Digital Africa : have you got your mojo?
J. M. Ledgard · Rhodes Journalism Review · 2011
The front line in Mogadishu was just beyond the ruined cathedral. You could hear the small-arms fire of the al-Qaeda fighters and the return of heavy machinegun fire from the sandbagged positions of the African Union troops. But the scene on the sun-washed street in the Hamar Weyne district was calm. Women were shopping for fruit and vegetables, and the ciabatta and pasta Mogadishu gained a taste for in its Italian colonial days. A couple of cafes, serving also as electronics shops, were crowded, with people inside making VoIP phone calls and surfing the internet. Outside on the street boys were fiddling with mobile phones, Nokia and Samsung mostly, but also those fantastical Chinese models you find in poorer countries, nameless, with plastic dragon-like construction, heavy on battery-guzzling features like television tuners. I asked my Somali companion what the boys were up to. He wound down the window and summoned his gunmen to go and ask. The answer came back. They're updating their Facebook profiles.