As students do after taking exam, interviewees recall the questions they were asked, reflect on the theme that guided the interview and the responses that weren’t as clear as they wanted them to be. As an interviewee, Hinbir reviewed the interviews in the light of S/land’s current social and political system and came to know that the theme of the interview was all about the abuse of political system. He then asked himself the questions: How did politics begin? Why people always talk about politics? Who can enhance and elaborate political ethics and who can abuse or
misuse it?
Hinbir couldn’t figure out how did politics begin and decided to check it out. But he thought that the goodness and badness of politics depend much upon how those who govern the people use political system. He based his thought tbat the goodness and badness depend much upon how politics is used on dividing the people into leaders and the led – those who govern and those that are governed. And to ensure whether his assumptions were right or wrong, Hinbir decided to see Hanad in order to know more about politics and its accompanying ethics.
Keeping that in mind, Hinbir came to Hanad and said after they greeted with each other warmly, “Whatever we encounter and experience, whether pain
or pleasure, as we make plans in our life,
is a direct reflection of what we aim at in life in order to have different tastes. What is it that motivates humans to have different tastes, Mr. Hanad?”
“People need different looks. They hurry
here, too slow there, too strong here, too weak there. They try one thing today and
do another tomorrow. At times they fail in some things; at other times they succeed
in others. The bond of need and necessity compells people to keep trying things constantly in many different ways,” Hanad returned.
“There are times when people own more than what they need and yet do things in different ways in order to possess what is much more than what they already have. What does doing things in different ways mean in such times as this?”
“Trials and tests always turn out to have
many layers of meaning. The discovery of each new layer changes the perception of
the whole. The theory of evolution proves
this point.”
“Out of wisdom of the past,” Hanad continued, “helps us over the present.
History gives people the evidence to
analyse and explain problems in the
past and puts people in a position to
see patterns that might be invisible in
the present. If we do not refer to the
past as we do in schools, it is because
we want something that we can apply to the present more directly. It is fine when past experience leads to a prophecy
of the future,” replied Hanad.
“How history helps humans perceive the present and predict the future,” demanded Hinbir
“Generations always pass inspiring and energizing habits onto each other through a shared values, not through means of faltering views. By examining and analysing old tools, new generations can elaborate how old generations made things as they are today. Without inheriting hints and hypothesis of evolutionary changes, a nation may falter, argue or otherwise fail. People cannot change their past, but can change their future provided that they
don’t repeat the same mistakes.”
“How people can change their future? Can they change their destiny individually or collectively? Which option do you recommend, Mr. Hanad?”
“I have often been told that there is strength in unity. Such belief is substantiated by thoughts like two heads are better than one and united we stand and divided we fall. This brings us to another saying that one is lonely, two is company, and three a crowd.”
“What is the importance above sayings raise?”
“The first involves unity and the second involves how human life originally began, that all of us must recall and recount,” replied Hanad.
“‘How human life has begun? Knowing how our life began is for me very interesting issue.”
“Human life is a journey that began from a little procession. The procession began from a line of two or three individuals moving in an orderly manner. The orderly movement grew into a pattern predicting its future. The prediction then bred a perception.”
“What do you mean by perception?”
“Perception is the ability to become aware of the sense that, for example, moving from one place to another promises a respite, but not a resolution that can by definition deliver an eternal rest.”
“And what was that promised respite?”
“The promised respite of that little procession was that out of the company a crowd sprang, from the crowd a community was born and from the community tribes and nations were born.”
“And after that respite what happened? I mean where did the journey of human life stop?”
“It is through this little procession that the ideas of organization, of shelter, of unity and of how villages finally got formed which later got developed into the towns, principalities, polities, cities, and the countries began.”
As they say, great ideas are born from a beard stroke. Hinbir stroke his beard and stared at Hanad for a while. He then said, “‘who was the first man who suggested to settle in an empty land after that little procession’s rest?”
“Hinbir, the history of who suggested to settle in an empty land and form the first village is something we cannot exactly know. To presume who that human was, is too large a story to conclude. What we exactly know is that villages, towns, and cities are the places where politics and policing began — the art of law and order.”
“How did politics begin?”
“The first time when politics began is when someone suggested an idea and tried to convince a group of people, and someone else came up with a different idea, and they both began trying to convince people to compare and contrast the two ideas and select the better idea.”
“Mt. Hansd, how preferring one idea over another was determined?”
“The actual determination of that debate just lied in how exactly the two ideas were conceived, which is a matter of choice — that is preferring one action or idea over another. And choice is the decision that determines what one wants to make, achieve and Implement.”
“Hanad, if politics began from a matter of choice – choosing between two different ideas – what began thousands of years ago as an idea that was meant to either change it, accept it or leave it, why it has now swelled into a cacophany of voices laying claim to the meaning of politics that pains us all the time?”
“See, Hinbir, politics is a pain when it is not seen in the right prerspective and even becomes a blister that oozes pus out when it is not applied to what it is meant to deliver and display. In the instances of the latter, politics is a wound and weakness is the scab on it. When political weakness grows bigger it becomes septic. The effect of septic wound, when remained un-nursed, causes irritation that engenders scratching that in turn makes the wound wide open.”
“Thus politics,” Hanad continued, “is like a scab we cannot stop scraching. One event after another propels it centre stage, where the subject proliferates questions:How are we to define politics; ispire it, enrich it, interpret it and enhance and elaborate it,
and apply it nicrly to people and be proud
of it.”
“Mr. Hanad, do you think that S/land people are proud of our country’s current political sysyem?”
“Politics should present an awareness that tells citizens in advance who really they may become as a people and where they want to be. There is no S/land politician who can articulate how the destiny of this nation would look like. The consenus of politics, as it is widely known, is not a tool to defend a privilege and postion when a leader’s capacity to lead a nation becomes questionable.”
“Worse than useless,” Hanad went on, ” niether the government nor self-mobilzed wise intellectuals have taken the role or responsibility to divert and disuade the masses from what is unwise and wrong toward what is right and good.”
“Mr.Hanad, what is wrong with S/land politicians, particularly the mujahids?”
“The real problem with S/land government officials and the mujahids is that they lie before they ever understand the things as they are in real truth. They avoid to tell the truth. They always go by assumptions. They even twist the story, change the way things happened and stll continue to happen, and retell everything emotionally rather than intellectually and then come to believe their own individual nonsense,” Hanad returned.
“It hurts. Isn’t?”
“Yes, it hurts and it already hurt S/land
masses and still continues to hurt them.
And the injuries are bleeding and remain uncauterized.”
“When did the moral decay, lost of vision and direction, and depletion of all standards and values and sense of losing social responsibility in S/and politics begin in this country?”
“Probably, when the mujahids rose to power,” replied Hanad.
“Sorry, since when?”
“Hinbir, since the year 2010, every elected
S/land administration which was and is still headed by a mujahid was turning out to be just like a child seeing the sky reflected in a puddle after rain, letting his foot touch the puddle, which at his touch will turn into a raging flood that will sweep him away?”
“Mr. Hanad, what about those governments before the Mujahids administration, commrncing from independence day? We must be fair in what we tell about S/land politics.”
“‘Hinbir, fairness is what we are always advocating and intending to revive and resurrect in the long run. What creates unfairness is the way we decide to take operation that directly or indirectly affects human rights. That is one tbing?”
“The other thing,” Hanad went on, “is those politicians before the mujahids were not perfect. Most of them were non-professional, with no transformational characheristics, particularly those who were in political control after independence,” returned Hanad.
“Does this mean tbat S/land people always suffers from bad leadership, leaders with no passion or providence for S/land progress?” The situation sounds that S/land political leaders, they be those in the past or those present ones, are no better than the other. What is the cause of this problem?”
“Look Hinbir. Each century, while giving birth to new ideas, gains new perceptions. Each and every leader of other nations looks differently at the world than those before them did. The reason why they look at the world in a different way is that they have witnessed the appearance of a range of factors that compel them to distinguish the difference between the problems of the past and the present ones and the way they use to encounter them.”
“Somaliland leaders,” Hanad added, “are not guided by the circumstances that are variable and changing day after day. It has become so common and so seemingly agreeable that every individual Somaliland government repeats the mistakes committed by the previous one. The strange thing is why it is hard for all S/land leaders to look at the world differently than those before them did, and whoever becomes a president or a parliamentarian can not read his thoughts any other way.”
“Here are,” Hanad went on, “the questions that need to addressed nationally: When myopia to rebel grips the S/land society time and time again, what would it acquire, and whom would it identify as its adversary? Is our land not a land of sages and saints? Is our nation infertile to produce keen leadership? Is arrogance what Somaliland leadership can all in all evoke? Where the care is that leadership is known to inspire? The sheer perfection of its design and dedication? The elegance of its strides? The searing integrity of its elaborate element? The qualities of its nobility, idea of dignity, of unself-interestedness, of largeness of spirit, and of a rising above spite, faction and greed? How come S/land masses experience and ecounter political situations in which their leaders are aware of what the country needs and most of them are not even brooding the past, leave alone they are to ensure that the future is safe?,” concluded Hanad.
In this country of “I have been a mujahid,” attempts to push today back to yesterday
are very easy when considering in how this country is led and its affairs are run.
To be continued
By: Jamafalaag
Hargeisa, Somaliland
jamafalaag@gmail.com
As per usual the opinions expressed in this articale are those of the author and do not reflect the opinions of qarannews.com
