Somalia, tribal lands on the Horn of Africa, is coming apart. I just heard an interview on NPR and Mercy Corps is standing by as the weakest and sickest who can make the trek into Kenya appear over the horizon. The ones who can’t walk out under their own power are already dying.
America could take one day off chasing those hundred surviving al Queda guys in Afghanistan and the savings would keep a hundred thousand Somali for a year.
The time to act is now.
First a little about Somalia. We refer to it as a country, but like Afghanistan it’s tribal lands – the ties of religion and ethnicity are more important than a colored by of space on a western made map. The diplomatic reality is that in the north Somaliland and Puntland have functional governments and we ought to recognize them, engage, and stop punishing them for the muddle in the south.
Disputed area? That would be where the oil is and ethnic divisions are not entirely clear. Keep in mind the residents are semi-nomadic herders.
Somaliland is home to the Ishaak. Puntland is Darod. The northern half of the rump Somalia is Hawiya, but the trouble zone, around Mogadishu and Baidoa is a mix of clans and non-Somali.
This is the neatest bit of information I found on the various ethnic groups:
The Somalis are classified as a Hamitic people with a Cushitic culture. It is believed that the Somalis descend from people who migrated from the equatorial lakes of Africa to settle in the area of Somalia's two rivers, there to intermix with pastoral groups from the north and migrants from the Arabian Peninsula, the Persian Gulf, and perhaps Southeast Asia.
Ethnic Somalis, who made up about 85% of the population in 1998, are divided into two main clan families: the Samaal, which includes the Darod, Isaaq, Hawiye, and Dir clan groups; and the Saab, which includes the Rahanweyn and Digil clans and other smaller clan groups. The Samaal are principally nomadic or seminomadic pastoralists; the Digil and Rahanweyn are primarily farmers and sedentary herders. There are also small Bantu-speaking groups who live along the Shabeelle and Jubba rivers.
The nonindigenous population consists primarily of Arabs, Italians, Pakistanis, and Indians. The Italians are mainly engaged in teaching, business, and banana production; the Arabs, Pakistanis, and Indians are primarily shopkeepers.
The source of the trouble is, of course, the hundred year drought that currently has ten million people in Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Uganda in its grasp. The bulk of them are in Kenya, but with a functional government those people have hope. But only if the U.S., consistently the world’s largest food donor, gets back in touch with what’s really important.
There are two things you can do to help. The first, immediate thing is to make a donation to Mercy Corps. These guys provide the information on their charity up front – 88% of the money given goes to those in need. This is a sensible amount – a group of this size has offices, a finance director, and they’re paying for people to travel to troubled regions. Any charity claiming to give 100% of what comes in is probably a scam, these guys look like a frugal, hard working operation. And they’re on the borders of Somalia right now, ready to help …
Over the last five years, Mercy Corps has used 88% of our resources for programs that help people in need. America's premier charity evaluator gives Mercy Corps four stars in organizational efficiency.
The bigger thing that Kossacks can do is to get our government moving. America has been the biggest global food donor and if we get moving the others will get in line behind us. I don’t normally work on this stuff, but after hearing that NPR report I’m not sure if I’ll be able to eat today at all …
So, how do we do this? Who here normally leads this sort of thing? We actions do we take to get our government focused on solving this problem now, rather than letting it fester until we have to send an Expeditionary Strike Group instead of a freighter full of rice and beans?