The leader of Somalia's al-Qaeda inspired Shabab was born in Somaliland — and many in the breakaway state fear he could now derail their two-decade-old bid for international recognition.
Days before Saturday’s presidential polls in the self-declared state, another key democratic test for Somaliland, the militant Islamist movement’s overall leader Ahmed Abdi Godane issued a chilling warning to voters.
"Those who take part in those so-called elections will face the consequences," said Godane, who was born in the Somaliland capital Hargeisa and has proclaimed his allegiance to Osama bin Laden.
For Godane, the choice facing voters is not between the three main candidates but the following: "Do we say yes to Allah and accept his ruling or follow the infidels who want to lead us in the path of the evil?"
Since it proclaimed its independence in 1991, Somaliland has been far more stable than southern and central Somalia and the recent rise there of the Shabab has so far had little impact on the northern breakaway state.
But Somaliland is a historical cradle of Somali Islamism and observers warn that whatever it has achieved over the past two decades remains fragile.
"If the Shabab take over Mogadishu and hoist the black flag on the presidency, I think it’ll be a matter of weeks, not months, before Somaliland collapses," one diplomat based in the region said.
The Shabab were accused by the Somaliland authorities of being behind deadly suicide car bombings in Hargeisa and voters in the region’s capital were taking Godane’s warning seriously but remained defiant.
"We will not surrender our independence because the Shabab issued a statement. We will vote and choose our leaders in a democratic manner," said Ali Hirsi, a local businessman.
"We must dismiss the Shabab’s heinous fatwa and continue living our lives."
More secular
While the Shabab and their hard-line allies in Mogadishu and other parts of central and southern Somalia impose a strict form of Islamic law (Sharia), the people of Somaliland are proud of their more secular lifestyle.
"Those cowards who are banning people from watching World Cup matches are now threatening our electoral process. They are scum who misuse Islam," shop owner Hassan Mohamoud Dahir said.
Religious leaders spent the past few days urging voters to be vigilant and contribute to ensuring Saturday’s ballot would be incident-free.
"You need to vigilant and take the responsibility of securing your nation during the election," Sheikh Mohamed Abdi Arab, a respected Somaliland cleric, said on Radio Hargeisa.
The electoral commission broadcast similar messages on the airwaves.
"All of you should turn into Somaliland’s police and armed forces, your eyes and ears open wide at all times for our security," the commission said.
It is not just Godane’s origins in Somaliland that make the region a target for the Shabab.
Somaliland has close ties with neighboring Ethiopia, whose invasion of Somalia in 2006 was the main grievance of radical Islamists and turned the Shabab from a political group’s youth wing into a guerrilla fighting machine.
The port of Berbera is one of landlocked Ethiopia’s key trade gateways.
The territory’s unilateral secession from the rest of the country is also a challenge to the nationalistic vision of a unified Somalia essential to some of the Shabab’s Somali leaders.
Shabab leaders and others in Mogadishu are proponents of a "Greater Somalia" whose borders would englobe Somaliland, the neighboring breakaway state of Puntland, as well as parts of northern Kenya and eastern Ethiopia.