Canadian risks 'everything' to make a better Somalia.

(Nairobi, January 16, 2008 Ceegaag Online)  

Normally when one is named a cabinet minister one can at least count on a euphoric reaction from friends and family thrilled by the prospect of good things to come.

Not for Ahmed Abdisalan Adan, who is noticing a tone of ominous condolence in the hundreds of voicemail messages arriving on his cellphone from Somalis the world over. Back this week in his broken ancestral home in a new role as Somalia's minister of information, the 47-year-old Somali Canadian is under no illusion of safety. Some people, quite possibly, will want him dead.

But in many ways, says Adan, the danger is no greater than it has been since he abandoned his comfortable middle-class life in Ottawa eight years ago to pioneer Horn-Afrik, Mogadishu's first truly independent radio station. Seven of his colleagues were assassinated in that span, including the bombing death last August of Somali Canadian Ali Sharmarke, with whom Adan co-founded the station.

"When I listen to my phone messages I can hear people praying for me," Adan told the Star in an interview in Nairobi last week in what may well have been the last day of his life without a bodyguard.

"It is not like in Canada, where becoming a cabinet minister is an upgrade, economically, socially and politically. In Somalia, becoming a cabinet minister means you are taking a huge risk with your reputation, with your life, everything. But it also means you have a chance to actually do something to make it better."

Home for now will be the south-central town of Baidoa, where the fledgling United Nations' backed Transitional Federal Government clings to a foothold, readying to negotiate its way into renewing its grip on chaotic Mogadishu.

There, Adan hopes to instil in government the same sense of national unity that earned HornAfrik the 2002 Canadian Journalists for Free Expression award for exceptional courage, a citation that recognized the difficulty of telling the truth despite threats and intimidation from rival militia warlords.

"When things are this bad – and there is no doubt this past year was the worst ever for Somalia – I believe there is also a new opportunity for hope," said Adan.

"The international community and the regional players are beginning to show an interest again, understanding that you can't just step aside and watch dirty wars play out. And among Somalis, there is a level of fatigue that suggests a readiness to try things a different way. It is time to create opportunity for a better life, because that is all that 95 per cent of Somalis want in this world."

Adan and his colleagues already managed this on a microscopic level, bringing unprecedented opportunity to an estimated 300 young Somali journalists who passed through HornAfrik's training program since it erected its first signal tower in Mogadishu in 1999. The results put the station on the map, giving Somalis a taste of national identity that had nothing to do with tribal politics.

"The goal was to put all the voices in the Somali tent on the air and we succeeded, against all odds. We were challenged, we got shut down, we got shot at. We lost good people. But we also proved something profound – we proved that the clan was simply a place that people retreated when they were in trouble," said Adan.

"When people had another opportunity, they immediately stepped out of their tribal identity and simply became Somalis. HornAfrik became a magnet for hundreds of desperate young Somalis who knocked on our door, aching for a chance to join us."

In the face of at least two separate proxy wars threatening his country – one pitting the regional interests of Ethiopia and Eritrea, a second involving the U.S.-led campaign against global terror – Adan says the re-establishment of a functioning state is the key to progress.

To that end, he hopes to encourage greater involvement of the Somali diaspora, including the expat community in Toronto, where Adan got his first glimpse of Canada when he arrived as a refugee in 1989.

"Every Somali in Toronto talks about the situation every day. And they send money – last year, an estimated $1 billion came into Somalia from the extended family around the world," he said.

"But that is not enough. We have to reverse the brain drain – we need more Somalis from Toronto, from London, from everywhere, to bring their skills and expertise back to Somalia to help put things back together," said Adan, who ran an innovative employment centre for the Ottawa-Carleton Municipality after taking his Masters in public administration at Hamilton's McMaster University.

"That is my message to the diaspora: you can sit there in Toronto and continue to criticize all the things that Somalia lacks. Or you can come back and actually try to do something about it. Your country needs you now."

Source: The Star

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