(ERGO) – A new online recruitment platform with mobile phone alerts is helping job seekers in northern Somalia’s Puntland region to know about job vacancies and to apply.
SOMALI SMS links employers with potential employees using a website and SMS alerts called Sahan SMS service. Job seekers register, upload their CVs, and subscribe to receive SMS vacancy notifications at a fee of half a dollar a month. Employers pay to advertise their vacancies on the platform.
More than 2,000 people looking for jobs have already registered with Sahan since it started in January. Almost 90% are youth. The majority of subscribers are in Bosaso.
Mohamed Hassan, head of SOMALI SMS, said young people in the country have always had difficulties knowing how to go about finding a job. The platform advertises jobs in UN agencies, NGOs, companies, schools, universities, hotels, and small processing plants and restaurants.
Sahan SMS website, which also gives interview tips and other advice to young people, says the service saves young people hours of expensive and time consuming trawling on internet sites.
Khadar Abdi, who graduated from East African University four years ago from the Information Technology faculty, got a job using Sahan SMS as a database developer with Tabaarak firm in Galkayo after just eight days. Ten others, including four women, have already been employed through the service.
Over 400 others competing for different posts are waiting for feedback from their applications.
Abdifatah Ajab is co-owner of Dehtal restaurant, which opened earlier this month in Garowe. He said they used Sahan SMS to hire their staff.
“We know that this type of work has normally been done by people with little education or even those who are illiterate. Now we can get highly educated literate people applying for the positions,” said Abdifatah.
Unemployment is one of the main reasons driving young people to migrate overseas.
