How Collaborations Between Traffickers, Crooked Authorities, and Top Banks Facilitate Their Schemes
MOGADISHU, Somalia (AXADLE) – Diplomats’ passports and official accreditation letters from Somalia are now rife on the black market, being peddled to anyone eyeing a ticket to Europe or America. An underground nexus of human traffickers and shady government officials is stretching its sinister tentacles across Mogadishu, as reported by the Horn Observer.
Our journalist went undercover at a bustling hotel in the heart of the city and exposed officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs striking deals with human traffickers masquerading as travel agents.
In one case, a Somali diplomatic passport, along with a letter of accreditation and a valid Ministry ID, can be yours for the princely sum of $10,000.
“Hand over the cash, and we’ll process the whole kit and caboodle. You’ll wait for the next government delegation headed abroad,” an official told a young woman.
The woman, known only as Fadumo, had arrived from Lower Shabelle with dreams of making it to Geneva.
“No sweat. We often send folks to various UN shindigs in Geneva,” the official assured her.
“If Geneva’s a no-go, we’ve got options—France, Germany, Finland,” he added, nonchalantly.
Fadumo nodded, “Germany’s cool.”
When the official probed about her trip’s financier, she clammed up. Their chat was broken off by her trafficker, Mohamud, the travel agency’s owner.
“This ain’t our first rodeo,” Mohamud stated to our mole, posing as a customer.
Beyond travel agency hustling, Mohamud also holds a position at Somali immigration, pulling strings and greasing palms to keep the trafficking machine running.
His network stretches from Mogadishu to Hargeisa and Nairobi, boasting, “We even got peeps at the Somali embassy in Kenya.”
Fadumo, balking at the steep fee, haggles it down to $5,000.
“We shipped out 28 folks in just six months. We cherry-pick clients ’cause our services don’t come cheap; bribes to officials ain’t a bargain,” Mohamud clarified.
“Wire the dough to a Premier Bank account in Mogadishu,” Mohamud directed Fadumo.
Upon her successful European odyssey, Mohamud would siphon the funds and trickle them down his web of traffickers, including Ministry officials.
When our journalist sought insight from Premier Bank’s deputy manager, Mahad Ahmed, he zipped his lips.
Jobs at NISA for Sale
It’s not just migration papers up for grabs. According to Hussein, a fresh university grad, he’s been in talks with a mid-tier official at the National Intelligence and Security Agency (NISA). A plum role there goes for $11,000.
“Cough up 11k, and the gig’s yours,” Hussein relayed. The job was Director of Operations for NISA in Middle Shabelle. No payment, no job.
“The current jobholder’s split and wants to offload his title and ID,” the official told Hussein.
Without any official registry to vet credentials, adding someone to NISA’s roster is a cakewalk. A mere recommendation can do the trick.
“After the cash changes hands, a senior NISA honcho dashes off a confirmation letter—no background checks needed,” Hussein lamented.
This lax oversight has opened the floodgates for militant group infiltration, especially Al-Shabaab, making NISA a leaky boat in Somalia’s security apparatus. Time and again, Al-Shabaab manages to embed deep within.
On August 4, 2023, one of the worst breaches occurred as NISA spilled the beans that two officers, Abdisatar Abdiqadir Isse and Ayanle Mohamed Ali, defected back to Al-Shabaab. They vanished with sensitive info, including classified documents and equipment tied to U.S. and Turkish drone ops.
The two young spooks had won NISA’s trust, one even earned stripes in the Department of Operations, dealing directly with foreign drone programs.
Trouble hit again on February 10 this year. A Somali soldier, formerly an Al-Shabaab turncoat, shot five military trainers from the UAE and Bahrain dead at a camp in Mogadishu. VOA probed and found that Mustafa Mukhtar Adan, inducted into the army late 2022, never severed his ties with Al-Shabaab, keeping that skeleton in the closet while serving in Somalia’s forces.
The hawking of diplomatic cred and high-stakes government gigs, coupled with internal breaches, exposes the rot within Somalia’s institutions. This chaos not only jeopardizes national security but also has ripple effects on the global stage.
