The Horn of Africa States is an important junction in world affairs and this pivots to its vital linkage in world shipping and hence trade and economic development. The West, as generally represented by the United States but in the past led by Europeans, and the East represented in the past by mostly Russia but now involving rising China and India, have always vied for control the Horn of Africa States as represented by the SEEDS countries i.e. Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti and Sudan. There was never the interest of these countries at heart in any of these competing forces and unfortunately the countries of the region have always been, over the past two hundred years, pawns in battles they have no control over or no say in.
There are even presently regional powers that have also presented themselves in the political and economic battles raging in the region, all vying to demonstrate they are for this camp or that in what generally Horn Africans could describe as the bride helpers or groom helpers in marriage ceremonies. They work for either the West or the East or both, which confuses the Horn of Africa in more ways than one or perhaps this is the beginnings of a more multipolar world.
The Horn of Africa States region has suffered greatly and lost many of its youthful population through this intense competition driven by geo-strategic, geo-political, geo-economic factors. Climate change manifested in more regular and recurring weather calamities was not helpful either. NGOs who thrive is such situations have themselves have worked in pulling down whatever governance infrastructures there were in the region through their indirect and ill-intentioned activities in the countries of the region without going through the central authorities of the governments of the region, thus undermining them in many respects.
The Horn of Africa States for good or bad was never out of the cold war because of its geostrategic location despite the many talks of re-emerging cold war lately. The Horn of Africa never saw respite over the past decades even when the Soviet Union collapsed, and NATO and the West declared themselves supreme power at one time – the unipolar world.
Terrorism and jihadism were introduced to the region and continue to wreak havoc in the region. Military forces from non-regional parties mostly, but also from the region were deployed under the African Union flag, and at........