Somaliland’s “Democratic” Parliamentary Elections

 Somaliland’s parliamentary election was,supposedly, democratic where everyone was supposed to get a single vote. However, that was not the case. The reasons why this happened are nepotism and corruption.

 It’s well known among Somalis that each person should do whatever it takes to get his/her clansmen to be in the government or to have some sort of a prestigious job. This was the reason why the vast majority of Somalilanders voted numerous times and a lot of them got paid by the candidates whom they were voting for. A man whom I asked who he voted for answered with a laugh and said, “What do you mean? Son, if you don’t vote for your clansmen, you’ll have to have another source where you can get anything from. I did vote for my uncle. Xaqsoor!”

In order to really analyze the problem and its source, we must understand why nepotism and corruption exist in the Somali society. Somalis are organized according to their clans. People in the same clan are basically just like a huge family and therefore support each other for one reason or another. This brings us to the next issue: Corruption. When government officials favor their clansmen, this will bring corruption. People from other clans might bribe the government official to get hired or get whatever they want because their credentials won’t matter like as much as their clan does.

Candidates don’t show their credentials or why they should be in the parliament unlike other candidates. For them, it’s about whom they know not what they know. The voting process is basically to go and vote for you clansmen as many times as possible. That is the reason why I didn't vote. Since I don’t know anything about the candidate I am voting for, how do I know that I am not voting for the next Hitler?

The outcome of this messed up system was a gun fight. On Dec 7^th 2012, there had been a gun fight between the police and a political group named Xaqsoor. This led to the death of two people and the injury of many others. Xaqsoor’s claim was that the party that is currently in power messed up the numbers on purpose and gave themselves 7 seats while giving them only 4. This should not be a surprise given how people have been voting and the corruption “teeming” inside the government’s bones.