Post 4- Piracy

When most people were children they pictured pirates as bearded men with swords on big ships that drank and make people walk the plank. Today in developed nations people probably associate piracy with illegally downloading music and movies than what’s going in places like Somalia. Somalia pirates attack or detain vessels that enter the waters near the country and loot whatever is valuable inside of them. The world sees these pirates as large annoyances that need to be taken care of for the good of all nations. However the circumstances around what’s happening in these waters are mostly ignored. A number of external and internal factors that leave citizens of Somalia living in poverty give Somalian pirates a reason or in some eyes an excuse to do this kind of work.

The international community looks at Somalia as a failed state due small and weak government and lack of infrastructure. Many of the citizens of this nation are impoverished which little means to make money and provide for themselves or their family through conventional means. This means that Somalia can be taken advantage of in ways that nations that stronger nations cannot.

Many countries infringe on Somalia’s control of their own waters without punishment. This includes illegally fishing and illegally dumping their wastes into Somalian waters. According to Waldo there has been massive illegal foreign fishing piracy that have been poaching and destroying the Somali marine resources for the last 18 years following the collapse of the Mohamed Siad Barre regime in 1991. Somalia makes most of its profits from fishing and polluting the waters has obvious detrimental effects to what is essentially the countries only industry.

Waldo then comments on the “usual double standards when such matters concern Africa, the “international community” comes out in force to condemn and declare war against the Somali fishermen pirates while discreetly protecting the numerous Illegal, Unreported and Unregulated (IUU) fishing fleets” (Waldo 2009). Somalia does not have the political clout to raise concerns over what’s going on in their waters and thus does not have the ability to be heard by the international community.

Some parts of countries population along with some members of the country’s parliament view these pirates as providing a service. To them the pirates serve as means to defend Somalia’s resources from outside invaders. Mohamed Mohamoud a Somali MP has gone on record stating “The pirates are... fighting the foreign ships that are plundering our fish and other marine resources” (Lecture 24). Other MPs described pirates as “heroes for keeping foreign fishing fleets away from Somali shores, and said they were acting as unofficial coastguards” (Lecture 24).  There are citizens within the country who do not support piracy and view it the way that the international community does. However, having the support of a portion of their countrymen can allow pirates to justify their action.

            However there are many that believe that Somalian pirates are only in it for the profit and that while other countries are illegal fishing, pirates are not attacking fishing vessels at the rate they should. Attacks on fishing vessels are highly successful but many pirates attack vessels that are carry much more valuable cargo. No matter which side of the issue you fall on it seems that the root of the issue are the high rates of poverty and resource scarcity within Somalia.