Agony of Discrimination, a Painful Documentary

By Abdirahman M. Dirye

A Review—CBATV Desk its Somali language in Hargeisa broadcasted a documentary titled “Hidamadda Haybsooca” to Somalis all over the world. The documentary not just met the Gabooyo traditional and political leaders and the ordinary who subjugated to clannish slurs day in and day out but also non-Gabooye figures who explained how the century-old discrimination undermined Gabooye’s social development.

The documentary explored untraveled territory by becoming the first national or international news channel ever tried to document the depths of the plight the discrimination inflicted this “minority”. CBATV made field trip to Dami, a predominantly by Gabooye tribe of a segregated ghetto in mirror of the slavery era of the southern States of America during the Civil War. To put in the modern context, Gabooye people are to other Somalis as Gypsies or Romas to Europe and yet Gabooye speak the same language and practice the same of school of thought. Basically the documentary says Somalia is a homogeneous and can’t claim to have a minority whatsoever. The TV showed its viewers that this problem is multifaceted.

The documentary summarizes their plights and long term unnecessary suffering in a way never seen before.

The documentary program shed light to a social problem that require an emergency solution and the audiences of the CBATV suggested in their comments in the YouTube channel “this is a wrongdoing and injustice” many of the audience learned new information while others didn’t know that their “clean cut jokes” of Midgan or other verbal attacks dehumanize an entire people of their fellow citizens.

Gabooye’s key figures interviewed in the documentary said that they are traumatized because the constant libels and slurs are heaped upon them for unexplained reasons in wherever they go.

Sultan Daakir said “There are no inspiring stories in our community, no role models be they successful businesspeople or academicians.” However, this community has the highest rate of pop singers per capita in Somalia. But remember music and an entertainment is a vile industry.

Gabooye, the documentary says, are the lowest in income and education for these above mentioned factors among others. The hatred and prejudices poured upon them made their life a living hell. A footage of their neighborhood displays huts of plastics, cartons, and broken sewage.  Their small houses tell their low living standards. Dami water wall lays next to dumpster that would cause a waterborne diseases.

Despite these people used to traders who make handicrafts in the old olds. They are believed to be the oldest tribe of Somalia ever urbanized. It is an irony to remain the bottom of the economy after centuries of work.  School enrollment is the lowest per tribe and they also suffer from early marriage and labor children just to survive.

they suffer a political and economic marginalization. The discrimination is more obvious, says the documentary, in matters like marriage of which Gobooye people are not allowed to intermarry with major clans keeping them in an abject poverty and social exclusion. If Non-Gabooye marries from them, he immediately meets an ostracism, not from Gabooye but from his tribe.

The documentary worthy of appreciation interviewed Gabooye of all walks of life from rich to poor, from governors to governed folks. Their story of facing discrimination parallels with the Jim Crow. This community face discrimination not matter how rich or poor they are; the revelation of facts seem alarmed many viewers.