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‘A government at war with its own people: testimonies about the killings and the conflict in the north' was a report published in 1990 by the then Africa Watch, later to become part of the bigger Human Rights Watch. Other significant reports current at the time included United States General Accounting Office Report to Congressional Requesters, entitled ‘Somalia: Observations Regarding the Northern Conflict and Resulting Conditions' published in May 1989; and ‘Why Somalis Flee: Synthesis of Accounts of Conflict Experience in Northern Somalia by Somali Refugees, Displaced Persons, and Others' by Robert Gersony, U.S. Department of State, August 1989.

This is the first of a series of essays aimed to warn off people about the impending peril of a new dictatorship and to put forth ideas for organizing strong resistance against the Farmaajo regime. When the issues at stake are fundamental, affecting principles of human freedom and democracy or the political and constitutional development of our country, negotiations do not provide a way of reaching a mutually satisfactory solution with a man intent on becoming a dictator.

The joint press statement issued by International Partners of Somalia yesterday reconfirms the principle of genuine democratic elections, the free (but currently indirect) expression of whose will provides the basis for the authority and legitimacy of government.

Yesterday's announcement that the FGS will go ahead with the 2021 elections with no resolution to the continuing electoral crisis and no reference to two FMSs, Puntland and Jubbaland, and the political opposition takes us much closer to the violent collapse of the nascent institutions.

Part II constitutes a verbatim transcription of a viral video containing a statement by a traditional elder and Nabadoon (peacemaker) of the Marehan clan in Gedo region, Maxamad Cabdullaahi Xirsi (pronounced as Mahamed Abdullahi Hirsi). This video statement is so relevant to Mr. Farmaaja's revival of militarism and his government's roguish behaviour everywhere that I decided to fully transcribe it, word for word.