My Role in the Foundation of the Somali Nation-State (2017): the memoir of Abdirizak Haji Hussein

The book

Abdirazak Haji Hussein: My Role in the Foundation of the Somali Nation-State, A Political Memoir is the life story of Abdirizak Haji Hussein, who served in the first governments of the Somali Republic and was prime minister from 1964 to 1967 under President Aden Abdulle Osman. He died on 31 January 2014 and was buried in Somalia beside Aden Abdulle Osman, as he had asked. The memoir was edited, with a preface, by the scholar Abdisalam Issa-Salwe, and published in 2017 by The Red Sea Press; library and distributor records also list it under Africa World Press of Trenton, New Jersey. It has about 412 pages (WardheerNews, 2017; Africa World Press).

What it covers

According to the summary published with the book's release, the chapters follow his life in order (WardheerNews, 2017):

• his childhood in a herding community and the solidarity of its small settlements
• the 1940s, and the 1950s under Italian trusteeship, including the question of Somali-inhabited lands left outside the new state
• independence in 1960 and the first government, in which he was minister of the interior from 1960 to 1962 and minister of public works and communications from 1962 to 1964
• the March 1964 elections and his time as prime minister
• foreign policy towards Africa, the East and the West, shaped by the border question
• the change of president in 1967 and his move into opposition
• the coup of 21 October 1969 and his imprisonment until April 1973
• his later life, including his years as Somalia's ambassador to the United Nations, his resignation in 1979, and his life after receiving asylum in the United States, where he took ordinary jobs, including work as a security guard in New York

The background is on UN trusteeship, 1950 to 1960, The civilian era, 1960 to 1969 and The Siad Barre era, 1969 to 1991.

The government he led

As prime minister he is best remembered for a reform drive known as Karti iyo Hufnaan (competence and integrity), which removed large numbers of civil servants who had been appointed through patronage. The analyst Hassan M. Abukar, writing after the memoir appeared, described him as "an incorruptible politician and a reformist", while recording that others, such as the former official Ismail Ali Ismail, saw in him "a streak of authoritarianism". Abukar also records that he refused to endorse the 1969 military takeover, was imprisoned, and later resigned from his United Nations post over disagreements with the government (WardheerNews, 2017).

How it was received

The historian Lidwien Kapteijns of Wellesley College described it as an unparalleled chronicle of modern Somali history, in a statement quoted by the publisher (Africa World Press). Hassan M. Abukar called it and Abdi Ismail Samatar's book Africa's First Democrats, published the year before, "important additions to Somali studies", since both cover his early life and his years as prime minister (WardheerNews, 2017).

Where to read it

It is sold in paperback by Africa World Press and The Red Sea Press and is held by research libraries (WorldCat).