March 29, 2005

Togane:

  After reading your article on A Hawiye in Hawaii, I came across this sentence.

 

“Hawiye fool called Ali Mahdi who turned Somalia into a nuclear garbage dump”.

 

  This is a very serious allegation which could have a great deal of ramification on one’s life.

 

I formally ask of you to retract the above mentioned statement and offer an apology to my father.

 

On the other hand bring forth any proof that you have and that can support your allegations.

 

If neither is done, I will be forced to take legal action against you and sue you for slander.

 

All the other remarks that you made against my father through the years I’ve tolerated it however this one goes beyond the norm of decency.  

 

Please fix it so we can all return to laugh about your rhetoric.  

 

Respectfully,

 

Liban Ali Mahdi

 

Dear Liban:

Thank you for giving me a decent way out of my own imbroglio!!

Since I can offer you no proof positive

that your dad, Ali Mahdi, did indeed “turn Somalia into a nuclear garbage dump”,

I hereby formally retract my false and baseless accusation

and apologize to your dad and to you and to your family and relatives and friends,

and to all those that I may have hurt by my reckless and baseless and thoughtless allegations.

I was irresponsibly repeating rumors.

Idle rumors fed to me by no-good Nosey Parkers. 

I thank you too for the graceful out

that you had given me

and now I am gracefully taking advantage of it!

We Somalis are so stupid

that we think we are being weak and womanly

when we admit our wrongs and apologize and seek forgiveness from each other!

On the contrary, there is nothing in this world stronger than gentleness!

The gentleness of admitting my mistakes and being accountable and making amends for my wrongs

is a sure sign of strength of character and wisdom: I thank Allah who is leading me right now to seek

your brotherly forgiveness after I had traduced your dad and you.

I know from a very personal experience that you are a gentle man who comes from a very gentle family:

in 1992 for forty-five days your dad and mom hosted me and housed me and fed me and protected me

in their own home in Mogadishu by the Lido Beach.

Liban, Adayr, as you very well know, there has been a standing pattern among us Somalis

of abusing and shaming and blaming each other

instead of loving and forgiving each other.

I am glad that right now and right here and in public—

that you and I are contributing to the genesis of the flowering of a culture of civility and accountability

and peace amongst us Somalis.

This reminds me of what one character said in one of the plays by Tennessee Williams:

All of my life I been like a doubled up fist…

Poundin’, smashin’ drivin’,—

Now I am going to loosen these doubled up

Hands and touch things easy with them.

Liban, I am glad

that the good Lord is giving me right now and right here

the strength and the courage to gently extend my right hand to you

and touch you

so you can gently shake my hand

in brotherhood and forgiveness!

Thank you.

And as it says in the good book,

 

"Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner

 

who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance. "

 

"... there is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents".

 

Liban: Adayr, thank you for affording this sinner, this Togane, this opportunity

 

of making us all, including Allah and his angels in heaven, all so joyful.

 

Imagine all the joy in heaven and on earth, especially in Somalia,

 

if all of us Somalis followed your example

 

of peacefully seeking redress instead of shedding blood.

 

Liban, Thank you for forgiving me.

 

Now I know better.

 

I have learnt my lesson!

 

Thank you for teaching me and chiding me so gently!

 

I am now glad to eat a humble pie so publicly!

 

I am now glad to eat crow so publicly!

 

I  know now

 

that baseless rumors hurt and don’t heal and

 

that what we Somalis need more than anything less in this world is

 

HEALING. 

 

Liban, Adayr,

 

He who laughs last laughs best!

 

I am glad that we can all safely return now to laughing

 

at my bungling punditry

 

Not in poetry

 

but prose run mad! 

                 

 

                         —Mahamud Siad Togane

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