Somalia had been a crossroads for Africans, Arabs, and colonial Europeans. Making a coherent country proved too difficult a task for Socialist, Arab, Black General/President Siad Barre. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
I like the aesthetics of todays stamp. Showing Mogadishu history as an ancient trading post with interesting Kasbahs and intrigues. The city was the capital and a city of 500,000 with pretentions of a brighter Somali future. Honoring the past is a part of that and one thing these socialist stamp issues did really well.
Todays stamp is issue A117, an 8.30 Somali Shilling stamp issued by Somalia on May 31st, 1982. It showed a coastal view of the old part of Mogadishu. It was part of a 12 stamp issue in various denominations issued between 1980 and 1983 showing views of different cities. Not my stamp, but you will often find a tag attached to this issue of stamps showing a map of Somalia with the city being shown highlighted. According to the Scott Catalog, the stamp is worth $2.75 whether mint or used.
Mogadishu was founded as a trading post by the Persians. For the bulk of its history, it was under the influence of the Sultan of Zanzibar, whose Royal line is still in power in Oman. When the Italians colonized the area they chose it as their capital. At the time the clans that today might be considered Somali were under Italian, British, French, and Ethiopian rule. Britain cleared the Italians from Somalia during WWII but the Somalia was returned to Italy under a mandate from the United Nations in 1946. Independence was achieved for the former British and Italian part in 1960. It was very poor and uneducated.
In 1969, the President of Somalia was assassinated by his bodyguards while away from the Capital. General Siad Barre than declared himself President and suspended the constitution that had been written by the Italians. He was a Marxist who had been trained by the British, the Italians and the Soviets. He started a program of nation building. There were large public works programs aimed at planting trees to protect towns and cities from being encroached by the ever present sand storms, perhaps Barre’s most lasting legacy. The military was expanded with Soviet help and Somalis were sent in large numbers to Djibouti to influence votes on the future scheduled there.
President Barre also worked to end the clan system by banning it. It is said that he progressed far enough in that the first question a Somali asks another when meeting changed from “What clan are you?” to “What clan did you used to be?” He had proposed the first question to be “What do you know?”, but lets face it, that question would have been met by blank stares. He promoted the use of the Somali language requiring government employees to be able to speak and write it. This was to replace Italian still spoken in higher circles but leaving out the bulk of the country. President Bari promoted the work of noted Somali linguist Shire Jama Ahmed who proposed preparing for the large literacy drives by simplifying and standardizing the language and changing the written script from Arabic to Latin script as had been done successfully in Turkey under Atatürk. In this he received a great deal of push back from militant Muslims who sneered that Latin script denoted no religion. Literacy did pick up in the cities but also sowed seeds that would eventually lead to President Barre’s fall.
Another big demerit in Barre’s rule was failed attempts to bring all Somalis into a greater Somalia. The efforts in Djibouti were peaceful but unsuccessful as France deported many Somalis before the vote on the future. The vote then went in favor of staying French. The Army in 1977 then launched an attack on Ethiopia that sought to bring the Ogaden desert into Somalia. There was some early success but both countries were then in close partnership with the Soviet Union. The Soviets sided with larger Ethiopia and the resupply and 30,000 Cuban troops was enough to turn the tide against Somalia. The defeats and the end of Soviet aid weaken Barre immeasurably. By the late 1980s, Barre was older and weakened physically by a bad car wreck. Former deputy and future warlord of “Blackhawk Down” fame Mohamed Farrah Aidid rose up against Barre and pushed him out of Mogadishu in 1991 and then into exile in Nigeria, where he died in 1996. The Civil War that followed ran hot and cold ever since and has squelched any hope of creating a coherent country.
Stamps were issued post 1991. They are not recognized by the catalogs as the postal system within the country ended at the beginning of the civil war. There is no clarity on who is issuing the stamps and they are of no postal use.
Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast the American, Italian, and other soldiers that entered Mogadishu in 1992 under the UN in a failed attempt to save Somalis from themselves. It probably sounded good to the leadership but was an impossible mission. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.