Overlapping nationalist projects and contested spaces: the Oromo–Somali borderlands in southern Ethiopia

Abstract

Over the past few decades the inhabitants of the Oromo–Somali borderlands of southern Ethiopia have encountered three competing nationalisms: Ethiopian state nationalism (patriotism), Somali ethno-nationalism (irredentism), and Oromo ethno-nationalism. The territories and peoples claimed by each competing nationalism overlap. In the 1960s and 1970s Somali irredentist claims predominated, and generated a severe Ethiopian response. In the post-1991 period, claims and counter-claims over territories around the borders of the Oromia and Somali ethno-national regional states of Ethiopia became the centre of conflicts. These claims specifically contest water points, tracts of land, ritual sites and towns. The ethno-territorial contestation and negotiation between the Oromia and Somali ethno-national regional states are mirrored and explained at the local level by disputes and conflicts between the Borana and Garri pastoralists, who have reformulated their longstanding competitions over pastoral resources along the new political dispensation. This article examines the multifaceted interactions between state patriotism, ethno-nationalisms, irredentism and ethno-federalism in these borderlands from the 1960s to the present.

Keywords:

• nationalism
• Oromo
• referendum
• Somali
• Ethiopia
• territoriality

Notes

1. Aguilar, “Writing Biographies of Borana,” 351.

2. The idea of “Greater Somalia” was formulated in 1943 with the establishment of the Somali Youth League (SYL). See Drysdale, The Somali Dispute.

3. Comaroff, “Ethnicity, Nationalism and the Politics of Difference.”

4. Ethno-nationalism in Ethiopia was a result of a century of political, economic and socio-cultural domination of the Amhara elite over others. See Getahun, “Emperor Menelik's Ethiopia.”

5. Markakis, National and Class Conflict; Mohamed, “The Development of Oromo Nationalism.”

6. Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, 14.

7. Taken from Adunga, ‘Negotiating identity’.

8. Interview, Sheikh Isaq (a Garri member of the SALF), September 2, 2006, Moyale; Interview, Jibril Musa (an Arssi member of the SALF), September 24, 2006, Addis Ababa.

9. Lewis, A Modern History of Somali; Schlee, “Islam and the Gadaa System”; Zitelmann, “Oromo National Liberation.”

10. Leenco, The Ethiopian State at the Crossroads.

11. Markakis, National and Class Conflict, 263. The WSLF was established at the same time as SALF. The two were operating in the eastern and western part of their borderlands respectively.

12. Interviews with former members of SALF in Moyale and Addis Ababa, 2006.

13. The OLF was part of the legal political system from July 1991 until they resumed the guerrilla warfare again in June 1992.

14. Young, “Regionalism and Democracy”; Abbink, “Ethnicity and Constitutionalism.”

15. The exception being Harari. See Vaughan, “Ethnicity and Power.”

16. James et al., Remapping Ethiopia; Schlee, “Redrawing the Map of the Horn.”

17. Abbink, “Ethnicity and Constitutionalism,” 173.

18. Interview, official of the House of Federation, February 1, 2008, Addis Ababa.

19. Hagmann, “Pastoral Conflict and Resource Management”; Aalen, “Ethnic Federalism and Self-determination,” 247.

20. These conflicts have been defined as conflicts triggered by drought and competition over scarce resources: Hussein, “Competition over Resources.”

21. Interview, Jemal Aliyyi (senior official of the Oromia National Regional State), October 18, 2007, Addis Ababa.

22. Taken from Adunga, ‘Negotiating identity’.

23. FDRE, “Constitution,” 48 (1).

24. FDRE, “Constitution,” 48 (1).

25. Interviews with traditional leaders, pastoralists and officials in Moyale and Jijiga, 2006 and 2007.

26. Interview, Mohamed Yasin (head, Bureau of Somali Region's Neighbours Affairs), October 23, 2007, Jijiga.

27. Interview with elders who participated in the conference. Many officials also refer to this meeting as point of departure to undertake the referendum.

28. For instance, the Gumi Gayyo assembly of the Borana that took place in July 2004 discussed and opposed the notion of solving the problem between the Oromo and Somali through a referendum. This assembly is held every eight years. It is associated to the Borana's gada system. Thousands of Borana meet and discuss their social problems and make new laws or revise the old ones (see Legesse, Gada, 94–9). The meeting usually lasts for several weeks. See Bassi, “The Politics of Space.”

29. According to a survey conducted in the 1980s, more than 90% of Borana family's cash income is derived from livestock and nearly all from cattle: Cossins and Upton, “The Borana Pastoral System,” 211.

30. Taken from Adunga, ‘Negotiating identity’.

31. Interview, abba gadaa Liban Jaldessa, December 18, 2003, at Nuura.

32. Interview, Guyyo Malicha, the ruling party cadre, Mega town, September 9, 2007.

33. Legesse, Gada; Bassi, Decisions in the Shade.

34. Interview, Haji Mohamed Hassan (Sultan of Garri), August 24, 2006 and December 13, 2007, Moyale.

35. Interview, Haji Rashid Mohamed, November 19, 2007, Addis Ababa.

36. Nagel, “Constructing Ethnicity.”

37. For a full discussion of this point, see Bassi, “The Politics of Space,” 221–45.

38. Report of the processes of the referendum by the National Election Board of Ethiopia to the House of Federation, November 11, 2004. According to the same document, a financial expense of the processes of the referendum was about 4 million Ethiopian Birr (US $470,000).

39. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7929104.stm, accessed on 13 March 2009.

40. Galaty, “States of Violence.”

41. There are two towns by the name “Moyale,” Ethiopian and Kenyan Moyale. They are situated on both sides of the international border, separated by a small river and a checkpoint.

42. Interview, Roba Boru (Borana elder), December 21, 2007, Moyale.

43. The Borana had initially attempted to resist the Garri incursion in Moyale, but were prevented by federal military forces. Group discussion, with Borana elders, May 29, 2006, Moyale. See also Bassi, “The Politics of Space.”

44. Interview, Amanuel Gobe, a Burji elder, August 27, 2007, Moyale.

45. Interview, Ali Kemal (senior official in Somali NRS), October 22, 2007 Jijiga; Interview, Ayele Feyissa (an Oromo official), July 27, 2006, Moyale.

46. Interview, Farah Ahmed, a top Somali official who participated in the meeting, October 21, 2007, Jijiga.

47. Kymlicka, “Emerging Western Models of Multination Federalism,” 39–40.