by C.H. | HARGEISA
IN a scruffy hall off
the dusty main thoroughfare of Somaliland’s capital, Nuruddin Farah, a
Somalia-born novelist, is berating the audience at the Hargeisa International
Book Fair over what he sees as the inherent cruelty of Somali society. Somali
history, he says, “is a consequence of this cruelty…we can never be a
democratic society until we change our behaviour towards those we consider
lesser.”
Despite being born in
the south of Somalia and living in Cape Town Mr Farah, probably the most
well-known Somali writer, feels quite at home in the internationally-unrecognised
state in Somalia’s north: “I have come to start a debate with my community”.
Debate permeated the fair in August and is now in its seventh year. Jama Muse
Jama, formerly an Italy-based academic and businessman and now a Hargeisa-based
publisher founded the fair in 2008 as a means to allow Somalilanders “to regain
their public space… to sit down and simply debate”.
Alongside authors
including Nadifa Mohammed, a much-lauded young British-based author born in
Hargeisa, topics including the preservation of Somali heritage, mother and
infant mortality, female genital mutilation, Somaliland’s own state-building
and western stereotypes of Africa exercised hundreds of attendees. Poets,
including the incomparable Hadraaawi, Bob Dylan-like here, declaimed
sonorously, dervish-like female sitaad dancers whirled. A delegation of writers
from Malawi, the guest country, and a sprinkling from Kenya alongside guests
from Europe and America underlined the fair’s international credentials.
Hargeisa itself is
buzzing. Roads that for decades had been pockmarked by damage caused by war are
now being repaired. Construction is booming too with gaudy McMansions, hotels
and malls going up. Many are funded by Somaliland’s wide diaspora. The logos of
Dahabshiil, a regional money-transfer giant, and conduit for all those diaspora
remittances, and mobile phone companies Telesom and Somtel and private
university billboards are everywhere. Petrol stations, often bearing the
blue-and-yellow livery of Hass Petroleum, based in Kenya, are springing up.
Outdoor stalls and cafes bear handpainted signs and the ubiquitous details of
the Zaad mobile-payment system. Earlier this year, the opening of a swimming
pool, atop a hotel roof, caused local excitement.
Mohamed Awale, the
director of planning at the Ministry of Commerce, lauds Somaliland’s regulatory
reform to ease investment, but worries that without foreign recognition,
Somaliland may remain stuck in “transitional” phase. He also worries about the
plight of Somaliland’s young. Some 75% of the population are reckoned to be
under 21, and 80% of them unemployed. Another economic threat is financial.
Western banks are clamping down on their dealings with money-transfer agents to
limit the risk that they may be implicated in financing terrorist or other
illicit activity. That may reduce the flow of funds from Somaliland’s diaspora,
exacerbating poverty.
Since declaring
independence in 1991, Somaliland has sought international recognition and the
funding and foreign investment it would bring. It has held a raft of elections
judged reasonably fair by international observers, but is little-noticed.
The international
community, with the backing of the African Union, is focused on Somalia, where
international forces are trying to curb an Islamist insurgency and shepherd the
country through federal elections, which are scheduled for 2016. Somaliland itself
has elections scheduled for 2015, although implementation of a
voter-registration system could cause delays.
Yet Somaliland may
soon attract increased attention. One reason is the widening contrast between
Hargeisa, where the streets are relatively safe, and Mogadishu—where on August
15th, at least 10 people were killed in a government-led attack on a militia
leader near the city’s airport. Despite its lack of official recognition,
Britain and Denmark are collaborating on a “Somaliland Development Fund” worth
US$50m, to back the government’s own ambitious infrastructure development
plans.
Oil firms are also
taking note. A host of companies, including Turkish and Norwegian firms, have
been searching for oil and gas in the east of Somaliland. Although commercial
potential has yet to materialise, big hydrocarbon discoveries could bring as
many challenges as benefits in an economy that is currently reliant on
remittances and livestock exports to the Middle East. Some of the sites being
explored are disputed between Somaliland and Puntland, a part of Somalia. Some
of the clans in the disputed territories do not recognise Hargeisa’s authority.
“It scares me what would happen if someone did make a big oil strike,” says
Michael Walls, a Somali expert at University College London (whose own in-depth
study of Somaliland’s state-building was launched at the fair): A conflict over
oil would be a cruel blow indeed.
Norwegian 
