By Osman Ali Hassan Across Africa, growing restrictions on the movement of people and cross-border trade are deepening economic and social divides, undermining regional integration and challenging the vision of a more connected continent. The recent Kenya’s plan to expel small-scale foreign traders reflects these broader tensions over migration, informal commerce, and economic competition, raising...
By Abdikarim H. Abdi Buh The Somali Regional State of Ethiopia has undergone a remarkable transformation in security and stability, emerging as one of the country’s most peaceful and secure regional states after decades of conflict and instability. That transformation is perhaps most visible in Jigjiga, the regional capital, where senior political leaders can move...
By Abdiqani Haji Abdi The Turkish ambassador’s recent remarks about Somalia’s future were presumably intended to inspire optimism. Instead, they risk sounding remarkably disconnected from the realities facing the Somali people. The ambassador speaks of satellites, oil discoveries, Turkish fishing fleets, mining, agriculture, roads and ambitious infrastructure projects—as though Somalia were already a stable country...
By Abdullahi A. Nor President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud says Somalia is finally preparing to move beyond clan-based recruitment and replace political connections with merit, competence and qualifications. It is a message that would be difficult to oppose—if it were coming from a government with a convincing record of practicing what it preaches. Instead, the president’s...
By Abdijaliil Osman Axmed Shire Xuseen survived the frontline against al-Shabaab. He did not survive the road home. His last plea is a question every Somali now has to answer. A video has been moving across Somali phones this week. I watched it once. It’s very panful to watch. I will not link to it...
By Abdisalam Ali Farah (Biligsey) A person who grows up in a society where government, police and courts function properly would struggle to understand how an innocent man could be killed because two clans fought somewhere else. Yet in parts of Somalia where state authority remains weak, a person’s clan identity can still become a...
By Abdikarim H. Abdi Buh Israel’s increasingly bitter confrontation with Britain is exposing a much larger question than a dispute over trade restrictions or settlements: how far can a government go in the name of security before the international community is compelled to respond to the suffering of Palestinian civilians? Israel has accused Britain of...
By Djama Mahamoud Ali On the night of September 3, 2026, a drone struck the residence of General Mahad Abdirahman Aden, widely known as “General Shub,” in Doolow, a town in Somalia’s Gedo region along the Ethiopian border. The former commander of Somalia’s Custodial Corps survived with minor injuries, but civilians, including his wife and...
Dr. Abdurahman Baadiyow I am a mother, over eighty years old, living in Mogadishu. The house they demolished was not merely a building; it was the home where I was born, where I grew up, where I lived, and where I carried the memories of my entire life. Every wall held a memory. Every corner...
A Rejoinder to “Much Worship, Little Morality” and “The Problem Is Not a Lack of Worship—It Is the Absence of Accountability” By Aweys O. Mohamoud, PhD The recent exchange between Dr Abdurahman Baadiyow and Dayib Sh. Ahmed raises one of the most consequential questions Somalis can ask themselves after more than three decades of state...