By M.A. Egge
In the last 24 hours, the international media has been commenting a lot and written much about the MoU reached and signed by the President of the Republic of Somaliland and the Prime Minister of Ethiopia, H.E. Musa Bihi Abdi and H.E. Dr. Abiy Ahmed respectively aimed at leasing to Ethiopia 20km of seashore along the Somaliland coastline, a move which in turn gets the Ethiopian government to be the first country in the international world of nations to justifiably accord the country its fully fledged, dejure, recognition.
This has all along the main dream that kept the nation’s flame of aspirations going.
The world media captured the historical understanding reached by the Republic of Somaliland and Ethiopia.
The Ethiopian press has emphasized the mutual understanding between the two countries, which they described as a historic one in the direction of development and cooperation between Somaliland and Ethiopia. The newspapers Addis Standard and The Reporter, said that this understanding, which will soon be changed to an official agreement, has been exchanged by Somaliland for the sea route it leases to Ethiopia, so that the Ethiopian government will be the first country to recognize an independent country as the “Republic of Somaliland.”
Also, Addis Standard and The Reporter, said that the preliminary understanding reached by the Republic of Somaliland and Ethiopia stipulates that the highest priority should be given to the cooperation between the two sides, especially in matters of security, trade and diplomacy, which they described as one which would play a positive role in the development of the Horn of Africa.
France 24 television, the famous Bloomberg newspaper, said that the agreement has become an encouragement and realization of a wide cooperation between the Republic of Somaliland and Ethiopia, which leads to the diplomatic relations between the two sides reaching the highest level.
The news agency of Reuters, said that this understanding will benefit Somaliland to get the recognition it wanted from Ethiopia, and quoted the President of Somaliland H.E. Musa Bihi Abdi saying, “We have agreed with Ethiopia that it would to be the first country to sign the official agreement to recognize Somaliland.”
Reuters further noted that the Minister of Interior Hon. Mohamed Kahin Ahmed has chided Somalia’s remarks on its position following the Somaliland-Ethiopia agreement hence pointed out that they had no legal rights whatoever to claim that Somaliland is part of Somalia hence said, he said, “I urge Somalia to apologize for its claim that Somaliland is part of Somalia.”
On the other hand, the historic agreement was highlighted and put in the limelight by other media power houses such asthe BBC, VOA, The Guardian and Akhbaarul-Aalam, which reported on the magnitude of the historic MoU.
Indeed this preliminary agree is historic as much as one which will open a new chapter of development and progress in the region of traditional partners.
