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Somalia Problems of National Integration
Although unified as a single nation at independence, the
south and the north were, from an institutional perspective, two
separate countries. Italy and Britain had left the two with
separate administrative, legal, and education systems in which
affairs were conducted according to different procedures and in
different languages. Police, taxes, and the exchange rates of
their respective currencies also differed. Their educated elites
had divergent interests, and economic contacts between the two
regions were virtually nonexistent. In 1960 the UN created the
Consultative Commission for Integration, an international board
headed by UN official Paolo Contini, to guide the gradual merger
of the new country's legal systems and institutions and to
reconcile the differences between them. (In 1964 the Consultative
Commission for Legislation succeeded this body. Composed of
Somalis, it took up its predecessor's work under the chairmanship
of Mariano.) But many southerners believed that, because of
experience gained under the Italian trusteeship, theirs was the
better prepared of the two regions for self-government. Northern
political, administrative, and commercial elites were reluctant
to recognize that they now had to deal with Mogadishu.
At independence, the northern region had two functioning
political parties: the SNL, representing the Isaaq clan-family
that constituted a numerical majority there; and the USP,
supported largely by the Dir and the Daarood. In a unified
Somalia, however, the Isaaq were a small minority, whereas the
northern Daarood joined members of their clan-family from the
south in the SYL. The Dir, having few kinsmen in the south, were
pulled on the one hand by traditional ties to the Hawiye and on
the other hand by common regional sympathies to the Isaaq. The
southern opposition party, the GSL, pro-Arab and militantly panSomali , attracted the support of the SNL and the USP against the
SYL, which had adopted a moderate stand before independence.
Northern misgivings about being too tightly harnessed to the
south were demonstrated by the voting pattern in the June 1961
referendum on the constitution, which was in effect Somalia's
first national election. Although the draft was overwhelmingly
approved in the south, it was supported by less than 50 percent
of the northern electorate.
Dissatisfaction at the distribution of power among the clanfamilies and between the two regions boiled over in December
1961, when a group of British-trained junior army officers in the
north rebelled in reaction to the posting of higher ranking
southern officers (who had been trained by the Italians for
police duties) to command their units. The ringleaders urged a
separation of north and south. Northern noncommissioned officers
arrested the rebels, but discontent in the north persisted.
In early 1962, GSL leader Husseen, seeking in part to exploit
northern dissatisfaction, attempted to form an amalgamated party,
known as the Somali Democratic Union (SDU). It enrolled northern
elements, some of which were displeased with the northern SNL
representatives in the coalition government. Husseen's attempt
failed. In May 1962, however, Igaal and another northern SNL
minister resigned from the cabinet and took many SNL followers
with them into a new party, the Somali National Congress (SNC),
which won widespread northern support. The new party also gained
support in the south when it was joined by an SYL faction
composed predominantly of Hawiye. This move gave the country
three truly national political parties and further served to blur
north-south differences.
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