Piracy and Poverty

The recent rash of piracy of in the Indian Ocean and the Gulf of Aden is due to the collapse of an official Somali government. This has allowed roving bands of Islamic militants to steal and destroy what little resources the Somali people have.

There is also the element of international fisheries that have stripped the coastal waters of Somalia bare of any tuna and lobster. The local Somali fishermen used to be able to make a living and thrive from the abundant fishing. These international fisheries have also been accused of dumping illegal toxic wastes in the Somali coastal waters furthering the demise of Somali’s local fishing industry. This makes for one less thing to eat in Somali.

The lawlessness of Islamic extremists fighting the government combined with a deteriorating local fishing industry brings about a lot of lean desperate men with growling stomachs. The chance to outfit a small boat with weapons and head out to sea to change your fortune by boarding a merchant ship and holding the crew for large ransoms suddenly becomes a workable option to pull yourself out of poverty.

A corrupt United Nations will do absolutely nothing for Somali. A coalition of naval vessels from different countries trying to patrol almost 3,000 square miles of the Indian Ocean is simply an exercise in frustration and may even provide more targets for the pirates.

An invasion of Somali by the United States will simply prove to be another failure.

Somali must find a way of establishing a legitimate government that can tackle the problem of the destruction of their coastal waters and establish the independence of the Somali fishermen and restore a way of life that provided food for the Somali people and a life of balance.

This entry was posted on May 7, 2009 at 6:14 pm and is filed under World. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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