Shaikh Abdulkadir Nur Farah: An Obituary

Several years ago, the prominent Somali scholar Shaikh Abdulkadir Nur Farah gave a speech at a conference in Puntland. He derided what he called “Ghuluwi” (extremism) as a new phenomenon that was gripping that country. Teens between ages fourteen and seventeen, he lamented, were being brainwashed and had become killer-machines targeting religious scholars when the latter entered or left mosques.  

Last Friday, February 15, 2013, Shaikh Abdulkadir, who was in his seventies himself, was killed in broad daylight while he was praying in a mosque in Garowe. The killer was sadly a teenager. The young assassin was immediately apprehended by unarmed citizens who risked their lives to capture him.

Shaikh Abdulkadir went to Saudi Arabia in 1970 to study at the Islamic University in Madinah. He graduated in 1974 and was sent by Dar-ul-Iftaa, a Saudi religious organization, to Niger in West Africa as a religious teacher. He and his longtime friend, Shaikh Yusuf Adan, were unable to work there because they arrived after the academic year had started. The two were stuck in Niger unemployed until Siad Barre, who was the Chairman of the Organization of African Union (OAU) that year, came to Niger on an official visit. Barre encouraged the two to return to their country where they were badly needed and, in fact, took them in his plane to Mogadishu. Abdulkadir was appointed as a judge in the Hodon District. A year later, Barre would put Abdulkadir and Shaikh Yusuf in jail without any charges ever being brought against them. The two languished in prison until 1978.

Shaikh Abdulkadir went through four stages in his life after his return to Mogadishu: Ostracism, rehabilitation, cautionary tale and acceptance.
Ostracism

Shaikh Abdulkadir was one of only a few Somali scholars who graduated from Saudi universities prior to 1974. Somalia, at that time, was primarily a Sufi-oriented society. The nascient Islamic resurgence in Mogadishu was spearheaded by Shaikh Mohamed Moalim Hassan, a graduate of the prestigious Al-Azhar University in Egypt, and an admirer of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB). Many of the young Islamists of that period were influenced by MB thinkers like Hassan El-Banna, Sayid Qutb, Mohamed Qutb, Fathi Yakan, Sa’eed Hawwaa and Pakistan’s own Abu A’laa Al-Mawdudi. Shaikh Abdulkadir, in essence, was an oddity and entered a hostile environment that was against Salafism, or as the Somalis derisively called the ideology “Wahhabism.” In many ways, Abdulkadir was treated like a pariah.

In 1975, I was a 15-year-old student when I first saw Abdulkadir. He was a rail thin man with impeccable manners. He was polite, courteous, and shy. He was given, like any Somali with a distinctive physical attribute, a nickname. His was Abdulkadir “Gacameey” (the one-handed). The nickname exposed his physical condition, and he hated it. Many years later, he implored his friends and acquaintances not to call him such a name.  

Student activists were told, in so many words, to steer clear of Abdulkadir because he carried an alien ideology that was ‘radical’. I remember one evening in 1975 when Abdulkadir was talking to two young activists and suddenly the student leader at the time, Abdulkadir Shaikh Mohamoud, came upon them and reprimanded the scholar. “What are you telling these youngsters?’ the student leader screamed. Then, in a clear indictment of the Saudi-trained scholar, the leader recited the Quranic verses; “And when it is said to them, “Do not cause corruption on the earth,” they say, “We are but reformers. Unquestionably, it is they who are the corruptors, but they perceive [it] not.”  Abdulkadir was stunned by the leader’s uncouth behavior but he simply ignored him. It was indeed ironic that this same student leader fled Somalia in 1976 and found home in Saudi Arabia where he spent for almost two decades and even graduated from one of that country’s finest universities.

There was also the case of a young man called Abdirahman who was influenced by Shaikh Abdulkadir. Initially, student leaders tried to reason with the young man but to no avail. Then, the leaders did something odd: Abdirahman was perceived as a mentally-ill person because it was unfathomable, in the eyes of student leaders that a “good person” would fall under the spell of Salafism. A group of twenty to thirty student activists went to the young man’s house in Pilaggio Arab to read Quranic verses to him, like someone who was possessed. When that attempt failed, the young man was ostracized like his mentor, Abdulkadir. Such was the ignorance prevalent at the time among young activists and the environment where there was zero tolerance for Salafism.  Today, the Salafi movement, in spite of its imperfects, has a strong presence in the country

Rehabilitation

In 1978, something dramatic happened. The student movement split into two groups. The first group, labeled “At-Takfir”, declared that Somalis, who are 100% Muslims, as “Kuffar” (infidels) because Islamic rule was not being implemented in the country. Members of this group stopped praying in mosques. The second group, however, had opposed to the first group and maintained that Somalis were Muslims but needed to be taught their religion. The strength of Salafism is its strong focus on issues about faith. Shaikh Abdulkadir, who was just released from prison in that tumultuous period, found a home in the second group and became active in eradicating the new alien and radical thought. In a short period, Shaikh Abdulkadir’s group adopted Salafism as its ideology. The group later became known as Al-Ittihad Al-Islami (AIAI), and the largest Islamic movement in Somalia.  Abdulkadir suddenly became someone whose counsel and guidance was actively sought.  

Cautionary Tale

When the Barre government collapsed in 1991, Somalia was beset with a civil war. Many armed groups emerged including militias run by the AIAI. Shaikh Abdulkadir was against the idea of establishing these militias. He believed that Islamists had no business carrying arms because such a tactic frightened ordinary people, distracted them from worshipping God, destabilized the country, and actively invited more enemies to go against the Islamists. Unfortunately, he was not listened to then. He settled in his hometown, Garowe, and continued teaching people their religion. The AIAI briefly took control of Puntland and Shaikh Abdulkadir was not pleased with the actions of his colleagues. He told whoever would listen to him that the group’s action would soon backfire. The solution was for the Islamists, according to Abdulkadir, to work with the local people, tribal elders, and politicians without brandishing AK-47 and delivering violence. No one heeded to his admonition.

The people of Puntland, who initially welcomed the Islamists, became disenchanted with their new rulers and their style of governing. A militia led by Colonel Abdullahi Yusuf expelled the religious group from Puntland. Many innocent people died in those military clashes. Afterwards, the AIAI did the unthinkable when it decided to completely disarm. Some of its members though were not happy with the group laying down its arms and founded their own group, Al-Shabab. This is the same militant group now believed to be behind Abdulkadir’s assassination and, in December 5, 2011, that of his long-time friend and a colleague, Dr. Ahmed Haji Abdirahman.

Acceptance

For the last decade and half, Shaikh Abdulkadir has been a highly respected scholar in Somalia and a leader of Al-Ictisaam, a Salafi nonviolent movement.  He was a voice of moderation in a sea of radicalism. He believed in education rather than engaging in an armed struggle. He criticized the Islamic movement in the country for not having a strategic plan to save the country. He called for a well-thought out plan to deal with the ordinary people, tribal chieftains, and politicians instead of Islamists simply reacting to events. He wanted a peaceful transformation of Somalia where people’s lives, properties, and institutions were protected. The young misguided radicals, he would say, should be educated. “They only know the benefits of jihad and not ‘fiqhul- jihad’ (jurisprudence of jihad).”  The youths do not know when to fight, who authorizes jihad, and who can fight, he stated.  He condemned suicide bombers as a bunch of fools who do not care about the irrational loss they inflict on themselves and innocent people. “These ignorant young men do not know that when they blow up themselves in a bomb that they will end up in hellfire,” he would quip.

Shaikh Abdulkadir refused to have security protection even when numerous threats were issued against him by the Al-Shabab. “I am in my seventies and I have nothing left in me,” he used to say. “Whoever kills an old man like me is a loser.”

 Indeed, his assassins are the real losers. May God bless him.