(ERGO) – Hundreds of casual labourers in Mogadishu have been put out of work by a ban imposed by Banadir Regional Administration on digging pits outside residential homes to bury household waste.
The administration instructed residents to stop digging pits outside their homes, saying it has assigned private companies to collect waste from neighbourhoods up to three times a month. This is to improve public sanitation and tidiness, and safety by protecting children and elderly people from the risk of falling into shallow pits.
Ibrahim Mohamed Fanay, 43, used to earn $5 to $10 a day digging waste pits and says he is now struggling to provide for his family of 10. He has resorted to asking friends for help and finds it increasingly difficult to obtain food on credit.
“We don’t even have rice to put on the fire. The last meal I ate was yesterday because someone helped us. I told my wife to try and find food on credit for the children. We have nobody to support us. We used to survive on whatever work we found around the city, but I don’t have any other skills to earn a living,” he told Radio Ergo.
Ibrahim walks the city streets looking for jobs loading and unloading goods but they are few and far between. The loss of income forced him to withdraw four of his children from primary school in March after he could no longer afford the monthly $20 fees:
“We became unemployed overnight. The places we used to work in have all been paved with interlocking blocks. The people we worked for told us they no longer need us, leaving us with nothing. Today I can’t provide for my family. I pray God eases this hardship. If things continue like this, we don’t know where to turn. “
Ibrahim lives in Sahan IDP camp in Mogadishu’s Daynile district, where water costs about 15 US cents for 20 litres. His earnings used to cover food, water and school fees. He owes $150 for food purchased on credit during the months he has been unemployed.
A farmer from Daafeed in Lower Shabelle, Ibrahim fled to Mogadishu in November 2025 after conflict and poor rainfall destroyed farming prospects on his three-hectare plot.
For several years, the Banadir administration has been upgrading roads with asphalt and interlocking paving blocks as part of wider urban improvement projects. As part of that programme, roadside waste pits and private drainage trenches, which became common after the collapse of the Somali state in 1991, have been removed or prohibited.
Although the city-wide sanitation programme has received significant investment, residents of displacement camps like Sahan say they have not benefited from improved services.
Another waste-pit digger, Ibrahim Dhugure Abdulsalam, 45, said the new city rules also deprived him of the only work he had for three years. The father of 11 earned $8 to $10 a day digging waste pits. He has no savings because his income just covered his family’s daily needs.
“Some days we eat, other days we don’t. We are rural people forced into the city by hardship. The only work that kept our families alive has disappeared because every house now has paving outside instead of the waste pits. We are labourers, but our strength is no longer worth anything,” he complained.
The family can’t now afford to improve the makeshift shelter they built from plastic sheets when they arrived at the camp. The plastic has worn out, leaving the family exposed to the sun during the day and cold at night.
Five of his children have dropped out of the Koranic school he’d enrolled them in when they came to the city because he can’t pay the monthly fee of $2.50:
“Three girls and two boys were studying there. Now they all stay at home. They have never attended formal school, and now they have also lost the religious education they had. Poverty is the only reason.”
Ibrahim spent most of his life farming in Tabiid village near Afgoye before being displaced in 2023 after fighting damaged his four-hectare farm. He now lives in a camp on privately owned land, where residents face the constant risk of eviction.
The chairman of the casual labourers’ cooperative, Mohamed Abukar Ali, said the only long-term solution would be creating alternative employment opportunities.
“The impact on these labourers has been severe. Many are sitting at home with nothing to do. District administrations ordered people to stop digging waste pits, while roads in many areas have been paved with asphalt or interlocking blocks. As a result, the labourers who depended on digging those pits have lost their jobs.”
He estimates that nearly 400 men have been affected by the ban on waste pits. The cooperative has appealed to the district authorities, but has not received a response.
