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Recurring Ethiopian Massacres in occupied Western Somalia

By Ali H. Abdulla

Tol la’ay Somaaliyeey,
Tab iyo xeelay  kumee,
Intay isu tegi lahayd,
Waata sii kala tagtee,
Tobanka u qaybsantee,
Tagtaye saw ma aragtaan.

Somalis hardly forgot about the kind of massacres that created Danan and the many innocent civilians killed in Buhodle, Gedo and Cadado, when Ramadan ushered in another massacre in a small village in what Somalis consider as Western Somalia while Ethiopia considers as one of its nine ethnic administrative regions. The 1977 war that led to the collapse of the Somali government was caused by this diametrically opposed viewpoint.

Ina ilay
Abdi Mohamoud Omar (Abdi Ilay)

The world is not aware of the recurring massacres taking place inside Ethiopian occupied Somali territories either by the Ethiopian army or by its functionaries like the president of the occupied Somali region and his heavily armed, ruthless and undisciplined militia known as the Liyu Police.

The Ethiopian administered Somali region is a vast area settled by ethnic Somalis who eke a precarious living as nomads roaming the landscape with their herds. When the rains fail, their livestock perish in the thousands and they rarely get any help from the dictatorial regional administration they come under, or the Ethiopian Federal government for that matter.  Both administrations care less about the suffering of these nomads. When the rains come, the nomads are harassed by the Ethiopian army and their collaborators and pay unfair taxes in kind without receiving any credible services in return. Education, healthcare and other social services are lacking except for a few privileged communities that support the regime.

At midnight On June 5 2016, a heavily armed contingent of the Liyu Police under the direct command of Mr. Iley and supported by federal soldiers from Ethiopia stormed a small village known as Jaamac-Dubbad and wantonly massacred everything that moved. More than thirty unarmed civilians including women and children were murdered in cold blood. Dozens were injured and left for dead or hauled away in army trucks to an unknown fate or destination. The small village was basically torched to the ground and obliterated from the map. There are reports of an old woman being killed and her daughter suffering the same fate when she expressed her grieve over her mother’s unjustified and cold bloodied murder. A toddler she was carrying was injured by the bullets that snuffed his mother’s life. The locals were later asked to bury their dead and pay taxes for the graves they dig for the mass burials.

It has become common practice for the Ethiopian soldiers and their collaborators to commit these atrocities  when they lose one of their members to accidental confrontations with the nomads. Some are killed on the mere suspicion of collaborating with the Ogaden national Liberation Front (ONLF) which justifiably calls for the liberation of their land from Ethiopian occupation. Some of the massacres come in the wake of conflicts between Somali Kat traders who try to avoid unfair taxes and collide with the Ethiopian tax collectors. The current massacre unfolded when Somali Kat traders in the area tried to recover one of their vehicles that was confiscated by the Ethiopian Tax collectors. In retaliation the army took revenge on the residents of the village who had nothing to do with the conflict and were not aware of its occurrence.

I realize that the international community has enough on its plate to care or worry about places like Jaamac-Dubbad. What makes the massacre the more painful for Somalis is the deafening silence of the so-called Somali Federal government and the multitude of autonomous enclaves in Somalia. It is their people that are being massacred without any mercy. The nomads that live in Western Somalia stretch into Somalia proper as well and have relatives on both sides of the border. Their herds move freely across the border in pursuit of water and fodder.

The remote location of places like Jaamac-Dubbad which is not easily accessible by the international media and the lack of strong leadership in Mogadishu, Garowe and Hargeisa encourages Ethiopia to commit these kinds of atrocities against ethnic Somalis. A world that does not care about the thousands of Somali youth perishing in the Mediterranean is not expected to care about the lives of ethnic Somalis being massacred by a regime that even president Obama considers to be a model for Africa.

All we can do is pray for the dead and hope for a miracle to help us get rid of the spineless leaders that Somalia has been afflicted with over the last twenty five years. Let us also pray in this holy month that we unite again so that we can protect our people against these senseless massacres.

Ali H. Abdulla
email: [email protected]


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