The “banana war” is just one symptom of the mess the United Nations leaves behind as it withdraws from Somalia this week. After nearly two years and $3 billion, it has failed to bring about disarmament or the formation of a national government. The U.S.-led effort to end Somalia’s famine (which did succeed) soon dissipated into a futile hunt for the warlordMohammed Farah Aidid. After 18 U.S. Army Rangers were killed by gunmen from Aidid’s clan in Mogadishu in October 1993, the Americans and most European troops pulled out. They were replaced by some 15,000 Asian and African blue helmetswho hunkered down behind barbed wireat the U.N. compound in Mogadishu as militiamen battled in the streets andthe warlords signed one meaninglesspeace deal after another. Now, as 2,500U.S. marines and 500 Italian soldiersprepare to wade ashore to rescue the peacekeepers, Somalia awaits renewed civil war. Aidid and his chief rival, Ali Mahdi Mohammed, are expected to fight for the country’s main prizes – Mogadishu’s seaport and airport – soon after the foreigners are gone.
The banana business isn’t small potatoes in Somalia, either. Starting in the 1930s, Somalia’s colonizer, Italy, built up an export trade worth tens of millions of dollars a year. But the industry fell into ruin in 1991, when Aidid’s and Ali Mahdi’s victorious militias drove the forces of former dictator Mohammed Siad Barre through the fertile valleys south of the capital. The Italian firm abandoned its business entirely during the U.N. hunt for Aidid in 1993. And last year Dole jumped into the vacuum, encouraged by the U.S. ambassador to Somalia and by U.N. officials, who escorted Dole executives on helicopter tours of the banana plantations. The company hired an Aidid clan member as its agent and staked farmers to fertilizer and seed. By last summer Dole was sending out three shiploads of bananas a month. Then, in September, the Italians came back. They argued that they had invested $4 million in the plantations over 20 years and that Dole’s contracts were illegal.
The ensuing struggle for the allegiance of the banana farmers quickly escalated to bloodshed. In late 1994 a Dole worker was shot dead in a warehouse. Dole’s Somali agent, Achmed Douale, says a Somalfruit gunman was responsible; Somalfruit denies the charge. On Feb. 2 two gunmen were killed by Somalfruit security forces when they blocked a convoy of trucks unloading at the port. Mortars were later fired at the Somalfruit vessel. Dole denies involvement in either incident. And a week later, an Italian journalist and a local Somalfruit employee were killed when gunmen fired at them as they left the airport. Somalfruit officials say that the gunmen were employed by Dole and that the intended target was a top company official who was expected to fly into Mogadishu that day. Dole says the incident was a common crime and called the allegations “propaganda . . . geared to discredit Dole.”
Both sides may be losers after the United Nations pulls out. Last week Aidid and Ali Mahdi agreed to establish a committee to jointly manage Mogadishu’s seaport. But Aidid has refused to back down from his prinicipal demand – to become Somalia’s head of state – and few rule out a violent grab for Mogadishu’s main prize. “If one side seizes the port, the other side can shell it and render it inoperative,” says U.S. Ambassador Daniel Simpson. “That would be calamitous for everybody” – including those who want to export such products as bananas. The banana war may be just the start of a greater conflagration.
