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Shabab Concede Control of Capital to Somalia Government

Notes from Malasayachlink:

Somali is going through sever crises since the last three decades. In that period, the government and all of the institutions are completely obliterated. The civil society at large disbanded and scattered over the globe and become refuge on their country. Murderers and clan criminals subdivided the country into pieces and allowed the dumping ground for industrial waste and hiding place for terrorist from everywhere. Now the poor mass of the people of Somalia are gripped by famine, diseases and vicious clan and terrorist war devastated and exposed to total decimations. The clan leaders of Somali remain senseless and unresponsive to the huge tragedies of their people and let the famine prey on the defenseless people. Alshabab, ruthless al-Qaida affiliated terrorist group brought untold misery and punishments to the fabric of Somalia and isolated the country from international community. So the news that Alshabab abandoned Mogadishu for whatever reason is great news. The absences of terrorist group of Alshabab from Mogadishu at least allow the famine stricken people to have access to the food and aid. May Allah help the people of Somalia and horn from repeated cycle of famine, civil wars and bad elites and governments.

Shabab Concede Control of Capital to Somalia Government

By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN and MOHAMMED IBRAHIM

Published: August 6, 2011

NAIROBI, Kenya — The Shabab Islamist rebels abruptly pulled out of Mogadishu, the bullet-ridden capital of Somalia, on Saturday, leaving the entire city in the hands of the government for the first time in years and raising hopes that aid groups could now deliver aid to more famine victims unfettered.

Witnesses described truckloads of heavily armed Shabab fighters driving away under the cover of darkness and beleaguered residents pouring into the streets to cheer and jeer their departure.

“We have been dreaming of this day for the last three years,” said Abdiweli Mohamed Ali, Somalia’s new, Harvard-educated prime minister.

The Shabab’s notoriously brutal brand of Islamism has tormented Mogadishu residents for years, but more recently the rebels have also blocked international relief groups from bringing food to victims of the famine that has swept southern Somalia this summer, contributing to tens of thousands of deaths.

Aid groups hoped the Shabab retreat would allow them access to more parts of the capital, where more than 100,000 famine victims have come seeking aid. But the Shabab still controls large parts of southern Somalia, the areas worst hit by drought and famine.

The rebels said Saturday that they had “completely vacated Mogadishu for tactical purposes,” according to Ali Mohamud Rage, a Shabab spokesman. He said that the Shabab would change its strategy to “hit-and-run attacks.”

“We will be back soon,” he warned.

But in the past few months, the Shabab, who have pledged allegiance to Al Qaeda, have taken a beating in steady urban fighting against a better-armed, 9,000-strong African Union peacekeeping force. Many analysts have said the Shabab was growing weaker by the day.

The Shabab has imposed a brutal reign in areas it controlled, chopping off the hands of petty thieves, lashing women for showing their ankles and beheading anyone deemed a spy. They also banned music, television, gold teeth and even bras, branding them all un-Islamic.

The rebels have been divided over whether to let in Western aid organizations to relieve the famine. There are indications, too, that they are running out of cash.

The Shabab has prevented most Western aid groups from bringing life-saving help to the rural areas of southern Somalia it still controls. The Shabab are also blocking starving people from leaving their territory; Shabab fighters have set up their own large displaced persons camp about 25 miles from Mogadishu where they are essentially imprisoning families trying to escape Shabab territory.

The Shabab’s departure from the capital offers no guarantee that Somalia’s weak transitional government will be able to capitalize on the opportunity, or that the city’s population will rally behind the government. Somalia’s Transitional Federal Government has been propped up by millions of dollars of Western aid, including American military aid, but its leaders remain ineffectual, divided and by many accounts corrupt.

“Unfortunately, I entertain no delusions that the T.F.G. will rise to the occasion,” said J. Peter Pham, Africa director at the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based policy institute. “The only exploiting that will be taking place will be whatever schemes its ministers will hatch to profit from increased aid flows.”

As the nation faces one of the worst droughts in 60 years, many analysts are pessimistic that the government will be able to deliver. On Friday, government troops looted sacks of grain and killed several people during a riot over emergency food in a refugee camp.

Not since 2007 has the government had such an opportunity in the capital. In late 2006, Ethiopian troops stormed into Somalia and pushed out a grass-roots Islamist movement that was ruling much of the country, and for a brief spell the transitional government was in control. But within months the Shabab were waging hit-and-run attacks, and by 2008, the Shabab had seized several towns across the country and several neighborhoods in Mogadishu.

The Shabab have imported lethal Qaeda-like tactics to Somalia, including roadside bombs and suicide bombs. But Fazul Abdullah Mohamed, one of the key Shabab commanders and a wanted Qaeda agent, was recently killed in a shootout in Mogadishu, dealing the Shabab a serious setback. The United States has also inflicted casualties on the rebels in a recent drone attack. Several Mogadishu residents interviewed on Saturday were happy the Shabab was gone but a bit tentative about what it meant.

“It was good they left because they were very oppressive,” said Mohamed Yare, who was arrested by the Shabab a week ago for talking about soccer. “But, the government must come with policies to restore the security of the area abandoned by the Shabab, and if the government forces start looting cellphones and other properties,” which has happened many times before, “the Shabab might get a vacuum to return.”

Major Paddy Ankunda, a spokesman for the African Union troops in Somalia, said the peacekeepers were cautious “because it could be a trap.”

Witnesses said the Shabab fighters were heading south of Mogadishu toward Merka, Brava and other towns they control in southern Somalia. In late 2006, the militant wing of the Islamist movement that had ruled Mogadishu made a similar escape, driving all the way down to the Kenyan border where it melted away into the bush, only to regroup a few months later.

Residents of Mogadishu also said that emissaries of various warlords were already beginning to identify bases in the neighborhoods that the Shabab had just vacated, which could spell yet another problem for the government.

Mohammed Ibrahim contributed reporting from Mogadishu, Somalia.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/07/world/africa/07somalia.html?_r=1