…After 16 years of anarchy, came the Islamic Courts. And though regarded by many as hardliners, yet they managed to secure the capital and bring some much-need stability into the region, and the public heaved a much-needed sigh of relief, for once.
…The Transitional Federal Government, upon witnessing the heaps of praises and welcomes awaiting the Islamic Courts at most cities, became envious and implored the might of the Ethiopians.
…Then they came in numbers
…Along with heavy military arsenal
…overpowered and defenseless, we just looked on
…as they marched through our soil, city after city, armed to the teeth.
…They even belittled our former soldiers and generals, displaying their weaponry as they towered over them under the scorching sun
…so we took it to the streets and protested
…and burnt whatever dead branches and logs we could find
…and the few tyres we could uncover from the rubble
…but they just laughed at us.
…so we got on our SUVs
…and ran to the bordering country to escape the chaos
…but there too, the merciless kenyan gunman awaited, in ambush
…With great effort, we made it to the refugee camps in a desperate attempt for peace and some serenity. kicked out of our own houses, our own land, our own shade! Today we live as refugees in other countries,
…while they rejuvinated under the cool shades of our trees along with subservient warlords at their disposal!
For the first time in a generation people could walk the streets in safety. Gone were the ubiquitous checkpoints where the warlords’ militias extorted and killed. Guns had been banned. Gone were narcotic qat possessing and slowly decreasing the minds of the young and old. Somalis who had fled the violence were returning from abroad.
The honeymoon of peace, law and order, unity and Islamic hood gone in just 6 months.
Inshallah the UIC will re-emerge again, stronger and mightyer than before.
Looking forward on your new post on this morning’s US airstrikes on our country.
Keep this blog up. I’m a always reading it :)
I couldn’t help but touched by your moving presentation of the defilings of the dignity of your people and the sanctity of your country.
For many Ethiopians, like myself, the transgression and brutality of the Meles regime in somalia left us with shame. Not that we, Ethiopians doing any better than you. In Ethiopias capital Addis Ababa, Children are being shot at and killed, beaten with cruelty that left thousands deformed, rounded up and sent to stalinist gaols, being watched by brutal army thugs that they brought in from God knows where. They suppressed all media and jailed prominent opposition leaders and journalists who critized them. To this day tens of thousands of young resenters remain in jails hidden from the eyes of the world and their own people.
The crimes of this regime of Ethiopia, shouldn’t and mustn’t associated with the common Ethiopians. somalis must understand, we Ethiopians are against this invasion, our sympathy is with you.
Silent Reader, it’s as if Somalia is destined for disaster. The temporary reprieve and the fresh wave of stability that we briefly inhaled soon started to decline, and upheaval paved the way. And now, the Americans said its time turn up the heat.
It isn’t over yet though, for the Islamic Courts have lived to fight another day!
p.s I am glad that you have found something worth reading on this blog, my dear Silent Reader. I hope you have found sense in these ramblings. As for American bombing, Alas! What’s there to write of that!
Larcor, Thank you very much for your comment, it has indeed delighted me and somewhat re-ignited my hope in the Ethiopian people. Though most of them see Somalia as an enemy, just as it is on the other side of the border, yet there remain the handful peace-loving humans that understand the value of human life, just as there is on this side of the border.
You must forgive us, my friend, for generalizing is one of our imperfections as humans.
You must also note that there is no resentment on our side for the Ethiopian people, but basic reason aided and abetted by intrinsic character flaws do not allow us to love our neighbours at all cost while their president commits adultery with his neighbours wife. I am sure you would understand.
I have not felt this much despair and hopelessness about Somalia in a long time. Circumstances have conspired to throw a battered people once more into the pit of war. Since the 1960s, what hairline divisions exist amongst our people have been ripped into highways with a final call for invasion and mindless rhetoric about ‘terrorists’ to beat one Somali against another. As someone fortunate enough to have been spared the death and destruction and whose loved ones are safe, I am both devastated and guilt-ridden about the people in Somalia who have not caught a break in nearly 17 years.
I can understand the anger and frustration people feel with the presence of Ethiopian soldiers in Somalian territory. They don’t appear to be welcomed other than by the transitional government. As an Ethiopian, I don’t see what Meles Zenawi is doing in Somalia as beneficial for either Ethiopians or Somalis. It is unfortunately the case that Ethiopians can’t make decisions as citizens of their country; dictators take care of that for them.
If it is helps any, Ethiopian soldiers will not stay long in Somalia. The government neither has the capacity nor the resources to stay even if it has the desire.
Aya, one can only pray for Somalia at this moment, for I do not see anything resembling peace in the near future.
Adey, The Derg regime was overthrown, and so could this one if the will was there. There has to be a majority of the population supporting Meles, otherwise there would have been an outburst. If the citizens of a country sit back and watch as events unfold brutally, we can only conclude that they support it too. Silence can be misleading and its only through silence that oppression continues to thrive.