Somalis look up to arabs due to our proximity to arabs and the gulf wealth they have and shiny ferraris and palaces, it's got not much to do with Islam or being close to the prophet that we seek to be close to the arab, it's their wealth. We didn't look up to them pre-arab oil boom and actually considered them with pity and gave charity through our livestock, we hardly ever migrated there, infact nobody did.
No-one really goes to places of poverty brother, it's not just arab. People like to grow in status and will go to where the status can be gained, today that is the western world. Somalis basically want to go these status countries, gain status through studying doctor, lawyer, or whatever profession that is deemed high class and come back to Somalia and be seen as 'successful' and deemed marriage worthy to lots of women while also gaining influence because he will be consulted about matters related to the nation, community, tribe, religion, and many other facets of the social structure even though that person may not be equipped with the wisdom for those areas and hence we complain about 'bad leaders' constantly because we elect leaders based on their status(qualifications) on fields we deem 'high class' just because he can study and memorize a book, doesn't mean he is an inventor, it doesn't mean he is a states-man, it doesn't mean he can negotiate tough social matters or lead the nation into prosperity because he doesn't have that 'wisdom' he is a technocrat he knows his own special field and that's it and we reward with him leadership and control over non-related fields because we are blinded by his status and then we come on Somalispot complaining about why we ain't moving forward.
Abdillahi Yusuf didn't have a high status role, he was a mere colonel, but he had wisdom and knew our culture, our problems, our divisions and left us a system that is fair and just for all to play on an even playing ground with no advantage or the playing field being tweaked towards clans for clan basis. We are still executing the system he left behind, it wasn't him who invented that system. It was really Puntland elders back in 1998, he was merely told to lead the process and ensure it's implemented Abdillahi Yusuf and as we can see initially it wasn't a pretty implementation(ethiopian forces, lots of death, etc) but sometimes tough decisions must be made along the journey or else we won't reach our federal goal which is where we are today.
