Abdirahman Aw Ali Farrah

Abdirahman Aw Ali Farrah, nicknamed Tolwaa (, ) is a Somali politician who was the 2nd Vice President of Somaliland from May 1993 to February 1997.

History Abdirahman was a high-ranking SNM colonel and one of few non-Isaaq members of the organization, belonging to the Jibril Yonis sub-division of the Gadabuursi Dir clan.

Borama Strategy Abdirahman contributed to the Somaliland peace process in the aftermath of the Somaliland War of Independence. In January 1991, in one of the final acts of the war, the 99th division of the SNM led by Colonel Ibrahim Koodbuur had pursued government forces that fled from Hargeisa to the town of Dilla. After a ferocious battle, the SNM captured the town and then continued into the main Gadabursi town of Borama. However, because the SNM leadership believed that the Gadabursi wished to seek peace, they withdrew their units after a mere 24 hours to allow discussions to take place without the shadow of occupation. This was eased by the fact that Abdirahman was present.

Vice presidency In May 1993, Abdirahman Aw Ali Farrah became the second Vice President of Somaliland, succeeding Hassan Isse Jama, who had served as the interim vice president. He was elected at the Borama Conference, where clan elders created a civilian government to replace the transitional military council. Farrah was chosen alongside President Muhammad Haji Ibrahim Egal, representing the Gadabuursi clan as part of a power-sharing arrangement designed to include non-Isaaq communities in the new administration.

Contemporary accounts describe the new executive of President Muhammad Haji Ibrahim Egal and Vice President Farrah as facing immediate priorities that included restoring law and order and completing the demobilisation of militia across Somaliland.

In a later interview cited by constitutional research on Somaliland, he criticised elements of the 1997 transition as creating an overly strong executive, describing it as a “monster” executive, a remark used in analyses of the balance of powers during the beel-era transition.

He continued to appear in public fora; in October 2024 he spoke at commemorations of the Somaliland Police Force’s 31st anniversary in Hargeisa, delivering a retrospective on the service’s establishment and early post-war security sector reforms.