Once upon a post-war time, Somalia had nothing left holding it together except clan grudges, bullet holes, and a dusty little thing called the Provisional Federal Constitution — a transitional document so fragile that even a sneeze from Mogadishu could tear it apart. It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t sacred scripture. But it was the last tube of glue keeping Somalia’s fractured clan plates from sliding off the table. And there was a clear rule: don’t mess with it until the Somaliland question is settled.
Enter President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and his Damul Jadid club of power-gamblers — a group whose political philosophy can be summed up in three words: Siyad Barre Reloaded. These folks saw the glue, read the warning label, and decided to squeeze it for their own political collage project.
Federalism? Never Heard of It
In theory, federalism means the regions have a say. In practice, Hassan Sheikh thinks federalism means the regions can vote… as long as they vote yes. Damul Jadid’s version of “dialogue” is sending troops, starving states of funds, and rewriting the constitution behind closed doors while telling the rest of the country it’s all “for unity.”
It’s the same playbook that drove the old Somali Republic straight into the grave — only now they’ve added a few Twitter hashtags and donor-funded “constitutional review workshops” to make it look modern.
Tampering: From Siad Barre’s Playbook
The President’s political vision isn’t about reconciliation or consensus. It’s about owning the rules of the game — literally. If you control the constitution, you control the referees, the ball, and the scoreboard.
Back in the late ’80s, Siyad Barre played this game until the whole country exploded. Hassan Sheikh seems determined to run the same experiment, apparently convinced that the results will be different this time. (Spoiler: they won’t.)
The Civil War: Damul Jadid’s Season 2
Some say the civil war ended in 2004. Damul Jadid says: Hold my tea. This crew has found a new way to keep the war alive without all the messy tank battles — just pick apart the one legal document that prevents the regions from walking away completely. Call it civil war by pen.
Of course, the PR machine insists this is “reform.” But in Somalia, “reform” usually means: We couldn’t win under the old rules, so we changed them.
The Warning Label on Somalia’s Future
The Provisional Federal Constitution is the one thing every region reluctantly agreed to respect — a truce written in legalese. Destroy that, and you’re left with Mogadishu shouting orders into a vacuum while the peripheries quietly pack their bags.
Hassan Sheikh isn’t just tampering with the glue — he’s peeling the wallpaper off the walls and selling the bricks while calling it home renovation.
If this continues, the next chapter of Somalia’s history won’t be titled Nation Rebuilt. It’ll be Siyad Barre: The Sequel — starring Damul Jadid as the centralist dreamers who thought they could bully federalism into submission.
And as every Somali elder knows, sequels are usually worse than the original.
Warsame Policy & Media Network (WAPMEN) 