Ahmed Abdiqadir Abdullahi “Isku-dhuq”: al-Shabaab’s Second Most Powerful Leader

Ahmed Abdiqadir Abdullahi “Isku-dhuq”: al-Shabaab’s Second Most Powerful Leader

Nine years ago, no one in the leadership of Somalia’s now-defunct Islamic Court Union (ICU) thought that Ahmed Abdiqadir Abdullahi (a.k.a. Amo, a short form of Camey, a Somali nickname given to the people who have problem or lost their cheekbone, or Sahal) “Isku-dhuq” (a.k.a. Ahmed Mohamed Amey) would be one of the most influential figures in the al-Shabaab’s youth wing that developed as the most notorious and most-feared terrorist organization in East Africa during the years following the fall of ICU administration.

“Because he didn’t have any previous involvement and experience in the Islamist movement in the country and that made us to assume that he wouldn’t be such influential because all other top leaders in the group are known to be have been involving armed islamist movement in the country for years,” a former ICU senior official who now works for the Somali government told Jamestown just three days after a U.S. missile strike killed Isku-dhuq in a remote area near the coastal town of Barawe on January 26. [1] The town, situated about 110 miles southwest of Mogadishu, was the site of a failed raid by U.S. Navy commandos in October targeting a Kenyan of Somali origin Abdulkadir Mohamed Abdulkadir a.k.a. Ikrima, an al-Shabaab commander who was tied to the Westgate shopping center in Nairobi in September 2013 (Reuters, October 5, 2013).  Barawe is one of the group’s last remaining strongholds in southern Somalia.

Al-Shabaab, which was born out of the collapse of the ICU administration and the invasion of Ethiopia, was founded by radical youth who were trained by and fought with Osama bin Laden’s al-Qaeda and Taliban against U.S. forces in Afghanistan in 2002. Some of them previously fought alongside al-Qaeda during the Soviet War in Afghanistan in the 1980s and with Somalia’s Ittihad al-Islamiya against Ethiopia in the Ogaden region in the 1990s. This region of eastern Ethiopia, whose inhabitants are primarily ethnic Somalis, has been at the heart of the unsettled Ethiopia-Somalia conflict for decades and the two countries have fought over it at least twice in 1964 and 1977 (See Terrorism Monitor, August 10, 2012).

Although Isku-dhuq has never been to Afghanistan and never fought alongside al-Ittihad al-Islamiya, some of the people who met him during the ICU administration said he was born in this war and insurgency wracked region of Ogaden during the 1960s. [1, 2] His family was among thousands of pastoralist families who were forced to move from one area to another in the Ogaden region due to the Ethiopian military campaign to extinguish the separatism sentiment of the population of ten million ethnic Somalis in the region. When the conflict between Ethiopia and the separatist group Ogaden National Liberation Front (ONLF) worsened in 1994 and dozens of villages were burned down and wells were buried by Ethiopia troops, Isku-dhuq moved to Somalia, according to Abdirahim Isse Adow, the former spokesperson of ICU who now directs state-owned Radio Mogadishu. [2]

Isku-dhuq remained unknown until the end of 2006 when he appeared as a junior officer for al-Shabaab when the ICU took over Mogadishu from the anti-terrorism coalition of warlords who had been controlling the city for a decade by 2006. Some of the people who met Sahal Isku-dhuq in 2006 said he was eager to develop good relations with al-Shabaab leaders including the group’s first Supreme Leader Aden Hashi Farah Ayrow, Ahmed Godane, the current leader, and Ibrahim Haji Jama “al-Afghani,” and that passion made him different from other junior officers, said the former ICU officer who wants to remain anonymous. [1] Ayrow was killed in a U.S. airstrike in the central town of Dusomareb seven years ago, while al-Afghani was killed in a shoot-out in Barawe last year after opposing the leadership of Godane, al-Shabaab’s current supreme leader (see Terrorism Monitor, August 9, 2013)

In the following years, Isku-dhuq, who was among the very radical and extremist members in the group, earned the trust of Godane, who hails from the same Dir clan. Isku-dhuq served as al-Shabaab’s officer in charge of extorting thousands of U.S. dollars from aid agencies trying to deliver food to the people living in the areas controlled by the group. He was also connected to the looting of several offices of aid organizations across the country, including the UNICEF compound in the southern town of Jowhar. [2]

When the power struggle that divided the militants into global jihadists led by Godane and nationalist factions of al-Afghani and Mukhtar Robow Abu Mansur began, Isku-dhuq sided with Godane and became responsible for receiving and recruiting foreign jihadists flooding into Somalia to join al-Shabaab. Former ICU spokesman Adow said that because Isku-dhuq was Godane’s most trusted friend and fluent in Arabic, a language most of the foreign jihadists speak, there was no one else to be trusted with the recruitment of the foreigners. [2] Isku-dhuq was in charge of vetting and screening foreign jihadists, who the group feared could be Western spies, before they were incorporated into the group and given access to classified operations.

Isku-dhuq is believed to have been the second most important leader of al-Shabaab – just after Godane – since the nationalist-minded group led by Jama al-Afghani who was widely seen as a successor to Godane was isolated from al-Shabaab’s leadership. Isku-dhuq helped Godane plan the operations of al-Shabaab’s Amniyat unit, an elite intelligence division that carries out assassinations and suicide attacks across the country (AFP, January 26).

Isku-dhuq was many things for Godane, a purveyor of a global jihadi agenda and close ties with al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri. Without a doubt, Isku-dhuq’s death should be a big blow to Godane, whose leadership is still being challenged by Shaykh Mukhtar Robow, his last major opponent. It will take Godane a very long time to bounce back from the loss of Sahal Isku-dhuq.

Muhyadin Ahmed Roble is a Somali journalist who writes for SomaliaReport and AfricaNews as a correspondent based in Nairobi.

Notes

1. Author’s interview with former Islamic Court Union official who is now a member of Somali government, January 29, 2014.

2.  Author’s interview with Abdirahim Isse Adow, February 15, 2014.