In the 21st century, we lack proper roads, 24hr power supply, a sewage system, rail to connect other cities, address and postal systems, organised city-planning, clean water networks and infrastructure and on and on and on...
More than two decades of independence from the south and none of these have been even remotely achieved. 23 years! Eritrea is a younger country than us with less resources and a bigger population and it has all of the above and more. It's starved of financial support and investment yet makes Somaliland look like a collection of shanty-towns. I'm sorry if I seem like a debby downer but I've always preferred brutal honesty to beautiful dreams. I want what's best for my people and between pointless musical chairs that is SL politics and the ictiraaf mania I feel we are being sold down the river.
Saxib, there are many differences between Eritrea and Somaliland. Aside from the fact that their major cities were not subject to aerial bombardment and did not go through civil war like us, their major cities were also well built by the Italians. It was said that at one point, Asmara looked better than Rome
But that isn't any excuse to justify why Somaliland is developmentally challenged. There are many issues that you brought up that we need to face.
One thing that we should do, which is something I've been advocating for years is a diaspora taxation system, similar to what the Eritrean government has done. It is not fair that we as qurbajoogs, who come every summer to build big houses and big shiny buildings, don't pay taxes to enrich the land that we always gloat about. A simple and effective way is to tax through remittance. Statistically, Somalis send around $1 billion a year to Somalia/Somaliland. Assuming that half of that goes to Somaliland, if we charge each remittance a flat rate of 10-20%, the SL government can see an easy $50-100 million dollars in revenue each year. That's more than enough to begin restoring the roads in our cities with traffic signals and sidewalks, establish some sort of sewage system in the major cities, fix our schools and hospitals, and revitalize our ports (especially Berbera). If a transparent committee is set up to oversee all this flow of income, we can get Somaliland going very quickly.
This is an idea that needs to be brought up in the next election...
