Issue No. 703

Historical Grievances Fuel Somalia's Clan Wars

The Sa'ad against the Leelkaase, the Ayr vs. the Duduble, and the Mareehaan clashing with the Dir. On an almost weekly basis in recent months, clan conflicts have flared in central and southern Somalia, often leaving dozens of fighters and civilians slain. Reasons for these escalations are distinct to inter-communal dynamics but share numerous similarities and are often rooted around deeper historical grievances as well as questions of local, regional, and national representation. Al-Shabaab, too, has a frequent hand in the violence, seeking to stoke inter-clan rivalries for its own advantage.
 
On 6 July, at the reopening of the federal parliament, Somalia's President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud accused the extremist group of driving the current spate of inter-clan violence in a bid to undermine the government's military operations. While it is true that the extremist group is believed to be furtively involved in a number of ongoing clan disputes, it is inaccurate to wholly attribute the internecine violence to Al-Shabaab. Many of these conflicts are tied to dormant grievances that are being increasingly accessed over ever-sparser grazing land or water access points. With climate change placing greater pressure on pastoralists and farmers across Somalia, once relatively bountiful areas are becoming points of increasing contestation between neighbouring clans.
 
For Al-Shabaab, fueling inter-clan violence is less about undermining the government's 'expanding' authority, as federal officials have asserted, and more about opportunity. There are several ways in which the jihadists covertly incite clan violence, but they frequently deploy fighters to their own communities to assassinate a neighbouring clan elder or leader to spark retaliatory violence. Rather than being viewed as an Al-Shabaab fighter, the killer is considered through the lens of their clan, and the bloodshed can quickly take on a life of its own. For Al-Shabaab, igniting these conflicts offers a chance to resolve them through their own clan representatives and influence inter-clan politics, as well as alleviating military pressure from militias that could be otherwise positioned against them. Further, when they advance, the jihadists can present opportunities for revenge and bloodletting to new recruits from these clans.
 
Casualty numbers can be eye-watering. For instance, in just 10 days in early June, at least 60 people were killed and dozens more injured in Galgaduud after fighting erupted between Mareehaan and Dir communities. While Galmudug's Information Minister Abshir Shikow cited Al-Shabaab as driving the violence, this time around, there was no clear evidence that the extremist group was fuelling the violence. Instead, the conflict seemingly arose from increasing competition for water and grazing land between the Mareehaan, who have traditionally occupied the area, and the Dir community, who are establishing a greater presence. In particular, tensions have been rising surrounding the building of residential buildings by Dir in the area, which should eventually grant them a share of the political representation of the district. While some clans can quickly access effective de-escalatory mechanisms, this is not the case between the Dir and the Mareehaan, whose clashes have been infamously bloody.
 
One particularly important element of inter-clan violence that is often overlooked is the manner in which historical grievances are remembered and acted upon. Somalia is a profoundly oral society with a rich history of storytelling, poetry, and fables, which are passed down through the patrilineal clan structures. On the flip side, particular affronts or notable killings as far back as a century ago are not forgotten, but with no written records, realities often become warped across time. Subsequently, the layered patchwork of complex grievances in Somalia is held close by clans, with stories of repression or heroism accessed again and again by families, often lying dormant until communities compete for political or economic resources. Of course, this dynamic is not unique to Somalia, but its particular oral society and clan structures can help drive a potent mix of retaliatory, cyclical violence. And with thirty years of continued instability and forcible displacement, disputes surrounding land are particularly acute.
 
Take, for instance, the infamous 'Tomaselli' line in Mudug that an Italian colonial administration established to separate the Darood/ Majerteen/Omar Mahmood to the north and the Hawiye/Habar Gidir/Sa'ad to the south. Yet today, no one can agree on where precisely the line was drawn, with some contending that it runs 60 km or 80 km to the south of Gaalka'yo, while others posit that it runs directly through the town. And with these disputes, the Tomaselli line has ironically become yet another area of violent contestation.
 
The current scale of the ongoing clashes is particularly revealing just how impotent the regional and federal governments are in reconciling communities and separating clashing militias. Economic or political disputes can quickly escalate into violent contestation in a country awash with arms and where the government does not possess a monopoly of force. Further, the violence we are seeing today is another legacy of the imposition of a top-down system of governance in a country where the hard graft of reconciliation and resource allocation between clans had not been tackled.
 
In Galmudug, a number of the ongoing conflicts have further been ascribed to politicians, including President Ahmed Karie 'QoorQoor,' ahead of the buildup to regional presidential elections. Regional and federal politicians have shown a repeated propensity to deploy their clan members to undermine opponents and foment crises. But with every new conflict that erupts, militias and communities that could otherwise be involved in the stalled offensive against Al-Shabaab turn inwards.
 
In part, the country is experiencing the failure to capitalise on the successes of the Hawaadle uprising in Hiiraan in August 2022 and continued disinterest in comprehensively engaging with the clan elite. As soon as violence ebbs and elders can hash together a tentative peace, regional and federal government's attention turns elsewhere. Amid growing speculation that Al-Shabaab could seize power in Mogadishu, either through negotiated capitulation or capture, the deadly clan clashes we are currently witnessing from the Luuq district in Gedo to Mudug may only be the beginning.

The Somali Wire team