February 20th Tragedy

This marked the beginning of the Somaliland struggle for independence and was triggered by the imprisonment of 20 members of the Uffo organizing a cleanup of Hargeisa Hospital.

The State of Hargeisa after the Ogaden war was dismal, Ethiopian bomber planes still flew over Hargeisa and released a few bombs once in a while.

The only Hospital wasn't supplied with an adequate amount of electricity and power cuts were frequent during operations.

The Uffo group sought to change this independently so they gathered volunteers and started to improve their community. They had a newspaper called Uffo which detailed their activities.

This made them popular with the city and especially with its youth. But when word reached Gani that the men were organizing a Self help scheme, he felt it threatened his position in power in Somaliland.

On November 2nd 1981, the first of the Uffo were arrested. By the next day the rest of the group were rounded up by the NSS and imprisoned in Birjeex where they were subject to brutal torture.

On the fateful day of the 20th of February 1982, the Government announced that the group would be trialled in the main Theatre of the city.

Students poured out of schools in defiance of their teachers and Soldiers. They gathered outside the courthouse and were met by armed soldiers who fired tear gas

The students multiplied and multiplied in number until the soldiers fired live bullets at the students.

Outraged the students picked up rocks and hurled it at the soldiers. The city became aflame with unrest as the protests spread from district to district to Burco where solidarity protests took place and were again met with bullet fire.

In total, the riots lasted for three days and killed over 300 students. Many were also arrested and sent to Birjeex and Mandheera prison where they were tortured and raped by government soldiers, many were subsequently executed.

This moment symbolised the point of No return as the SNM began a campaign armed struggle as a result of the deaths leading up to the 1988 Genocide.

The Youth were a key player during this struggle orchestrating a campaign of civil disobedience in the cities that were unable to be stopped by the government or Headteachers.

The government retaliated from executing Students caught engaging in these activities to kidnapping children from school and bleeding them to death. Schools became a war zone between Students and Soldiers escalating with every SNM attack and massacres by government troops.

Here are Some photos and artist interpretations of that day

The sacrifice of our Youth must never be forgotten. Allahu Naxariisto