Somali African Muki Organization

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Somali African Muki Organization (SAMO) or Somali-African Muki Organization was the name of an organization in Somalia that campaigned for the interests of the ethnic minority of the Somali Bantu . This minority is discriminated against in Somalia because of their descent from slaves, their sedentary peasant way of life and external characteristics that differ from the majority of the population.

The organization was founded in the 1980s (1986, according to another source, 1983) by Bantu intellectuals under the name Somali Agriculturalists Muki Organization . Muki in Somali refers to a tree under which meetings are often held.

After the beginning of the Somali civil war , from which the Bantu were badly affected, the SAMO was renamed the Somali African Muki Organization in the early 1990s . This reflects the change in the identity of the “Bantu”, who, due to the war experience, increasingly perceived themselves as a separate group outside of the Somali majority. At that time, the chairman of SAMO was Mohamed Ramadan Arbow . Since the international community had sympathy for the Somali Bantu, the SAMO was involved in all-Somali peace negotiations in Addis Ababa in 1993 , although it had little political and no military power. Because of their potential for sympathy, the other Somali warring parties then tried to win the SAMO for their coalitions, which led to their split between the Somali National Alliance of Mohammed Farah Aidid and the group of Ali Mahdi Mohammed .

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