Hargeysa, April 28, 2007 (SL Times) – A British woman and a Canadian man are being held in detention in Gabiley, 55km west from Hargeysa, in connection with a land dispute.

Somaliland-born Shun Hersi Gelleh, and her nephew Ibrahim Mohamed Ismail, were arrested on early this month by an order issued by the Hargeysa Security Committee, an extra-legal body, after a businessman called Ibrahim Mohamed Ali (Arab Ha Iswaalin) challenged their ownership of a land that they had inherited from the late Hersi Gelleh.

Mrs. Shun Hersi has been locked in a 2 year legal battle against a claim by businessman Ibrahim Mohamed Ali to the title of a portion of the land in question.

The land is situated near Abarsu, about 10km west of Hargeysa and has sufficient space for building at least 200 homes.

The real estate was planned to become building plots and divided among the legal heirs including Shun Hersi, her Canadian nephew and other members of the Gelleh family. Each beneficiary has been allocated a portion of the land in accordance with the Islamic Sharia law.

Claiming that he purchased 6 blocks from Shun’s brother, businessman Ibrahim Mohamed Ali challenged Shun’s ownership of her portion of the land. The case was still under court review when businessman Arab started building on the plots he claims to have purchased from Shun’s brother. But Shun insists that even if Arab’s claim were true, it would have been illegal on the basis of both Islamic and civil laws which prohibit the dispensation of inherited properties before being divided up among the legal heirs.

“Arab and his friends at the security committee want to usurp our land, and have deprived us of our right to have the case decided by the court,” Shun told the Somaliland Times.

“The security committee has violated our right to due process and want me to relinquish my title to my own portion of the land,” she added while appealing to the British government to intervene and seek her immediate release from jail.

Though both the Somaliland Parliament, and Supreme Court, had declared the security committee as an illegal apparatus, Somaliland President Dahir Rayale, has so far, refrained from the abolishing this organ.

Source: Somaliland Times

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