I would like to draw your attention that the Somali people lost their government for almost two decades ago and they are struggling to establish political system that share for all Somalis up to now.  Why they did not succeed to form a government that seeks to come up the solution of the Somali crises. If they want to get a solution for this problem, I suggest them to understand the problems of the Somalis, and their  stregnth before they think any form of the government.

I summarize their strength and weakness as follows:

The strength:

1-      They are sunni muslim and profess strong alliance to Islam. They belief strongly all powerful of Allah.

2-      They are great walkers with limited resources.

3-      They are courageous, firm and determine to defend their land from foreigners.

4-      They are endowed with great natural intelligence.

5-      They  are friendly  and warm people

6-      They help their brethren. Their generosity extends to their family, clans and all Somalis.

7-      They are proud to be Somalis and they love their country.

8-      They are independent and feel their freedom is not negotiable.

The weakness:

1-      Tribal minded. Somalis are divided deeply into clan and they are strongly loyal to their clan instead of the nation.  Each clan has an enemy of its neighbor clan, each of them has its boundaries, if he crosses it to another area, and then the fighting will start between them. Therefore, there are frequent clan conflicts between Somalis that lead into a devastated war between them.

2-      Corrupted leadership and parliamentarian.  The parliamentarian elects dishonored president and in turn he elects dysfunctional ministries who encourage openly, their family, their clan, and their relatives and friends to steal the resources of the nation without mercy.  The worst is that many of these leaders are holders of foreign passport who care less in building the nation but their aim is to collect illegal money and invest it to their host countries.

3-      Failure of Judiciary System.   Somalis wetness that their relatives are killed, their resources are stolen, their land is buried with poison, and their sea is overfished. They have not seen a Somali judge who opens a case for those leaders who stole their resources openly and those who commit these crimes every day.  It seems that the whole country is occupied by these criminals who have no mercy with their fellow Somalis.

4-      Chewing Khat leaves.  Many Somalis are chewing these drugs which have played a big roll to spread chaos, unemployment and social disorder.  They lost their traditional values, cultural virtues that exist before.  Murder, rape and robbery are common with these drug addicted people.

5-      They say that 95% of Somalis are illiterate and living in the rural area. They resist abiding the law and they seek to beak it by using with different means. Their clan loyalty is extremely high which lead them to commit heinous and cruel crime knowing that it is against Islam. They belief individualistic and envy principles that against to work together with common benefits of the society.  They do not have any concession for certain issue for the sake of the nation.

In conclusion, I suggest that Somalis need to wipe out all corrupted leaders for all. They need to select team who has positive characteristics and works to put an end in a gradual systematic way of these negatives that I mentioned above. I think that Somalis should be brethren and put a side tribalism ingredient in their life, be educated and eradicate the illiteracy, and should bring all criminals into justice as early as possible with no exception. God Bless Somalia.

Abdirizak M. Yusuf

afwajtsP@emirates.net.ae