A new actor is jostling in the Horn of Africa. Somaliland, a self-declared breakaway republic in northern Somalia, scaled up its foreign policy in 2020 following years of lobbying for international recognition. Emboldened by its geopolitical centrality, leaders of Somaliland embraced a new quest for regional and international allies last year. Nevertheless, President Muse Bihi Abdi’s new strategy is set to build new ties while also breaking others. The ultimate result of this brinkmanship diplomacy remains to be seen.
The Republic of Somaliland separated from Somalia in 1991. Its ten-year conflict against Mogadishu had reached appalling levels of violence, such as the bombing of Hargeisa in May 1988. Therefore, when Somalia plunged into anarchy, Somaliland leaders carved out their enclave in northern Somalia and continued to enforce their autonomous rule in open defiance to Mogadishu. The latest round of talks between Mogadishu and Hargeisa took place last summer in Djibouti, but it quickly went awry. Somaliland’s foreign policy indirectly contributed to that outcome. Now, the Somali constitutional crisis further rules out an agreement between the two parties.
From Geo-economics to Geopolitics
Somaliland is a net beneficiary from power competition in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. As regional powers grew interested in this strategic waterway, ports became economic and security pivots. In parallel to its effort in Yemen, the United Arab Emirates crossed the Gulf of Aden and landed in the historic port city of Berbera. Despite the ban from the Somali federal government, the Dubai-controlled DP World signed a 30-year concession with Somaliland authorities to develop and manage the port. In March 2021, Abu Dhabi appointed a career diplomat to its trade office in Hargeisa, which signaled its desire to maintain strong ties with the local authorities.
In March, DP World delivered three gantry cranes to Berbera as part of its programme to bring the port’s capacity to 500,000 TEU (Twenty-Foot Equivalent Unit), hence overtaking Djibouti’s container terminal with its 350,000-TEU capacity. So far, Djibouti maintains the upper hand due to its superior infrastructures serving the port—specifically, the Djibouti-Addis Ababa railway, its developed free trade zone, and the Chinese-built Doraleh Multipurpose Port, which opened in 2017. However, the Berbera port will enhance its competitiveness after completing the free trade zone by the Emirati company and the carriageway connecting Berbera to the Ethiopian border in 2022.
Landlocked Ethiopia is pivotal for Djibouti and Somaliland. Addis Ababa depends on the tiny outlet of Djibouti for 90 percent of its maritime imports. Therefore, it decided to diversify its commercial routes by investing in the port of Berbera. Since 2016, the Ethiopian government has owned 19 percent of the port’s share. Yet recent decisions have put Addis Ababa and Hargeisa at loggerheads. As part of his project to establish a regional order, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed built ties with Somalia’s central government in Mogadishu. However, this unprecedented strategy-change was perceived with hostility in Somaliland, which reacted by leveraging Ethiopia’s main fault line: the Nile dam dispute.
After the Ethiopian government scaled down diplomatic relations with Hargeisa in favor of Mogadishu, the president of Somaliland hosted an Egyptian delegation to discuss trade and investments in July 2020. The parties reportedly discussed the leasing of an Egyptian military base as well. The visit alarmed Addis Ababa. An Egyptian presence in a neighboring country would represent a strategic threat to Ethiopia. That was sufficient to convince Abiy Ahmed to send a delegation to re-establish full diplomatic relations that month. In September, another delegation of top security officials landed in Hargeisa to discuss further cooperation and, possibly, the creation of an Ethiopian naval base in place of the Egyptian. Addis Ababa has probably averted the threat of an Egyptian base on its doorstep for the time being. However, it will be increasingly difficult to balance the alliance with Mogadishu and Somaliland’s new posture.
The Republic of Somaliland separated from Somalia in 1991. Its ten-year conflict against Mogadishu had reached appalling levels of violence, such as the bombing of Hargeisa in May 1988. Therefore, when Somalia plunged into anarchy, Somaliland leaders carved out their enclave in northern Somalia and continued to enforce their autonomous rule in open defiance to Mogadishu. The latest round of talks between Mogadishu and Hargeisa took place last summer in Djibouti, but it quickly went awry. Somaliland’s foreign policy indirectly contributed to that outcome. Now, the Somali constitutional crisis further rules out an agreement between the two parties.
From Geo-economics to Geopolitics
Somaliland is a net beneficiary from power competition in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden. As regional powers grew interested in this strategic waterway, ports became economic and security pivots. In parallel to its effort in Yemen, the United Arab Emirates crossed the Gulf of Aden and landed in the historic port city of Berbera. Despite the ban from the Somali federal government, the Dubai-controlled DP World signed a 30-year concession with Somaliland authorities to develop and manage the port. In March 2021, Abu Dhabi appointed a career diplomat to its trade office in Hargeisa, which signaled its desire to maintain strong ties with the local authorities.
In March, DP World delivered three gantry cranes to Berbera as part of its programme to bring the port’s capacity to 500,000 TEU (Twenty-Foot Equivalent Unit), hence overtaking Djibouti’s container terminal with its 350,000-TEU capacity. So far, Djibouti maintains the upper hand due to its superior infrastructures serving the port—specifically, the Djibouti-Addis Ababa railway, its developed free trade zone, and the Chinese-built Doraleh Multipurpose Port, which opened in 2017. However, the Berbera port will enhance its competitiveness after completing the free trade zone by the Emirati company and the carriageway connecting Berbera to the Ethiopian border in 2022.
Landlocked Ethiopia is pivotal for Djibouti and Somaliland. Addis Ababa depends on the tiny outlet of Djibouti for 90 percent of its maritime imports. Therefore, it decided to diversify its commercial routes by investing in the port of Berbera. Since 2016, the Ethiopian government has owned 19 percent of the port’s share. Yet recent decisions have put Addis Ababa and Hargeisa at loggerheads. As part of his project to establish a regional order, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed built ties with Somalia’s central government in Mogadishu. However, this unprecedented strategy-change was perceived with hostility in Somaliland, which reacted by leveraging Ethiopia’s main fault line: the Nile dam dispute.
After the Ethiopian government scaled down diplomatic relations with Hargeisa in favor of Mogadishu, the president of Somaliland hosted an Egyptian delegation to discuss trade and investments in July 2020. The parties reportedly discussed the leasing of an Egyptian military base as well. The visit alarmed Addis Ababa. An Egyptian presence in a neighboring country would represent a strategic threat to Ethiopia. That was sufficient to convince Abiy Ahmed to send a delegation to re-establish full diplomatic relations that month. In September, another delegation of top security officials landed in Hargeisa to discuss further cooperation and, possibly, the creation of an Ethiopian naval base in place of the Egyptian. Addis Ababa has probably averted the threat of an Egyptian base on its doorstep for the time being. However, it will be increasingly difficult to balance the alliance with Mogadishu and Somaliland’s new posture.
