External powers financed Sharmarkee’s 1967 presidential campaign against Hussen’s government

Evidence

But none would prove more crucial than the presidential election of 1967. As if to signal what was to come, former prime minister Abdirashid Sharmarkee began to undermine whatever effort the government made: Abdirashid has announced his candidacy in the election for the Presidency of the Republic, slated for July, 1967, and reportedly received assurances of financial assistance for his bid from the USSR, [United Arab Republic], and [People’s Republic of China]. Increasingly in the Assembly sessions beginning in April, Abdirashid opposed legislation proposed by the SYL in the party caucuses and on the floor of the Assembly for the sole purpose of discrediting the Abdirazak [Hussen] Government, and, indirectly, Abdirazak’s principal supporter, President Aden [Osman]. He supported in the Assembly a number of private bills which the Government opposed. — Abdi Ismail Samatar, Africa’s First Democrats, 901

Categorization

• XREF: Key Cold War detail for the reader’s history: USSR, UAR, and China backing Sharmarkee prefigures the superpower competition that shaped later Somali politics and the 1969 coup context.
• QUESTION: Worth chasing: did Sharmarkee actually receive this Soviet/UAR/Chinese money, and how did that foreign backing influence his presidency toward the pro-Soviet tilt that followed?
• SHARE: Send to someone researching Somali Cold War alignments — the specific funders of the 1967 presidential bid are a precise, hard-to-find fact.