Author: Abdiweli Mohamed Ali
Length: 180 pages
Publisher: The Red Sea Press, Inc. (February 20, 2017)
***
Abdiweli Mohamed Ali “Gaas” was
Somalia’s prime minister for 14 months, from June 2011 to October 2012, and is
now the head of Puntland regional government. His new book is a memoir of his
childhood, his early and later schooling, as well as his tenure as premier. Oddly,
the book does not include his years as President of Puntland.
Born in the early 1960s to a
nomadic family in the rural area of Galkacayo, Abdiweli grew up in central
Somalia and later moved to Dhusamareeb, where he spent his formative years. As
a teen, he dabbled in Marxism and “was on the edge of becoming an atheist.”
After graduating high school, he attended Mogadishu’s National University,
where he majored in economics. After graduation, he worked briefly for the
ministry of finance and then won a rare scholarship to attend Vanderbilt
University in Nashville, Tennessee. He returned to Somalia after finishing his Master’s
degree but came back to the United States shortly afterwards to pursue a doctorate.
He settled in the Washington D.C. area where he struggled to juggle school, work,
and supporting his budding family. He worked as a security guard, a cab driver,
and did whatever he could to help his family. Finally, he completed his
doctorate at George Mason University and subsequently found a teaching job at
Niagara University in Buffalo.
While in Buffalo, he met Mohamed Abdullahi
“Farmajo,” Somalia’s current president. In 2010, Farmajo was appointed as prime
minister and asked Abdiweli to join his cabinet. Abdiweli was initially reluctant
and asked for two days to consult with his wife. Farmajo called him again the
next day, but this time he was prepared with a new enticement and a better
offer. He asked Abdiweli to serve as his deputy and minister of planning and
international cooperation. Abdiweli immediately accepted the position. After seven
months, fate again favored Abdiweli when Farmajo was forced out of office.
Farmajo then asked Abdiweli to replace him as premier. The once provincial kid
from central Somalia, who had never dreamed of becoming prime minister, suddenly
rose swiftly to unexpected heights.
This book is well written, thanks
to people like Professor Lidwien Kaptejins, who helped the author. It is the
story of a young man who excelled in school, received a rare scholarship in
America and obtained a Ph.D. in economics. It is a personal story of survival, hard
work, ambition, discipline, and being in the right place at the right time.
However, aside from the personal
success story, the book lacks insight and forthrightness. Moreover, it is stingy
with details. It does not tell us much about Abdiweli’s contributions as a
minister of planning and international cooperation (devoting only one and half
pages to the topic) and his tenure as prime minister. When he became a minister
of planning, he found a computer in his new office, which did not contain a
single government file. He said he appointed a capable director general, re-organized
the bureaucracy, instituted a system of division of labor, and made sure employees
were paid regularly. By the time he left the ministry after seven months, there
were “computers, printers, and internet.” That is all Abdiweli said about his
experience as a minister of planning and international cooperation. The former college
professor found himself preoccupied by the prosaic day-to-day concerns of
bureaucracy. In his book, nothing is said about public policy development,
socioeconomic planning, statistics management, implementation monitoring, or evaluation.
Abdiweli’s tenure as prime
minister was buffeted by an endless power struggle between President Sheikh
Sharif and Speaker Sharif Hassan. He was caught between these two powerful
figures who made sure he consulted with them in the affairs of his government.
The two succeeded in blocking Abdiweli’s first proposed cabinet. After some
wrangling, a compromise was reached in which a new cabinet that precluded ministers
who had served under Farmajo and Omar Abdirashid was to be appointed. What did
Abdiweli do next? His managerial gaffe was so blatant he asked the departing
ministers to pick their own replacements. He told them, “Since you are not
returning to the cabinet, please give me your recommendations for the right
person to replace you.” The department ministers showed their true colors and selected
representatives of their own clan.
Conveniently, one glaring cabinet
selection by Abdiweli is not mentioned in his book: The man who became his deputy
and minister of defense, Hussein Arab Isse. Abdiweli appointed Isse, a man with
no known education and no government experience who—until his appointment—had
been in the transportation sector in Sacramento, California. Many years later,
Isse spoke about that fateful day when he was asked to become a cabinet member.
He told an audience in Minneapolis that Abdiweli had called him and asked him to
be defense minister. “I was utterly shocked by [Abdiweli’s] offer,” said Isse
in a deadpan voice.
Abdiweli writes extensively about
his pioneering work in laying the foundation for the “Roadmap,” which he said was
initiated by him and other stakeholders. “The Roadmap was a detailed list of
dozens of tasks designed to steer Somalia out of the transition period and
toward more permanent political institutions and greater national security and
stability.” There were four key areas of the Roadmap (security, political
outreach and reconciliation, and good governance and institution, as well as
drafting the constitution for adoption by a National Constituent Assembly). By
all measures, the implementation of the Roadmap remains incomplete. Security
has been a big problem in the country even though Al-Shabaab withdrew from major
cities such as Mogadishu, Baidoa, and Kismayo and some smaller towns. However, the
militant group still controls a swath of the country. The provisional
constitution was adopted and approved by a National Constituent Assembly, but has
yet to be approved in a referendum. No genuine reconciliation has taken place
in Somalia and the country has consistently been identified among the world’s
most corrupted nations in the world.
Abdiweli’s book is full of boasting
and bluster. It is littered with pictures of the former prime minister meeting
with world and local leaders and there is not a single photo of him with ordinary
Somalis. There is insight into Abdiweli’s contentious and debilitating relationship
with then-President Sheikh Sharif, Speaker Sharif Hassan, and Abdirahman Farole
of Puntland. Farole has been a stubborn problem for Abdiweli and the two have
been involved in numerous tiffs. There is no love lost between them.
In 2012, Abdiweli ran for the
presidency, but failed miserably. A newcomer, Hassan Sheikh Mohamoud, outwitted
him and asked Abdiweli to endorse him in return for keeping his job. When
Abdiweli hemmed and hawed, Mohamoud told him bluntly, “Abdiweli, this is
Mogadishu, the Hawiye stronghold. All I want is to protect you from the
problems of the Hawiye.” Abdiweli ended up backing Mohamoud instead of his
boss, President Sheikh Sharif. To his dismay, when Mohamoud became president,
he lost his job. Paradoxically, Abdiweli is restrained in talking about his secret
agreement with Mohamoud.
In a nutshell, Abdiweli’s book is
a good read, but it lacks an honest assessment of his tenure as prime minister.
It is unfortunate that a highly educated man with a purview in economics has
failed to articulate a clear vision of development under his tenure and,
instead, has been busy collecting every trapping of material wealth. Abdiweli’s
short tenure as premier represents at best an affirmation, rather than a repudiation,
of the status quo.
No comments:
Post a Comment