Around 150 internally displaced families have been forced out of their homes on land reportedly owned by the government near the former Digfer hospital in Hodan district of Mogadishu.
The families have moved to an open area near Elasha Biyaha on the outskirts of Mogadishu. They say they were evicted by men claiming ownership of the land.
Anbiya Ibrahim, a 20-year-old mother of three, is among those evicted from the land, and is currently building a makeshift house at the new camp. She told Radio Ergo they were evicted without prior notice.
“On 6 November tractors and trucks carrying construction equipment arrived and we were ordered to leave. We had no other option but to move out. As you can see now, I am busy building a new makeshift house in this open place. I used to sell groundnuts before, but I have not gone to the market for the last 10 days,” Anbiya said.
Most of the affected families were originally displaced from Baidoa district in Bay region.
Hawa Ali Abdirahman, a 35-year old mother of seven, said it was not the government that evicted them, but armed men who grabbed the land by force after the collapse of the former government. “We have no power, we have to accept this,” she said. Hawa has not built a makeshift house yet and lives in the open air. “I used to work at Bakara market. I used to leave behind my children in the care of neighbours. Now I don’t have anywhere to go to and the market is far from this place.”
Rahma Mohamed Musse also among the evicted people said she had no other choice. “We are displaced and poor. We don’t have any shelter from the rains, so we are appealing to the government and relief agencies for help.”
A man identifying himself only as Mukhtar said he was among those who had recently bought the land from a militia group that had seized the land much earlier. “I know it is government-owned land, but we bought it from those who grabbed it. We bought here because we couldn’t afford to buy legally owned land as it is being sold at a high price of $25,000 and so we bought this land at $1,000,” Mukhtar told reporters.
When asked how they bought government-owned land from a militia group, Mukhtar said: “When the government comes, we will move out, but before that we will use it. The militia group gave me the land ownership documents; though I know the documents were issued at Abdalla Shideye market.”
Banadir regional spokesman, Ali Mohamud Seko, said he did not know of anyone who could enforce evictions without the government’s knowledge. He warned people not to buy government-owned land, as the government would one day come to claim back its property and would evict all illegal occupiers without any compensation.
Ali also called upon the IDP families to go back to their original homes and resume their livelihoods in farming and herding animals. “We will do all we can to help families return to their homes, it is not good for them to be evicted and remain in camps all the time. They should go back and take part in the development of the country,” he said.
(Hamdi Abdullahi Hassan/MH)
