Africa
East Africa:
Djibouti, Somaliland, Ethiopia and Kenya
(10 August - 27 September 2024)
August 10 – 11: Flight from Zürich via Cairo to Djibouti with Egypt Air
August 11 – 15: In Djibouti
The air in Djibouti is scorching with temperatures of 45° to 50°C and nearly 100% humidity as it was raining the previous night. I have been picked up at the airport by the landlady I booked a room at the Rue de Siesta approx. 1 km north of the business centre. On the way to my lodge, we passed the Ethiopian embassy to apply for a double entry visa to Ethiopia, which, as the Ethiopian Embassy in Geneva told me, could only be issued in Djibouti. At the Ethiopian Embassy in Djibouti, I was informed however that their office has been scaled down and the visa section closed due to the ongoing dispute with Djibouti about the use of their port which is the
Ethiopian hub to import and export all its sea transport cargo: Beginning January 2024, Ethiopia and Somaliland signed an MoU to lease Somaliland’s seaport of Berbera as well as territory to build a military naval base. In return, Somaliland demands from Ethiopia bilateral recognition as an independent state. Fearing they would lose a big business, Djibouti was not amused about this development and cut electricity and Internet to the Somaliland representation thus compelling them to leave the country. Thus, I had to apply for a single-entry visa to Ethiopia, as a double-entry visa is electronically unavailable.
Djibouti City did not impress me much. I expected a well-developed country but found a dirty place with garbage all over the road sites as well as along the beach of Rue de Siesta. The buildings in the business centre are run down, in restaurants prices and quality of meals do not match. Right behind the business centre, one finds a huge open and stinking sewage spreading over an area of 2 to 3 football fields. Disgusting and a health hazard. Considering the lease amount paid by the seven nations with a military base in the country (France, US, UK, Italy, China, Japan and Germany) and the income from the seaport, appropriate maintenance of the infrastructure should be possible. Local people however claim behind closed doors that that rampant corruption by the authoritarian ruling family and their associates deprives the citizens
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For travelling to Somaliland on Thursday, I bought a 1st class train ticket for DJF 3200 (USD 18 for 379km) to Dire Dawa. The booking office informed me that the import of any currency to Ethiopia is not allowed, and one should open a forex account in Ethiopia – or to well hide the money, which I did.
August 15 – 16: Travel to Somaliland via Dire Dawa​
The landlady, kind enough, brought me to the Djibouti (Sebeta) railway station located a bit outside of the city. I was not allowed to take any pictures of the station, neither outside nor inside – a top military secret. At 8 am, very punctually, the train left the station. Most of the seats were occupied. The a/c worked, and the
of Djibouti to the benefit of these resources.
Close to the Centre of Djibouti
My lodge in Djibouti
temperature was pleasant, the seat ok. The train moved slowly south and stopped again from time to time. The landscape outside was barren, with no vegetation, and stony hills on the left and right sides. Larger puddles of the rain that had fallen just before I arrived in Djibouti were still visible. The train stopped from time to time. At the border to Ethiopia, the Djibouti customs officials stamped the passport and the travel went on, sometimes 30km and 60km an hour. At a railway station along the route, the train stopped again and stood for hours. Nobody knew why. But everyone was patient. And waited, waited. After 2 hours the journey went on, slowly, but steadily. We left the barren land and green bushes, sometimes with grazing camels in between, became more common. Agricultural fields in the plains, wadis along and between the hills, some villages and huts could be made out. The further south we moved, the greener the landscape became. We were supposed to arrive in Dire Dawa at noon. But due to all the delays on the way, we arrived in Dire Dawa past 4 pm. Hundreds of people left the train and queued up in front of 2 desks of the customs to have their luggage checked. Nobody checked the money, no forms had to be filled in. Later, I read on the internet that by the beginning of August 2024, regulations had been changed and the import of foreign and local currency had been fully relaxed.
View from the Chinese built Djibouti-Addis Ababa train shortly after the border in Ethiopia
When I left the train station, the night was falling, and I decided to go by a tuk-tuk (3-wheeler scooter taxi with a half-open cabin manufactured by Bajaj/India) downtown to search for a hotel close to the central bus station to get quick transport to the border of Somaliland the next morning. I checked with 3 hotels – all were booked out. I was told that the Ethiopian government held a conference and occupied all available rooms in the town. In the 4th hotel, I was already walking out again when they called me back and offered the presidential suite for USD 50. We settled the deal for USD 40 – and the room was amazing. A bedroom of 8 x 8m, in the middle a bed of 2.5 x 3.5m with a direct view through a large window to a jacuzzi in a bathroom, as a second bathroom with a shower and dining room with a huge sofa Saudi type and a dining table for 12 persons. And, of course, a TV screen again of 1.5 x 2m was fixed to the wall in every room. I felt lost and had to connect to my wife with WhatsApp to show her around in ‘my palace’.
The next morning, I tried to get public transport to Jigjiga, the capital of the Ethiopian Somalia province (Ogaden), to meet my contact to bring me to Hargeisa, the capital of Somaliland. But no seat was available till noon. And off it has gone. The bus climbed up through the green hills and passed through the many villages. A beautiful landscape. Around three o’clock we reached Harar, the shrouded in-legend town from ancient times, the fourth most holy city after Mecca, Medina, and Jerusalem for the Sunni Muslims, famous also for its old out-of-loam constructed houses and defence wall. Commercially Harar was most important as a marketplace where also the transport of goods changed from mules and horses to camels. The bus did not stop and rushed to the urban outskirts with new and modern buildings. Luckily I have been visiting the old city in the second half of the 1980s during a consulting mission in Ethiopia.
Past 4.30 pm I reached Jigjiga and was dropped by the bus driver at a local hotel to meet my Somalilander contact, Bashir S., who runs a printing business in the town. He arrived soon after in the car of a provincial minister, explaining that we were late, but the minister organised in his Land Cruiser my transfer my transfer to the border, which usually closes at 5 pm. And it worked. At 5.15 pm, the Ethiopian officials checked me out and at the Somaliland border, an officer from Somaliland checked me in. Shortly after 7 pm I reached Hargeisa and checked in at Hotel Ambassador, said to be the best hotel in the city and booked by my contact with a special discount.
Waiting for the bus in Dire Dawa
August 17 – 24, 2024: Hargeisa, Berbera and Salahley
My goal for the trip to Somaliland was to find out why this de-facto state, with its currency, functioning administration, police, and army, is not officially recognised by any other country in this world, excluding Taiwan. Compared to all the neighbouring countries, namely Somalia, Ethiopia, and Djibouti, it maintained peace – hardly any Al-Shabaab terrorist attacks -, facilitated a modest but encouraging prosperity, and, above all, has a functioning democracy with already four elections for its parliament and presidency. I wrote down the gist of the information – see below – collected from politicians, economists, leading business people, members of think tanks and civil society organizations, and common people. Bashir S. with his excellent contacts across the entire society was a great help in guiding me in my research.
Somaliland deserves international recognition
Somaliland, the breakaway republic of Somalia in the Horn of Africa, will hold its fourth elections on November 13, 2024. It is considered an ‘oasis’ in a region marked by violence and oppression. Its secret is a functioning, stable democracy with the same performance indicator as that of Ukraine. Only Taiwan has recognized Somaliland as an independent country to date.
On the way to Jigjiga
Lunch on the way to Hargeisa
Somaliland, located in the politically turbulent Horn of Africa, is preparing for the presidential election on November 13, 2024. The current ruling party ‘Kulmiye’ with the incumbent President Muse Bihi Abdi, known as Bihi, and the opposition party ‘Waddani’ with the candidate Abdirahman M. Abdullahi Irro, known to the people as ‘Irro’, are facing each other. Bihi has been in power since 2017, and his party Kulmiye since 2010. In 2022, his re-election was due, but he postponed it for two years for flimsy reasons. This year’s election is already the fourth democratic election since Somaliland seceded from Somalia in 1991 and declared itself an independent state. However, Somaliland has only been officially recognised by Taiwan to date. Many countries fear that recognition would lead to further secessionist movements in Africa. As an unrecognized country, it cannot become a member of the UN, and as a direct consequence, it receives significantly less bilateral and multilateral development aid than neighbouring states.
Striving for international recognition
Somaliland’s quest for international recognition led to a memorandum of understanding with Ethiopia in January 2024, stating that the landlocked country of Ethiopia can lease the
port of Berbera on the Gulf of Aden, with direct access via a road corridor. In addition, the right to operate a naval base to protect the ship transports should be granted. The memorandum triggered a massive protest in the neighbouring countries of Djibouti and Somalia. Djibouti fears losing its port monopoly, and Somalia still claims sovereignty over Somaliland, especially regarding the conclusion of international treaties. Egypt has also intervened, as it has been at odds with Ethiopia for several years over the construction of the massive Renaissance Dam on the Blue Nile in the highlands of central Ethiopia. Egypt fears that in the future there will be too little or delayed water and no silt as fertiliser for agriculture in the lower reaches of the Nile in Egypt. Therefore, Egypt supports the protest and builds a threat scenario with arms deliveries and the deployment of its own troops to Somalia. However, it is generally not expected that there will be an open military conflict, as Somalia is resource-poor, the army is poorly equipped, and the country is still heavily involved in its clan disputes and the fight against Al-Shabab.
Camel herd outside of Hargeisa
Democratic Somaliland
The upcoming elections are of great importance for the future of Somaliland in its quest for international recognition. Today, the country has well-estab-lished democratic struc-tures, partly due to the tribal tradition. It is a great advantage that 80% of Somalis belong to the Isaaq clan, and this situa-
The modern port of Berbera at the Golf of Aden
tion leads to fewer power struggles than in Somalia, where there are (too) many powerful clans.
Historically, Somaliland was a British protectorate (British Somaliland) and Somalia an Italian colony. Somaliland was granted independence in 1960 but united with former Italian Somalia to form the Republic of Somalia in the same year. National integration proved difficult, and Somaliland felt disadvantaged by the central government in Mogadishu and opposed the military junta of dictator General Mohamed Siyad Barre. The bloody civil war ended in 1991 with the overthrow of the government in Mogadishu and the secession of Somaliland.
After Somaliland’s de facto independence, a bicameral system was defined in a long process of self-discovery by the clans: a lower house of elected parliamentarians and an upper house, called Guurti, with seats for clan leaders. However, the composition of the upper house needs reform today, as no elections have been held at the clan level since 1991. The death of older clan representatives or the delegation of the functions of clan leaders to unsuitable persons not supported by clan members compromises the functions of the Guurti. Leading figures in the economy, civil society, and clans support a change in the system of appointing the upper house. The idea is that elections should also be held within the clans, the term of office should be limited, and a function cannot be delegated.
It is also interesting to note that representatives of lo-cal think tanks, civil societ- ies and scientists state that the independent develop-ment of the government system took place without external influence from the international community. The broad-based, clan-in-ternal process allowed the system to be internalised as its achievement. Additional-ly, it is emphasised that the relatively marginal develop-ment aid compared to nei-
Meeting of tribal and business people under an Akacia tree to discuss common issues of concern
Interview with the Speaker of the Parliament
ghbouring countries has not only had negative effects. The government and the population are aware that the available resources must be used much more carefully. A significant financial resource is the high remittances from the diaspora. These have helped to successfully build the economy with small and medium-sized enterprises.
Somaliland in the conflict-ridden Horn of Africa
In the past three decades, Somaliland has been remarkably peaceful, in contrast to
Somalia, with violent clashes within the clans and the terrorist organisation Al-Shabaab. In much of Ethiopia, ethnically motivated, bloody conflicts over border corrections and more political autonomy for individual population groups have been raging for six years. Violent clashes are also increasing in Kenya; the better-educated youth no longer want to accept the devastating corruption of the political elite and protest loudly in the streets. The police try to suppress the demonstrations with brutal force.
However, there have also been repeated unrest and violence in Somaliland in recent years. Although Al-Shabaab could hardly gain a foothold, there were fierce and bloody clashes between the government and minority clans in eastern Somaliland in 2023, with hundreds of deaths and more than a hundred thousand displaced. Ultimately, the rebellious clans were able to defeat the Somaliland army and drive them out of the east of the country. In the meantime, an own administration has been established, so that the country is now effectively divided.
Elections on November 13, 2024
The disproportionate, massive military intervention of the Somaliland army is blamed on the current president and former general Bihi. A broad population across all social strata criticises that he did not seek dialogue sufficiently to resolve the conflict peacefully. He is also accused of increasingly authoritarian rule, nepotism, insufficiently combating corruption, inadequate economic development, and uncontrolled inflation. This justified criticism could cost Bihi re-election on November 13, 2024. The advantage of the opposition is that it has not yet had to prove good governance. Due to its more conciliatory approach, it is believed that it is capable of resolving the conflict with the east of the country and reintegrating the rebellious clans into the state of Somaliland. Both parties want to continue the contract negotiations with Ethiopia regarding the port and a naval base, and thus also advance Somaliland’s recognition by Ethiopia.
International recognition of Somaliland
Somaliland emphasises that it meets most of the requirements of a state. These include free and fair elections, a functioning administration, its currency, and its police and army. According to their interpretation, Somaliland also meets the declared norm of the Organization for African Unity (OAU) that colonial borders should not be changed, as Somaliland was formerly a British protectorate. In addition, a large majority of the population belongs to the Isaaq clan and thus differs from the population of Somalia.
Somaliland can be considered an ‘oasis’ of stability in the turbulent Horn of Africa, thanks to its democratic form of government and the more or less homogeneous clan structure. The democracy and civil rights movement ‘Freedom House’ rated Somaliland in 2023 with 43 out of 100 points in the freedom index as partly free, Somalia with 8 (not free), Ethiopia with 20 (not free), Djibouti with 24 (not free), and Kenya with 52 points (partly free). In comparison, Ukraine also received 43 points (partly free) like Somaliland and Hungary 65 points (also partly free). Somaliland’s freedom index has declined in recent years due to the government’s harsh crackdown on clan opposition in the east of the country and the postponement of the presidential elections from 2022 to 2024.
The international community, especially the Organization for African Unity, should reconsider recognizing Somaliland as an independent state. This would not only honor the country’s previous efforts but also encourage it to further expand democratic and liberal structures. Additionally, Somaliland would gain access to loans from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which would promote faster economic growth. This, in turn, would also have positive effects on the current ‘brain drain’, employment in the country, and high youth unemployment.
Most interesting was a day visit, on Wednesday, to the seaport and town of Berbera, which has become a spot of conflict with the MoU signed between Somaliland and Ethiopia to lease the port together with a coastal strip for a marine base to Ethiopia and open a Pandora’s box. A connecting road corridor from Ethiopia to Berbera is already constructed and is in use. Somalia, which still considers Somaliland as its sovereign territory, strongly opposes this intention and aligns with Egypt, which is furious about the huge Blue Nile Renaissance Dam built in Central Ethiopia for hydropower, fearing shortages of irrigation water and silt in fields downstream in Egypt. Egypt sends large amounts of weapons and around 10,000 soldiers to Somalia to testify its solidarity. Djibouti fears losing its income as so far the only seaport used by Ethiopia and generating billions of USD income. Eritrea, the archenemy of Ethiopia, also shows its solidarity with Djibouti and Somalia. New tensions boil up in the Horn of Africa.
The seaport of Berbera, with a capacity of clearing 500,000 containers a year, has been built in a strategic position during the past years with VAR as the financier. The facilities allow the biggest oil tankers to harbour. The efficient unloading of ships allows for saving on demurrage payments which have become a financial problem in the inefficient Djibouti port. The present installations represent only 30% of the planned capacity. In the next phase, 75% of the capacity should be reached with a capacity of 2 million containers per year.
Next to the port at the seaside, one finds a 3.8 km2 Free Trade Zone out of which 10% has been established with top modern facilities managed by DP World. According to management, interest in hiring space to establish factories seems to be good.
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Visit to Maternity Hospital in Salahley
Another day’s visit, on Thursday, brought me to Salahley, a small town around 70km southeast of Hargeisa at the border with Ethiopia, to visit a referral hospital of the regional Mother and Child Health (MCH) clinics. Hadiya Medial Swiss financially supports the government-run hospital through the local organisation, the Excellent Development Organization (EDO). The project begins with investments in a stable electricity supply through solar panels, a water desalination facility, a laboratory, a small operation theatre and other technical installations. A major challenge of the next phase will be to organise the management system to coordinate the
Under Construction:
Modern Maternity Hospital in Salahley
hospital with and to im-prove the performance of the affiliated MCH clinics. Considering that Somaliland has one of the highest rates of maternal deaths in the world - an estimated 732 women die for every 100,000 live births – the improve-ment of the maternity health system, particularly in the rural areas, is most im-portant.
De-salination plant in the
Hospital of Salahley
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Hospital equipment ready to be installed