction from the ashes of the civil war and put Somalia where it belonged among the community of nations. The onus is on the people! BY M. M. Afrah©2005 Afrah95@hotmail.com