Somali Roads to Police Development Alice Hills*

Hills, A 2014 Remembrance of Things Past: Somali Roads to Police stability Development. Stability: International Journal of Security & Development, 3(1): 11, pp. 1-14, DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/sta.di

RESEARCH ARTICLE Remembrance of Things Past: Somali Roads to Police Development Alice Hills*

Police reform is thought to require a police force to break with its past. This is notably so in the aftermath of conflict or regime change. In practice, however, most police forces are selectively reconstituted, and their development is influenced as much by legacy issues as by international standards filtered through local norms. This article uses the experience of Somalia’s three regional police forces to reconsider the relationship between past and present projects to build police authority and capacity, and what this says about institutional memory in the absence of documentation. In Somalia, as in other clan or tribal-based societies, police development is influenced by a blend of security levels, political imperatives, pragmatism, international resources and memories of past practices, with group experience playing a more significant role than institutional memory. The only identifiable general principle is the need for political settlements and tactical flexibility – that is, for stability.

Introduction some three million inhabitants. Furthermore, On 20 December 2013, Mogadishu’s Somali its claim to be the successor of the post- Police Force (SPF) celebrated the seventieth independence force rests primarily on the anniversary of the founding of its namesake international support and protection that it (Keydmedia 2013). Originally established and Mogadishu’s government receive. Even in 1943 as the Police Corps of Somalia, it so, the public police forces operating in changed its name to the SPF in 1960 when Somalia’s other main administrative regions — it joined with the British Somaliland Scouts Somaliland in the north-west and Puntland in to form the national force of the newly the north-east — accept the SPF’s existence and independent Somalia. Fragmenting in 1991 inheritance. This suggests that, while political when former president Siad Barre fled and settlements and international resources play two decades of civil war began, today’s SPF a significant role in Somali police develop- re-emerged in the late 2000s. It celebrated ment, so do memories of policing in the 30 its anniversary for the first time in Decem- years between independence and the wars of ber 2013. the 1990s. This article uses Somalia’s experi- Unlike its predecessor, the current SPF ence to consider the relationship between is confined to Mogadishu, a coastal city of past and present in areas of limited statehood with low literacy rates, and what this tells us * Durham University, United Kingdom about the role of institutional memory in the [email protected] absence of documentation. Art. 11, page 2 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past

These issues deserve attention because such as Yemen or Afghanistan, let alone to the principles on which a police is best other states like Guinea-Bissau that are usu- reconstructed or reformed and its author- ally classified as failed. Yet it offers insights ity established are unclear. Police culture is into the interplay between memories of notoriously resistant to change (Hills 2012) policing and the experiences and skills that yet police development continues to be shape the re-emergence of police in the after- understood as a reform project designed to math of conflict. Two are noteworthy. First, it break with the past (e.g. Bayley 2006; OECD suggests that police development is an adap- DAC 2007; Downie 2013). This is understand- tive process reflecting a mix of contingen- able in that the brutal or corrupt policing cies, political imperatives, pragmatism and found in many fragile environments is often functional knowledge, and that group and cited as a cause of instability and conflict. individual memories play a key part in this. Nevertheless, most development projects aim Indeed, this is markedly so in societies, such for fundamental change, with police reform as Somalia’s, that value genealogy and group regarded as a means for social engineering. relationships. It could even be that clan mem- Take, for example, the ambitious and future- ory, which transcends the individual, plays a oriented goals of the UNDP’s civilian police role similar to institutional memory.1 Second, project for Somalia, which is one of the poor- re-emergent forces such as the SPF are best est and most fragmented countries in the understood as reflecting layers of functional world. Established in 2002 as part of a Rule and political knowledge and experience. of Law and Security in Somalia (ROLS) pro- ‘Layers’ is used in a descriptive, rather than gramme, with an annual budget of US$ 20 a scientific manner, but it conveys the way million in 2012, the project focuses on pro- in which police typically integrate technical viding a professional civilian police service. experience and local norms and practices It aims to meet the needs and expectations into a meaningful framework. of all Somalis, with a special emphasis on The discussion that follows is divided inclusive and accountable policing. This will into three sections. The first offers an over- enable Somalia to ‘make progress towards view of Somalia’s three public police forces peace and the Millennium Development before analysing their development in terms Goals through equitable economic develop- of a layered knowledge base, rather than an ment’ (UNSAS 2010). institutional memory. The second section Police development projects also assume identifies security and stability as critical var- that the officers concerned depend on a iables influencing the re-emergence of police police institution for support, opportunity forces, with tactical flexibility the only iden- and knowledge. It is thought that police as tifiable general principle. The third section a group share an institutional memory; i.e. concludes that policing is selectively recon- that an identifiable set of facts, concepts, stituted, rather than fundamentally restruc- experiences and knowledge exists. But what tured or reformed. In Somalia, as elsewhere, happens to the organisation and activity of the success or failure of police development policing when the institutions, processes, projects is determined by the political skill influences and officers on which it is seem- with which local realities, contingencies and ingly predicated for existence fragment, and international expectations are balanced. stay fragmented for 20 years? Somalia rep- resents a textbook case in which to explore Layering Knowledge these issues. Somalia is commonly regarded as the para- Admittedly, Somalia’s experience is digmatic failed state (Fund for Peace 2013) extreme, and the lessons it offers may not yet it is actually managed by a variety of transfer to other clan or tribal-based societies, security and administrative entities and Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 3 of 14 authorities. These are linked ethnically and the UK opened an embassy in May), the exist- economically but have different levels of ence of the FGS and SPF actually depends on stability and styles of governance. (Govern- the presence of thousands of African Union ance here refers to the rules, processes and troops and on financial and humanitarian interactions through which decisions are support from the United Nations and donors made and authority exercised). The interna- such as Japan. tional agenda for Somalia focuses on Moga- The Somali environment also means that dishu as the capital of a unified state, but in officers in all three forces lack the appear- practice inter-governmental organisations ance and attributes commonly associated (IGOs), bilaterals and donors divide Somalia with police and police forces. Not all have into three main administrative areas: Somali- uniforms, not all consider conventional land, Puntland and Mogadishu (see UNDFS forms of discipline and hierarchy (e.g. ranks) 2011). South-Central Somalia is best catego- desirable or necessary, and the social accept- rised as a remainder rather than an entity or ability and addictiveness of chewing qat, a region; its cross-hatching of clans obstructs mild narcotic, means that many stations are the development of an entity with a common closed in the afternoon (Hills 2014: 97–98). governance structure. This division reflects Also, as classes at Somalia’s regional training that Somaliland declared itself an inde- schools emphasise (Personal observations, pendent republic in 1991, Puntland claimed Mandera, September 2011; private com- autonomy in 1998, while the international munications, international adviser, August community supports a government confined 2011), many general-duties officers are unfit, to Mogadishu. And each of the three main elderly, illiterate or unable to understand the entities has a distinct public police force.2 basic principles of international-style polic- The nature of Somalia’s complex and ing. Yet, this does not mean that they are not dynamic environment means that progress police or that ‘a police force in the Western in police development depends on political sense is...an alien institution’ (Murphy 2011: settlements, which require relative stabil- 156; for Western policing see Manning ity. This has been a positive experience in 2011). Regardless of their appearance, or Somaliland where, in 2011, the director gen- ability to read or provide order, Somalia’s eral of the Ministry of the Interior described forces share occupational commonalities security and stability as the country’s most with police in other regions, are linked to significant achievement (Interview, Director international policing networks,3 are aware General, Hargeisa, 7 September 2011). The of the internationally recognised policing development of Puntland’s police has fol- that Somalia experienced during independ- lowed political settlements, too, albeit to a ence, and are in some cases (primarily in lesser extent. But the process has been much Somaliland) consciously developing the less successful in Mogadishu. Somaliland’s complex of practices, procedures and norms police structure reflects the skill with which required for the capacity-building through its power brokers have balanced political cal- which institution-building is thought to culations, clan relations and modern and tra- emerge and be expressed. ditional institutions (Harris and Foresti 2011; In other words, Somali officers are police, Renders 2013), whereas the SPF’s rudimen- and they belong to police forces even if those tary system reflects the precarious position of forces have little in common with those Mogadishu’s Federal Government of Somalia described by, for example, Deflem, for whom (FGS), on whose behalf it acts. Although ‘police bureaucracies are hierarchically- the US formally recognised the FGS as the ordered with a clear chain of command... national government of Somalia in January and policework follows set rules and proce- 2013 (the IMF did the same in April 2013 and dures...’ (Deflem 2000: 744; Deflem 2002: Art. 11, page 4 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past

18). More importantly, all three forces have insurgency and counter-terrorism, many enough in common with police elsewhere older Somalis know something about the in the world to offer a baseline for exploring history of Somali policing in the decade after the ways in which police authority is consti- independence in 1960. This was when the tuted and institutional memory developed SPF was created as a civilian police capable in societies subject to chronic insecurity of counter-balancing the Soviet-supported and high levels of illiteracy. Indeed, Somalia army (Barre had been the Somali National is a particularly valuable case with which Police’s commissioner during the last decade to discuss these issues because its three of pre-independence). Anecdotal evidence forces cover a policing spectrum that spans suggests that some of the officers operating an under-resourced SPF that is expected to during those years felt a professional pride in provide civilian policing in the middle of an their job, displaying willingness and self-reli- insurgency and humanitarian emergencies, ance. In 1959, for instance, on discovering Somaliland’s relatively developed system, that only three of the 30 officers in a small and Puntland’s emergent force which is posi- town in today’s Puntland were literate, a sen- tioned between the two. ior officer brought in teachers to make the Somalia’s police forces are also surprisingly remaining 27 literate in Italian (Interview, conventional. They are structured on lines NGO official, Garowe, 14 September 2011). common throughout Africa and are famil- More importantly, many of today’s officers iar with international practices and proce- and officials are conscious of both Somalia’s dures even as they filter them through local internationally respected policing during interests and dispositions. Admittedly, this the 1960s (Perito 2002: 30) and their need assessment conflates diametrically opposed to avoid the repressive practices of the Barre meanings of ‘conventional’ (of police rely- era of the 1970s and 80s, which many asso- ing on local practices while complying with ciate with centralised policing. Indeed, con- Western structures), but it reflects the ways versations with senior officers suggest that in which Somali police, like police around the officers and officials in all three forces build world, respond to imported models or new on memories of independent Somalia’s 30 practices in an adaptive manner, integrating years of national policing even as they reject aspects of international understanding with Barre’s brutality. Rather than trying to shed local realities and personal or group experi- its colonial-era identity, Somaliland officers ence. It reflects the ways in which officers and officials say the legacy is a useful refer- adjust to local realities (Menkhaus 2006) and ence point (Personal conversations, Hargeisa, international pressures (Höehne 2009: 253). 7 September 2011).4 This is understandable The best way to understand this situation is given that the police commissioner (chief to see it as layers of knowledge, with the lay- officer) in post in Somaliland in the autumn ers consisting of legacy issues, international of 2011 enlisted in 1942, and the comman- influence, and local norms and practices. dant of Somaliland’s police training academy at Mandera joined in 1958. There is no wel- Legacy issues fare provision so officers have no incentive Since approximately 2008, when the UNDP to retire. began keeping records of officers receiv- The extent to which an identifiable insti- ing training, international notions such as tutional memory developed during this rights-based policing and police-community period is debatable. On the one hand, the partnerships have been promoted as a means SPF’s institutional base was initially strong. to mitigate Somali policing’s flaws. However, It was organised into northern and southern while Somali policing is typically minimal, group commands, divisional commands (cor- predatory or oriented towards counter- responding to the districts that existed then), Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 5 of 14 station commands and police posts, with licence is. They have never seen one. No-one regional governors and district commission- has even heard of insurance ... We are learn- ers commanding regional and district police ing to be normal again’ (BBC 2012; Compare elements. By the mid 1970s, its approximately Kentucky.com 2014). 15,000 officers (which included 6,000 from In practice, the foundation on which the a clan-based militia called the Daraawishta) new normalcy is built owes more to relative were divided into 18 regional districts, each stability, clan calculations, tactical flexibility, with about 90 stations and 100 posts in pragmatism and memories of what is needed smaller towns. Its officers carried out patrols, for international recognition than to inter- traffic duties, criminal investigation, as well national policing models and practices. And as intelligence and counter-insurgency while memories of the internationally-respected the Daraawishta and a riot group (Birmadka policing Somalia experienced during the Booliska) acted as elite mobile units capa- 1960s matter because they influence Somali ble of stopping clan conflict in remote areas ideas about police today. Lund’s observation and along the frontier.5 It was overseen by that state-based notions and concepts such the Ministry of Interior until 1976, at which as stateness — or, in this case, police — are point it came under the control of the presi- best understood as an amalgamation of pub- dential adviser on security affairs. lic authority by local institutions ‘conjugated On the other hand, Somalia operated under with the idea of the state’ is indicative (Lund a civil administration for only nine years 2006: 685). (Barre came to power in 1969’s coup d’état), and kinship and customary law (Xeer) were International influence always more important organising principles While individuals have different experiences for Somalia’s pastoral-based society than for- of life during the wars of the 1990s and the mal institutions. Also, Barre distrusted and entities have differing visions of Somalia, emasculated institutions such as the SPF, there is a consensus on what police should leaving only the National Security Service in look like that is reinforced by officers in all a position of influence. Furthermore, by the three forces having a history of international late 1980s, his authority was confined to the contact. The original SPF received equipment main towns where police played a minimal or training from, amongst others, China, role; the riots of 1989 were policed by troops Egypt, the German Democratic Republic, with machine guns who cleared the streets Italy, Sudan, West Germany, the UK and the by shooting anything that moved. USA. Additionally, Barre’s advocacy of Marx- Somalia has not experienced central polic- ism embedded certain Soviet approaches, ing since 1991, though precisely what hap- and anecdotal evidence suggests that this pened to the SPF’s officers during the 1990s still influences the attitudes of some senior is unclear (for the early 1990s see Ganzglass officials.6 1996; Thomas and Spataro 1998; Perito Training projects supported or provided 2002). Anecdotal evidence suggests that a by IGOs such as the UNDP, the UN Political handful of individuals offered a minimal and Office for Somalia (UNPOS) and the African localised police presence, but most melted Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) add into their neighbourhoods and clan group- another layer to Somali policing knowledge, ings. The practices and values associated with and, while training projects rarely affect the bureaucratic institutions were forgotten. As way officers conduct their everyday business, 45-year-old Mohammed Haroum (an SPF they offer individuals a window onto inter- traffic policeman who had resumed his job national ideals and modern or ‘professional’ after a two-decade break) said in 2012: ‘These skills. Thus, the UNDP’s civil policing project days ... people do not know what a drivers’ in Somaliland provides a comprehensive Art. 11, page 6 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past package of activities that includes not only or water rights, and mayors in towns such basic recruit training and specialist training as Puntland’s Bossaso, Galkayo and Garowe in criminal investigation, critical incident say that land and water rights are the biggest management and headquarters functions issue they hear about on daily basis. They also (such as financial management and logis- settle many cases without recourse to either tics), but also offers courses in rights-based elders or courts, as when the five female partnership policing, the Cairo Declaration officers attached to Hargeisa’s women and on Islam and Human Rights, and the children’s desk settle informally nine or 10 Somaliland police charter and constitution. of the 10–15 cases they receive each month Between October 2010 and 2011, 2,400 offic- (most involve children). In many cases, officers were trained at Mandera, while other ers enlist the support of traditional authori- international activities included the visit to ties, but they also use their discretion to Mogadishu in 2009 of an AMISOM police deal with minor incidents such as theft from team with a remit to train, mentor and advise market stalls (Interview, five female officers, the SPF, mid-level training courses by the Hargeisa, 6 September 2011). Uganda Police Force, and cadet courses held The role of discretion in policing has long in Uganda and Ethiopia. In November 2010, been acknowledged (Kelling 1999). However, UNPOS, funded by Japan and in partner- Somali policing lacks the hierarchical and ship with the AMISOM civilian police unit, bureaucratic-based organization that inter- began a three-month basic training course national policing models use to offset discre- in Djibouti for 501 new SPF officers based tion. Additionally, negotiation and tactical on a curriculum developed by the UNDP and flexibility are underpinned by the threat of approved by UNPOS, AMISOM and donors. political or physical violence, for these are More recently, a delegation from the SPF and strong themes in Somali policing, just as they AMISOM went to Sierra Leone for a study are in Somali society. This is particularly true visit. Sierra Leone having been identified as of SPF officers who may be aware of interna- a success story that Somalia could learn from tional policing practices, but must repeat- (Hiraan Online 2013). edly negotiate between the contradictory demands of donors’ insistence on civilian Local norms and practices policing and the federal government’s need Of the three elements identified here, local for counter-insurgency operations. They norms and practices is the most influential must also negotiate with a range of alterna- on every-day policing and policework. This tive policing providers, for security and jus- is because officers are recruited from, and tice are provided by militia and clan groups represent, elements of Somali society. They loyal to factional leaders, as well as by busi- must, for example, integrate traditional ness men and Shari’a courts. Consequently, Somali approaches into their functional combinations of formal and informal secu- knowledge, because unlike the situation rity providers are common. In July 2011, for in Liberia for example, the social fabric did example, security in Mogadishu’s Dharkenlay not collapse after 1991. Somalis look first district improved significantly as a result to customary justice and local or traditional of the combined efforts of an experienced non-state actors such as elders or Shari’a, cross-clan militia made up of officers who rather than to police; officers typically inter- had served under Barre (the Hillac brigade), vene only when requested by elders imple- youth militias (madani), a Sufi militia (Ahlu- menting customary law.7 Also, officers (and Sunna Wal-Jama, which is theoretically general-duties officers in particular) engage aligned to the government but actually oper- with local elders, mayors and district secu- ates autonomously) and the district’s police rity committees about issues such as land (PAC July 2011). Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 7 of 14

As this suggests, local norms and prac- levels. Specifically, the insecurity and insta- tices play a critical role in policing. Somalia bility Mogadishu has experienced since 1991 is the site of multiple conflicts over terri- allows consideration of the issue at the heart tory, trade monopolies, political power and of this article: the significance for police scarce resources, all of which are fought by development of institutional memory in the people with little if any interest in institu- absence of written documentation. tions or institutional development. Policing is a commodity and a business opportunity, A Re-emergent Force rather than a community service, and is part Ironically, it is the SPF which best illustrates of the same political dynamics as clans, con- what happens to the organization and activ- flict, entrepreneurialism and fragmentation ity of policing when the institutions, pro- (Interviews, officials, Nairobi, September cesses and international influences, on which 2011). And Somalis are susceptible to such it is seemingly predicated for existence and pressures because clan-based commitments opportunity, fragment — and remain frag- and obligations are the only guarantees most mented for 20 years. Indeed, the SPF’s experi- can rely on; security, protection, opportuni- ence adds a new dimension to police studies ties for poverty reduction — all depend on because a small number of former officers clan/group relationships, rather than on gov- retained personal memories of policing and ernmental directives or institutions (Luling policeness even after formal state author- 2006; Gundel 2009; Danish Immigration ity collapsed and policing was taken over by Service 2013). militia groups, warlords, traditional elders, Legacy issues, international support and Shari’a courts, and businessmen. Explain- local norms and practices have in this way ing this — and identifying its analytical and provided Somali officers with a layered empirical implications — is, however, compli- knowledge base that does not rely on insti- cated by a lack of hard evidence. Not only is tutional memory. Nevertheless, institutional there minimal documentation available from development is now a fact. Significantly, Somali sources, but also there is little between in each police force it depends on political the articles and reports written by advisers in settlements, which in turn require relative the early 1990s (Ganzglass 1996; Oakley et al. security and stability. International advisers 1998) and the records created by the UNDP’s may regard Puntland’s police as being tech- civilian policing project since 2008 — and nically and institutionally five years behind record keeping remains challenging even for Somaliland’s (Puntland was a backwater the purpose of paying today’s stipends. during Barre’s era), but technical and insti- What currently exists reflects a combina- tutional development has been possible in tion of relative security and stability, and the both because their forces were established influence of international advice and stand- after political settlements were agreed; their ards filtered through local norms and imper- police are seen as legitimate elements in atives, rather than institutional records; the their government’s control apparatus. But occurrence books recording events in sta- this is not the case in Mogadishu where the tions are rarely kept up-to-date (Personal SPF are little more than militiamen in uni- communications, Nairobi, September 2011). forms and the credibility of the government It also suggests that despite several decades on whose behalf it claims to act is limited of conflict, memories of the SPF as a cen- (Financial Times 2014). Hence the signifi- tralised command organisation has helped cance of the SPF’s name and claimed line- to ensure that a baseline for public policing age — and its utility as a tool for addressing exists. Mogadishu remains a dangerously the key contextual issue affecting institu- insecure city but the speed with which the tional development in fragile states: security SPF has developed over the last four or five Art. 11, page 8 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past years suggests that the force has re-emerged, experiencing a building boom (Yahoo News rather than been created. 2013), but many share the bleak outlook of participants in OCVP focus groups in 2011. Coping with insecurity Participants spoke of a ‘lack of faith in the In June 2013, the Islamist insurgent group al- ability of the community (let alone the state) Shabaab attacked a UN compound just out- to protect individuals, a sense of injustice, side Mogadishu’s airport where thousands trauma, and general hopelessness for the of African Union troops are based, killing future’ while youth focus groups identified 15, and in August 2013, Médecins Sans Fron- ‘fear of the unknown’ as a prompt for joining tières (MSF) pulled out of Somalia because armed groups (OCVP 2011: 35). the threat of violence had become intoler- Despite this (or perhaps because of it), able: ‘We have reached our limit’ (Al Jazeera a range of resources for coping with the 2013). Elsewhere, suicide bombings, assas- consequences of insecurity and social frag- sinations, mines, IEDs, stray bullets and hit- mentation exists, with the most success- and-run attacks erode traditional practices ful predicated on local ties, knowledge and and values. Insecurity is fuelled by fears that informal responses (compare Renders 2012). veiled women bus-passengers and students This approach is reinforced by Somalis pri- with rucksacks could be suicide bombers, oritising reconciliation and reparation over and is exacerbated by clan and community retribution and punishment, and preferring tensions, freelance militias, and disputes informal alternatives to formal sentencing about land, livestock and water (especially in and detention facilities. Customary law is IDP camps).8 There are no reliable statistics more powerful than formal institutions and covering crime and violence in the city, but even governments use elders to solve, man- Somalia’s dozens of (almost real-time) news age and negotiate issues; government (secu- services speak of high rates of theft, forced lar) law, and its associated institutions, is the detention, sexual violence and gun-related weakest of all. Co-operative arrangements murders (compare OCVP 2011: 2). exist, too, as when militias loyal to district Unsurprisingly, many Somalis see such commissioners ensure that people return- crimes as components of broader conflict ing to their neighbourhoods register at a dynamics, rather than as individual events police station, while police accommodate (OCVP 2011: 21). Somalia receives weapons civil society initiatives providing surveillance from Ethiopia, Yemen, Djibouti, Ukraine, and reporting: ‘they tell us’. They must also Libya, Saudi Arabia, Eritrea and the USA, and accommodate militia operating under agree- it is thought that more high-powered weap- ments with the government and AMISOM. In ons are in circulation now than in the 2000s. other words, police development cannot be This, combined with memories of Barre’s discussed in isolation from broader trends. brutal policing, meddling by frontline states such as Ethiopia, and the FGS’s weakness, Tactical flexibility destroys respect for state institutions. Somali The long-term consequences of fragmenta- politicians and power brokers think in terms tion for the police’s state-based authority of individual or clan interests, government are more limited than international policing authorities are unresponsive to people’s models suggest. It is undeniable that many needs, and social factors play out in the politi- SPF officers are little more than militiamen cal sphere (OCVP 2011: 36). It makes for high in police uniforms, yet this does not mean levels of suspicion (Somalia Report 2012a), that they are not police any more than being which undermines even minimal forms of former rebels precludes South Sudanese institutions and governance. It also makes from being policemen.9 Indeed, Mogadishu’s for hopelessness. Mogadishu is currently environment makes this understandable. Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 9 of 14

The SPF’s technical capacity has declined, Federal Government (TFG), and its police and its operating procedures and disci- controlled approximately 98 per cent of pline are minimal, but memories of how Mogadishu, which was divided into 16 dis- policing was organised before 1991 have tricts, each of which had a headquarters and evidently been influential. It managed to four divisions (there is a station in each).10 In keep between four and six stations open addition to stations at the airport (70 offic- throughout the war, and by 2011 had a ers), port (94) and the CID (150), there were (semi-functioning) headquarters and train- stations in Dharkenley (65 officers), Hamar ing academy. Organised conventionally in Weyne (91), Hamar Jabab (250), Shangani directorates of operations, finance, training, (40), Waberi (72) and Wadajir (92) (PAC July Criminal Investigation Department (CID), 2011). Dharkeynley, for instance, had 30 and administration, its activities range from uniformed officers at checkpoints and in counter-insurgency to traffic management markets, while officers in Wadajir manned and criminal investigation. Dharkeynley dis- a checkpoint on the district’s main road trict may be managed by militia but even in and patrolled the nearby market and main April 2011 there were 30 uniformed officers bus stations armed with AK47s, talking to present on the streets and in local markets local people in a ‘friendly’ manner (PAC (PAC April 2011). April 2011). Reports by the PAC noted that It is true that this picture owes much to in April 2011 security was tight at Wadajir international resources, which are intended station (several inmates had recently tried to reinforce the appearance of the SPF as an to escape), but hygiene in the cells was gen- institution. For example, most of the city’s erally good, with water and electricity avail- officers are dressed in light blue shirts and able, and inmates separated by sex, age and dark blue trousers or in military-style light crime (unusual for Somalia). brown (colour is based mainly on where the The range of activities typically undertaken officers are trained) even if their pay is delayed by SPF officers can be seen from the PAC’s and they lack weaponry, handcuffs, batons Monthly Report on the Activities of the Somali and the pick-up trucks needed for mobility. Police Force for July 2011. (It is consistent Similarly, the SPF’s line ministry may be lit- with that offered in 2013 by international tle more than an inexperienced newcomer in assessments such as those provided by the an empty office, but approximately 5,300 of Danish Immigration Service). Written pri- its estimated 6,000 ‘police-soldiers’ (the term marily for the UNDP/ROLS, and, therefore, used by the city’s police oversight body, the arguably presenting an ideal picture, the PAC Police Advisory Committee (PAC)) are given report notes that the SPF’s workload is organ- a three-month police training course by the ized around divisions and stations, and is UNDP before being sent out to Mogadishu’s based on information from street patrols and operational police stations (the rest are informants and on government directives or trained in the region under bilateral agree- orders. Activities are divided into operations ments between the FGS and its partners). intended ‘to enhance community safety’ and Nevertheless, internationals can only exert ‘street patrolling as part of wider counter ter- influence when Somalis allow it (Hills 2014: rorism efforts’, but most relate to deterrence. 97–98), so the situation seen in 2011, for Officers manned checkpoints, deployed at example, indicates Somali views on what a major intersections, and conducted random police force should look like: officers should stop and search operations in an effort to be conventionally organised, maintain a vis- increase the police’s presence. They tar- ible presence and provide area security. geted individuals or small groups suspected By mid-2011, after two decades of con- of armed robbery, kidnapping and looting flict, the FGS’s predecessor, the Transitional (the latter involved militiamen responsible Art. 11, page 10 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past for providing night-time neighbourhood align their practices to international stand- watches) though non-terrorist prosecutions ards while operating in a rule-based society were rare. No mass arrests were carried out characterized by the legal pluralism of for- in July but March had seen a major security mal, customary and Shari’a law.11 This sug- operation involving 300 people charged with gests that Somali policing structures are, like having unlawful weapons and violating secu- Somali social structures, best understood as rity rules (the use of mass arrests is noted in flexible social and political processes, with Danish Immigration Service 2013). the emphasis on accommodation, inter- The PAC’s July report emphasises the SPF’s pretation and knowledge based on a range role in counter-terrorism and/or counter- of resources (compare Little 2003: 3), all of insurgency, rather than civilian policing or which is overhung by the threat of actual or formal governance. But this is appropriate potential violence. given that the SPF is a faction in the con- tinuing conflict in which its lightly-armed Conclusions officers confront insurgents armed with Surprisingly little is known about the ways heavy machine guns and light anti-aircraft in which the past and present interact to artillery. Indeed, PAC members routinely affect police development in areas of limited refer to ‘policemen-soldiers’ targeting ‘sleep- statehood. International police projects are ing insurgents’, particularly among IDPs. designed to ensure that local forces break It noted that Dharkenlay police had had a with their past whereas local realities help particularly difficult week, fighting youth to ensure continuity. This is notably so in militias (armed with hand grenades and conservative clan-based societies where the handguns) suspected of being both armed absence of welfare arrangements means that robbers and covert insurgents, and arresting there is no incentive for unsuitable offic- seven men (three of whom were military) ers to retire or reject the political economy who had set up illegal check points to extort they are part of. Tensions arise as the future- money. The PAC’s members, like respondents oriented agenda of international reform to focus groups conducted by the Hargeisa- projects collides with the more immediate based Observatory on Conflict and Violence expectations of local recipients, but the Prevention (OCVP), were clear about the interface is rarely analysed. distinctions between police and military Somalia is a particularly interesting case in enforcement agencies, but were less con- which to explore these issues because signifi- cerned by those between police and militia. cant number of its officers were members of And Mogadishu’s environment makes this the original SPF and are now, after 20 years understandable: policing is subject to shift- of conflict and fragmentation, part of the ing loyalties, tactical fluidity and clan calcula- re-emergent SPF or the new regional forces. tions, and a significant proportion of officers Hard evidence is missing, but anecdotally, have close links to militia. Younger and fitter the experience of serving officers suggests officers probably find the swarming tactics that police development is influenced by a employed by militia and fighters (Kilcullen blend of variables. These include contingen- 2013: 81–86) more attractive than the com- cies, international resources, and political munity-based policing promoted by donors. and/or entrepreneurial imperatives, all of Whatever the case, the PAC report implies which are superimposed on technical skills, that Somali policing places a premium on experience and memories of past practices. flexible and pragmatic approaches that are The critical issue for IGOs and donors, there- at odds with international-style policing’s fore, concerns identifying the optimum bal- reliance on a formal and bureaucratic insti- ance — or tipping point — between past and tution. Discretion is a feature of most police present, and between locally and interna- systems, but Somali officers are expected to tionally acceptable norms and practices. Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 11 of 14

Taking this as its point of departure, this the absence of formal government structures article offers five findings, which are also and institutions. relevant for police reform in other clan or Linked to this is a fourth point, which is tribal-based countries: that even token forms of institution build- First, police knowledge is layered. Personal ing and technical development require the experience of policing in the 1960s, an aver- broader political-security environment to be sion to Barre-era practices, a lack of formal relatively stable; formality is not required for education in the 1990s, or life as a militia- police development, but relative security and man in the 2000s, combine with local norms stability are. Stability has allowed Somaliland and exposure to international approaches to reconstruct a locally acceptable police that to provide Somali officers with a functional combines elements from the past with an eye knowledge base that is more reliable than to the future, whereas Mogadishu’s police institutional memories or formal documen- and government are dependent on the politi- tation. This is reinforced by low literacy, cal agenda of external actors. Consequently, respect for genealogy and the resilience com- the SPF’s primary concern is to acquire the mon to many clan-based societies. heavy weapons, vehicles, fuel and communi- Second, the Somali approach to polic- cations equipment it needs to survive today ing is tactically flexible because officers (Interview, SPF commissioner, Nairobi, 19 operate in a rule-based society character- September 2011. Compare Reuters 2014). ized by legal pluralism. In most countries Hence the prospects for police development policing is characterised by discretion and are favourable in Somaliland and, to a lesser pragmatism, but Somali policing is, like extent, Puntland, whereas the SPF’s future Somali politics, particularly subject to shift- is uncertain. ing loyalties, clan calculations and opaque Lastly, police institutions may disintegrate decision-making; pragmatism and informal- and their documents may be destroyed, ity are more characteristic of its governance but police systems are remarkably resilient. than routine or precedent. Officers protect Somalia’s experience offers insights into the what they value, manipulate what they can nature of institutional memory in the absence use and subvert approaches that offend the of documentation and line ministries, and sensibilities of their conservative society. into what happens to the organisation and This tendency is reinforced by police reform activity of policing when the institutions and attracting international resources, which processes on which it is seemingly depend- make it a business opportunity for senior ent for existence and opportunity fragment. officers, as for politicians and businessmen. But, general principles are hard to find The real challenge for reformers is how to because the re-emergence of police is driven protect the institutional development some by a blend of aspirations, opaque decision- now associate with professional and mod- making, political settlements, memories and, ern policing from the predations of other critically, levels of security and stability. officers and politicians. Third, Somalia’s record shows that while Notes institutional development (and technical pro- 1 A rich literature on Somali genealogy, cul- gress) depends on political settlements based ture and institutions has developed since on an agreed set of rules, the re-emergence the publication of I. M. Lewis’ seminal or restructuring of police forces is not con- research (as in Pastoral Democracy), but tingent on institutional structures or institu- none of it addresses the police’s role. For tional memories. Neither is it dependent on an overview see Höehne and Luling 2010. the existence of a formal criminal justice sys- The analytical and empirical implications tem. Indeed, the last decade emphasises that of this literature for the wider debates minimal forms of policing are sustainable in about police culture, institution building, Art. 11, page 12 of 14 Hills: Remembrance of Things Past

the rule of law and development have yet Police 2011: 3). Typically, cases of rape are to be analysed systematically. referred to elders whereas armed robbery 2 The assessment of Somali police pre- — which is regarded as less shameful and sented here is based on four week’s more serious — is referred to the police. fieldwork conducted on behalf of the This picture is consistent with the OECD’s UNDP’s Rule of Law Programme in Soma- estimate that in Africa approximately lia (ROLS) in Puntland, Somaliland and 80% of security and justice provision is Nairobi in September 2011, though the delivered by non-state providers (OECD views are mine alone. It builds on per- DAC 2007: 11; Baker 2010). sonal observations and semi-structured 8 There were approximately 369,000 IDPs interviews with approximately 30 Somali in Mogadishu in February 2013 (IRIN officers, supplemented by interviews 2013). with officials, elders, district safety com- 9 Compare the experience of Eritrea and mittees, oversight committees and non- South Sudan. In 1996, Eritrean officers governmental organisations (NGOs) from dismissed the utility of rank on the basis across Somalia’s entities. These were that there had been none during the rev- cross-checked against interviews with olution, though they admitted that war international advisers and officials in records influenced informal rankings and Nairobi and the UK in 2012 and 2013. It status (Personal communication, Bram- was not possible to visit Mogadishu, but shill, 19 April 1996). Ten years later, many interviews were held in Nairobi with the of South Sudan’s new police were ex- Transitional Federal Government (TFG)’s rebels. Some had a policing background police commissioner and director general but most did not, and those who did of the Ministry of the Interior, as well as identified themselves as former rebels, with past and current members of Moga- rather than policemen (Personal commu- dishu’s Police Advisory Committee (PAC), nications, Pretoria, April 2007). either in person or by telephone. 10 Thirteen stations are listed at www. 3 Somalia has been a member of INTERPOL policesomaligov.net. The FGS succeeded since 1975, and was connected to INTER- the TFG in August 2012. POL’s I-24/7 global police communica- 11 For the practical implications of this see tions system in 2007. Somalia Report 2012b. 4 Compare Puntland’s penal code, which is based on Anglo-Indian models. References 5 In 2009, the Daraawishta consisted of Al Jazeera 2013 MSF halts all operations in 2,750 personnel with 50 ‘technicals’ (an Somalia. Al Jazeera 15 August. Available at improvised gun truck based on a Toyota http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/ Hilux pick-up truck). One thousand were 2013/08/201381512052166975.html absorbed into the SPF (UNDP-SSA 2009: [Last accessed 15 August 2013]. footnote 6). In 2011, the SPF had six Baker, B 2010 Security in Post-Conflict Africa: technicals. The Role of Nonstate Policing. Boca Raton, 6 Comments based on personal observa- FL: CRC. tions and conversations with international Bayley, D 2006 Changing the Guard: Devel- advisers in London, Nairobi, New York and oping Democratic Police Abroad. Oxford: Somalia in August-September 2011. OUP. 7 This means that officers in Somali- BBC News 2012 Traffic police and other land’s Hargeisa handle an average of 2.4 signs of normality in Mogadishu. BBC reported crimes a year while those in Sahil News, 25 February. Available at www.bbc. Region (several hours drive to the north co.uk/news/world-africa-1715562124 of Hargeisa) deal with 5.6 (Somaliland [Last accessed 25 February 2012). Hills: Remembrance of Things Past Art. 11, page 13 of 14

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How to cite this article: Hills, A 2014 Remembrance of Things Past: Somali Roads to Police Development. Stability: International Journal of Security & Development, 3(1): 11, pp. 1-14, DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5334/sta.di

Published: 11 March 2014

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