News Saturday 12 June 2010
Elections, Gaffes & Deceptions

Election campaigns are always interesting and exciting times, as the competitors vie for advantage and maximum visibility. For this reason, election campaigns bring out the best and the worst in the candidates and parties seeking office, and one of the more enjoyable spectator sports during such times is watching and waiting for the gaffes that inevitably occur, much to the chagrin of the gaffe-maker and his or her supporters.

Having said this, however, the recent statement by a senior official of KULMIYE regarding Mohammed Ibrahim Egal, cannot be considered an innocent mis-statement. This official stated that he cannot understand why Egal is venerated as the father of nation since, as this official said, “…he hastily delivered us to Xamar in 1960 and sacrificed our independence”. This statement is not a gaffe, because it was carefully constructed as a deliberate and calculated misrepresentation of the truth. As everyone who has a modicum of knowledge about the history of Somaliland knows, it was Egal who repeatedly advised caution and deliberation in entering into union with ex-Italian Somaliland. In fact, he formally suggested a six month period of independent, self-government while Somaliland negotiated the terms of the proposed union with the south, and supported his proposal with the famous comment “…after all it is customary to keep a new-born child within the house under the careful watch of his mother for forty days”. However, the wave of euphoric nationalism sweeping the country at that time, whipped up and fanned by the losing party of the general election (the USP), swept his counsel aside and Somaliland rushed into the ill-fated and unequal union.

Thus, the comment of the KULMIYE official is not the innocent gaffe of someone caught up in the emotion and hype of the election campaign, but rather a calculated attempt to malign the standing and legacy of Egal. It does not even qualify as ‘dirty’ politics since the history of the man he seeks to malign, as well as the events he seeks to misrepresent are so widely known that they are practically imbibed with mothers’ milk by Somalilanders. It is merely a sad testament of the desperation for office which drives some candidates and the depths of mendacity to which this desperation propels them. The irony is that those which are driven by this desperation are those to whom Egal was a political father and whom he had given their first break and lessons in politics. It is a Somali proverb that “Laga baray; laga beedi”; i.e. the student shall surpass the teacher. Unfortunately, these students can never match their teacher, much less surpass him. In Somali, when a lightweight seeks to measure up to a heavyweight master, they are referred to as “casia-waladain” and dismissed, so be it.

Finally, we are sure that in the heat of the election campaign, there are likely to be other gaffes, some of which may invoke the name of Egal. This is the nature of things, and there is no sense in being thin-skinned about it, however those that let those that seek to malign his name or legacy know that such defamation is not cost-free. The simple fact is that the Egal’s most committed defenders and guardians of his legacy are the people of Somaliland. As his children, the wonderful and glorious spectacle of his funeral in Berbera showed us that we share our father with all of our country men and women, and we are confident in the guardianship of his legacy by the our brothers and sisters, many of which encouraged us to write this piece. Regarding the election, we fully stand behind the words of Chief Caaqil Cumar Jama Xaji Cilmi and his brother Xildiban ‘Dable’ at Las Geel where they summed up the inheritance Egal left for all of us as a stable Somaliland with a constitution and a functioning state, a representative democracy with established parties, and UDUB – his brainchild.

Wa Billahi Towfiq

Ahmed & Ibrahim M.I.

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