Agencies mull alternative means to defeat Shabaab
SUNDAY
FEBRUARY 5 2017
A Kenya
Defence Forces soldier takes position at a vantage point during patrol in
Afmadow town, Somalia, on November 22, 2015. Disputes about payments for Amisom
soldiers serve as a morale boost for the Islamist fighters. PHOTO | JEFF ANGOTE
| NATION MEDIA GROUP
By
KEVIN J. KELLEY
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NEW YORK
With a
decade of military force having failed to defeat Al-Shabaab, officials and
analysts are being asked to consider whether the Somali government and its
international backers should seek a political settlement to the conflict.
Humanitarian
considerations do require efforts to reach at least a limited accommodation
with the Islamist insurgents, the top United Nations official in Somalia said
recently.
Al-Shabaab
controls some parts of the country hardest-hit by a worsening drought that is
posing a growing risk of famine, noted Michael Keating, the UN
secretary-general's special envoy for Somalia.
Gaining
access to those areas for relief operations "is highlighting the need to
engage with al-Shabaab," Ambassador Keating said last month at a
think-tank session in New York.
But
exploratory attempts to hold talks with Shabaab did not prove successful in the
past, the UN official added.
And the
time for direct political negotiations is not yet at hand, Ambassador Keating
added.
The
Al-Qaeda-aligned group has made clear that it is not interested in bargaining
with its enemies, Abdirashid Hashi, director of the Mogadishu-based Heritage
Institute for Policy Studies, said in an emailed reply to a series of questions
posed by the Sunday Nation.
Shabaab's
"core, specific demands" include imposition of Sharia law in Somalia
and withdrawal of all foreign troops, Mr Hashi pointed out.
But the
Constitution adopted in 2012 stipulates that any law contrary to the tenets of
Islam is null and void, he said, suggesting there may be some “common ground”
between the insurgents and the government.
BETTER STRATEGY
If the
two sides were to agree to discuss national reconciliation, “I do not think the
international community would object to this,” Mr Hashi added.
But the
US and European Union, which jointly bankroll the fight against Shabaab, find
Shabaab's disregard for human rights standards “unacceptable”, said Stig Jarle
Hansen, a Harvard University research fellow and author of the book, Al-Shabaab in Somalia.
A more
feasible political approach would involve distinguishing between “hard-line
jihadis” loyal to Al-Qaeda and “clan-based militant groups” that have aligned
with Shabaab due mainly to Somalia's social dynamics, suggested Dr J Peter
Pham, head of the Africa programme at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based
think tank.
“There's
no negotiating” with the most militant ideologues, but elements identified as
“Shabaab-by-convenience” may prove amenable to holding talks, Dr Pham said.
“The
key thing is figuring out how to peel away those groups,” he added.
Even if
that were to occur, “the need for a credible interlocutor” would have to be
resolved, Dr Pham continued.
Somalia's
federal government, fresh from “the fiasco of an election”, may not qualify as
a dependable negotiating partner, he said.
Mr
Hashi also cited the obstacle of “an inept national government with
corrupt/mediocre leadership”.
Over
the years, the Somali think-tank director added, “there has not been serious
reflection and discussion among the Somali elite and perhaps among Al-Shabaab
leadership as to ‘where to go from here’”.
Despite
its recent round of bloody strikes on African Union and Somali national forces,
Shabaab is not operating primarily from a position of strength, the analysts noted.
The
militants lack a genuine base of support even in rural parts of the country
that they control militarily, Mr Hashi and Mr Hansen both said.
Local
residents of those areas “have to try to stand on friendly terms with them in
order to survive, including supplying recruits and funds and sometimes even
marriage", Mr Hansen said.
And Mr
Hashi expressed the belief that most Somalis do not share Shabaab's worldview.
AMISOM MORALE
At the
same time, Mr Hashi noted, parts of the African Union Mission in Somalia
(Amisom) also lack grassroots political support.
“Most
Somalis do not believe Kenya and Ethiopia are in Somalia for Somalia’s
interest,” he said.
“They
are in Somalia for their own interests and sometimes these interests align and
other times they do not.”
In
addition, many of Shabaab's leaders and fighters have 10 years of experience in
battling much larger forces, Mr Hashi noted.
The
likely scenario, he suggested, is continuation of the military status quo, “and
that would not signal defeat of Al-Shabaab”.
“All
these factors give Al-Shabaab energy and enable them to appear bigger then they
actually are,” Mr Hashi commented.
Similarly,
disputes about payments for Amisom soldiers, leading to threats of at least a
partial pullout of troops, serve as a morale boost for the Islamist fighters,
Mr Hansen said.
“What
is certain is that the haggling is observed by the Shabaab, and it encourages
them, as the pullout of Ethiopia in 2008 paved the way for Shabaab's 'Golden
Age' and their largest territorial control ever.”
Amisom
may in fact reduce its presence in Somalia next year, but significant segments
of its fighting force will remain in place, Dr Pham said.
Burundi
and Uganda do not have the same “frontline” outlook as do Kenya and Ethiopia,
he noted, raising the possibility that countries further away from Somalia may
draw down their troops.
TALKS NOT IN OFFING
The two
bordering countries, by contrast, have “direct national interests” in Somalia,
and “you're therefore not going to see a total disengagement”, added Dr Pham,
who is reportedly under consideration to head the State Department's Africa
Bureau in the Trump administration.
Nicholas
Kay, Ambassador Keating's predecessor as top UN official in Somalia, offered a
perspective three years ago that remains relevant today.
“Most
conflicts end in some kind of political settlement,” Ambassador Kay told
reporters at the UN.
He
added on that occasion in 2014 that such an outcome was not yet in sight in
Somalia.
And
despite its arguable inevitability, a political settlement appears to still be
a distant prospect.
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