Somalia emerging from failed state status

BT Tower I worked there for some time

It's a dozen or so years since I first became aware of the troubled nation of Somalia, when I worked at BT Broadcast services (now  I suppose part of BT Media)  as a pre-sales engineer there were plenty of prospective broadcasters with wildly optimistic business plans and shortages of both finance, experience and realistic business plans.

(In fact I see a reference to the country in  my Blog 10 years ago)


Having been heavily involved with setting up Deepam TV a channel for the Tamil Diaspora in Europe, it felt like a similar solution could work for the Somalis who had left their civil war besieged country to start a new life in Europe.


The Tamils though had established businessman (and women) in the UK who were able to draw on Indian TV programming and some money.


So even now if you look at Direct to home Satellite TV in Europe (like Hotbird at 13 degrees East) you'll find a number of Somalian  satellite TV  channels, not particularly professional but presumably having some sort of audience.

Anyway what I'm leading to is the fact that I met up with one of the guys from this rather disastrous project for a cup of coffee today and the news is that Somalia is starting to be a functioning state again (at least in places) the money the 'Warlords' were able to accumulate is now available to start infrastructure projects and the developed world has  good reason to want Somalia to function.

The UK's Premier league would be a great draw for TV viewers in Somalian homes and social centres 

 I expect to keep in touch with my friend as Mogadishu at least starts to join the 21st Century and foreign investors start to do deals for the mineral deposits  and other opportunities.

The Tyranny of Tens

£330 is another multiple of £10