Published: May 24 2011 21:25 | Last updated: May 24 2011 21:25
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| Steeped in the community: Abdirashid Duale says his family has built the business through understanding its customers and developing a network of outlets |
Today he divides his time between London and Hargeisa, the capital of Somaliland, an autonomous region of Somalia that declared independence in 1991, and is the chief executive of Dahabshiil, a global money transfer company that operates through 24,000 outlets in 144 countries. Dahabshiil also offers debit cards, reward points and SMS notification services and, soon, Somaliland’s first fully operational bank which is currently under construction in the capital.
“From a very early age I got used to talking to adults ... while other friends or even my brothers used to play football, for me my fun was to stay in the store, and sell people goods,” he says. He even drove his father’s car, at age 13. “I was in competition with other people who were working for my father, so I wanted to be useful and serve him,” he says, speaking in the garden of a Nairobi restaurant.
In four decades, Dahabshiil has evolved into an international business that uses the most modern technology. However, working in Somalia, a failed state, means danger has never been far away: in 2009, two workers were killed in an attack by al-Shabaab, an Islamist group, forcing the business to close half its 50 or so Mogadishu outlets. To this day, the company sometimes transports cash hidden in cars. Mr Duale thinks the company’s best protection is its local approach: “We are ‘money without borders’ – people need us. Customers see us as a part of them. We’re bringing money to them, not guns, so they will look after us.”
The business was transformed from the shop of Mr Duale’s 1970s childhood into a global business by finding opportunities in a string of calamities that have befallen Somalia – from poverty to war and terrorism.
For the family’s story is also the story of the Somali diaspora. Poverty and trade first sent Somalis to Yemen, Dubai and the Middle East. In 1991, the capital Mogadishu was overwhelmed by fighting between rival groups, earning Somalia its label as a failed state. Perhaps 1m Somalis scattered throughout east Africa but also to the Middle East, Australia, Europe and North America. “After 1991 all the Somalis were displaced in a way,” says Mr Duale. “I’m one of them, so we know where they live, how to communicate with them and serve them.”
Mr Duale says his company handles remittances of $200m a year to east African countries outside Somalia, and that the company also remits a large proportion of an estimated $1.6bn sent back to Somalia every year, making it the largest money-transfer service in the Horn of Africa. Continued
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