Somalia’s Prime Minister Launches Internet Governance Forum to Accelerate Digital Transformation

Somalia Bets on Bandwidth: What a National Internet Forum Signals About the Country’s Future

In Mogadishu this week, the bustle inside a government hall felt different from the city’s usual political hum. Laptops were open, notepads filled quickly, and the talk drifted easily from spectrum policy to satellite dishes. Prime Minister Hamza Abdi Barre took the podium to open the Somalia Internet Governance Forum 2025—the third edition of an event that, on the surface, is just another policy gathering. But beneath the acronyms and panels lies a bet on Somalia’s future: that better internet governance can pull more citizens into the economy, extend government services, and knit together a country where connectivity has long been uneven and costly.

Barre called the internet “the backbone of national development,” an assertion that resonates across the Horn of Africa as governments compete to upgrade digital infrastructure and attract investment. The forum, he said, is meant to be more than a talking shop—it’s a test case in Somalia’s attempt to embrace a multistakeholder approach, bringing ministries, telecom firms, engineers, civil society and young entrepreneurs into one room to chart the rules of the road online.

Why this matters right now

Somalia’s digital divide is stark. Official figures indicate internet penetration stood at about 10.9% in early 2024—roughly 5.08 million users in a nation of 18.4 million. Mobile connections are far more widespread, with SIM penetration closing in on half the population, and for many Somalis, the mobile phone is bank, marketplace and newsroom combined. Yet connectivity remains uneven: urban neighborhoods in Mogadishu, Hargeisa and Garowe generally browse faster and pay less than rural villages where electricity and mobile coverage are patchy.

Affordability is the hard brake. The United Nations’ global target suggests 1 GB of data should cost no more than 2% of average monthly income. In many low-income countries, that figure still sits well above the mark, and Somalia is no outlier. The entry of Starlink and other satellite services promises to beam bandwidth to places fiber hasn’t reached. But the up-front price of equipment and the monthly subscription remain steep for most households and small shops, even as competition gradually nudges prices down.

The governance question

An internet forum, by design, is about more than cables and towers. It’s about rules, rights and trust—how to keep citizens safe from fraud and harassment, how to protect personal data, how to police hate speech without silencing legitimate voices, and how to keep networks resilient in a country long tested by conflict and climate shocks.

In that sense, Somalia’s SIGF arrives at a delicate moment for digital policy across Africa. Over the past few years, several governments on the continent have resorted to internet shutdowns during elections or protests, despite court challenges and a growing body of evidence showing the practice damages economies and public trust. Somalia has a chance to chart a different course: to prioritize openness, transparency and due process while addressing real security concerns.

That starts with clear, predictable regulation—the sort that encourages telecom operators to invest, gives start-ups the confidence to build, and ensures citizens understand their rights online. Laws on data protection and cybersecurity, transparent spectrum management, and independent oversight of regulators can make the difference between a digital economy that hums and one that stalls. At a time when AI-driven content and cross-border digital trade are reshaping markets, getting the basics right remains the surest path to progress.

Infrastructure is only half the story

Somalia’s telecom sector has shown resilience and ingenuity, often outpacing the state’s capacity to regulate it. Mobile money is ubiquitous, a lifeline that keeps markets moving even when cash is scarce and roads are rough. But next-generation services—e-learning platforms, telemedicine, cloud-based accounting for small businesses—demand stable power and affordable broadband.

That requires attention to stubborn bottlenecks:

• Electricity reliability, especially outside major cities, to keep base stations online.
• Device affordability—smartphones and laptops remain out of reach for many families and students.
• Backbone redundancy so that a cable cut doesn’t silence an entire region.
• Fair, transparent taxation that avoids pushing services out of users’ reach.

Somalia has made strides in recent years, connecting to regional subsea cables and expanding 4G footprints. New LEO satellites add a fresh option for remote clinics, schools and off-grid communities. But these pieces need to be knitted into a national plan that lowers costs and spreads benefits beyond urban centers.

What neighbors can teach—and what Somalia can teach back

Regional peers offer case studies, good and bad. Kenya’s embrace of mobile money and fintech regulation gave birth to a wave of digital services, though concerns persist about data protection and fees. Rwanda’s investment in backbone fiber and e-government shows how a small country can move quickly with clear policy direction. Ethiopia’s partial liberalization of its telecom market revealed both the gains of competition and the complexities of opening a once-closed sector.

Somalia can draw lessons on universal service funds that actually fund access, not bureaucracy; on digital ID systems that protect privacy; and on how to shape content policies in a way that supports innovation rather than stifling it. Conversely, Somalia’s own experience—where markets filled gaps amid insecurity, and where mobile finance thrived despite weak formal banking—offers a reminder to the region that bottom-up solutions can be powerful if the state enables rather than smothers them.

Satellites, sovereignty and the new bandwidth politics

Starlink’s arrival is reshaping rural connectivity debates from Latin America to Southeast Asia. For Somalia, it introduces both opportunity and governance questions. How should regulators license satellite operators? How do you ensure fair competition with terrestrial providers while encouraging universal access? And what about content jurisdiction when the pipe delivering your internet is managed from orbit and offices far beyond national borders?

These are not uniquely Somali questions. But they land with special weight in a country striving to rebuild institutions and stitch together a national market. A robust, transparent licensing framework—aligned with international standards and enforced consistently—can help Somalia harness new technologies without losing control of the public interest.

What success could look like in five years

Beyond the policy rhetoric, tangible markers will tell the story:

• Data affordability approaching the UN target for low- and middle-income countries.
• Meaningful growth in rural broadband coverage, measured by actual speeds and usage, not just maps.
• Digital public services that work on low-end phones, in Somali and Maay, with basic connectivity.
• Clear legal protections for user data and avenues for redress when things go wrong.
• Fewer outages, faster disaster alerts, and a surge in local content—from education to agriculture tips—produced by Somalis for Somalis.

When Barre calls the internet the backbone of development, he’s not wrong. In Somalia, connectivity can link a camel herder to weather forecasts, a fisher to market prices, a teacher to a virtual classroom, and a small business to clients across borders. It can also expose citizens to scams, surveillance and disinformation if governance lags behind technology.

The SIGF 2025 is, in that sense, a promise more than a finish line. Can Somalia keep the forum open and plural, where civil society can question, and youth can propose? Can the government translate talk into enforceable, fair rules? And can the market deliver lower prices and broader coverage without sacrificing quality or safety?

The answers will be written not just in Mogadishu conference halls but in the signal bars on a farmer’s phone near Baidoa, the download speeds at a clinic in Kismayo, and the budget line a student in Hargeisa sets aside for data each month. If those indicators trend in the right direction, Somalia’s digital decade may finally arrive—not as a tech hype cycle, but as practical progress felt in daily life.

By Ali Musa
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.