In Somalia there is no national government even though some part can be peaceful which is the self declared ‘Republic of Somaliland’ but fighting can still erupt without warning in many parts killing many people. Somalia’s problem dated back to the civil war in 1991 with the downfall of President Said Barre which resulted in power tussle and clan clashes in many parts of Somalia. In November 1991 the most severe fighting broke out in the capital, Mogadishu between two factions, one supporting the interim president Ali Mandi Mohamed and the other faction supporting the chairman of the United Somali Congress, General Mohamed Farah Aidid.
This aggression resulted in widespread deaths and destruction of lives and properties, this forced thousands of Somali civilian to run away from their homes and causing a dire need for emergency humanitarian assistance. Approximately 4.5million Somalis, over half of the estimated population were threatened by severe malnutrition and malnutrition related diseases and most affected are people living in the rural areas, almost one million Somalis sought refuge in neighbouring countries and elsewhere. On April 24 1992, the United Nations Security Council establish the U.N operations in Somalia (UNOSOM) to facilitate the immediate termination of hostilities and the maintenance of cease fire throughout the country and also to promote the process of reconciliation and political settlement.
With a rather fragile cease fire only in the capital city of Mogadishu in March 1992, the north and south are still experiencing continued fighting because warring factions greatly outnumbered the UNOSOM forces. Aids started flowing into Somalia and numerous NGOs (e.g FAO, UNDP, WHO, UNICEF, WFP) attempted to distribute it to starving people. In short period of time it became apparent that armed bandit and looters were benefiting from the aid far more than those who really need it and this hasn’t a stop at all, as its the case this article.
This whole U.N operation in Somalia is humanitarian but has a political undertone to it, even though there have been so many speculations by the media on both, the media speculated that president Bush took on this task so as to end his tenure on a good note. This is so because in 1992 the U.N ordered the Operation Restore Hope which was taken up by the United States of America under the then President Bush, the aim is to ensure the success of humanitarian effort and facilitate the cease fire operation. But the operation which as the U.S has the dominant force was quick to turn from relief effort into a war in which U.S recorded a large number of casualties, which could have been easily avoided. This has been said to change the face of United States peacekeeping operations.
Providing aid to Somalia people has been a challenging one over the years, armed militants and different political faction who have opposing views on international military intervention. This coupled with the fact that Mogadishu has been a breeding ground for Islamist terrorist the Al-Shabaab for a while now and they are affiliated with Al-qaeda. These Islamist group have issued a series of threats before but did not carry them out, it was at the beginning of this year that it all came to a head when the Al-Shabaab issues and ultimatum to the U.N and WFP to withdraw their aids from Somalia claiming the amount of food brought into Somalia has prevented local farmers from selling their products and it warned all Somali, both men and women not to have anything to do with the WFP.
The withdrawal of aids from Somalia will have a devastating effect on the citizens especially those in the southern parts, the food aid is said to have created a dependency culture, that could be true because farmer people will not be encouraged to do anything to help their economy because food is being brought in for free. Looking at it in another way, with the political instability and terrorist group the economy is not the most important thing the Somalis should be fighting for. What should be paramount on their minds is maintaining a democratic government and security for all its citizens.
It has been speculated that the U.S is playing politics with the food aid in Somalia.