Somaliland and the African border dilemma

But insisting that borders are absolutely sacred under all circumstances brings its own dangers

- Joan Swart

Drawing the line in the sand: The recognition of Somaliland’s sovereignty brings the dilemma of recognised borders back to the surface. Photo: Clay Gilliland

(Clay Gilliland)

With Israel's decision on 26 December to formally recognise Somaliland, a question that has lingered for decades has abruptly become immediate again.

Other states — including Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates and possibly the United States — are now being mentioned as potential followers.

If further recognition does occur, it will not simply be a diplomatic sequence. It will reopen one of the most enduring and unresolved questions in African politics:

For more than 60 years, African regional diplomacy has lived with a structural tension — not due to confusion but by deliberate design. Over time, through its founding charter and key resolutions, the OAU — and later the African Union — committed itself to three powerful ideas: the sovereignty of states, the stability of inherited colonial borders and the principle of self-determination. None of these emerged accidentally. Each was a response to trauma.

Sovereignty and noninterference were intended to shield newly independent states from external manipulation and regime destabilisation. Having endured colonial rule, African leaders feared that interference would simply continue under new names. But experience — especially the moral catastrophe of Rwanda — revealed the limits of absolute sovereignty. This is why the AU Constitutive Act later created an unprecedented clause allowing intervention in cases of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Sovereignty mattered, but human life mattered more.