Mohamed Nur Hassan has been unable to pay the family’s house rent, school fees, or even to afford food since losing the roadside stall he was running to make a living in Hamarweyne, Mogadishu.

Local shop owners told him to move away from the front of their shops in December, forcing him out of business. Having made is way up and out of the city’s IDP camps, he has now had to move the family back to a camp.

He said he and his family of eight children were down from three to just one meal a day now. They had to move from their iron-sheet house in Kahda because he could not pay the $40 rent.

“We cook food at four in the afternoon, and whatever is left we eat again as breakfast the next day,” he told Radio Ergo’s local reporter.

Mohamed started this business in 2017 when they were living in an IDP camp. As the stall brought in good profits he was able to move his family out of the IDP camp in April 2021. He feels defeated to be back in the camp again.

His three children in their first grade at Garasbaley School dropped out in January as he could not pay the fees.

Mohamed noted that the area where he had his stall was bought up by developers who did not want competition from low prices offered by the hawkers. He tried moving the stall to Hodan district but there were fewer customers. He has goods worth $300 but was coming home with a meagre $2 a day instead of the comfortable $10 he used to earn.

Small businessmen like Mohamed complain that they have no designated areas to sell their products safely in Banadir region apart from the roadsides or the streets.

“We need spaces to sell our products, we get evicted from everywhere. Sometimes we see people coming with guns to evict us,” he said.

A similar experience has befallen Mohamed Abdirahman Mohamud, 24, who had two stalls in Suuq Ba’ad and Hamarweyne. He was evicted six times and finally gave up on the business as it was not making any income.

He said his family needed $160 a month, but since January he failed to pay the bills. His wife now goes out to wash clothes to make ends meet for the six children and their household in Gubadley area in the outskirts of Mogadishu.

“We are facing hardships, our life was better before and I could comfortably pay for our needs but now it’s hard. I used to afford the house rent which is $30,” he said.

Mohamed was attending part-time adult learning classes on Thursdays and Fridays and dropped out last December because he could not pay the school fees. He now his spends time searching for work.

The small business owners’ association in Banadir has been speaking with the local authorities to ask for specific areas to be assigned for them to conduct their businesses. The chairman, Ali Barow, estimates almost 1,000 small business owners have been evicted while those who are left in the city are eperiencing dwindling incomes.

Source: Radio Ergo