Mohamed Siad Barre (Maxamed Siyaad Barre)

Who was he?

Mohamed Siad Barre ruled Somalia for 21 years. He led the coup of 21 October 1969, six days after President Abdirashid Ali Shermarke was killed, and governed until he left Mogadishu on 26 January 1991 (Wikipedia, Siad Barre). The full story of his government is on the Siad Barre era, 1969 to 1991. This page is about the man.

Early life and police career

His exact birth year is not known; estimates run from 1909 to 1921 (Wikipedia). Castagno gives 1919 and records his birthplace as Luuq, in Gedo. His herding parents died when he was ten (Castagno, Historical Dictionary of Somalia, 1975, "Mohamed Siad Barre"). Wikipedia records his official birthplace as Garbahaarey, also in Gedo, and his family as Mareehaan (Darood) (Wikipedia).

He went to school in Luuq and Mogadishu. Under the British Military Administration (1941 to 1950) he joined the police and rose to the highest rank open to a Somali. In the 1950s he studied for two years at the Carabinieri police school in Italy (Castagno 1975). In 1960 he moved to the new national army, and in 1965 became its commander (same source).

The coup of 1969

After President Shermarke was killed on 15 October 1969, the army took power on 21 October without a fight. Siad Barre led the Supreme Revolutionary Council that now ran the country (Castagno 1975). He said the coup was a last resort to end corruption and clan politics and to move the country forward (same source).

What his government built

His government chose the Latin script for Somali in 1972 and sent students and teachers to teach reading across the country (Library of Congress, Somalia: A Country Study, 1992). It ran large public works. Somalia joined the Arab League in 1974, and that year he chaired the Organisation of African Unity (Wikipedia). See Shire Jama Ahmed.

Harm on the record

A 1970 security law let the National Security Service hold people without trial (Wikipedia). In January 1975 ten religious scholars were executed for opposing a new family law (same source). After the Ogaden war and a coup attempt in April 1978, the government narrowed its base and punished whole communities (Library of Congress 1992).

Wikipedia, drawing on many studies, records that government units destroyed water reservoirs used by Majeerteen and Isaaq herders, and that tens of thousands of Isaaq civilians were killed, with estimates from 50,000 to 200,000 (Wikipedia). In 1988 government forces bombed Hargeisa and Burao, and more than 300,000 people fled to Ethiopia (Library of Congress 1992). Calankii records this harm as the deeds of a government and its forces, never of any community.

Fall and death

Armed fronts rose in every part of the country in the 1980s. He left Mogadishu on 26 January 1991 (Wikipedia). After two attempts to return, he went into exile in May 1991, first in Nairobi and then in Nigeria. He died of a heart attack in Lagos on 2 January 1995 and was buried at Garbahaarey (same source).

How Somalis remember him

Views differ widely. Some remember the script, schools and national pride of the 1970s. Many others remember detention, the bombing of the north and the collapse that followed. Both are part of the record.