When the Somali state collapsed in 1991, the government’s social management institution – for cultural and religious guidance – which controlled what’s permissible in the country and what’s not – went with it. And with the lack of border controls following immediately the collapse of the Somali state, numerous foreign Islamic ideologies were imported into the country. The biggest and most effective of all, was Saudi Arabia’s Wahabi Islam (recently upgraded to Salafism) – which was not traditionally practiced by the African societies. It found a fertile ground in the vacuum that followed the overthrow of the Siyad Barre’s military government.
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Al Shabab women brigades
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Moreover, it’s universally held view that at times of hardship ordinary people seek refuge in extreme forms of religion. If you live in a rundown small town America, for example, or the economically deprived cities of northern England, there would certainly be a knock on your door at least once in a fortnight by a deeply religious Jehovah Witness militant, inviting you to their next meeting at church, while at the sometime handing out their latest message from Jesus. And had there not been effective governments with sound economies and assisted by the free – and increasingly rightwing – mainstream media in both Britain and the US, these Christian fundamentalists would have possibly caused unimaginable destruction to society. Unfortunately, in the case of Somalia and some parts of Africa, there is no mechanism to ward off the onslaught of the Wahabi Islam extremists across the waters in the Red Sea or the global Jihadists elsewhere.
Following the disintegration of Somalia as a nation, the grief stricken Somali populace – believing that a help is at hand – readily embraced the new teachings of Islam, and the incentives for the Somali people are what I call ‘cash for extremism’. Throughout the civil war in Somalia, the Saudis had never supported the security services of the relatively peaceful semi autonomous states of the North while at the same time sending shiploads of food and Wahabi Islam literatures to the South. The resulting outcome was that the overwhelming majority of Somalis – one way or another – developed some sort of Islamic extremism. And largely unnoticed by both the Somali diaspora communities and the general population inside the country, a strange and alien religious fundamentalism was to spiral out of control, diluting and fragmenting the unique Somalia’s camel boys folklore and poetic based culture. The fine and tolerant Somali society was fatally wounded.
It’s in this context of the recent Somali social discourse coupled with the lack of governance institutions that is causing the atrocities and the mayhem, together with the continuing interferences by Saudi Arabs in the Sufi tradition of African Islam in the country. Many Somali people pretend as if there is no case here and shy away to bring the issue up. People’s fears, however, are well founded. In the recent Somali social and religious norms that have been incorporated into the Somali social structures, criticising or even speaking out about these sensitive but important issues can cause a lot of problems for those involved. And if someone hears that you are interested to know as to why the Somali people’s Islamic attitudes are increasingly hardening, religious based groups or even the individual citizens can take action against such persons, without the chance for a rational debate.
The Somali society has taken a dramatic turn for the worse over the past couple of decades. For example, the female adults attending Madarasas in their middle ages or the sixth century Arab names that are popping up all around young Somali households. As Richard Dowden, the veteran Africa news correspondent summed up in the early 90s in one of his last articles for the Independent: ‘the Somali Taliban was born soon after the overthrow of the secular dictator’.
From Hargeisa to Kismayo, alien and strange sounding names such as Abu Zubayr, Zumaya and Bint Khuwayja have replaced the popular and fashionable Somali names like Robleh, Raageh and Rhoda. The huge surplus of mosques that are being built across the country at the expense of hospitals and schools can’t be questioned either. And if you dared ask such questions (a relative is nowadays the safest option when asking) the answer you’ll get is simple: ‘we have become better Muslims; we were ignorant about our religion’.
Paradoxically, when I was growing up in Somalia, even though it was mandatory that all the kids in the towns were able to read the Quran, actually we did not understand its meaning. The main reason for this was that most religious teachers were not qualified to interpret the Qur’an from Arabic and into Somali. All the kids were expected to read the thirty chapters of the Qur’an at least once before going to formal school education.
Throughout our childhood, we did not notice any changes or something untoward to the traditional narrative of Somali Islam. Some of the clever kids were able to read it twice over in as many months. We loved citing passages of the Qur’an when playing in the hills and valleys during the rainy season; it was intriguing and fascinating to read the Qur’an and funny sounding lines were repeated again and again until fully memorised. Difficult verses were avoided in case the other kids noticed your mumbling. But if you were found out, the teacher compelled you to pronounce the words loud. It was fun and time consuming. Some of the kids would later acquire their lifetime nicknames from those difficult-to-read verses such as the famous and regular BBC Somali Service cultural and traditional commentator, Idaajaa.
Religious schooling was to end on or just before primary school start date at the age of six or seven. However, a combined single Arabic and religious class continued right up to the end of secondary school. But after that it was optional for students whether to specialise a religious degree at university if they so wish. If you wanted to be religious expert or a Sheikh at a mosque, it was a choice that you had to make at adulthood.
In those days, ideological conflicts among the Somali society’s Sufi religious leaders were minimal and had been confined to Mosques. Extremism were unheard of, perhaps it did not exist at all. There were no students returning to Qur’anic Madarassas, and those staying on who was the same age as us were teased and looked down as not being intelligent enough because they did not finish their religious education in time. Unfortunately, an irreversible change has taken place in Somalia.
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Is Mali fast becoming the next Somalia
I often compared Somalia to Afghanistan. Both societies have their own languages, and Arabic, the language of the Quran, is not widely spoken in these countries. Less than one per cent of Somalis considered themselves to be fluent in Arabic in the early eighties; and 0.2 per cent Afghanis were thought to have basic knowledge of Arabic. Afghanistan is in South Asia and Somalia is in Africa. Both countries have been engulfed by endless violent conflict for many decades (centuries in the case of Afghanistan). Afghanistan is located to the north of the Arabian Peninsula where Islam originated while Somalia is just to the south of it.
Afghanistan has history of foreign interventions; in fact the Afghanis continue to battle foreign armies from the nineteen century to the present day. And the Great Game between the British and the Russians in the nineteen century Afghanistan is being superseded by what seems to be a new Great Game that is currently being played out between radical Islamists, the Taliban and the West. Recent reports suggest that there would be no viable state in Afghanistan after the foreign troops leave the country in 2014, with the possibility of further unrest in that country. It could be argued that Somalia has just started her own battle (though smaller in scale) with foreign armies which are getting into the third decade. But the similarities, if it can be called as such, end there.
Afghanistan is geographically and traditionally South Asian and does not, apart from being a fellow Muslim country, proclaim to have social and blood ties with the Arabs. But Mali and Somalia are in Africa, and for several reasons, Somalia can be a classic case study for the present Malian conflict.
A large Somali tribe prides itself of being related to the Yemani Arabs; another says it’s descended from the Sunni Iraqi Arabs. And in comparison, the Kel Ansar tribe in Mali believes that they are descended directly from Prophet Mohammed. In fact it’s this myth which Malians and Somalis entertain that reinforces their misplaced belief that they are part of the Arab world, without fully understanding the Arab language or culture. Every year tens of thousands of Malians and Somalis visit Saudi Arabia and the UAE, for Hajj in SA and for trade in Dubai. But both Malians and Somalis are oblivious to the local politics and cultures in the Arab world. Even those who frequently visit or work in the Gulf overlook the fact that Wahabi Islam is strictly controlled in Saudi Arabia and that in downtown Dubai, African soukous and Western pop is deafeningly playing into the early hours of the morning in the nightclubs across the city. Are they not Muslim too?
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Ansar Dine rebels near Timbuktu, northern Mali.
Photograph: Romaric Ollo Hien/AFP/Getty Images |
And from 2007 – about the year that the Somali Al Shabaab came into existence – Mali has been going through similar transformation. Like the areas of Somalia controlled by Al Shabaab, music is banned in large parts of northern Mali and anyone found dancing or smoking risks being flogged in public. Thieves got their hands cut off. In the city of Goa in August this year, heavily bearded Islamist spokesman declared: ‘we don’t want the music of Satan. Qur’anic verses must replace. Sharia demands it, he decreed’. As in Somalia before it, Mali’s new Al Shabaab which is being protected and supported by the global Al Qaeeda is taking firm root in the desert where world famous music concerts used to be held.
