African Cities

As the capital and the seat of the Somali government, Mogadishu has undergone a slow process of urban recovery over the course of the past decade. The city is experiencing rapid urbanisation, growing up to as much as 4% per year by some estimates, with a concomitant building boom driving up land prices. However, central tenets of the political settlement remain unresolved, including Mogadishu's constitutional status.
Drawing on current political settlements and domain studies, ACRC researchers Surer Mohamed, Afyare Elmi, Abdirizak Muhumed and Abdifatah Tahir discuss urban politics and power dynamics, issues of security and citizenship, and the trends they are seeing that give them hope for urban reform in Mogadishu.
Surer Mohamed is the current Harry Frank Guggenheim Research Fellow at Pembroke College, University of Cambridge, focusing on the politics of urban belonging in Africa and the aftermaths of political violence in cities. She is the ACRC uptake lead and domain lead for land and connectivity in Mogadishu.
Afyare Elmi is the executive director of the Heritage Institute for Policy Studies, as well as the ACRC city lead and political settlements co-lead in Mogadishu.
Abdirizak Muhumed is a senior researcher at the Heritage Institute for Policy Studies and co-leads ACRC's political settlements research in Mogadishu.
Abdifatah Tahir is a postdoctoral research fellow at The University of Manchester and former member of Somalia’s federal parliament. He is working on the land and connectivity domain within ACRC.
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Music: Brighter Days | Broke in Summer
Sounds: Zapsplat
This podcast presents the views of the speakers featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

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ACRC defines inclusive urban reform coalitions as partnerships between government, experts and civil society organisations – often directly involving communities and groups most directly affected by the issues at hand – to drive sustainable urban transformation.
In this episode, Joseph Macarthy, executive director of the Sierra Leone Urban Research Centre (SLURC), joins Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael for a conversation around coalition building for inclusive urban reform, drawing on his experiences in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
Discussing SLURC's ongoing work with with the Centre of Dialogue on Human Settlement and Poverty Alleviation (CODOHSAPA) and the Federation of Urban and Rural Poor (FEDURP), Joseph talks about collaborating with community residents as co-researchers, the development of a Community Action Area Plan, and how City and Community Learning Platforms can provide a space for genuine dialogue among different actors in Freetown.
Joseph Macarthy is executive director of the Sierra Leone Urban Research Centre (SLURC) and ACRC's Freetown city lead, also overseeing city of systems and housing research in the city.
Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael is a postdoctoral research fellow at the African Cities Research Consortium, supporting research across the crosscutting themes of finance, gender and climate change.
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Music: Brighter Days | Broke in Summer
Sounds: Zapsplat
This podcast presents the views of the speakers featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

Stay up to date with the latest publications, announcements and insights from the African Cities Research Consortium:
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"How can the interest and the commitment of those in charge of this city be galvanised, so that they see service delivery as important as an end in itself? For me, we need first to mobilise citizens."
People living and working informally are often the most affected by shortfalls in service provision, impacting their access to education, healthcare, markets, sanitation, roads and more. In this episode, ACRC researchers Badru Bukenya and Buyana Kareem join Junior Alves Sebbanja for a conversation about service provision in Kampala, discussing the systemic and governance challenges underpinning it.
Drawing on findings from their ACRC research, they talk about emerging crosscutting issues, including how limited capacities and inconsistent political support are impacting governments' abilities to deliver on policies. They discuss citizen engagement as a key starting point for building sustainable programmes, highlighting the importance of including communities within planning processes in order to understand their needs and priorities, and to deliver contextually appropriate solutions.
Badru Bukenya is a senior lecturer in the department of social work and social administration at Makerere University, and political settlements lead for ACRC in Kampala.
Buyana Kareem is an interdisciplinary researcher at the Urban Action Lab, Makerere University, and supports ACRC's city of systems research in Kampala.
Junior Alves Sebbanja is a project manager at ACTogether Uganda and part of ACRC Kampala's uptake team.
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Music: Brighter Days | Broke in Summer
Sounds: Zapsplat
This podcast presents the views of the speakers featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

Stay up to date with the latest publications, announcements and insights from the African Cities Research Consortium:
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Urban reform coalitions can play a critical role in building inclusive, sustainable and productive cities. Made up of diverse stakeholders who collaborate to achieve common goals, these coalitions can work to strengthen relationships between disadvantaged groups and influential state/non-state actors. This collective action can be powerful in challenging socioeconomic inequality and enabling marginalised groups to capitalise on political opportunities for inclusive reform.
So where do researchers come in?
This podcast episode is a recording from a webinar we held in September 2023 to discuss the role that academics, action researchers and professionals can play in fostering the formation and functioning of urban reform coalitions. In doing so, we wanted to give special focus to how knowledge and evidence can catalyse urban reform coalitions.
Chaired by ACRC research associate, Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael, the webinar comprised presentations from three panellists, who talked about their experiences of working with urban reform coalitions and shared valuable lessons learned, followed by a question-and-answer session.
Shalini Sinha is the urban Asia lead and home-based work sector specialist at Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO). She discusses the “I, Too, am Delhi” campaign, including the importance of having multi-sectoral partnerships and an intersectional perspective, along with the need to “demystify the technical”.
Catherine Sutherland is an associate professor at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. She shares her experiences and lessons from co-producing knowledge with disadvantaged groups in the Palmiet Catchment Rehabilitation Project, aimed at building flood resilience in Durban, South Africa.
Paul Mukwaya is coordinator at the Urban Action Lab and ACRC's city lead for Kampala. He talks about his experiences as part of the Just City and Informality Working Group, led by Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) Uganda.
Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael is a research associate at the African Cities Research Consortium, supporting research across the crosscutting themes of finance, gender and climate change.
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Music: Brighter Days | Broke in Summer
Sounds: Zapsplat
This podcast presents the views of the speakers featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

Stay up to date with the latest publications, announcements and insights from the African Cities Research Consortium:
> Website
> E-news
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ACRC defines inclusive urban reform coalitions as partnerships between government, experts and civil society organisations – often directly involving communities and groups most directly affected by the issues at hand – to drive sustainable urban transformation.
In this episode, George Masimba from Dialogue on Shelter Trust – support NGO to the SDI-affiliated Zimbabwe Homeless People’s Federation – talks to Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael about the trust's experiences of working within reform coalitions to improve access to urban services for marginalised communities in Harare, through initiatives including the development of an inclusive framework for participatory informal settlement upgrading.
He highlights how coalitions have been instrumental in securing buy-in for SDI's approach to informal settlement upgrading in the city, and explores their value in leveraging financial and technical resources, strengthening engagement processes, and creating a community of likeminded stakeholders who can push for change together.
George Masimba is head of programmes at Dialogue on Shelter and is the lead for ACRC's city of systems, uptake and informal settlements domain work in Harare. George appeared on a previous episode, discussing knowledge co-production in the city.
Ezana Haddis Weldeghebrael is a postdoctoral research fellow at the African Cities Research Consortium, supporting research across the crosscutting themes of finance, gender and climate change.
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Music: Brighter Days | Broke in Summer
Sounds: Zapsplat
This podcast presents the views of the speakers featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

Stay up to date with the latest publications, announcements and insights from the African Cities Research Consortium:
> Website
> E-news
> X (Twitter)
> LinkedIn
> YouTube