There are truths that statistics can support but never fully explain. One of them is this: Somalia lives and breathes through Mogadishu. Say it plainly, without fear or apology. When Mogadishu stands, Somalia stands. When it bleeds, the whole nation feels the wound.
This is not a claim born from nostalgia or regional pride. It is the lesson of history, paid for in blood, displacement, and endurance.
When the Somali state collapsed in 1991, Mogadishu did not simply lose its status as a capital—it became the battlefield where the idea of Somalia itself was tested. Institutions disappeared. Power scattered. Greed replaced responsibility. For years, Mogadishu was treated as a prize to be looted rather than a city to be protected. Yet even in that chaos, the city did not die.
It survived because it could not be erased.
Mogadishu held on to what mattered most: its people. Millions stayed, returned, rebuilt, traded, worked, argued, and dreamed. Markets reopened before ministries did. Homes were rebuilt before slogans were written. Life pushed forward because it had no choice. The city carried the weight of the nation when the nation had no government to carry itself.
Today, those who pretend that Mogadishu is just one city among many are ignoring reality. Mogadishu is where Somalia’s economy lives. The port feeds the treasury. Businesses fund the state. Banks, telecoms, traders, workers—this is where the money is earned, where salaries are paid, where the engine runs. Remove Mogadishu from the equation and the Somali state does not merely weaken—it stops functioning.
But money alone does not explain Mogadishu’s power.
The city holds Somalia’s largest and most diverse population. Every region, every clan, every accent meets here. Mogadishu is the only city that truly belongs to all Somalis. That diversity is not a weakness; it is the source of its strength. It gives the city manpower, resilience, and a national character no other place can replicate.
Even when politics turn against it—even when federal states argue, resist, or compete—Mogadishu still stands. History has shown this again and again. The capital does not survive because it is favored. It survives because it is necessary.
That is why enemies of Somalia target Mogadishu first. Al-Shabaab understands something many commentators refuse to admit: destabilize Mogadishu and you shake the entire country. An attack in the capital is not just violence—it is an attempt to break confidence, scare investors, disrupt revenue, and tell the world that Somalia cannot govern itself.
And yet, Mogadishu keeps standing.
Its people have buried loved ones and gone back to work the next day. They have rebuilt streets after bombings, reopened shops after threats, sent children to school in the face of fear. This is not blindness. It is courage. It is the quiet stubbornness of a city that refuses to surrender its future.
Some argue that focusing on Mogadishu threatens federalism. That argument misunderstands how states work. No federal system survives without a strong center. A weak capital does not empower regions—it creates chaos. Without Mogadishu functioning, there is no security coordination, no national revenue system, no international credibility. Federalism without a functioning capital is not balanced; it is in collapse.
Somalia’s hope of becoming economically self-reliant, stable, and respected by 2035 does not begin in plans or conferences. It begins with keeping Mogadishu secure, governed, and alive. Roads, ports, institutions, and trust must be protected where they already exist before they can grow elsewhere.
This is the hard truth many avoid: Somalia is Mogadishu, and Mogadishu is Somalia. Not because other regions do not matter—they do—but because every nation has a heart. Mogadishu is ours.
If Mogadishu is lost, Somalia does not fragment—it fades.
If Mogadishu is protected, Somalia has a future.
This is not a slogan. It is the lesson of our past and the condition of our survival.
