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It is with great sadness that we announce the death of our friend and colleague, Mohamed Hassan Ibrahim.

Somaliland’s main port, at the city of Berbera, accounted for two-thirds of the country’s revenues in 2020. Over the years, these revenues have mostly gone into the central state coffers, while the development of Berbera has been neglected. 

Today’s large-scale infrastructures that link African countries to each other and to the outside world are imbricated in colonial relations of power. Colonialism itself can be read as an infrastructure projectspeeding up, directing, and controlling movement to, from, and within Africa.

Having survived centuries of successive governments, colonialism and war, have Berbera’s dockworkers finally met their match?

Somaliland’s dockworkers have been part of the unique fabric of the breakaway republic – and the broader Horn of Africa region – for centuries.

The port city of Bosaso, located at the north-eastern corner of Somalia, provides a striking example of the interlinkage between security and infrastructure.

Berbera port is the main oversee trade gateway of the breakaway Republic of Somaliland. The port city is located on the Gulf of Aden – one of the globally most frequented seaways connecting the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean.

A closer look at DP Ports World investments in Africa reveals its close alignment with the security policies and geostrategic considerations of Abu Dhabi.

Since independence, the development of Djibouti has relied on its port and its location at the Red Sea corridor. The country’s geostrategic position, and its reliance on foreign investments to develop its infrastructure, continues to draw the country into the centre of international power politics.

Bosaso port is located on the shores of the Gulf of Aden. It is the main seaport of the Puntland State of Somalia, the north-eastern and oldest of the member states of the Federal Republic of Somalia. A 750 km long tarmac road links the port to Galkayo, a town at the southern border of Puntland that connects Bosasso to the central and southern parts of Somalia facilitating the circulation of goods and people. Bosaso port is one of the main hubs for import and export trading activities in Somalia.  Most imported goods, including cars, electronics, building materials and food, are re-exported from the United Arab Emirates (UAE), followed by Oman, and Yemen. Exports, mainly livestock (goats, sheep, camels) and livestock-related goods (hides, skins), go to Saudi Arabia, UAE, Oman, and Yemen.

Berbera is the main port city of the Republic of Somaliland. Straddling the geopolitically relevant Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, the port is a site of both national and international power plays.  Over the centuries, the port has attracted the interest of competing powers, including the Ottoman Empire, Egypt, Great Britain, the USSR, the United States, and more recently the United Arab Emirates. The city of Berbera hosts several key businesses and infrastructural nodes, including the Berbera cement factory, Berbera oil reservoirs, and one of the longest airstrips in Africa. Despite the competition among international and sub-national powers for control of the seaport, the city’s major infrastructures remain underdeveloped. Many citizens do not have access to energy grids, and electricity is unaffordable for many. Major roads in the city are not paved and lack proper rainwater drainage, regularly causing flooding. The road networks connecting Berbera, Hargeisa, and Burao remain in poor conditions.