Worlding Mogadishu: ‘New cities’ and material modes of urban speculation

Over the past 15 years, Mogadishu – the capital city of Somalia – has undergone rapid transformation. As the state was rebuilt following its collapse in the 1990s, the city became a site of diaspora return and investment. In this paper we explore the role of telecommunications companies in the development of urban land in relation to these contemporary, contested processes. We focus on Hormuud Telecommunications Company and its affiliated companies involved in financing, construction, technical training, electricity provision and transnational money transfer. We show that telecommunication companies (telecoms), having expanded far beyond traditional ambits, are playing a central role in urban speculation in Mogadishu, aimed at both global and local audiences. As speculators, telecoms are not only involved in generating imaginaries for the future of the city, but take material and laborious steps to produce them. This is most apparent, we argue, in Darul Salaam, the new city being developed for the diaspora and local elites on the periphery of Mogadishu. Overall, we argue that telecoms engage in the performative work of both market-making and world-making, enrolling diaspora capital towards bold urban imaginaries in ways that are distinct from other economic sectors. While we focus on Somalia and its unique context, telecoms across Africa are growing in wealth and scope, necessitating empirical and conceptual engagement with their role in urban processes.