Risky business in Mogadishu’s volatile Bakara market

By Aweys Yusuf | December 11, 2007

People conduct their business activities at the Bakara open-air market in Mogadishu December 13, 2007. REUTERS/Ismael Taxta

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Braving grenade blasts, mortar attacks and assassinations, the need to scrape a living in Somalia draws Osman Mohamed each day to the riskiest part of one of the most dangerous cities in the world — Bakara Market.

He and other small traders in Mogadishu often find themselves in the firing line as Islamist insurgents battle the interim government and its Ethiopian allies, setting roadside bombs, firing artillery shells and gunning down officials.

The market has become a flashpoint for violence — at least nine people were killed there in a mortar attack on Thursday that left mutilated bodies piled in pools of blood.

Most people caught in the attack, blamed on Islamist insurgents, were buying gifts for the Eid al-Adha Islamic festival. But the attack was just the latest for Bakara residents and traders, used to near-daily violence.

“The day before, I saw three men armed with pistols shoot dead a man,” Mohamed told Reuters in the teeming market as he sat outside the blue-painted shop where he sells cosmetics.

“It has really become one of the norms. I know I work in a dangerous zone, but what can I do? My source of revenue depends on this business.”

Whenever fighting breaks out in Bakara — notorious for its large open-air gun market — traders and customers alike flee. And traders say some shops are often ransacked in their absence.

“Life is not simple here. You have to survive to feed your family,” Mohamed said as a group of government soldiers walked past on patrol, fingers on the triggers of their AK-47 rifles.

The troops warily scanned faces, looking for insurgents who typically hide guns or grenades under their clothes.

CROSSFIRE

Deeper in the market, Hussein Ali Hassan bargained with three veiled women at his clothes warehouse.

“These are my first customers since yesterday,” he said. “Business has got worse because a lot of people fled fighting between the troops and the rebels. So now I strive hard to convince the few buyers coming here to at least buy something.”

Every trader talks about the rampant insecurity.

Hawo Hersi Mohamed, a 45-year-old mother of four, said she was on the verge of closing her food and sweets business after getting caught in the middle of a fierce clash a day earlier.

“Explosions and gun battles began as soon as I got off the bus,” she told Reuters, wringing hands adorned with gold rings and bracelets. “I had to run away to escape from the crossfire.”

Last month, her family fled the city and joined hundreds of thousands of displaced people sheltering in Afgoye, to the south. Each day, she travels 30 km (19 miles) to the market.

“I am thinking of stopping doing business here,” she said. “If you come to Bakara, don’t think of making your way back alive. In fact, it’s more dangerous here than ever before.”

Despite the insecurity, the Somalis with businesses remain the lucky ones. Food prices have risen sharply in recent months, and this has particularly affected the many locals who maintain a perilous existence by begging or doing odd jobs.

Madey Aden Aliow, a father of five, makes a few coins using his wheelbarrow to move goods around the dusty market.

“I earn 23 Somali shillings (about $1) a day if I am lucky,” he said. “I can only afford to buy half-a-kilo of rice and a few tomatoes. Sometimes I get nothing when there is violence here.” (Writing by Daniel Wallis; Editing by Michael Winfrey)

Mortars rock Mogadishu as death toll rises to 19

MOGADISHU (Reuters) – Artillery and gun battles broke out in Mogadishu for a second day running on Friday as a Somali government official said Islamist rebels had joined forces with thousands of foreign jihadists.

At least 19 people have been killed by violence in the past 24 hours, including a mortar strike on the capital’s busy Bakara Market that left mutilated bodies piled in pools of blood.

Many Somalis say the insurgents — remnants of a hardline sharia courts groups chased out of the city a year ago — have become increasingly confident in recent months while the interim government has been hobbled by infighting.

“Foreign Islamist elements from Afghanistan, Chechnya and some Arab nations have arrived (in October and November). There are around 4,500 foreign terrorists in the country,” said Sheikh Qasim Ibrahim Nur, a director at the Security Ministry.

“Eighty percent of the country is at risk, and I can say terrorist activities in Somalia are at their maximum level.”

Fighting in Mogadishu has killed nearly 6,000 civilians this year and uprooted some 720,000 more, according to a local rights group. The United Nations says the humanitarian crisis in Somalia is Africa’s worst.

Nur said the insurgents were receiving weapons from Iran.

“We have evidence that a large amount of weapons were shipped to Somalia from Iran. These weapons have been offloaded from Hobyo and Bravo ports,” he said. “These sophisticated weapons were intended to annihilate the Somali people.

His report could not immediately be independently verified.

After Thursday’s mortar blasts, heavy battles broke out on Friday, forcing scores of residents to flee their homes.

“Our vicinity is occupied by Ethiopian tanks and soldiers. They are firing heavy weapons towards nearby areas,” said Mohamed Ali, a resident in Arafat in the north of the capital.

“There is no single human being left in the neighborhood today. What is happening is unbearable,” he told Reuters.

Another witness said he saw the bodies of two women who had been killed in the crossfire sprawled in a road. The city’s main Madina Hospital was treating more than 80 wounded, doctors said.

In Addis Ababa, Ethiopian Information Minister Berhan Hailu said joint Somali-Ethiopian forces killed 75 rebels on Thursday during a surprise attack on an insurgent base outside Mogadishu.

There was no independent confirmation of that from Somalia.

Berhan denied civilians had been killed in the latest fighting in the Somali capital.

“As far as we know, Mogadishu remained peaceful during the week,” he said.

(Additional reporting by Tsegaye Tadesse in Addis Ababa; Writing by Daniel Wallis)