Created in 1960 from a former British protectorate and an Italian colony, Somalia collapsed into anarchy following the overthrow of the military regime of President Siad Barre in 1991.
The Somali conflict is a multifaceted dispute triggered by the fall of President Said Barre regime on 27 January 1991. General Barre’s dictatorship was synonymous with extreme brutality, suppression of opposition groups, both nationalistic and Islamic, and exacerbation of interclan rivalries (clannism).
By 1988, the dissatisfaction with the government led to nationalist groups throughout the country, with Northern Somalia (modern-day Somaliland) leading the charge, to attack government and military posts, prompting the First Somali Civil war (1988-1991).
The fall of Said Barre’s regime and the Somali Civil War created a power vacuum in which nationalist and Islamic groups, warlords, clan and sub-clan militias and other actors aimed to carve out swathes of territory for their own governance.
FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF SOMALIA: FACTS
Capital: Mogadishu
Area: 637,657 sq km
Population: 17 million
Languages: Somali, Arabic
Life expectancy: 55 years (men) 59 years (women)
THE TIMELINE
7th-19th Centuries – From the 7th-Century arrival of Islam onwards, modern-day Somalia is ruled by a series of at times competing sultanates.
19th Century – European colonial powers gradually make inroads into Somalia’s rival regional states, with the bulk of the area coming under Italian rule and the British establishing control of the northwest.
1960 – Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland become independent, merge and form the United Republic of Somalia.
1969 – Mohamed Siad Barre assumes power in coup after the assassination of the elected president; he goes on to declare Somalia a socialist state and nationalises most of the economy.
1991 – The ousting of Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991 sparks a decades-long civil war between rival clan warlords and the disintegration of central authority. Former British Somaliland declares unilateral independence.
1990s- US-spearheaded UN peacekeeping mission fails to restore peace.
2006 – Militias loyal to the Islamist Union of Islamic Courts capture Mogadishu and other parts of south after defeating clan warlords, before being driven out by Ethiopian forces.
2007-11 – An African Union peacekeeping force, Amisom, begins to deploy and Ethiopian troops withdraw in 2009. Al-Shabab – a jihadist breakaway from the Islamic Courts – advance into southern and central Somalia, prompting an armed intervention by Kenya.
2012 – Efforts to restore a central authority since 2000 finally make substantial progress, with the swearing in of the first formal parliament in more than 20 years, and the holding of the first presidential election since 1967.
2022 – Somali government forces, aided by US air strikes and African Union troops carry out major offensives against al-Shabab, retaking control of significant areas that had previously been under the group’s control.
Now Somalia is facing catastrophic hunger, with the country devastated by the extreme drought in the Horn of Africa. A total of 6.5 million people face acute food insecurity amid the driest conditions in 40 years, following five consecutive failed rainy seasons. Drought is compounding the impacts of other recurrent climate shocks, persistent insecurity and instability.
PRACTICE QUESTIONS
QUES . Which one of the following countries has been suffering from decades of civil strife and food shortages and was in news in the recent past for its very severe famine? UPSC 2023
(a) Angola
(b) Costa Rica
(c) Ecuador
(d) Somalia
Ans (d)
