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Ahmed Hussein Kahin
In accordance with Somaliland’s constitution the final verdict on the country’s first presidential elections since its creation in 1991 was transferred to the Supreme Court and after two weeks of careful deliberation the Supreme Court declared on 11th May that the UDUB party had indeed won the elections. Yet again, the KULMIYE party rejected the supreme courts final verdict just as they had the election commissions previous result even though the other opposition party, UCID, accepted the results issued by both bodies.
It is well known that the KULMIYE chief, Mr. Sillanyo, had pledged during the election campaign that he would respect the outcome of the elections but after realizing that he had lost he cried foul. If Mr. Sillanyo had no faith in neither the election commission nor the Supreme Court then he shouldn’t have made such a pledge nor should he have contested as a presidential candidate at all. The fact that the elections were fair and free and that the counting of ballots was transparent and rigorous has been confirmed by the international observers who stayed in Somaliland in the days preceding voting day and during the ballot count.
In the midst of this, members of Somaliland’s parliament and council of elders intervened in order to defuse the tension and advised that a coalition government compromising all the three parties, UDUB, KULMIYE and UCID be formed. President Rayale, who is also the chairman of the UDUB party, heeded their advice and wholeheartedly accepted the idea of power sharing even though the constitution of Somaliland does not oblige the winning party to form a coalition government with the other parties. Mr. Rayale acceptance was due to his willingness to find an amicable solution to the current impasse by compromising and offering such a concession to the KULMIYE party. The UCID party, which has acted in a dignified and responsible manner throughout recent events, accepted to take part in a coalition government but unfortunately the power greedy KULMIYE, who are not interested in power sharing, has rejected the conciliatory steps of the honorable members of parliament and council of elders who have since Somaliland’s creation been at the forefront of maintaining and strengthening the peace and stability that the country enjoys today. If the KULMIYE party has misinterpreted President Rayale’s good faith and the UDUB party’s compromises as a sign of weakness they will soon find out how wrong they were. It is quite clear that the KULMIYE leaderships position is to create as many obstacles for the incoming administration and they are hell bent on derailing Somaliland’s progress in order to make the whole country suffer just because a few men could not assume power after losing through the ballot box in elections that were by all international standards fair and free. In the post-election period, not even the KULMIYE voters expected their party to act in a reckless manner that would jeopardize the whole country and because of this the KULMIYE party has deviated from the path that its supporters had hoped it would take and betrayed the trust of its supporters as well.
Somaliland’s current predicament is like a ship in high seas while a few on board are trying to drill holes into it and leave it to sink as they jump onto the safety rafts that they have prepared for themselves. Those few are no doubt the hierarchy of the KULMIYE party who during the past two months have demonstrated their selfish behavior and utter disrespect for their people by creating one crisis after another in their attempts to assume power at all costs. The KULMIYE party has turned into a destructive group rather than be a constructive opposition like the respectable UCID party. In a string of callous statements coming from the KULMIYE camp, their latest one stipulated "we are prepared to talk to the ruling party, the Unity of Democrats Party (UDUB), so long as they are not claiming to be the winners of last month's elections. In the national interest, we are calling on UDUB to come to the negotiating table without any preconditions, and as equals."
Such a proposal is not only absurd but would in effect mean that there would be no authority to call a government at all in Somaliland and this would not only have dangerous consequences on the country’s security and stability but this would at the same time undermine our international credibility as a country. If the KULMIYE party, as they claim, really had the interest of the country at heart they would not have kept on creating one stumbling block after another and should have accepted the proposal of power sharing so that Somaliland could move forward and use the recent elections as an opportunity to convey to the world that Somaliland is a democratic state that deserves international recognition.
The stubborn stance of some of KULMIYE’s leaders has even alienated others within the party who want to find a solution to the problem, put the election events behind them and take part in the country’s development with their brethren from the UDUB and UCID party. Reliable sources emanating from the KULMIYE camp report that these voices of reason within the KULMIYE party are growing louder by the day and they are beginning to oppose the disruptive tactics of Sillanyo and his few die-hard henchmen. In the meantime, the UDUB and UCID party, whose combined votes constitute 58% of the recent election count, should immediately form a coalition government because Somaliland’s progress as a nation should not be held hostage to KULMIYE’s intransigence and hurdles.
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