- Government and society
- Cultural life
Somalia’s defeat in the Ogaden War strained the stability of the Siad regime as the country faced a surge of clan pressures. An abortive military coup in April 1978 paved the way for the formation of two opposition groups: the Somali Salvation Democratic Front (SSDF), drawing its main support from the Majeerteen clan of the Mudug region in central Somalia, and the Somali National Movement (SNM), based on the Isaaq clan of the northern regions. Formed in 1982, both organizations undertook guerrilla operations from bases in Ethiopia. These pressures, in addition to pressure from Somalia’s Western backers, encouraged Siad to improve relations with Kenya and Ethiopia. But a peace accord (1988) signed with the Ethiopian leader, Mengistu Haile Mariam, obliging each side to cease supporting Somali antigovernment guerrillas, had the ironic effect of precipitating civil war in Somalia.
Threatened with the closure of their bases in Ethiopia, the SNM attacked government forces in their home region, provoking a bitter conflict that left ghost towns in the hands of government forces. Ogaadeen Somali, who had been progressively absorbed into the army and militia, felt betrayed by the peace agreement with Ethiopia and began to desert, attacking Siad’s clansmen. Siad became preoccupied with daily survival and consolidated his hold on Mogadishu. Clan-based guerrilla opposition groups multiplied rapidly, following the example of the SSDF and SNM. In January 1991 forces of the Hawiye-based United Somali Congress (USC) led a popular uprising that overthrew Siad and drove him to seek asylum among his own clansmen. Outside Mogadishu, all the main clans with access to the vast stores of military equipment in the country set up their own spheres of influence. Government in the south had largely disintegrated and existed only at the local level in the SSDF-controlled northeast region. In May 1991 the SNM, having secured control of the former British Somaliland northern region, declared that the 1960 federation was null and void and that henceforth the northern region would be independent and known as the Republic of Somaliland.
In Mogadishu the precipitate appointment of a USC interim government triggered a bitter feud between rival Hawiye clan factions. The forces of the two rival warlords, Gen. Maxamed Farax Caydiid (Muhammad Farah Aydid) of the Somali National Alliance (SNA) and Cali Mahdi Maxamed (Ali Mahdi Muhammad) of the Somali Salvation Alliance (SSA), tore the capital apart and battled with Siad’s regrouped clan militia, the Somali National Front, for control of the southern coast and hinterland. This brought war and devastation to the grain-producing region between the rivers, spreading famine throughout southern Somalia. Attempts to distribute relief food were undermined by systematic looting and rake-offs by militias. In December 1992 the United States led an intervention by a multinational force of more than 35,000 troops, which imposed an uneasy peace on the principal warring clans and pushed supplies into the famine-stricken areas. The military operation provided support for a unique effort at peacemaking by the United Nations.
In January and March 1993 representatives of 15 Somali factions signed peace and disarmament treaties in Addis Ababa, but by June the security situation had deteriorated. American and European forces, suffering an unacceptable number of casualties, were withdrawn by March 1994. The UN force was reduced to military units mainly from less-developed countries, and the clan-based tensions that had precipitated the civil war remained unresolved. The remaining UN troops were evacuated a year later. Over the next few years there were several failed attempts at peace as fighting persisted between the various clans; the SSA and the SNA continued to be two of the primary warring factions.
In 1998 another portion of the war-torn country—the SSDF-controlled area in the northeast, identified as Puntland—announced its intentions to self-govern. Unlike the self-declared Republic of Somaliland, Puntland did not claim complete independence from Somalia—it instead sought to remain a part of the country as an autonomous region, with the goal of reuniting the country as a federal republic.
1Proclamation of the “Republic of Somaliland” in May 1991 on territory corresponding to the former British Somaliland (which unified with the former Italian Trust Territory of Somalia to form Somalia in 1960) had not received international recognition as of November 2013. This entity represented about a quarter of Somalia’s territory.
2The government controlled little of Somalia in December 2014.
3The Upper House may have a maximum of 54 members; it had yet to be created as of Dec. 1, 2014.
|Official name||Jamhuuriyadda Federaalka ee Soomaaliya1 (Somali); Jumhūriyyat al-Sūmāl al-Fīdīraliyyah (Arabic) (Federal Republic of Somalia)|
|Form of government||federal republic2 with two legislative houses (House of the People ; Upper House )|
|Head of state||President: Hassan Sheikh Mohamud2|
|Head of government||Prime Minister: Omar Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke2|
|Official languages||Somali; Arabic|
|Monetary unit||Somali shilling (Shilin Soomaali; So.Sh.)|
|Population||(2013 est.) 10,252,000|
|Total area (sq mi)||246,201|
|Total area (sq km)||637,657|
|Urban-rural population||Urban: (2012) 38.4%|
Rural: (2012) 61.6%
|Life expectancy at birth||Male: (2012) 48.9 years|
Female: (2012) 52.8 years
|Literacy: percentage of population age 15 and over literate||Male: (2002) 25.1%|
Female: (2002) 13.1%
|GNI per capita (U.S.$)||(2011) 107|