Tracking the Pirates into Shore

When a 24-year-old marketing researcher quit his job in 2008, packed his bags and headed for the most dangerous country in the world, the end result could have been anyone’s guess.

That young man is: Jay Bahadur. His destination: Somalia. The purpose of his travel: to conduct research and write a book about Somalia’s piracy problem.

The final outcome: his bestselling book, Deadly Waters: Inside the Hidden World of Somalia’s Pirates.

Bahadur puts together a strong narrative about the origin of Somalia’s pirates, its growth since the new millennium, and the international community’s response to this unfolding crisis. He even becomes the ultimate pirate insider: wearing ma’awis – a traditional Somali sarong – he was able to visit, interview, eat and chew khat with the buccaneers of the 21st century.

The centre of focus in Deadly Waters is Puntland, the semi-autonomous region in north-eastern Somalia, the home turf of pirates and the breeding ground for a generation of young men who have captured the world’s attention for the last couple of years. These young men, the author notes, have become, as they were in yesteryears, the enemy the whole world agrees to defeat for good.

They have become the common enemy because the pivot of their activities is at the heart of one of the world’s most important shipping routes. The ‘Pirate Alley’, as Bahadur calls it, has become a notorious hunting ground – both for pirates looking out for their next prey in the high seas, and for international naval forces trying to abort the sea bandits’ next mission. This has led to skyrocketing marine insurance costs, which if added up, “would destroy the profit margins of all but the most lucrative consignments.”

The Somali coastal stretch, which is one of the longest in Africa, has also become a focal point for human trafficking and weapon smuggling, and the fishing enterprises that once sprung along the coast is now almost defunct.

Debunking myths:
If anything, the book sets straight on the myths that have surrounded the effects and reach of the Somali piracy. Key among them is the fact that pirate ransom money is the leading factor contributing to escalating real estate prices in Nairobi.

The main reason, Bahadur asserts, is because “of the Kenyan government’s investor-friendly policies over the last half-decade – not the laundered proceeds of pirate kingpins.”

If anything, we need to look at the hundreds of thousands of dollars cycled back to Kenya and Ethiopia through the binges of fresh khat that is transported for the pirates’ consumption.

Interestingly, Bahadur singlehandedly uses basic statistics to debunk the myth that the pirates become overnight millionaires – piracy, apparently, is a very expensive affair. Following on their footsteps, we read a story of youngsters who are in their early 20’s if not younger; who are high on khat and alcohol; have no political leaning or trusting figure; who are suicidal, spendthrift and are desperate to get out of the misery that has shaped Somalia for decades. We see a group that is constantly amending and flexing its ways just to elude capture and to accommodate profit no matter the cost.

On a bizarre note, pirates also hold wacky nicknames: “Computer”, who is a psychic-turned-pirate-financier; Eighty nine; Afweyne, known otherwise as “Big Mouth”; and also Garaad, which means ‘a wise man’ in Somali. And their audacity to assail vessels and boats has even caught the eye of filmmakers. Soon after the pirates on board the South Korean oil super tanker MV Samho Jewelry were captured and flown to Seoul, pirates began appearing as characters on Korean television shows.

Despite all this, the book illustrates a tale of frustration and how best to solve the piracy problem once and for all. As of now, policy regulations and international conventions have failed short on spelling out the right frameworks on how to best capture, try or even deal with pirates on a general level. As Bahadur pinpoints in the book, with “$1 – $1.5 billion per year being spent to clamp down on a piracy “industry” worth not more than $90 million, it is hard to argue that the international naval armada has provided a good return on investment.”

The solution, as the norm goes among analysts, is to deal with the problem on land, not in the sea. That land, Bahadur states, is Puntland, the region that first bore the symptoms of a deadly dealing that is now getting out of hand.

With a host of remarkable interviews, extensive field research, and interaction with both pirates and ship captains, Bahadur puts together an extraordinary account that is sure to become a reference book on Somali piracy.

For one thing is for sure: as the last gush of monsoon winds makes its way out of the Indian Ocean, a new wave will come in with even greater gusto: Somali pirates.

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