During its first six months of self-declared independence, Somaliland achieved modest success in assembling a government and maintaining peace under seemingly insurmountable conditions. Although laden with problems that required human and financial resources beyond its means, the new Somaliland leaders put in place the cornerstone of a foundation for a stable government to grow.
Not all Somalis, however, appreciated the direction of the government’s admittedly slow progress.
The SNM leadership remained fragmented, and clanbased factions and armed militia groups from the war competed for political prominence.
In October 1991, Somaliland’s first armed rebellion tested the political unity of Somaliland. The
Habar Awal, a minority Isaaq sub-clan, controlled Somaliland’s strategic port city of Berbera and refused to share port revenue with the government or other sub-clans. The Habar Gerhajis, the majority Isaaq subclan, acting “in the interest of the state,” attacked Berbera. By mid-1992, the attack had escalated into a civil war between the government and a coalition of clanbased militias led by the Red Flag faction of the SNM.
Although intense clashes occurred in Berbera, Burao, and Hargeisa, they did not result in major population displacement. Fatigued by war, clan elders reflected the views of the majority of Somaliland’s citizenry and overwhelmingly condemned the attack and resulting violence.
In September 1992, the xir (traditional conflict resolution system), resuscitated by clan elders at a shir in the town of Sheikh, averted potential anarchy by negotiating an end to the fighting.
Somaliland’s leaders convened a national shir in Borama in January 1993 to build upon the peace restored in September 1992. Concluding in May 1993, the shir peacefully dissolved the SNM transitional government and transferred power to a community based
system that consisted of executive, legislative, and judicial bodies. The shir also elected Mohamed
Ibrahim Egal, who had been the prime minister of British Somaliland and Somalia, the second president of Somaliland.
Discontent within the Habar Gerhajis sub-clan over the election of Egal, who was a member of the rival Habar Awal sub-clan, combined with continued factional discord within the SNM, soon shattered Somaliland’s tenuous peace.
In November 1994, clan and sub-clan tension escalated into a full-scale civil war—Somaliland’s
second internal war in a span of four years. The conflict began in the capital, Hargeisa, and by March 1995 spread west to Burao and to Somaliland’s central regions of Woqooyi Galbeed and Togdheer. The war displaced the entire population of Burao and tens of thousands of civilians in and around Hargeisa. More than one year of fighting pushed an estimated 90,000 Somalis into refugee camps in neighboring Ethiopia and uprooted an additional 200,000 people within Somaliland. The civil war destroyed the modest rehabilitation Somaliland had achieved during its first five years of self-declared independence and halted the favorable conditions that had encouraged the return of Somali refugees.
A third national shir, convened in Hargeisa in October 1996 and concluded in March 1997, again ushered official peace to Somaliland. The Hargeisa shir preserved Egal’s presidency and created a bicameral legislature, consisting of a house of parliament, elected by the populace, and the Guutri (traditional leaders), chosen by clan councils. Two-thirds of the shir representatives approved the new structure and ratified a provisional constitution requiring the government to hold a nationwide referendum in three years. Under Article 151, a vote in favor of the referendum equated approval of the provisional constitution and endorsement of the sovereignty of Somaliland.
The deep involvement of the two non-Isaaq clans, the Dolbahante and Warsangali, was the critical ingredient to the success of this peace agreement. In late- 1996, Dolbahante and Warsangali leaders realized that Isaaq clans and sub-clans, their former arch-enemies, were serious about forging a sustainable peace and began to participate actively in the peace process.
