Somali band Waahaya Cusub performs at the International Solidarity Concert as part of the Mogadishu Music Festival in Somalia's capital on March 29, 2013. This was the second concert organised as part of the historical festival, which is the first of its kind in over two decades since civil war broke out in Somalia in 1991. Phil Moore (AFP)/Getty Images
By Abdi Guled,
Monday, April 08, 2013
MOGADISHU, Somalia – Fueled by the high-volume music and fast-talking rappers, the Somali crowd danced, shouted and sang. Mogadishu’s first music festival in decades acted as another step in moving past a city soundscape once filled with gunfire and mortar shells.
The Reconciliation Music Festival was organized by a Somali rap group who moved overseas, Waayaha Cusub. Last week’s performances attracted international artists to a capital city that until recently was music-free.
The militant group al-Shabab ruled Mogadishu from 2006 until the fighters were forced out in August 2011. No lyrical stanzas were allowed in al-Shabab-controlled areas, and the al-Qaida linked militants banned music as a “sin” punishable by public flogging.
Two years ago, an al-Shabab spokesman threatened Waayaha Cusub after it produced a song disparaging the militants’ rule and its penchant for killing civilians.
“We want to change the world’s impression toward Mogadishu as a dangerous city,” rapper Shine Akhiyar told the crowd from the stage. “Mogadishu is more peaceful than many cities considered peaceful. Through music, we are committed to fight extremism.”
For the cheering audience in this seaside capital, the winds of change were audible.
“It’s a great night,” said Abdishakur Ali, a 17-year-old who was standing among his dancing peers. “I have never seen something like this. It’s a nice one. We are tired of war.”
Music is gradually returning but Somalia still has a long way to go to regain its rich cultural past. The packed open-air venues of the 1980s have been bombed to rubble or occupied by squatters. The music has changed too. Gone are the songs about love and romance. Instead, new tracks explore the struggle for peace.
The foreign and Somali musicians also had a private showing with an audience that in the past may have wished them dead – a group of militant defectors now participating in a government-sponsored rehabilitation program. To the musicians’ surprise, many former fighters – some of them still in their early teens – immediately began to dance.
“The most important achievement of our festival really was to rap and sing alongside former fighters and child soldiers,” said Daniel Gerstle, an American musician from Ohio.
Ban was speaking at the headquarters of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in The Hague, which is sending a team of 15 experts to join the commission, along with World Health Organization staff. The team is led by Ake Sellstrom, a Swedish professor who was a U.N. chemical weapons inspector in Iraq and now works at a research institute that deals with chemical incidents. Ban said he spoke to Sellstrom on Sunday night and he was now heading to join the advance party in Cyprus.
Source: AP