- Abdul Rashid has sold sweet Somali tea on the muddy streets of
Hargeisa for decades. As night falls in the capital of breakaway
Somaliland and worshipers flood out of the mosque, a handful congregate
around his rickety table. While he pours from a flask into paper cups,
buyers type a string of numbers into mobile phones, take their tea and
go on their way. A cup of Mr Rashid’s tea costs 2,000 Somaliland shillings –
equivalent to $0.25 or Dh0.92 – and his customers pay almost exclusively
with their mobile phones. “I never see cash,” he tells The National.
Mr Rashid is not alone. Across Somaliland – which declared
independence from Somalia in 1991 but is yet to gain recognition from
the international community – people are turning away from cash and
embracing mobile money. This makes the region, with its tiny
livestock-dependent economy, a candidate for the world’s first cashless
society.
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