The British Media, its ignorance and misconception of Somalia Every time something happens in one end of the world, the British media is known for two things: indignant haste and sensational reportage. These are the two starting pointing that on which the understanding and analytical basis of many British journalists is based. The drive for increased speed of news delivery informed by quick profiteering and rating-driven craze always increases the likelihood of distorted news being made available for public consumption. The majority of the public, which is too busy to conduct their own critical analysis and filtering of news, may end up taking as facts stories that don't conform with the realities on the ground. Furthermore, stories related to developing countries do not usually attract much interest from great many. Thus, these unwillingness for critical analysis of news makes entire societies in the Third World (especially in the Muslim world) become the victims of media misrepresentation or misinformation. Among these disadvantaged societies include the Somali society which has fallen prey to the British media. Inside the United Kingdom, the media has often lambasted the Somali community as being 'donkey eaters, phoney asylum-seekers, terrorists, thugs, dangerous criminals and what have you. As a result, the Somali community has become one of the most vilified communities in the UK. However, this very community that is being vilified as criminals suffers daily victimization. Although the Somali community has no more criminals that any other community in Britain, and victims than criminals, the media expediently ignores this. Not even the so-called neutrality of the British Broadcasting Corporation does justice to Somalis living in the UK. The few and far between research or study that has been conducted about the Somali community has repeatedly noted that the community is the 'most victimized ethnic community in the UK', and also, recent research conducted by the University of Sheffield has indicated that Somalis, as a result of under representation, 'have become an invisible community'. Albeit this invisibility, you would think that they would not attract the media's dreaded and negative attention. The moment a crime is committed by an individual of an ethnic minority background, or even when illegal asylum seekers are mentioned in inter-party debates, the media always finds the Somali community as its prime target, and surprisingly enough the point of contact for these 'journo-vultures' is uniformly Somalis who have no understanding of UK life, let alone able to speak the English language to a good degree. Quite often, therefore, the media gets the materials it requires for creating negative and sensational reportage of misinformation, which abviously generates an upsurge of public curiousity. Lately, however, the media couldn't get enough materials from the Somalis living in the UK for their news-doctoring, but unsurprisingly, the journo-vultures have decided to tie Somalis to another negative term just to generate more misinformation. Soon after the tragic 7/7 bombings in London, Somalis have achieved to basket another negative term to the ones they already possessed, and that term is: terrorists. This is because what one man had sawed, is what the entire community has come to reap. Such fate isn’t new to Somalis in the UK. It has happened before, when one man who is infected with HIV/AIDS committed a heinous crime. That man's face, as is usual with the media, has been made to represent the image of the community as a whole. However, whenever a Somali kid is killed (as is often the case), he/she will get nothing close to the attention the one Somali criminal gets from the media. Just few days ago, a young Somali man was brutally assaulted while travelling on a bus and has suffered multiple fractures. As a result of the assault, the young man fell into a comma with little chance of recovery. Now, this boy's ordeal is not known to many outside the Somali community. Few weeks before that another young Somali was killed by the police, and what happened? Nothing whatsoever! 'Nothing is to be done' is the precarious fate in which the Somali community has come to find itself, and nothing is more depressing than being left in this state of helplessness with no end at sight. Yet, the Somali still calls itself British while the British media labels it terrorists. What an endurance that is! As if this helplessness needed to be deepened into new lows, the media is now bracing itself for more sophisticated fabrication of news about Somalia, the country and its people. I call this 'more sophisticated fabrication' because while domestic reportage about British Somalis is easily countered with the provision of another side of the story, the stories fabricated about Somalia are not easily countered or understood by the majority of the public. When the public is not fully acquainted with international issues such as concerns Somalia, the media’s inclination to make news out of nothing is highly increased. A case in point is a news report that had appeared in The Independent on 17/06/06, which if read by individuals well informed in Somali issues, would find it ridiculous. What is ridiculous about Kim Sengupta's (who is apparently in Mogadishu) article is her inference that the Islamic militias who have captured Jowhar, Somalia, had 'American and British accents'. She says: "What has also emerged is that many of his fighters are Somalis returning from the Diaspora to the West. Those storming the buildings in Jowhar, just 50 miles from Mogadishu, spoke English with American and British accents and the same tones can be heard among others in Mogadishu. Some said they did not want their photographs taken because they wanted to seek work in the West" The Independent Sengupta says she is writing about Jowhar which she cannot visit, yet she claims these Islamic Courts Union fighters had American and British accents. While in fact Kim cannot visit Jowhar just yet and thus means that she is relying on word of mouth, which purports as 'news'. Sengupta is unethical in not realizing that what she designs to be news will have wider implications for the status of Somalis living in the West. One implication is to make it seem as if Somalis in the West are (Taliban-style) terrorists who go back to an African Afghanistan which is untrue. Contrary to what she implies, Somalis rarely go back to Somalia to fight and also Somalia is not Afghanistan. Therefore to imply otherwise is to commit a journalistic crime against Diaspora Somalis and those living in Somalia. The media must not prey on poor Somalis wherever they are (especially in the UK) and also public broadcasting institutions must be responsible enough not to tarnish the image of the community needlessly. Ignorance about the affairs of the community is not an entitlement to fabricate negative reportage about it. That said, just as all other ethnic communities living in the UK receive their equal opportunity for representation and integration, Somalis must also be allowed the same. Source: The Somali Analyst www.thesa.motime.com/

people come to the chatroom

18 Feb, 2006: Demonstration in London - http://www.globalcivility.co.uk/index.htm Supporters List of organisations participating in the Muslim Action Committee (MAC). International Muslims Organisation Markazi Jamate ahle Sunnat Jamate Ahle Sunnah Europe Sunni Confederation of Mosques Islamic Human Rights Commission World Islamic Mission Hizb ut Tahrir Stop Political Terror Prisoners of West Salam Magazine Ahlul Bayt Islamic Centre Leeds Al Huda Islamic Centre - Glasgow Al Ikhlaas Al Jamia Al Karimia Trust Al Karam Mosque & Community Centre Al Madina Mosque Al-Hira Education Centre Al-Khazra Markazi Masjid Amir-e-Millat Mosque & Community Centre Anjuman Muhabban-e-Rasool Jamia Masjid Gosia Anjuman Naqeebul Islam As-Shifa & Karimia Mosque Bain-ul-Aqwami Anjuman Tabligh-ul-Islam Banbury Madni Mosque Birmingham Islamic Centre Burton Muslim Mosque Central Jamia Mosque Anjuman ul Muslameen Ltd Central Jamia Mosque Ghamkol Sharif Central Jamia Mosque Madni Central Mosque - Wolverhampton Central Mosque of Brent Central Mosque Razvia Burton Central Mosque Redditch Conwy Islamic Society Crescent International Dar Al Quran Islamic Centre Dar ul Islam Central Mosque & Islamic Education Centre Dar Ul Uloom Qadiria Jilania Darul Uloom Islamia Ghausia Darul Uloom Qadria Jalania Dar-ul-Uloom Jamia Chashtiah Monir-ul-Islam Derby Jamia Mosque Dudley Mosque Easton Masjid ELYF - Youth Forum Fajr Youth Association Free Babar Ahmed Campaign Ghausia Jamia Mosque & Welfare Association Ghausia Mosque Trust Ghausia Qasmia Trust Mosque & Community Centre Ghausiah Mosque Ghosia Mosque Ghousia Jamia Mosque Ghousia Mosque Ghousiah Mosque Gilani Noor Mosque Golden Mosque Gousia Razvia Jamia Mosque & Islamic Centre Gulzar-e-Madina Mosque Hanfi - Sunni Jamia Masjid Eraza & Muslim Association Hanfia Mosque & Islamic Cultural Centre Haqqani House Sufi Centre Harrow Central Mosque Hawzeh Elmieh of London Hazrat Dewan Hazoori Centre Hazrat Sultan Bahu Trust Jamiah Islamiyah Mosque Hounslow Jamia Masjid & Islamic Centre Ilford Islamic Centre Imam Hussain Mosque Institute of Islamic Studies International Women Organisation Iraqi Welfare Association Islam Channel Islamic Centre (Noorani Mosque) Islamic Centre England Islamic Centre of England Islamic Centre of Sakina Trust Islamic Centre Redhill Islamic Centre, Maida Vale, London Islamic College for Advanced Studies Islamic cultural & Educational Association - Madni Jamia Masjid Islamic Cultural Society Luton Central Mosque Islamic Education Centre Jamaa Masjid - Dundee Islamic Society Jamait-ul-Muslemeen Jamia Masjid Jamatia Islamic Centre Jame Masjid Aston Jameah Fatimiah Jami Islamiyah Hazarat Sultan Bahu Trust Mosque Jamia al Karim Mosque & Gloucester Islamic Trust Jamia Ghausia Jamia Ghausia Mosque Jamia Islamia Ghousia Trust Jamia Islamia of Manchester - Central Mosque Jamia Masjid Ghausia Jamia Masjid Ghosia Jamia Masjid Gulshani Baghdad Jamia Masjid Hanfia Association Jamia Masjid Hanfia Ghousia Jamia Masjid Islamic Centre Jamia Masjid Sultania Jamia Mosque Jamia Mosque Eagle Street Jamia Mosque Ghausia Jamia Mosque Gulzar-e-Habib & Education Centre Jamia Mosque Heckmondwike Jamia Mosque Jamiyat Tabligh-ul-Islam Mosque Jamiah Mosque Anwar-e-Mustafa Jamiyate Tablige Islam Masjid Keighley Jamia Mosque Khanka Naqshbandia Mosque Kharza Central Mosque KSIMC Khoja Shia Ithna Asheri Community of London LAMP - Association of Muslims Professionals Lenton Muslim Centre Liverpool Islamic Cultural Centre & Mosque Loughborough Mosque Madina Mosque Madina Mosque Madina Mosque & Muslim Welfare House Madni Masjid Madrassa Darbar Ali Ghamkol Sharif Madrassa Gharib Nawaz Association Madrassa Zia-ul-Quran Madrassa Zia-ul-Quran Middlesborough Madressa Islamia Rizvia Mahabbah Unlimited Majlis Ulema Shia Europe Makkah Mosque & Muslim Community Centre Manchester Central Mosque & Islamic Cultural Centre Manchester Islamic Centre Markazi Jamia Masjid Anwar-e-Madina Markazi Jamia Masjid Bilal Markazi Jamia Masjid Ghausia Markazi Jamia Masjid Ghosia Markazi Jamia Masjid Gulzar-e-Madina Markazi Jamia Mosque Ghousia Ahl e Sunnah wal Jamat Markzi Jame Mosque Riza & Islamic Centre Masjid Anwar-e-Madina Masjid Gows-ul-Azam (Dulwich Islamic Cultural Centre) Masjid-e-Ghosia Masjid-e-Noor-ul-Islam Meadows Muslim Action Group & Mosque - Muslim Centre Misbahul Uloom Urdu Centre Mosaue & Islamic Centre of Aberdeen Mosque & Islamic Centre of Brent Mosque Raza - Islamic Educational & Cultural Centre Muslim Community Centre & Mosque Muslim Directory Muslim Prisoner Support Camp MYA - Youth Association Bedfordshire MYA - Youth Association Hertfordshire Nagina Mosque & Urdu School Naqshbandia Mosque North Manchester Jamia Mosque & Ibadur Rahman Trust North Watford Mosque Nur-ul-Islam Mosque Islamic Trust Peterborough Mosque Q news RAHMA Racial Attack and Harassment Monitoring Association Ramadan Foundation Raza Jamia Mosque & Islamic Centre Raza Mosque Rizvia Mosque & Muslim Welfare Association Shah Jehan Mosque - Woking Shair-e-Rabbani Islamic Centre & Mosque Shere Rabbani Mosque Spring Organisation St. Albans Islamic Centre Sufat-ul-Islam Taiyabah Mosque Telford Central Mosque The Islamic Centre - Leicester Central Mosque The Islamic Centre - Leicester Mosque The New Jamiyat Tabligh-ul-Islam Mosque Tunstall Mosque Walthem Forest Islamic Association - Jamia Masjid Ghosia Washwood Heath Muslim Centre Watford Jamia Mosque Werneth Jamia Mosque WIPE - World Islamic Propagation Enterprise Wycombe Islamic Mission & Mosque Yvonne Ridley ---

Kanshare: To each his own! Don't forget to add the her. We don't wish to judge you politically incorrect . It is the little things my dear, little things.

Does the chat room have specific times that it works and other that it doesn't? Just wondering.

24 Dead in Political Violence in Ethiopia June 8, 2005 10:02 a.m. EST Niladri Sekhar Nath - All Headline News Foreign Correspondant ADDIS, Ethiopia (AHN) – At least 24 people were killed when security forces opened fire on violent protestors on Wednesday in Ethiopia. The demonstrators were protesting against election results. The Associated Press reports 11 bodies were found at the capital's main hospital, while another 13 bodies were received by two other hospitals. Hundreds of injured were also being treated in those hospitals. Information Minister Bereket Simon, the ruling party spokesman, tells AP he did not have an exact death toll. He held opposition Coalition for Unity and Democracy responsible for the protests. According to AP, Bereket says, "Today, some of their followers - and some who wanted to use this opportunity for looting - have gathered in some parts of Addis and disrupted the smooth functioning of life. So, the government had to use the anti-riot police to resolve the situation." Seven buses were destroyed and businesses and banks were damaged. Bereket also says, “These people were committed to disrupting the smooth functioning of civil life and law and order, so we had to protect people." On the other hand, a Coalition for Unity and Democracy leader said the party was not behind the protest. Vice Chairman Berhanu Nega says, "Our sense is that the government is deliberately targeting us and fomenting violence to stop the electoral process and then blaming it on the opposition. We have been saying all along that the public must be calm and patient and wait for the outcome of the investigations into the election." http://www.allheadlinenews.com/articles/2236478670

One Big Mac? You want a rat with that?

W/Salaam. ^ But you do not refute the charge that the salafis are protectors of leaders that are collaborative with non-Muslims (who can be classed direct enemies), than they do with Muslims? Shall we cover our eyes about this, to remain good Muslims? PS: Welcome to the forum.

Groups like the Salafis provide the moral foundations upon the subjugation of Muslim masses is conducted. Their moral justification of the most corrupt leaders involves the discouragement of questioning. It is as if a Muslim is kept ignorant intentionally to ensure that that Muslim's never acquires an understanding of any sort. This is more like the cripling of the Muslim mind, or the disuse of thought in personal affairs. He/she can't speak against what he/she percieves to be wrong, because if he/she speaks they have committed a sin. Or they cannot question the authority because it is a taboo. Or if the authority has a sort of democracy, they cannot oppose that state, while at the same time they cannot be part of it. In others they cannot do anything. They must thus stay down and subjugated 'cos that has more ajir than doing other things. This is plain nonsense really. This group (Salafis) should be disposed of, that is, if the Muslim Ummah prefers dignity to indignity.

^^^ Wait till I get my papers ready, you will see .

The title of the article was 'The Dark Side of Borame Town and its Residents' and not 'Borama is an evil town'. The author of the article it seems, though disdainfully depicting Borama, doesn't in any place say 'Borama is evil town' and nothing else. His title rather portrays Borama as having a 'darker' side, which means there is a brighter side too. If he insists that Borama has a dark side only then the author will be guilty of logical fallacy. What makes darkness is brightness. So Wind, whatever the initial title of the article, you seem to have doctored it - to show, that is, your inconsiderateness and contempt. I am sure if you could've posted the initial article with its original title, you could've deflected all blame from yourself. But now that cannot be the case now. You are as much implicated in this mud-slinging as the author is. You have doctored the title to give the artilce an edge and to show the level of your enmity and venom.

^^^ Maybe Lidia is from Brava. Remember the portugese Vasco De Gama history in East African coast? There are decendent of portugese origins living in places such as Marka and Brava, I heard. In Mombasa, Kenya I remember the story of 'forte jesus' which he (i think it was de gama) build and is a tourist attraction even today. So if Lidia traces her origin back to the portugese, my talk about the early portugese (when portugal and spain were main colonizers) may be relevant to what she's saying.

Toward A New Country in East Africa by Graham Green Somewhere in East Africa there lies a green valley that is often referred to as Nomansland. It received this name for two reasons. First, almost nobody has lived there during the past two centuries. Second, for a long time the surrounding states, those of Ethiopia, British Somaliland and French Somaliland, showed little interest. It was only in 1954 that this nomansland, until then a white spot on the political map of the United Nations, received its color. It was then that the UN divided it among two sovereigns, the larger part going to Ethiopia, the smaller to British Somaliland. When I visited this beautiful valley for the first time, I instantly saw its potential as a new country. Like Galt's Gulch, it is surrounded by mountains, which gives it privacy. It has a pleasant, temperate climate due to its elevation of 1500 metres (4900 ft). Its size of 6500 km 2 (2400 square miles) makes it slightly larger than Jamaica and six times larger than Hong Kong. With modern cultivating techniques it could easily feed a million people. My big question was, why are there almost no villages in this valley? The answer soon came. The British had reserved it for nomads, i.e. suppliers of meat to their ships going through the Red Sea to Asia. When I asked the nomads of this valley whether they were interested in becoming an independent country, they answered positively. They said that their tribe, like any other Somali tribe, is sovereign, taking no orders from another tribe, or from a state. Just the same, they offered to discuss my suggestion with the Republic of Somaliland, established in 1991, which professes to welcome foreign investors. The African continent has the reputation of being in a perpetual mess. But who created that image? The proponents of state order, for sure, who regret that the Africans reject that order. Indeed, since its decolonisation, Africa has been faced with a choice between two different political systems: state government, which is authoritarian, and tribal government, which is libertarian. A country is libertarian when its inhabitants are free to exercise the economic activity of their choice, including that of establishing a police force or court of justice; it is authoritarian when its policemen monopolise their services. In a libertarian society there are several independent police forces and, as a result, several (competing) systems of law; in an authoritarian society there is only one system of law, called state law. When a police force monopolises its trade, we call that force 'a state'. A libertarian society is therefore known as a stateless society. Many people believe that being an authoritarian is just as honorable a position as being a libertarian. But the right to establish a police force or a judiciary is a human right, grounded in natural law. That law consists of the rights and obligations inherent in human nature. The authoritarian option, therefore, infringes upon natural law. In fact, all authoritarian political systems, democracy included, can rightly be said to be of a criminal nature. Most experts on tribal government hold that a society is stateless when its governments lacks permanent offices, lacks a bureaucracy, lacks a hierarchy and lacks full-time professionals performing the functions of government. They agree that at least a dozen African tribes fit into that category. But if one defines statelessness as the libertarians are doing, then there are almost 2.000 tribes that are stateless. Indeed, there are some 400 million rural Africans who still live with tribal government. Therefore, one can say without exaggeration that there are 400 million stateless people in Africa, 400 million libertarians. It has been said that the Africans lack the skills for establishing a state and that, therefore, there is no virtue in their libertarianism. But this hypothesis has never been substantiated. On the contrary, George Ayittey from Ghana, as well as several other eminent scholars, has shown that statelessness in Africa is there by design, not by accident. He points to three facts: (1) several African tribes succeeded in regulating the lives of their subjects in frightening detail; (2) in most other tribes there exists a legend of a dictator whose reign was so oppressive that the tribe foreswore dictatorship forever; (3) almost all African tribes organise their government in such a way that no politician can ever hope to accumulate any power over his fellow tribesmen. Let's analyze these three points in more detail. Prior to the colonial period, about half a dozen of Africa's 2,000-odd tribes had organised themselves as into states. The State of Dahomey, for instance, lasted for more than 200 years, until the end of the 19th century. It had a powerful army and an efficient bureaucracy. Says one scholar (A.A. Boahen, Topics in West African History, New York, Longman 1986): "The farmers in each village were counted by officials of the ministry of agriculture and the tax paid in kind by each was fixed according to the assessment made of the villages' total production. Livestock was also counted and taxed. The kings of Dahomey regularly conducted a population census to get an accurate estimate of the number of people to be taxed... or conscripted." Two other writers (G.T. Stride and C. Ifeka, Peoples and Empires of West Africa, Lagos, Thomas Nelson, 1971) have this to say about the State of Dahomey: "The entire administrative machine was ruthlessly efficient. Headed by rulers of rare political talent and backed by people of great military skill and courage, it was a dynamic political organism." As for legends, listen to this one. Once upon a time, the Habar Ghidir Sa'aad clan (central Somalia) decided to have a ruler. No sooner had he been appointed than he issued a decree that he would eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner nothing but the marrow of goats, so as to secure eternal youth. He called for 25 goats to be slaughtered in the morning, another 25 at mid-day and yet another 25 in the evening. After the first day of his reign, the elders of the clan came together. Not because they feared for their leader's stomach, but because they had calculated that it would take only a short time for the clan's wealth to be consumed. So, collectively, they killed their new ruler, vowing never to have a dictator again. As for structure, Africa's tribal governments are organised as follows. In each village one finds a chief. Always, he is accompanied by three men who are both his advisors and his guardians. The role of the chief is to execute the decisions of the Council of Elders, who, in turn, must seek the consensus of the village assembly. In quite a number of tribes, a dictator is instituted during times of war, but such ruler is stripped of his powers as soon as peace returns. During peace time, chiefs are carefully watched by the Council of Elders. Many an African chief lost his chieftaincy by stepping outside the lines drawn by his Council. The tribe which owns the green valley that caught my attention offers a good example. During the 1930's it deposed its king because he had signed a pact with the State of Ethiopia without a mandate to that effect from the Council of Elders. Another time-tested device to prevent the creation of a state is secession. Each African family is free to leave its community when it disagrees with the decisions of its leaders. Of the chief that has so mismanaged that his villagers have all deserted, it is said that he is 'chief of the pumpkins'. Some observers of tribal government point to the existence of kings among the Somalis. True, but they have no power. During political deliberations a king keeps his mouth shut. In some tribes he pulls a blanket over his head during the meetings of the Council. When the Elders have taken their decision, the king is requested to speak up. He then removes his blanket and says:"and so it has been decided". Indeed, a Somali king is little more than a rubber stamp and an archive. Given this almost obsessive fear of the Africans that a state may emerge in their midst, one wonders why the Europeans and Americans are so much at ease with monopolised government. The French historian Bertrand de Jouvenel wrote superbly on this in his On Power, The Natural History of its Growth, republished in 1993 by the Liberty Fund in Indianapolis. He writes: "From the twelfth to the eighteenth century, governmental authority (in Europe) grew continuously. The process was understood by all who saw it happening; it stirred them to incessant protest and to violent reaction. In later times its growth has continued at an accelerated pace... And now we no longer understand the process, we no longer protest, we no longer react. This quiescence of ours is a new thing, for which the State has to thank the smoke-screen in which it has wrapped itself." De Jouvenel points to the state's cunning in hiding its profoundly criminal character. One way of doing this is by making people believe that there is no alternative to the state. The states achieve this in many ways, including sabotaging efforts to bring stateless governments to life, for instance, by sending their secret agents to create havoc. Therefore, experiments with statelessness are best conducted in places with a large percentage of libertarians. Given the large number of sub- Saharan states that face hostile, libertarian populations, Africa will be a fine testing ground. In some of its countries the power of the state doesn't reach much farther than the capital city and the main airport and seaport. Attempts at levying taxes beyond those limits often fail. Some of these states have an annual budget of less than ten million US dollars, and will do anything to live another year. The most libertarian of all African nations is surely that of the Somalis. They are the only nation, thus far, which abolished statehood after gaining its independence, which returned to its indigenous political tradition. It is true that quite a few jobless politicians in Somalia try to revive the state, often plotting with foreign states, including the USA. But when the US and the UN tried to impose statehood on the Somalis in 1993, they successfully defended their newly won freedom. Thus, the Somalis bore out a pet libertarian theory that free nations need not fear foreign armies unless their soldiers are ready to wipe out the entire population. Tribal government in Somalia is eminently suitable for a rather static, pastoral way of life. Up till now, it had only little exposure to the dynamics of the world market. Without this exposure, these tribal governments will not be able to serve the needs of the rapidly expanding Somali business community. Unfortunately, the Somali politicians have not yet given up their efforts to replace tribal government by a state. Obviously, they are unaware that this is tantamount to erecting a big wall between the population and the world market, a wall that will slow down the development of the Somali nation. These politicians are unaware that a nation can connect almost instantly with the world market provided it remains stateless. But is no use telling them that. No Somali politician will listen to, or act upon, such advice. In fact, the only way of letting the Somalis travel the way to peace and prosperity is by establishing a small model country in their midst, populated with dynamic foreign businessmen who base themselves on the fundamentals of Somali society. Such a model country would show in practice how a nation can function without having a state. Very quickly such a mini country would start to prosper. Indeed, it would accumulate wealth several times faster than if it would have been organised as a nation- state. Such a country would be both a model and a training ground. Any Somali would be welcome to settle there in order to engage in entrepreneurial, educational and scientific activities. In this way, this mini-country would quickly become the gateway through which the Somalis would enter the world market. In their efforts to develop their politics and economics, the Somalis have sought help from all sorts of foreign agencies, both governmental and non-governmental. But the help offered was always contingent on the pre-condition that the Somalis part with their own political culture, that they institute a state. These agencies hold that the Somali culture forms an obstacle to economic development. Yet, many a development economist knows from bitter experience that nations develop only when they cherish their own culture. Up till recently, there was no way in which the Somalis could get around these opponents of their culture. But recently, several associations of international businessmen have been founded who respect statelessness and are both willing and able to create, anywhere in the world, a haven for free enterprise. The existence of these associations spells a bright future for the Somalis. Finally they can team up with their likes abroad. No longer need they be subservient to their politically-minded fellow tribesmen who boast of their expertise in begging for foreign aid. Henceforth the Somalis can develop their country free of politics, free of a state, yet skilfully, profitably and proudly engaged in world-wide trade. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nuune iyo Muraad...lol "Soomaali aragtayaaba yaab aragtay" Sidii nin yaasaa ah oo yaabis lagu sooray, Oo sarqaansan sidii sow maan qaraaryoonin....