Ethan Zuckerman's musings on Africa, international development
and hacking the media.
There’s no shortage of diplomatic and military developments within Somalia, though it’s difficult to sort rumor from fact. IRIN is reporting that the UIC – the Union of Islamic Courts, which controls Mogadishu and most of southern Somalia – has agreed to negotiations with the transitional government of Somalia, which controls the provincial town of Baidoa and has looked weak and disorganized since a failed no-confidence vote on Prime Minister Ali Muhammad Gedi and the resignation of 40 Somali MPs. UIC had previously refused to participate in the Khartoum negotiations until all Ethiopian troops had left Somalia – Ethiopia denies that its troops are in Somalia, though there are numerous reports of uniformed Ethiopian military personnel in and around Baidoa. UIC has now dropped this requirement and agreed to negotiations in Khartoum beginning August 31st. Prime Minister Gedi has been requesting a ceasefire prior to negotations – no indications so far that the UIC is interested in such an agreement.
In the meantime, UIC fighters – advancing in “technicals”, Toyota pickup trucks mounted with machine guns – are reported to have captured the port town of Hobyo without a fight. But the BBC reports that UIC denies that it captured Hobyo, saying instead that their armed vehicles “reached the people of Hobyo to bring them our message of peace.”
Updated map – blue names correspond to locations mentioned in this post, primarily places where UIC forces have advanced.
Hobyo is very close to Puntland, the home of interim President Abdullahi Yusuf. UIC may have been able to seize Hobyo by promising free passage for the clan leaders who controlled the town, allowing them to retreat to the north. Control of Hobyo may be part of an effort to control piracy on the southern coast of Somalia, which has long been a no-go zone for international shipping due to widespread piracy. BBC reports that the UIC moved into Harardhere and Eldher ports this weekend, both of which had been bases for pirate gang – both ports are south of Hobyo, closer to Mogadishu where UIC is based.
Christian Science Monitor, in a story about Somali refugees flowing into overcrowded Kenyan refugee camps, shares reports that UIC has moved into Bur Haqaba, a town very close to Baidoa, in territory that was believed to be controlled by the provisional government. And the Mail and Guardian has a story on UIC reports that some provisional government soldiers are defecting to the UIC forces, which the government confirms, though stresses that a small number of soliders left their posts.
SomaliNet, a Somali expatriate site based in the UK, has an intriguing report that Ethiopian forces are digging in in the Balanbale district of Galgadud region, a region on the border with Ethiopia. I can’t find confirmation of this, or much military logic for the action, as the maps I have access to don’t have major roads across the border in western Galgadud.
SomaliNet also reports Ethiopian troop presence near Beledweyne, the major city in Hiraan province, close to the Ethiopian border and to Baidoa. UIC announced control of this town last week – SomaliNet suggests that Ethiopian troops are allying with clan leaders who’d been ousted from Beledweyne when UIC moved in.
The backdrop for this conflict is an east African drought which already threatens food security in Somalia. 1.8 million Somalis already depend on food aid for survival – the UN’s Food Security Analysis Unit predicts that that number could double based on displacement from the ongoing conflict.
The fine folks at the Center for Global Development keep a raptor’s eye on the world of development aid. Each year, they issue a report in conjunction with Foreign Policy magazine, “Ranking the Rich” on their commitment to international development.
Their index is considerably more subtle than the comparisons usually used to determine who’s giving a little and who’s giving a lot of international aid. Large nations like the US point to their overall giving as evidence of their responsibility and generosity. The FP index adds a bit more nuance to this, by considering aid in relation to national GDP. Given the US’s vast GDP, the large amount of aid given – the largest in absolute dollar terms – is small in comparison to the generosity of nations like Denmark, which spend single-digit percentages of their national budget on foreign aid. (The US government allocates $0.19 per citizen per day to foreign aid, as compared to $0.86 in Sweden and $1.06 in Denmark.) The FP index also discounts tied aid – aid that goes to purchase products or services from the donor nation, and aid to dictatorships and nations unlikely to spend the money well. (US aid to Iraq is counted at $0.10 on the dollar to recognize the unlikelihood of most of that money reaching the people it is intended to benefit.)
But while the US does badly on the aid score (2.2 out of 10), the US finishes in the middle of the pack of the world’s 21 donor nations, at 13th. That’s because the index also measures scores in trade, investment, migration, environment, security and technology transfer. In comparison to the largely European competition, the US gets excellent scores in trade and investment, pointing to a willingness to enable private investment in developing nations and comparatively low trade barriers. (While the US continues to heavily subsidize farmers in otherwise unprofitable industries like cotton and sugar, these subsidies are modest compared to European farm subsidies and Japan’s notorious 900% tarrif barrier on imported rice.)
What’s most interesting to me about the index is that none of the nations listed are perfect, or even close to perfect. (And only one, Japan, scores dramatically worse than the others.) The Netherlands, topping the index due to outstanding scores in aid, environment and investment is around average on migration. Nations I’ve never thought of as immigration-friendly – Austria, Switzerland – get high marks for admitting unskilled as well as skilled labor. It’s fascinating to see how many levers nations have that affect development policy, far beyond just trade tarrifs, aid dollars and border control.
Very much worthwhile – the visualization tool CGDev offers on their site to let you explore this year’s findings. You’ll note that the most succesful countries have a strong geographic clustering effect – evidently the Scandinavians and the Low Countries “get” development in a way few other nations do.
My friend Sean Coon was kind enough to point to some of my recent Africa posts, noting that “maps really help” one get a sense of complex political situations. As I read a terrific op-ed by my friend Mike Clough – “Dragged Back Into Somalia” – I realized I wanted to understand the regional dynamics of the unfolding conflict better.
So I started making a map, based on a 1992 map of Somalia – had I found this more recent map on the UTexas map server, I wouldn’t have had to draw in Eritrea… My goal was to combine a couple of maps I’d found useful – the territory map the BBC is using to explain the expansion of UIC influence, the Economist map that shows borderland areas and the influence of Somalia in Ethiopia. The goal is a map that helps narrate the forces behind the conflict that may be about to unfold in the Horn of Africa.
I guarantee that this map is inaccurate. It’s not just that I’m a crappy cartographer – it’s also that many borders in this part of the world are in dispute, and that the territory claimed by Somaliland and Puntland appears to vary map to map. Apologies in advance to anyone and everyone I’ve offended.
Click on the map for a larger version
Somalia only existed as a nation from 1960 to the late 1991, when Siad Barre was ousted and any semblence of statehood collapsed. Before 1960, British Somaliland – roughly corresponding to the pink Somaliland on the map above – and Italian Somaliland were separate colonial possessions. These two territories didn’t encompass all people of Somali heritage – many Somalis live in the Ogaden region of Ethiopia, and some over the border in Kenya.
In July 1977, Siad Barre invaded Ethiopia, hoping to capture the Ogaden region and create a “Greater Somaliland”. The invasion had less to do with Somali ethnic nationalism and more to do with opportunism and cold war politics. Ethiopia looked weak – Haile Selaisse had been overthrown by the Derg, and was transitioning to a Marxist-Leninist state, supported by the Soviet Union. Somalia – possibly encouraged by the US – invaded the Ogaden, supporting ethnic Somali rebels in the Ogaden This precipitated a war where socialist nations, including Yemen, Cuba and North Korea, sided with Ethiopia. By early 1978, Barre pulled back his troops, the Somali military largely destroyed by Ethiopia and allies. (More on the Ogaden war here and here.)
The events in Ogaden go a long way towards explaining why Ethiopia has interests in the current situation in Somalia. If the Union of Islamic Courts, which currently controls Mogadishu and much of southern Somalia, has expansionist urges, one could imagine UIC support for rebels in the Ogaden. Ethiopia recently announced that they’d arrested rebels associated with an independence movement in the Ogaden, who had crossed in from Somalia.
Or one could argue that Ethiopia is supporting the transitional government – which has international support, but very little control of the country outside of Baidoa – out of political expediency. Ethiopia needs a port since losing their northern coast when Eritrea broke away in 1991. A stable Somalia might give Ethiopia access to Mogadishu. Or Ethiopia might be backing the transitional government to win points with the US, which is deeply worried about the UIC gaining too much power and providing sanctuary to Al-Qaeda – given recent crackdowns on human rights and shooting of activists in the streets, Ethiopia could use some brownie points.
Ethiopia argues that UIC is backed by Eritrea, and that the Eritrean government is arming the UIC. The logic behind this? The Ethiopian/Eritrean border is still unsettled, even after the 1998-2000 civil war. Eritrea feels that the UN hasn’t done enough to settle final borders, and expelled UN peacekeepers in late 2005. If Ethiopia found itself fighting the UIC on a southern front, perhaps Eritrea could seize some of the disputed territory on its border.
One of the most intriguing recent developments: the UIC is advancing on Galkaayo, a major town in Puntland, a semi-autonomous region in northern Somalia. Unlike Somaliland, which is seeking independence, Puntland has sought to be part of a new, federal Somalia. The interim president of Somalia, Abdullahi Yusuf, is from Galkaayo, and given support for a federal model, Puntland is a natural ally to the Baidoa government.
How does Somaliland lean? That’s a little trickier. Ethiopia is one of the few governments to recognize an independent Somaliland, in part because Ethiopia wants access to the port at Berbera. On the other hand, a strengthened Baidoa government might try to keep Somaliland as part of a united Somalia.
So what’s going to happen? Your guess is as good as mine. But at least now we’ve got a map.
Welcome, trendsetters!
Good news for all of us: according to the cover story in the Sunday Style section of the New York Times, Africa is finally fashionable!
Actually, Alex Williams is slightly more cautious than that, noting “And much as it may strain the limits of good taste to say it, Africa — rife with disease, famine, poverty and civil war — is suddenly ‘hot.’”
Evidence of Africa’s newfound hotness: Clay Aiken’s trip to Uganda, Jessica Simpson’s trip to Kenya, Madonna’s stage show which features images of AIDS orphans, Angelina Jolie’s decision to give birth in Namibia, Gwyneth Paltrow’s declaration that she’s African, complete with war paint and a beaded necklace.
There’s a question many African and Afrophile bloggers found themselves asking during the conversations around Live8: Is the attention worth the distortion? It’s tempting to dismiss celebrity interest in Africa out of hand, because it seems so superficial, and sometimes, so stereotyped. But there’s another argument: when Brad and Angelina travel to Namibia, it helps put the nation on the map, introducing it as a tourist destination. When Madonna puts AIDS orphans on the screen behind her gyrations and mock-crucifiction, it might get people thinking about a set of issues they’d otherwise never engage with. Celebrities may be able to convince people to pay attention, to read the news, to give money.
On the other hand, the picture of Africa the celebrities are helping to paint is exactly the picture folks like Emeka Okafor are working to dispel – Africa as helpless, sick, impoverished, in critical need of outside help and assistance. For those of us working with African entrepreneurs, trying to attract foreign investment to the continent, this sort of attention can work at cross-purposes, reinforcing the idea of “Africa as crisis”.
What I found most worrisome in Williams’s article was the explanation he offered for celebrity interest in Africa: moral clarity. Celebrities – and people interested in celebrities – are interested in Africa because it’s easy to tell the good guys from the bad guys: “…the seemingly unambiguous nature of Africa’s needs can be unifying.”
Unfortunately, as in the rest of the world, moral clarity is often in short supply in Africa.
Many problems seem unambiguous until you look closely at them. Darfur, at first glance, is an unambiguous genocide, with Arabs indiscriminately killing black Africans. As Dr. Richard Lobban points out in “The Complexities of Darfur“, that’s only part of the story – a more complex story involves armed struggle against the Sudanese army, the use of proxy militias, tension between Sudan and Chad, resource misallocation within Sudan, tension within the Sudanese army between officers and soldiers, and ecological crisis. Is the story of Darfur more or less compelling when you know who the JEM and the SLA are? And if you think Darfur is complicated, the unfolding situation in Somalia, or the African World War that took place in the DRC both require scorecards to tell the players apart.
Even less ambiguous situations, like the plight of AIDS orphans, get more complicated when we look for solutions. Yes, it’s critically important that orphaned children receive support to continue their schooling. But who administers these programs? Do we give money to corrupt governments, knowing that only a fraction of the money is going to make it to the beneficiaries, while another fraction lines the pockets of government bureacrats? Give it to NGOs on the ground, knowing that they don’t have the staff and management capacity to put that money to work? Give it to US and European NGOs, and raise the question of whether paying lots of wealthy white people with money intended for African children is a misalocation of money or a return to a form of colonialism? Do we focus on keeping parents alive in the first place, providing subsidized treatment for AIDS drugs? Or do those subsidies reward US and European drug companies for overpricing their wares, using charitable money to increase their profits? Should we support compulsory licensing instead, demanding that drugs neccesary in African nations be available at affordable prices, even if it hurts pharma companies? And will pharma companies continue developing AIDS therapies if they are worried that their IP will be licensed away from them.
Fortunately, celebrities don’t have to answer those questions. Africa won’t be trendy for long, says celebrated New York cynic Michael Musto: “Just like a trendy restaurant lasts 18 months, so will interest in Africa.”
Unfortunately, civil wars, AIDS, malaria, water-borne diseases, illegal mining, small-arms trade and food insecurity will probably all still be problems in 18 months. Some trends just last longer than others, I guess.
The Islamist coalition which controls Mogadishu is spreading their territorial control – South Africa’s Independent reports that the coalition seized Beletweyne, a key town north of areas they currently control. Beletweyne may be a stepping stone towards Galkaayo in Puntland, a functionally autonomous region allied with the largely powerless secular government based in Baidoa. It’s also very close to the Ethiopian border, a situation which likely makes the Zenawi government very nervous. The Ethiopian government announced that they’d captured and killed 13 rebels affiliated with the Ogaden National Liberation Front, allegedly armed by Somali Islamists and Eritreans.
Image from an article on CulturalOrientation.net
The International Crisis Group, which has a pretty good track record of alerting the wider world to potentially explosive conflicts, is warning that the Somalia standoff could erupt into regional conflict. An Islamist invasion of Baidoa, the only stronghold of the secular government, would likely provoke further incursions from Ethiopian troops, which might pull Eritrea into a regional war as well. Their report, “Can the Somali Crisis Be Contained?” suggests that the answer is “Nope, not without lots of diplomacy and international cooperation.” Unfortunately, international cooperation is in short supply lately – I’m not sure there’s any to spare in the Middle East, never mind in the Horn of Africa.
The Economist has an excellent, thoughtful article that helps contextualize the conflict in Somalia, setting it against a backdrop of population explosion, food insecurity, migration, easily available small arms, as well as religious tensions. For those less interested in all the subtleties, there’s always CNN and AP, which are portraying the situation in terms of “holy war”, with provocative photos of Islamist Somali leaders with guns. The story reports that the Union of Islamic courts is urging solidarity with Lebanon… though it’s unclear just what that would mean in terms of the local conflict.
Conflicts create refugees, and IRIN warns that refugees are trickling into Kenya, joining camps that already house tens of thousands of Somalis. Should the conflict expand, one can expect trickle of refugees currently coming to Kenya to expand into a stream.
My Heart's In Accra by Ethan Zuckerman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 United States License.
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