Somalia: Nation Building and the Role of the Youth

Nation Building and the Role of the Youth
Abdirashid Bicir Dahir
Lacle1004@gmail.com
July 28 2012

OPINION

So much has been said and written about the Somali turmoil, famine, and long lasted civil unrest, thus did we think about the root cause of the state failure, the agents of the civil unrest and the influential players on the ground?, of course it is obvious that the Somali youth have been the main players of the Somali civil unrest and it might not became possible to avert such serious incidents.

What the youngsters smoothly took to these incidents is almost known and it is poverty. This poverty generated from the drought which has decimated across vast vicinity and finally transformed to famine and starvation. Somalis suffered from the drought fled nearby refugee camps including Dhadhaab which once marked as the world’s largest refugee camp and Kenya has been serving as our real lifeline.

It is quite correct to emphasize that Somali refugee problem became a major driver of several international conferences and our anticipation downgraded and to some extent darkened.

Today, our leaders are preparing the process of ending the transition period in order to transcend to permanent government. In the” Time to Part Ways” xilliga kala guurka our government must craft viable political, economic and social strategies so as to experience immediate transformations in many directions. Wonderfully, SEMG (Somalia and Eretria Monitoring Group) issued a crucial report shedding light on widespread corruption which has gone beyond the government main offices, among the accused offices, the office of the president, the office of the prime minister and the office of the parliament speaker are at the forefront.

It is disheartening that our leaders are yet to finalize threats emanating from Somali political fault lines where the world has focused and injected massive amount of money. Inclusive participation prioritizing veteran politicians, influential leaders, educated Diaspora and knowledgeable youth at large can become better measure for the effort of rooting out conflicts. Despite major achievements in the roadmap there are formidable challenges emanating from failed politicians, spoilers and anti-peace elements.

The post transition government is expected to pave away prosperous frame work thereby allowing non-aligned individuals and sides to accelerate nation building process. The non aligned individuals must be included the educated youth who are competent, genial and peace advocates.

In the heart of my intention, country’s education sector has made greater stride in the past couple of years, regional ministries of education commenced scholarship allocations, local universities were opened and extensively utilized and privately owned institutions broadened their educational capacity, hence inclusive quality education was ensured and delivered  and efforts was concerted on the youth’s knowledge betterment.

In order to further assure sustainable stability and durable peace, the Somali government should argue youth to join in the process of consolidating Somali’s peace process for the aim of undermining the growing influence of extremists and improving inclusive consultation process.

Community consultation process offering particular opportunity to the youth can result concrete developments. I think those who do lack public support can’t achieve Tranquility, territorial integration, and functioning Somali state.

Finally, “Let the Somali youth be involved in the process of nation building” and explore the final solution for Somalis.

Abdirashid Bicir Dahir
Addisababa –Ethiopia

Abdirashid previously served as a program producer as well as chief in editor in various media stations. You can send comments and questions to Lacle1004@gmail.com.

=====================================================

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Raxanreeb’s editorial policy.