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US officials and the
international community have been frequently repeating their support for
Sheikh Sharif’s government. They have called that government the “last
chance”, the “best chance”, the “best window of opportunity” and so on.
But none of this seems to impress Somalis, and the Sharif government,
like its many predecessors, remains a government in name only, and
Somalia remains governmentless. Instead of reconsidering their policy,
the US and the international community have ratcheted up their pro
Sheikh Sharif rhetoric, as if the louder they screamed and the more
adamant they became, they would be able to persuade Somalis. So they go
on and on about how Sheikh Sharif’s government is an internationally
recognized government and how it is a democratically elected government.
But the response from Somalis is still negative. Why?
There is a simple answer and a complex answer for why Somalis rejected
Sheikh Sharif.
The simple answer is that Somalis have heard this before. The US and the
international community used to repeat the same exact phrases about
Abdillahi Yusuf’s government. Somalis did not believe those phrases then
and they do not believe them now.
The complex answer is that most Somalis know that Sheikh Sharif’s
faction is neither a government, nor democratically elected. It is not a
government because it hardly governs anything. And it is not democratic
because it was selected outside the country by self-appointed
individuals who do not represent the communities that they claim they
represent (it is easy to see that most members of the so-called
government do not have local constituencies from the fact that they
cannot rally supporters for the government). The US and the
international community seem not to have asked themselves how could
ordinary people in Somalia support Sheikh Sharif when members of his own
administration are not supporting him (his 500 member parliament alone
could have become the nucleus of a small army if they were really
committed to him), and when his troops are deserting him and selling
their arms and ammunitions to his enemies.
The bottom line is that most Somalis see the Sheikh Sharif government as
the weakest faction among several factions, and that by throwing their
weight behind this faction, the US and the international community are
disenfranchising the rest of Somalis. This is the main reason most
Somalis are opposed to Sheikh Sharif and his so-called government.
The resorting to rhetoric that is far removed from Somali realities has
damaged the credibility of the US and the international community in the
eyes of many Somalis. This is particularly true in Somaliland, where the
combination of this baseless pro Sheikh Sharif rhetoric and the lack of
an initiative for engaging Somaliland at a level commensurate with its
geopolitical position in the Gulf of Aden/Horn of Africa region has
alienated so many people, it should be worrying to US strategists as
well as the international community.
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