Somalia seeks Wike, FCTA’s support to build Mogadishu

The Somali government has pleaded for the support of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, in building the country’s capital, Mogadishu.

The FCT Minister received the ambassador of Somalia to Nigeria, Jamal Mohammed Barrow, in his office on Thursday.

The ambassador expressed the desire of Somalia to leverage the experience of the FCT in developing the capital city of Mogadishu and called for the support of the FCT Administration.

“We hope that Nigeria is the best role model for Somalia now because we have gone through the same experiences like the civil war and we feel that Nigeria can be our example in the future, especially in the capital city of Abuja,” he said.

Wike, who assured the support and cooperation of the FCT Administration for Foreign Missions, equally promised to approve the request for land allocation to enable the construction of the Somali Chancery in Abuja.

“We are here to make things comfortable for our guests. Whatever you think that FCT will do, do not hesitate to let us know. We are always willing to cooperate with our guests, particularly foreign missions,” Wike said.

“We will immediately call for the file so that you can have your parcel of land to be able to build your own chancery. I can assure you that after this discussion, I will call for the file so that you can have it approved and start building your Chancery,” he added

Wike, while noting that Nigeria and Somalia share a similar history of civil wars, also pledged the readiness of the FCT Administration to pass on its city development experiences to Somalia as the country seeks to develop its capital city of Mogadishu.

Also responding to the invitation by the envoy to visit Mogadishu to have a better experience of how it looks, the FCT Minister assured that he would make time to visit the city.

The minister said: “Mogadishu is a city, the capital of Somalia. We would also love to have the experience of seeing what the city looks like. So, we believe that we will work out the arrangement to see how we can share things and pass on experiences in terms of the development of cities.”