Nuruddin Farah - Crossbones

Fee-Jigan has the habit of grinning every time his and Malik’s eyes make contact. If there is something that unnerves Malik, it is this: Why does it feel as though he is in the company of a head of state with his retinue, not a mere funder of pirates?

At the entrance to the alcove, Ma-Gabadeh dismisses Gumaad and Qasiir with a wave of his hand. Malik notes the discreetly armed men loitering in the vicinity. In the alcove, the air conditioners are on, and three young men are working the table, the food already laid out, the colorful drinks poured, the large knives sharp as a butcher’s. Ma-Gabadeh ejaculates, “Bismillah,” and, waiting for no further formalities, immediately takes his seat and heaps mountains of rice and mutton on his plate, then takes hold of a knife and begins to slice off mouthfuls of the meat. Time is money to Ma-Gabadeh; it is obvious he doesn’t waste it on eating. Fee-Jigan keeps up with him, and begins eating just as quickly.

A slow eater, Malik lags behind, afraid of boring them.

Ma-Gabadeh teases Malik, “Why was I told that in America you do everything fast, eat standing and on the run, in buses, trains, and offices?”

Embarrassed, Malik gives up eating. The table is cleared forthwith.

Buoyed by the presence of two witnesses, Ma-Gabadeh is true to his sobriquet, fearlessly agreeing for their conversation to be taped, on condition that he receives copies of the interview when it is published. He explains to Malik that he has invited Fee-Jigan to join them to answer some of the questions, as he has done research on the topic. Anyhow, “Two heads are better than one.”

Malik asks, “To what do you owe your success?”

“I am the success.”

Malik is ill prepared for this sort of talk. Not only does he disagree with the intent of the statement, but he finds it smacks of cockiness with a terrible sting in its tail.

“Please explain your meaning,” he says.

“I was born poor in a small hamlet,” Ma-Gabadeh says, “to parents who hadn’t a cent to spare for my education. Luckily, I knew I wanted to make it in the bigger world and had the ambition to match my wish. I started off as a junior clerk, and within a year was promoted to a section head in the Ministry of Fisheries, and within a couple more years I headed a service. I was on the verge of being made a head of department when the civil war erupted. I achieved what I achieved on my own, with little or no help from anyone. Let’s face it: I, too, like many others, contributed to the creation of the crisis and then profited from the turmoil. Turbulence upsets things, sends the dregs to the top. We are enjoying the turmoil and are unfettered by tax laws, a parliament issuing decrees, a dictator passing edicts, a government declaring draconian measures: the ideal situation for growth of capital.”

Malik asks, “Are you different from those born in the same hamlet as you, who were raised in more or less the same poverty?”

“There is no poverty worse than the poverty of many of the coastal areas in the northeast of Somalia,” Ma-Gabadeh says, and then corrects himself. “Except for the places where there are deepwater ports. There are no tarred roads, no developed forms of communication, no transportation by land or even by sea. The region I come from has suffered total neglect, from the days of Italian colonialism onward. Since the collapse of the state, things have become much worse, because of the foreign vessels fishing illegally in our seas. So we have nothing to eat, no fish to fish. Think about it.”

“Where were you when the state collapsed?”

“When the state collapsed, I was in Mogadiscio — a small, honest cog in a state machine, part of a bigger machine. I served my country until the engine of the state of which I was a mere cog ceased to run, because our president had fled in an army tank. Then I went home, depressed.”

“What did you do then?”

“I sent my wife home to Guriceel, her hometown.”

“Where is your wife now, as we speak?”

“She is in the States, an American citizen.”

“And where are your children?”

“They are with her; Americans, too.”

“What did you do after sending your wife home?”

“Jobless for several months, I contacted an Italian I knew and proposed he and I go into the lobster business together. I had at my disposal some of the old files, because I had saved them from the looters who were setting fire to the buildings after emptying them of computers and furniture. To cook up a deal with some of my old mates, I moved to Bosaso and linked up with them. We were fired up to provide employment for people, hired a thousand or so unemployed fishermen. Soon enough we started to export shiploads of lobster and other precious fish to Italy. When we became big enough to set up freezing facilities of our own, I moved my base to Mogadiscio. Not long after, we found that ships flying flags from faraway places — Korea, Japan, Spain, Russia, Yemen, China, Belize, Bermuda, Liberia, and a handful of countries you couldn’t place on a map — were in our seas, plundering our fish and destroying their habitat. Bear in mind that our waters contained huge fishing potential — Somalia has the longest coastline in Africa.”

Fee-Jigan interjects, “It is over thirty-three hundred kilometers long, and there are special features found in and around Ras Hafun, where there used to be an abundance of the largest variety of fish at certain periods of the year.”

Ma-Gabadeh continues. “Anyway, upset by what these illegal fishing vessels were doing, we apprehended a trawler with a dummy registration in Kenya that was fishing inside Somali waters near the town of Garcad. The trawler was fined, the proceeds were shared out among the community of fishermen. After this, the foreign trawlers hired local militiamen, arming them, to protect their illegal fishing. The more numerous and the bigger the vessels, the more destruction they caused. We counted five to seven thousand professional fishermen, and not one of them could make a living. This was a no-win situation, and I quit.”

Malik asks if Ma-Gabadeh has been engaged in funding some of the “piracy” acts taking place off the coast of Somalia.

Ma-Gabadeh replies, “I am an honest businessman, earn my money in an honest way, and spend what I must spend honestly. Granted, I give charitably to honest causes.”

“Would you consider funding the Courts in their fight against the warlords a charitable activity worth funding?” Malik asks.

Fee-Jigan intervenes. “It would be unwise for Ma-Gabadeh to specify the institutions to which he contributes charitably. That is between him and his Creator.”

Malik tries again. “What are your links to the pirates?”

Ma-Gabadeh replies, “I’ve said I am an honest man, I make honest money, and spend the honest money I make on honest causes. I have no links with the pirates.”

“Nor with Shabaab?”

“Nor with Shabaab.”

“Nor have you ever funded Shabaab?”

As if on cue, Ma-Gabadeh’s mobile phone rings. He glances at it, then, turning, trains an angry stare on Fee-Jigan, who for his part is stagily looking away, fingers nonchalantly drumming on the table, his humming audible. Malik can’t make sense of the goings-on, especially because Ma-Gabadeh behaves as though he is at once miffed, shocked, and disappointed. As if weighing his options, Ma-Gabadeh hands over his mobile phone to Malik and says, as if Fee-Jigan is not there, “Look at what this hapless fool, Fee-Jigan, is doing.” He shakes his head in disapproval. “I hate his sort. Filthy cowards.”

Malik turns to look at Fee-Jigan, who still acts as if he doesn’t know what Ma-Gabadeh is on about. This in turn makes Ma-Gabadeh still more irate. He explains to Malik, “When he and I met in the hotel foyer before your arrival, Fee-Jigan suggested he would ring me on his mobile phone if you put an embarrassing question to me, so I might justifiably terminate our conversation and say that I was called away to attend an emergency business meeting. I told him to do no such thing and to make sure that he did not make a fool of us. Yet here he is and he has done precisely that — turned us into a laughingstock.”