Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Gerrard Cowan, December 2009, The World Today, Volume 65, Number 12
RAINFALL AND FOOD HAVE LONG BEEN SCARCE IN Somalia. But the real driver of the human trafficking problem is the same as that which underpins piracy: the continuing inability of Somalia's Transitional Federal Government to assert its authority. Large swathes of the country are ruled by Shabab militants, or a medley of tribes and powerful, largely autonomous regions. The helplessness of the government is highlighted by the spread of trafficking, which is snaking its way up the coast.
According to figures from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), between the beginning of this year and mid-October, almost fifty-five thousand people crossed the stretch from the Horn of Africa to Yemen. This is fifty percent more than the number who made the journey in the same period last year.
It is a perilous passage across the Gulf of Aden. Last year, 589 people drowned, and 359 were classed as missing, presumed dead. For this year so far, the figures stand at 266 drowned and 153 presumed dead.
So why has the problem of human trafficking got worse?
The drought in the region is particularly severe this year, according to the World Food Programme. And the price of food is surprisingly high; last year's spike in commodity prices, which has abated in the west, is still being felt.
Almost half of those who crossed this year were from Somalia, with far more expected in the coming months; traditionally the end of the year sees an increase, particularly during and after the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Many believe they will receive a warmer welcome from their Yemeni co-religionists at this time. The country is home to more than one hundred and fifty thousand Somali refugees, the majority of who mare based in the capital, Sana'a, the Basasteen area of Aden, and the Kharaz camp in Lahj.
'We expect the figures at the end of the year to be quite amazing,' says Andrej Mahecic, Senior Communications Officer for the UNHCR.
Potential emigrants each pay anywhere from $600 to $2000 for passage, says Jean-Philippe Chauzy of the International Organization for Migration (IOM). While it is unclear where this cash comes from in a country of extreme poverty, it is thought that families join together to pay for individual members to make the crossing.Many of those who make it to the main embarkation point at Boosaaso are robbed by bandits on the way, and have to raise the money all over again in the city. Amazingly, many manage to do just this, apparently through menial jobs.
LEFT ADRIFT
The culmination is a two hundred-mile journey in temperatures of perhaps 40 degrees Celsius, packed into eighteen by three metre boats with forty to fifty other people, often with no protection from the sun. And it is a passage whose success is by no means guaranteed; the NATO antipiracy mission in the area describes seeing people smugglers throw their human cargo into the water along the way to dissuade warships from approaching.
On October 23, a naval vessel came across a human trafficking skiff adrift with 43 people onboard. Two boats had been crossing together, but the engine on one broke down; the traffickers, realising their chances of completing the journey were now slim, transferred the human cargo from the working vessel to join those in the stranded boat.
'They abandoned them all, just sailing off having literally cut their losses for that trip,' says Lieutenant Commander Alex Kendrick of Britain's HMS Cornwall, the lead ship of NATO's anti-piracymission.
What becomes of the refugees who slip through the UN/Yemeni net is unclear. Although target destinations are believed to include Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states, many more end up staying in Yemen.
Because Somalis are recognised as refugees, they can stay in Kharaz for anything from a few days to several years. They face several obstacles to becoming self reliant, including an economy that is not growing fast enough to accommodate them, scarce vocational training, and the difficulties of securing work permits. According to the UNHCR, when they do find work it is generally in the informal sector.
UNSTABLE
While the Transitional Government remains incapable of imposing the rule of law country-wide, an increasingly desperate population is seeking sanctuary elsewhere.
Traditionally, the human tide was centred on the city of Boosaaso, while this is still the case, the UNHCR says ships are now leaving from as far north as Djibouti. The tens of thousands crossing the Gulf of Aden are just a drop in the ocean, the UNHCR estimates that there are 1.5 million internal displaced people in Somalia and more than half a million refugees in neighbouring countries, many of whom are in the Dabaab complex in northern Kenya.
To its credit, the Transitional Government has held together. But it needs constant outside support. The UN backed mission in the country – AMISON – is pursuing a three-phased approach: beginning with a support package, moving to a 'light footprint,' followed by a transition from AMISON to a United Nations peacekeeping mission.
But the UN-supported African Union force, which has been in place since 2004, has yet to reach its mandated level of eight thousand troops. At just 5,300 soldiers, its effectiveness has been brought into serious question.
Funding is also relatively low. Support for the African Union mission is provided through voluntary contributions to trust funds, combined with direct bilateral support. Confirmed pledges stand at $200 million – but there is 'a critical gap between that figure and donor disbursements,' according to Craig Boyd, the director of the UN Support Operation to the mission.
While an attempted coup was defeated in May, Mogadishu and Transitional Government bases continue to come under attack. The security situation is so dire that the UN has only been able to deploy personnel to the United States African Command bases for limited periods, and says that 'continuing insecurity … continues to limit the incremental build-up of a United Nations presence … the incremental approach will continue to be followed'.
This needs to speed up. A major multinational land mission is desirable, but unlikely soon, particularly given the war in Afghanistan. At very least, Somalia needs more money, and its troops more training.
If the Transitional Government became the fifteenth Somalian government to fall since 1991, it would be bad news for the country and bad news for the region.
For human traffickers, pirates, and bandits there could not be a more welcome development.