Somaliland-Djibouti Relationship - Somali News Online from ...

Somaliland-Djibouti RelationshipGelle: The Tireless Crusader Against Somaliland 2012Today, it would consider any suggestion to be part of the Pan-Somalism concept such so preposterous aproposition.Now put aside gratitude. Forget that they, themselves, unceremoniously spurned Pan-Somalism. Nevermind their complacency in—and arguably their compliancy with—the miscarriage of the creed’s firstattempt at realization. But for the Djibouti ‘president’ to call on others to remain devoted to Pan-Somalism is nothing less than the height of hypocrisy.Somalilanders would be the least to find fault with Djiboutians in exercising self-determination on anyissue under the sun that concerns them, including on Pan-Somalism. Thus, what justification couldDjibouti evoke in denying Somalilanders the exercise of the same self-determination?Yet Djibouti’s Gelle has left no stone unturned to nip Somaliland’s right to self-determination andindependence in the bud—exactly the same right he and his predecessors had exerted to its fullest extentwithout any fear or expectation of reproach and, in the opinion of most Somalilanders, rightfully so.To mind comes a Somali saying: “There is he whose shoes you are mending while he is mending yourdeath body cloth” (Nin aad kabahiisa toleeso ayaa kafantaada vii toleeya.) It seems that, as strangely as itmight sound, Somaliland and Djibouti have been playing these roles, one benevolent and the othermalevolent, respectively on each other.In every contentious issue that cropped up between Somaliland and Somalia, Djibouti’s leaders havesided with the Southerners.Another Somali adage pertinent here as well: “Neighborliness is closer to one than kinship” (Owdi ab kadow). It is incomprehensible to most Somalilanders why Djibouti leaders have always been and still ismore favorably disposed to the Southerners with whom they share neither neighborhood nor kinshipthan to the Northerners with whom they boast both common ancestry and land.There is no shortage of theories of the real motives behind Gelle’s callous antagonism towardsSomaliland. Like all theories, some would seem rather farfetched. Others are more plausible. Aselect spectrum of these hypotheses, fluidly classifiable either way, might be worthwhile to bementioned here.Berbera: A Maddening Thorn In Gelle’s SideLike a jealousy stricken lady who, though he is devotedly faithful to her, can’t stand the mere sight ofanother woman within six miles of her husband, Djibouti wishes to possess the only functioningSeaport between the Suez and Mombasa. Berbera, the only fairly operational seaport in Somaliland,particularly invokes in Djibouti’s psyche a maddening fit of hysteria.To them, Berbera is a direct threat to their vital economic interests. Djibouti fears that not only wouldSomalilanders cease using its port’s facilities but also that Berbera would compete with Djibouti in thetransit trade of landlocked Ethiopia.AIH Page 9