While Colombians were generous in acknowledging the critical support from the U.S. and EU in their military efforts to eliminate the threat of the FARC, they also spoke at length about the importance of ownership in how a people and a country tackle and resolve conflict in order to mold the society they want to live in. This approach resonates strongly with the people of Somaliland.
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In the course of 23 years, Somaliland has worked hard to achieve many important milestones. Not only has it enjoyed relative peace, but it has also established a functioning system of government, with an executive presidency, an elected parliament, an upper chamber known as the Guurti intended for clan elders and akin to a senate, an array of political parties, as well as an army and police force.
Despite its tenuous position as a self-declared independent nation, it has held a series of democratic elections since 2003, including two presidential elections, which saw an orderly transfer of power from a sitting President to the head of the main opposition party in 2010. Although criticized for issues related to multiple voting, efficiency and the distribution of state resources, Somaliland was applauded for conducting elections that were relatively fair and free of violence.
Though it remains a very poor country, there has been a dramatic increase in economic growth and reconstruction as well as in revenue generation for the public sector. Private sector and community initiatives were, and still, are, the main drivers of the economy. The spirit of entrepreneurship has been a central and critical thread in transforming the economy.
From war-torn rubble, it is now a place where telecommunication, airline, money exchange, and construction companies are thriving, including companies which provide electronic money transfers. Private schools, universities, and clinics attract an ever-growing clientele and shops and markets offer a wide choice of goods. This is not to say that Somaliland is where it should be: the economy remains precarious, poverty is still widespread and youth unemployment is exceptionally high.
The ultimate goal – international recognition as an independent state – has remained elusive, a fact which remains incomprehensible to the majority of people who are not interested in, or privy to, international debates about statehood and concerns about the wider impact of recognition.
What they do understand are the practical, tangible consequences of non-statehood: the inability to travel on their passports, the absence of foreign embassies, the impediments to trade, and the knowledge that Somaliland remains ineligible for large-scale support from the international community.
Maintaining and deepening peace, as well as strengthening governance, remains a work in progress. In a context of poverty, isolation and non-recognition setbacks are inevitable. Without understating Somaliland’s achievements in the most testing of circumstances, the difficulties of state-building remain daunting, especially in a region which continues to be volatile.
To the Colombian military officers and politicians tasked with defeating the FARC rebels, the definition of the “battlefield” included the economic and social prospects the state offered the people and regions affected by the war. There was an unequivocal understanding that in the eyes of parents who envisioned a better life for their children, jobs, roads, schools, and hospitals represented the government, and expressed the quality of its engagement with citizens. It is a lesson the post-independence governments of Somalia ignored at their peril, and one Somaliland would do well to heed.
Outside the main towns of Somaliland, basic services and facilities are scarce and openings for the young remain rare. Much of the population in the rural areas is pastoralist. The livestock they depend on for their livelihood is also the economic backbone of Somaliland; the export of livestock overseas is a major source of foreign currency. Yet successive administrations have failed to successfully invest in pastoral communities. Veterinary services and drought mitigation efforts, especially the provision of clean water and better range management, can improve the livelihoods of pastoral communities.
Those living in the periphery (rural populations in particular) are all too easy to forget. They are too far away from the capital to be politically visible and too disenfranchised to worry politicians. In Colombia, for far too long, the military and political leaders believed they could afford to contain the threat from the rebels, operating as they did in more remote areas. It was not, we heard until the “problem” appeared to be getting uncomfortably close to Bogota that it became a matter of vital and immediate national concern, concentrating minds and creating the necessary partnerships to harness all available resources.
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