By Abdullahi Salad and Zamzam Daqare - Reporters
Mogadishu, 27 August 2026 - The World Bank says its Somalia portfolio's disbursement ratio, about 29.4 percent in the 2026 fiscal year and about 24 percent in the 2025 fiscal year, ranked among the top tier of countries in the Africa East and Southern Africa region. The assessment came in a written response the Bank gave exclusively to Dawan Africa, amid a dispute between former Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire and the Somali government over the state of the economy.
Those ratios describe how much of the Bank's total undisbursed portfolio, a rolling pool of financing spread across projects at different stages, gets disbursed in a given year. That is a different measurement from a single year's allocation being tallied as spent or unspent by year's end, which is how Hassan Ali Khaire framed the same money in an opinion article he published on Dawan Africa, writing that "over half a billion dollars" in development financing went unspent in 2024 and 2025 because of "mismanagement and graft."
The Ministry of Planning, Investment and Economic Development responded to Khaire's article with a statement rejecting his broader account of the economy, though it did not directly address his figures on undisbursed financing. Both Khaire and the Ministry cited the World Bank's Somalia Economic Update, the 11th edition, published in May 2026, as their source. Dawan Africa examined that report and put further questions directly to the World Bank Group.
What the World Bank said about undisbursed financing
Khaire's article states that 73 percent of more than $330 million allocated to Somalia in 2024, and 70 percent of more than $407 million allocated in 2025, went unspent. Neither figure, nor the underlying dollar amounts, appears in the World Bank's Somalia Economic Update. Dawan Africa asked the World Bank Group directly for its own disbursement data to test the claim; the ratios above, and the top-tier comparison, were its reply.
The two sets of figures are not measuring the same thing. The Bank's ratio is calculated against the undisbursed balance of its entire Somalia portfolio at the start of each fiscal year, a standard World Bank metric for financing spread across multiple projects at different stages, not against a single year's new commitments. A project disbursed evenly over four years, for example, would show roughly 25 percent disbursed and 75 percent undisbursed at every year-end check along the way, which is normal progress rather than a shortfall. Khaire's figures present a single year's allocation as though it were assessed once, at year's end, and found mostly unspent. The two sets of percentages land in a similar range, but that overlap reflects how multi-year portfolios are structured, rather than independently confirming his claim about the $330 million or $407 million specifically.
The Bank said "undisbursed balances are a normal feature of project implementation and should not be interpreted as evidence of poor performance." It added that disbursement patterns vary from year to year depending on project design, procurement timelines and the sequencing of activities.
Dawan Africa also asked the Bank directly whether any funds committed to Somalia in 2025 or 2026 were cancelled or returned specifically because of corruption, fraud or misuse. The Bank did not confirm or deny this. It said the portfolio had undergone "routine reallocations, restructurings, cancellations of closing balances" to ensure efficient use of resources, adding that where concerns arise, they are "addressed through the Bank's established fiduciary, integrity, and project oversight processes."
Verdict: Khaire's specific figures do not appear in the World Bank's report, and the framing behind them, a single year's allocation judged as spent or unspent, does not match how the Bank itself measures disbursement across a multi-year portfolio. The Bank did not confirm any link between undisbursed financing and corruption when asked directly, and describes the pattern he is criticizing as normal for projects implemented over several years.
The wider dispute: what else does the report support?
The undisbursed financing figures were not the only claim at issue. Dawan Africa checked the remaining claims in Khaire's article and the Ministry's rebuttal against the World Bank's Somalia Economic Update, the report both sides cited.
GDP growth: a slowdown, not a contraction
Khaire wrote that the World Bank report shows the economy "contracting by three percent" in 2025. The report does not describe a contraction. It records real GDP growth of 3.0 percent in 2025, down from 4.1 percent in 2024, a deceleration in growth rather than a decline in output. The report attributes the slowdown to a sharp cut in foreign aid and poor rainfall during the Deyr season.
The Ministry's statement, that the economy "did not shrink, it grew," matches the report. Its own figures, describing growth easing "from 4 percent to 3.1 percent," are close to but not identical to the report's 4.1 percent and 3.0 percent.
Verdict: Not supported. The report describes slower growth, not a contraction.
Household purchasing power: figure not found in the report
Khaire's article states that "household purchasing power fell by 5.7 percent" in 2025, citing the same World Bank update. That figure does not appear anywhere in the report reviewed by Dawan Africa. The update discusses rising electricity, food and transport costs weighing on households in general terms, and separately records inflation of 3.7 percent in 2025, but it does not publish a specific percentage decline in purchasing power.
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Verdict: Not supported by the report.
Private sector credit: slower growth, not a collapse
Khaire wrote that credit extended to businesses "collapsed from 30 percent in 2022 to just 14 percent in 2025." The report describes something different. It says private sector credit "continued to grow in 2025, albeit at a slower pace," with the annual growth rate easing to 14 percent from close to 30 percent in 2022 and 2023. In the report's own account, credit to businesses kept expanding each year, only more slowly, rather than shrinking.
The Ministry's statement also argues that credit rose, citing an increase from $222.7 million in 2021 to $620 million in June 2026, a rise of 179 percent, and banking sector assets up 91 percent over roughly the same period. Those specific dollar figures do not appear in the World Bank update and could not be verified against it, though they are broadly consistent with a market that kept growing rather than shrinking.
Verdict: Khaire's description of a "collapse" is not supported by the report's own language, which describes continued growth at a slower rate. The Ministry's direction of travel matches the report, though its specific dollar figures come from elsewhere.
Food insecurity and displacement
Khaire's claim that 6.5 million people face food insecurity matches the World Bank report, which cites the same figure for February to March 2026, based on Integrated Food Security Phase Classification data. His figures on internal displacement, that the number of internally displaced Somalis grew from 2.9 million in 2022 to 3.4 million today, do not appear in the World Bank Economic Update and could not be verified against it. They may be drawn from other sources, such as United Nations displacement tracking.
Verdict: The food insecurity figure is accurate and matches the report. The displacement figures are not confirmed by this report.
Claims not addressed by the World Bank report
Several claims from both sides do not appear in the World Bank's Somalia Economic Update and could not be checked against it. These include Khaire's references to sixteen checkpoints between Afgooye and Mogadishu and a $320 per container fee at the Port of Mogadishu, and the Ministry's figures on Somalia's GDP in dollar terms, income per capita, and crop production during the 2025 Gu season. These claims may be accurate and sourced elsewhere, including other World Bank or IMF publications, but Dawan Africa could not confirm them against the report both sides cited.
The bottom line
On undisbursed financing, Khaire's specific figures are not confirmed by the World Bank's report or by the Bank's own disclosures, and the similar scale reflects how multi-year portfolios are structured rather than independent confirmation of his claim. The Bank did not confirm any link between undisbursed financing and corruption when asked directly, and describes the pattern as normal for projects implemented over several years. On the other points that can be checked against the World Bank's Somalia Economic Update, the report describes an economy that kept growing, more slowly, in 2025, with credit and domestic revenue also still expanding, while food insecurity worsened. Khaire's description of a "contracting" economy and a "collapse" in credit relies on framing not found in that report, as do several of the Ministry's supporting figures.
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Correction (added [28 August 2026 ]): An earlier version of this article described unspent development financing as “aid” and stated that the scale of funds Khaire cited was “broadly in line” with the World Bank’s disclosed disbursement figures. The World Bank’s figures measure annual disbursement against its total Somalia portfolio, not a single year’s allocation, and cover only the Bank’s own financing, while Khaire’s figures span multiple institutions. This version has been corrected to reflect both distinctions.