Carried the banner: every generation since 1895

The Dervish movement, 1895 to 1920

• What they set out to do: a Somali authority under Sayyid Mohammed Abdullah Hassan to end British, Italian and Ethiopian rule, based at Taleh.
• What held it back: colonial powers arming rival local groups against it, rivalry between Sufi orders, and the defeat of its WWI backers. Taleh fell in February 1920.
• Wikipedia

UN Trusteeship, 1950 to 1960

• What they set out to do: a 10-year run-up to independence. The Somali Youth League won the 1954 and 1956 elections, and Somalis ran the administration by 1956.
• What held it back: a thin budget, a banana-only economy, little higher education, and a south on a different track from the north.
• Wikipedia

The union, 1960 to 1969

• What they set out to do: joining two newly free territories into one Somali Republic.
• What held it back: two legal, tax, police, school and currency systems merged after the fact. The north gave the 1961 constitution under 50% support.
• Wikipedia

Greater Somalia, 1960 to 1978

• What they set out to do: uniting every Somali-inhabited land under the five-pointed star.
• What held it back: neighbours holding the Ogaden and NFD, the 1961 NFD vote left unacted, and African bodies holding to colonial borders.
• Wikipedia

The Barre era, 1969 to 1991

• What they set out to do: one party, an anti-clan ideology, Somali taught in schools from 1972, a mass literacy drive, roads joining north and south.
• What held it back: rule by security law and, after 1978, repression aimed at whole communities. The state collapsed on 26 January 1991.
• Wikipedia

Reconciliation rounds and transitional governments, 1991 to 2012

• What they set out to do: Djibouti 1991, Addis Ababa 1993, Arta 2000 (first civil-society-led talks), the Kenya talks of 2004 (federal charter and the 4.5 clan formula).
• What held it back: faction leaders who gained more from the vacuum, neighbours able to veto, and dependence on foreign backers.
• Wikipedia

The Federal Government, 2012 to now

• What they set out to do: federal member states and a move toward one person, one vote.
• What held it back: 4.5 becoming permanent, and centralising amendments passed without a referendum. Puntland left in 2024, Jubaland suspended ties, and South West followed in 2026.
• Horn Review, WardheerNews

Puntland, 1998 to now

• What they set out to do: a self-governing state built at a three-month Garowe conference of elders, business and civil society, as a building block for federal Somalia.
• What held it back: being seen as the state of only some communities. It now runs apart from Mogadishu until there is a referendum-approved constitution.
• Wikipedia

Somaliland, 1991 to now

• What they set out to do: a return to 1960 borders and home-grown institutions.
• What held it back: no UN member recognising it until Israel on 26 December 2025, a move Somalia and the AU rejected.
• Dawn

Where it stands now

On 5 November 2026 the Supreme Court ruled that parliament's term ended on 14 April 2026 and the president's on 15 May 2026. It ordered a deal on an election framework within 30 days (about 5 December 2026) and elections within 90 days (about 3 February 2027). The government rejects the ruling, and the presidency dismissed the chief justice on 4 November. Sources: Garowe Online, Eurasia Review.