The Problem Is Deeper Still: Somalia’s Crisis of Political Character and Adverse Selection

A Rejoinder to “Much Worship, Little Morality” and “The Problem Is Not a Lack of Worship—It Is the Absence of Accountability”

By Aweys O. Mohamoud, PhD

The recent exchange between Dr Abdurahman Baadiyow and Dayib Sh. Ahmed raises one of the most consequential questions Somalis can ask themselves after more than three decades of state collapse, conflict, fragmentation and repeated attempts at reconstruction: why, after everything we have endured and everything we have tried, do we continue returning to substantially the same political difficulties? Baadiyow begins with a disturbing paradox. Somalia is an overwhelmingly Muslim society in which religious observance remains highly visible, yet the moral consequences one might reasonably expect from that devotion—honesty, justice, compassion, restraint, trustworthiness and concern for the common good—are frequently difficult to discern in public and political life. His question, “What is wrong with us?”, therefore directs attention towards the gulf between worship and moral character. Somalia, he argues, requires leaders whose faith produces morality, whose morality produces integrity, whose integrity produces trust, and whose trust ultimately helps build functioning institutions.

Dayib Ahmed’s rejoinder moves the discussion in another important direction. Perhaps, he suggests, the question should not merely be “What is wrong with us?” but “What happened to us?” Decades of violence, displacement, institutional collapse, unresolved grievances and impunity cannot simply be removed from the explanation of contemporary Somali behaviour. Nor can the country’s difficulties be reduced to deficiencies of individual morality. Somalia requires accountability, reconciliation, enforceable laws and institutions capable of restraining the abuse of power. A functioning state cannot depend upon the fortunate accident that whoever occupies public office happens to be a good person. Dayib therefore moves the argument from personal morality towards the structures surrounding power: how leaders are chosen, what constrains them, what consequences follow misconduct, and how institutions can prevent the weaknesses of individuals from becoming weaknesses of the state.