Manipulating State Failure: Al-Shabaab's Consolidation of Power in Somalia (original) (raw)
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Al-Shabaab: State Collapse, Warlords and Islamist Insurgency in Somalia
Violent Non-State Actors in Africa, 2017
Somalia represents a classic case of 'state collapse' in the post-Cold War global dispensation. At the center of Somalia's disintegration and eventual collapse is the failure of the state to sustain the basic structures of authority, thus giving room for the efflorescence of clan warlords, armed militias and other violent non-state actors (VNSAs). Al-Shabaab represents a latent specimen of VNSA and cas fortuit behind the disintegration, anarchy and collapse of state legitimacy in Somalia. In post-Cold War Africa, a new set of conflicts has emerged in which VNSAs-including a plethora of ultra-nationalist and extremist religious ideologues-exploit socioeconomic discontents and other fault lines in the state to engage in terrorist tactics and unleash wanton destruction against innocent civilians. The rising terrorist threats in parts of Africa have triggered an appalling humanitarian crisis as a result of violence against unarmed civilians.
SOMALIA - THE LINK BETWEEN FAILED/FAILING STATE AND TERRORISM
Abstract This research paper will be an empirical study that seeks to clarify two hypotheses. The first is that it has become commonplace to assert that failing/failed states offer attractive venues for terrorist groups. The second is that there is a strong link between these states and terrorism. Some factors that entail failure include disintegration and criminalization of public security forc-es, the collapse of the state administrative structures, and the erosion of infrastructure that sup-port the effective position of the former two. The theory of state building, the concept of state failure, and its links to terrorism, will be analyzed to understand how Somalia’s failure brought rise to the Al-shabaab and how it has developed as a potential safehaven for terrorists. Although this paper considers already established research findings, most of them suffer from analytical errors with a lack of common consensus regarding both definition and measurements, which severely limit the ability to respond to the phenomenon. Additionally, while international actors remain caught up by fighting terrorism, the humanitarian aid is demolished by terrorist developments.
Small Wars & Insurgencies, 2020
Based on unique field work in southern Somalia, this article explores how the interrelationship between jihadi insurgent rulers and traditional authority structures fostered local order in the southernmost part of Somalia in the period 2008 to 2012. While the Jihadi insurgent group al-Shabaab’s state project was profoundly inspired by jihadi-Salafi ideology when it conquered large parts of South-Central Somalia in 2008–2009, it developed a strategy to cooperate with and co-opt local authority structures. This was partly a pragmatic approach in order to gain control of local institutions and populations. However, utilizing the local clan elders was a practical and cost-effective arrangement through which al-Shabaab could collect material resources, such as money, weapons, new recruits and other local resources. By sustaining the traditional authority structures, al-Shabaab also fostered a degree of trust and legitimacy from the local populations.
2022
This chapter argues that to understand the significance of the political Islamic movements in Somalia, particularly the ones that became influential in the time after the state collapse in 1991, one has to consider one crucial point of the political offer they make: to establish an order beyond clan(ism). To support this argument, it is outlined how clannism emerged as destructive political force that eventually, under the warlords in the 1990s, produced heightened insecurity for most Somalis. Moreover, the chapter shows how Islamists, who generally are quite diverse but united in their focus on reforming Somali society and overcoming clannism, managed to offer a new form of order and solidarity based on their fundamentalist interpretation of Islam. After setbacks in the early and mid-1990s, the Islamists learned some lessons. Al Shabaab, from 2007 onward, emerged as important political power that, despite massive counter-terrorism, still manages to control large parts of the Somali hinterland (as of 2022). This is partly due to its success regarding the delivery of justice and security – two areas of governance in which the Somali government in Mogadishu, which is still clan-based, largely fails.
The Rise and Decline of al-Shabab in Somalia (Turkish Review 4, no. 4 [2014], 386-395)
This article traces the rise and decline of the Somali jihadi-insurgent group al-Shabab from 2006 to 2014. Particular attention is paid to the group’s implementation of a philistine and coercive interpretation of Shariah in areas under its control, the political economy of insurgent violence, local governing administrations, and internal schisms and recent deadly infighting. The group’s potential future trajectory is also assessed. Please see the references (end notes) at: http://www.turkishreview.org/newsDetail\_getNewsById.action?sectionId=360&newsId=223635
State Collapse, Insurgency, and Counterinsurgency: Lessons from Somalia
2013
: For almost a generation, Somalia has been a byword for state failure, defying the combined efforts of diplomats and soldiers to restore some semblance of order, to say nothing of a functional national government. In the absence of an effective sovereign, the country is a backdrop for multiple humanitarian crises, as well as the emergence of an epidemic of maritime piracy that threatened vital sea lanes in the Gulf of Aden and the western Indian Ocean. Even worse, notwithstanding a military intervention by the army of neighboring Ethiopia and the subsequent deployment of an African Union force operating with a mandate from the United Nations Security Council, an al-Qaeda-linked militant group, al-Shabaab, managed to seize control of most of central and southern Somalia and confined the internationally-recognized government and the peacekeepers protecting it to little more than a few besieged districts in the capital of Mogadishu. Consequently, in the space of months, the tide was t...
Armed conflict and state collapse since 1992 in Somalia have resulted in over 1,000,000 international refugees and 2.6 million people internally displaced people (IDPs). In this paper, we summarize the findings of the 2017 Somali Minorities Survey, a face-to-face survey of 139 Somali Bantu households (Jareer) who had been displaced from the Lower Jubaa Valley in Somalia during the previous year. The survey was conducted face-to-face between October and December 2017 by local interviewers and used quota sampling. Our objective in the survey was to understand Al-Shabaab’s treatment of the Somali Bantu and other groups in the five administrative districts located in the Lower and Middle Jubaa Valley, the traditional homeland of Somali Bantu. The Bantu are a sizable ethnic group with East African slave ancestry who live largely in farming communities. The Lower and Middle Jubaa Valley came under Al-Shabaab control in 2009 and only the regional city of Kismayu has been successfully retaken by the Darood-led militia known as the Interim Jubbaland Administration. The rest of the Lower and Middle Jubaa Valley remains under Al-Shabaab control. The Survey The survey asked questions about experiences living under Al-Shabaab rule and focused on two areas: extraction and service provision. Evaluating Al-Shabaab’s predatory extraction practices across ethnic groups and five administrative localities in Somalia Jubba River Valley, we find that Al-Shabaab exploits the Somali Bantu while allowing Somalis from the powerful clans better access to vital services. Extraction We find that Al-Shabaab focuses mainly on extraction, providing limited services only to majority-clan members such as the Darood and others, and governs in a way that harms the weakest people in society. This includes not only the Somali Bantu but also women and weak members of other clans. We find that Al-Shabaab, in order to fund and sustain the war, extracts more resources from and treats most brutally, the Somali Bantu, who may make up to one-third or more of the national population and have a lower social status than other clans, than from members of other clans. The respondents indicate that Al-Shabaab commits numerous atrocities against the Somali Bantu in Somalia, restricting their movement, forcing them to live by Al-Shabaab’s version of Islam, taking their children at young ages for a forced marriage or military service, and punishing any resistance with violence. The Somali Bantu are systematically subjected to extortion by Al-Shabaab, which generates revenues by imposing house taxes, collecting Zakat, seizing remittances, and taking half or more of most farmers’ harvests. For instance, we find that many Somali Bantu boys are conscripted and that this occurs on average at age 13. Bantu boys receive about one-third of the salary of a Somali soldier (when paid at all). Somalis from Majority clans are reported as subjected to conscription by about one-third of respondents. Many Somali Bantu girls are forcibly married on average at age 16 to Al-Shabaab fighters. Most respondents state that Somali Bantu girls forcibly married to Al-Shabaab militiamen can expect to live fewer than seven days per month in their ‘spouse’s’ household. Moreover, Somali Bantu households are subjected on average to approximately 300peryearinZakatpayments,accordingtooursurvey.Theymustalsopay300 per year in Zakat payments, according to our survey. They must also pay 300peryearinZakatpayments,accordingtooursurvey.Theymustalsopay60 per month on average in a “house tax” and they lose more than 20 percent of their remittances and 50 percent of their harvest to Al-Shabaab extortion. The most common clan to which respondents gave their harvests and house tax was the Ogaden, which is part of the larger Darood clan. The Somali Bantu also state that members of other groups face extortion (e.g., conscription, forced marriage, taxation), but it is less severe than that faced by the Somali Bantu. Service Provision We find that Al-Shabaab offers few if any services to Somalis, instead harshly extracting material and human resources. According to the 139 Somali Bantu households interviewed, Al-Shabaab offers few services to majority-clan Somalis except for religious courts and protection for middlemen engaged in trading goods such as charcoal, much of it produced by through Al-Shabaab coercion of Somali Bantu laborers. The Somali Bantu were not entitled to any services, except for religious courts, which are often used as means to punish or coerce minorities and others not abiding by Al-Shabaab rule. In order for Somali Bantu to access basic services like healthcare, education, and government documents, they are required to pay bribes to Al-Shabaab, despite these services mostly being provided by local communities and businessmen. Comparison with the Islamic Courts Union (ICU) The Somali Civil War has moved through several stages over the decades, with the identities of the primary combatants shifting as the struggle has evolved. Al-Shabaab’s immediate predecessor was known as the Islamic Courts Union (ICU), and it was the ICU’s defeat at the hands of a US-backed Ethiopian invasion that effectively left Al-Shabaab--formerly the ICU’s youth wing--as the most powerful successor. Based on the survey responses, we find that Al-Shabaab treats the Somali Bantu more harshly than did the ICU. A Post-Al-Shabaab Somalia Although some news outlets, research organizations and academics claim that the Somali Bantu enthusiastically join Al-Shabaab, the UN Security Council’s Monitoring Group on Somalia and Eritrea counters this by reporting that the “range of persistent and serious violations experienced by the [Somali Bantu] community as documented by the Monitoring Group may constitute war crimes in non-international armed conflict and also crimes against humanity, including with respect to the underlying acts of persecution, murder, torture and sexual slavery.” While there may have been some early Somali Bantu acceptance of Al-Shabaab, our research results support the contention that the terrorist organization has lost any support from the Somali Bantu. The Somali Bantu are almost unanimous in claiming that they will abandon Al-Shabaab’s religious practices once the organization is gone and that they perceive themselves to be victims of Al-Shabaab persecution. Conclusions The UN has already claimed that Al-Shabaab is exploiting Somali Bantu farmers. Our research is among the first survey evidence showing that this is occurring and how it is conducted. In this respect, our findings are consistent with other analyses which suggest that some members of majority-clans benefit from this extractive system and thus do not have an incentive to end the war, which also attracts foreign aid. We believe the current US military strategy in Somalia is unlikely to be successful if the Somali partners from majority clans do not have an incentive to fully defeat Al-Shabaab and end the war. Our research sheds light on the nature of the humanitarian catastrophe in Somalia and offers insights into difficult choices that the international community generally and the US in particular face in Somalia. On a security level, it may be effective to work with the Somali Bantu to defeat Al-Shabaab or at least to force the terrorist organization out of the Jubaa Valley in order to alleviate the gross human rights violations being perpetrated against the Somali Bantu. On the diplomatic level, it may be more effective for the US to use foreign aid and military support as leverage to bring the parties to the table to negotiate a political framework that is acceptable to all stakeholders.
Many poor countries in the world where the governments can barely ensure that their societies withstand poverty and insecurity may be described as ‘fragile states’. Several of these are either in conflict or pursuing reconstruction.1 Under such circumstances, the country’s government cannot effectively administer its territories and provide security and other basic services. Somalia has suffered from warring factions since the era of Mohamed Siad Barre, who ruled the country for more than 20 years before being ousted in 1991. In 1993, the United States took a more hands-on approach to the country’s instability and sent troops into Mogadishu. Familiarity with the terrain worked to the advantage of the insurgent forces who pushed the US troops out of the capital city, killing and wounding several others. Since then, several militant Islamic groups have violently fought for control. These include Al-Shabab, which was labeled a terrorist organization by the United States. Al- Shabab has also been the main opponent of neighbouring Ethiopia. In 2006, a group of Somali Islamic leaders going by the name "The Union of Islamic Courts" took control over parts of Southern Somalia before being ousted by U.S.-supported invasion by Ethiopian forces. This led to the installation of internationally recognized transitional leaders to guide the country to a semblance of democracy. U.S. forces have reportedly offered financial, logistical and military support to Ethiopian forces and have also been said to secretly support secular warlords in their fight for power against militant Islamic groups.
Fragile States and the Spread of Terrorism in Africa: Experience from Somalia
2017
The 9/11 terrorists attack on the United States changed both regional and global perception of terrorism. Terrorism is now perceived as a collective security challenge that must be tackled by not just individual states alone but by regional and global bodies. This development rekindled people’s consciousness and awareness about the phenomenon and the counter measures to checkmate the menace. This is probably due to improved understand of its humanitarian and socio-economic effects on every societies arising from the experiences of the 9/11 attacks on United States. Unfortunately, despite the coordinated mounting global campaigns against terrorism, the existence of terror networks have continued to spread like wide fire across African hemisphere, especially in Somalia where the activities of the al-shabaab still pose serious threats to regional security and development process. To investigate this menace, this study adopted documentary method in the gathering of data while the conten...