By Ibrahim Adam Ghalib, Borama Awdal.

In the past when the month of Sha’ban comes to an end both the people and the government used to be preoccupied with the sighting of the Ramadan crescent to verify the arrival of the Muslim fasting month. The radio used to deliver religious sermons to capture the hearts and minds of the people and to enlighten them about the importance of the holy month of Ramadan. The government was in charge of making the final decision and announcement on the advent of Ramadan.

Today nothing of that sort is apparent. The people in this country usually fast with Saudi Arabia. Sometimes you can see people in one place fasting different days. The people of Somaliland are not interconnected due to the lack of far reaching mass media. The public media such as the Radio and televisions as well as newspapers are all confined in the capital and do not reach 10 kilometers outside Hargeisa. It may be difficult to visualize that despite the information explosion in the rest of the world, it is only through the word of mouth that information travels in Somaliland to and from the capital city.

Nobody really knows whether the people in Erigavo fasted the same day with the people of Borama or even the capital Hargeisa. There is always a possibility that the people of Somaliland celebrate Eid on different days. I have witnessed before two years here in Borama that the people fasted different days.

This year Ramadan coincided with political crisis in the country. Both the government and the opposition party Kulmiye are in political disarray. The administration is deadlocked with both the arbitration commission and the other branches of government to solve the problem of the leaders of Qaran Engineer Mohamed Hashi Elmi, Dr. Gabose and others who are still behind bars. The budget issue is not also solved and it is apparent that the government defied the changes that the parliament have made and spent and incurred expenditure at face value.

On the other hand Kulmiye could not finalize their convention before Ramadan. It is obvious that the opposition party Kulmiye could not reach an agreement to hold the party convention to decide and nominate the candidates that will run for president and vice president in the party ticket. The people are really fearful and frustrated about the future of their country. These issues brought more gossip and disturbed the peaceful atmosphere of Ramadan. There are always conflicting messages coming from Hargeisa and people are busily exchanging them everywhere.

Ramadan is also different this year from the preceding ones. The economy is in bad shape. The price of gasoline and food has skyrocketed all of a sudden. Sometimes you cannot get fuel for your car for three days or more. No progress has been made in the political and socio-economic spheres. The people are getting poorer by the day. You can feel this agony in the faces of the people. The people have no money to buy food to offset their hunger and are engaged to beg money [shaxaad] from those who are better off.

This year the consumption of Kat has tremendously decreased. There are two reasons for this sudden change in the people’s attitude. There are a lot of people who abandoned the consumption of these drug leaves during Ramadan night due to financial constraints, while others have stopped it for health reasons. This led to a drop in the price of Kat and the reduction of its supply.

There was some optimism about a change in the offing in the New Year but it seems such optimism is waning at the moment. The country is in a political turmoil and there is a possibility of postponing the elections. Nobody can predict what the future holds for us. I hope this crisis will not derail the hard won peace and the coexistence of the people of Somaliland.

Ibrahim Adam Ghalib, Borama Awdal.

kaalib33@hotmail.com