I had purposefully stayed away from reporting on the politics of Somalia because I didn’t want to get too far afield from the purpose of Refugee Resettlement Watch, but this story from AP today is too juicy to ignore. Entitled, “Somali pirates turn villages into boom towns,” it begins:
MOGADISHU, Somalia – Somalia’s increasingly brazen pirates are building sprawling stone houses, cruising in luxury cars, marrying beautiful women — even hiring caterers to prepare Western-style food for their hostages.
And in an impoverished country where every public institution has crumbled, they have become heroes in the steamy coastal dens they operate from because they are the only real business in town.
“The pirates depend on us, and we benefit from them,” said Sahra Sheik Dahir, a shop owner in Haradhere, the nearest village to where a hijacked Saudi Arabian supertanker carrying $100 million in crude was anchored Wednesday.
These boomtowns are all the more shocking in light of Somalia’s violence and poverty: Radical Islamists control most of the country’s south, meting out lashings and stonings for accused criminals. There has been no effective central government in nearly 20 years, plunging this arid African country into chaos.
So while we hear the lament of people like the woman in St. Paul yesterday, that we need to bring their poor “relatives” to America ASAP, pirates and their villages are rolling in other peoples’ cash. Maybe the pirates could be persuaded to use their millions to help THEIR OWN PEOPLE!
Who cares if the money is legal or illegal says one recipient of the largesse:
“Regardless of how the money is coming in, legally or illegally, I can say it has started a life in our town,” said Shamso Moalim, a 36-year-old mother of five in Haradhere.
Based on what we have learned about Somali immigration fraud, I suspect this same mindset runs through the whole Somali culture—-who cares if it’s legal or illegal. Oh, but then we are lectured we must have respect for cultural differences! This one too?
…. towns that once were eroded by years of poverty and chaos are now bustling with restaurants, Land Cruisers and Internet cafes. Residents also use their gains to buy generators — allowing full days of electricity, once an unimaginable luxury in Somalia.
Come to think of it, I guess this piracy is the ultimate redistribution of wealth that our newly elected President seems so eager to bring to America—just accomplished in a tad bit more dramatic way.