In this article, I will look at different sectors of the effects of the war and recruiting of young children to be soldiers in Somalia. It will investigate the youth who joined forces with the government and Al-Shabaab groups, whether they got what they expected before or what happened after joining, and how they solved the problems with the government and what the role of the community, such as regional leaders, in this process.
Children, who are weaker threats than adults, require assistance and are more cautious when they are young. After the collapsed Somalia government, the country went down and every sector was destroyed. The children born at that time lacked support, so without treatment, no education, unhealthy lifestyles, and insecurity, they had a lot of problems.
Some of them lost their fathers or mothers. These are some of the effects of the civil war on them.
1. They might be the children of one of the militia groups.
2. The militia recruits young people and trains them in order to use them to defend themselves.
3. The militia taught the youth to be enemies of anyone who disagreed with them.
4. Creating enmity in the clan system
5. If one of the children dies, his or her family members will take revenge on the killer.
Some of them learned to use different drugs because they believed that they didn’t have any other alternative in life.
Those points show our leaders can learn a lot when it comes to recruits, recurrent troops, and young children. Another concern is the issue of insecurity that is suffering youth currently in the country.
It is totally not right that the government allows people under maturity age to join the Army. On the other hand, the Al-Shabab group recruits young children, and they attack the government.
There are several reasons why young people are more prone to recurrence:
1. Unemployment rate, the majority of the youth don’t have a job and Al-shabaab can see a huge opportunity in the youth.
2. Insufficient faith in the Islamic region.
3. The Al-shabaab asks the pastoralists in the rural areas to teach their children especially boys their ideology.
The role of the government is to stop young chiders join to Armies.
1. To create job opportunities for youth
2. The government should take action to suspend the recruitment of young children to armies
3. The government must do public awareness in case of those who would want to join Al-shabaab group or the government army.
4. Those who left the Al-shabaab group to be allowed back to the society and given livelihood skills to help them.
In another way, what is the role of religious leaders in contributing to this problem? The regional leaders have a lot of capacity, but some of them are not interested in talking about the issue of young people who want to join Al-Shabab because al-Shabaab teaches them the wrong ideology about religion. But the reality is that they talk to youth about what they believe until they kill themselves by wearing bombs and killing civilian people.
The regional leaders can discuss whether it is right in Islam for someone to kill him or herself or to throw human blood on the earth every day. When I was writing this article, I knew some leaders couldn’t talk in public or in the mosque because they feared attacks from the Al-Shabaab group. In other words, some believe what al-Shabaab believes and they live under a system of government.
Although there are regional leaders who are part of the government and they talk to the public about what they do with the Al-Shabaab group in Somalia, there is still blood thrown around and Al-Shabaab's administration is still working in some places of the government. It shows us Al-Shabaab is still strong. They can collect money, which they call "Sakawaad" If you refuse, they can take you if you are alone or bomb your business.
Conclusion and Recommendations
This issue for recruiting forces to youth exists in the government and Al-Shabaab group, but the case of Al-Shabaab is very dangerous, the youth in Al-Shabaab group wants to kill the civilian people because they convey extreme ideologies which they learned from leaders of Al-Shabaab. Their side is called “Amiir”.
This situation needs to be tackled by all members of the society including the government and it needs more awareness that comes from the leaders of religion. The leaders of religion have to teach the society the right way in Islam especially the youth.
I recommend these three points to the community, government, and leaders of the region:
1. Young people must get job opportunities or capital to start their own business with the help of the government and community.
2. The government should create public awareness about terrorism groups’ ideologies.
3. The leaders of the religion should teach the society about the dangers of the wrong ideology that Al-Shabaab believes in, to kill people.
Author
Farah Muhumed Hiraane
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