Zawaya

Fighting extremism in Somalia and beyond cannot rely solely on force

By: Abdelaziz Karraky

The declaration of the African Union leaders to make of 2010 a Year of Peace and Security in the Continent prompts them to confront many challenges, including democratization, eradication of famine, and peace establishment. All these issues are interrelated and overlapping, but let’s focus on peace. The Somali crisis seems to be a real challenge to the African Union, for various reasons: 1) This crisis is not a new nor a transient one, it’s a crisis that started many years ago; 2) This crisis is a result of the Cold War that changed a lot of geopolitical data, and led to the decline in importance of many areas that benefited from this war on multiple levels, including tolerance and the absence of democracy and the acceptance of all kinds of oppression and violations, in exchange for accession to some treaty. Somalia was one of the countries that benefited greatly from this situation, as the force of former President Siad Barre ousted from power on 26 January, 1991 had increased, leaving the door open to all possibilities and subject to all interpretations.

Many clans that make up the Somali people appeared again, namely: Isa, Isaaq, Hawiye, Darod and Madjan. The power of some of these clans – like Hawiye – has reached some neighboring countries. But the danger in all this lies in extremism creeping into this region, which started to get inspiration from Al-Qaeda’s techniques. Battles there don’t distinguish between people, and focus mainly on hunting down colossal numbers of victims with terrorist attacks. This happened recently when two car bombs exploded in the African military base in Mogadishu, which is an undeniable proof of the spread of Al-Qaeda’s terrorist style to Somalia, and of the beginning of ideological exploitation of all areas where the State authorities are weak. Such circumstances encourage penetrating isolated regions and attracting more people in order to carry out suicide attacks. It is true that the African troops in Somalia play a significant role in establishing peace and security in the country, but the question remains: can the army – with its power and means – eliminate extremism? Especially that extremism is based first and foremost on a simple ideology that consists of gathering desperate and deprived people around it with great ease, and preparing them well before engaging them in armed action. In other words, the strength of extremism lies in the fact that it is based on a specific way of thinking, while the presence of African armies is based on other aspects that are mainly about maintaining legitimacy. Therefore, a critical question raises: can we eliminate a way of thinking by force? The answer is certainly negative, because that depends on creating an opposite way of thinking. That, in my opinion, is the real gateway towards fighting extremism, not only in Africa but in the entire world.