ABSTRACT
The overall impact has been to inject a sectarian dimension into the regional dynamics of political Islam at the expense of finding common ground with governments in combating the specifically jihadist tendencies seeking to exploit Islam. In the process, Somaliland's isolation prevents is able to play a moderating role in terms of the addressing the challenge of political Islam as factor in the Somali regions politics. The militarization of the GWOT has had the consistent impact of promoting the most extreme and fanatical of political Islamist and jihadist tendencies throughout the Muslim world, including in Africa. The African National Congress national party conference debated the intersection of religion, politics and AFRICOM and resolved to reduce the ongoing worldwide polarization. As a result, Washington's war on terror has taken on the dimensions of a new cold war in which the communist monolith of the Soviet Union's 'evil empire' has been superseded by a so-called 'Islamofascist' monolith comprising an axis of evil.
