Mogadishu diary part 4: Walking wounded
Ali Abdi Abukar is nine years old, and walking very gingerly - one hand resting on the bandage that covers a 10-inch gash running down his abdomen.
Ali Abdi Abukar's father was killed in the attack in which he was wounded
Ali, his mother, and perhaps 500 Somali civilians have been queuing since early this morning in the dunes outside the heavily defended compound of the African Union peacekeepers, known as Amisom, on the edge of Mogadishu. It’s a long walk from Ali’s home in the no-man’s land that splits the city centre. Each person is carefully searched before they’re allowed into the camp.
There are other hospitals in Mogadishu, and some foreign aid organisations providing humanitarian assistance to hundreds of thousands of needy Somalis. But security concerns prevent us from visiting them.
By nine in the morning, the sandy courtyard inside Amisom's clinic is packed with people. Ali is seen quickly by a Ugandan army doctor, James Kiyengo. It’s a month since the boy was caught in crossfire. His father was killed that day. Now the stitches running down his stomach are septic.
“We see over 10,000 patients a month,” says Dr Kiyengo. “Most of them would not have survived if they did not have the care that we give. So our impact is quite big. A child like this needs so little but the impact is so big. If we weren’t here, he would definitely be dead.”
Amisom spokesman Major B-B is with us, as always. “This is also about winning hearts and minds,” he says. “Al-Shabab hate this place.” And yet there are victims here too of Amisom’s sometimes indiscriminate attacks – inevitable perhaps in a crowded urban war-zone, but “hearts and minds” can be won by both sides.
A lot of the patients are afraid to be filmed or give their names, saying they fear they will be targeted by the militant group. I run into a middle-aged lady in the clinic’s stairwell. She speaks good English and has come to have an eye infection treated. “We live like animals in Mogadishu,” she says. “Like animals living in a hole – we just go out to find food. Al-Shabab are bad. If they get you, they kill you by knife. They are not strong, but they are helped by business people and foreigners.”
Near the clinic are tents and cabins for in-patients. There’s a ward full of children – several with bullet and shrapnel injuries; a ward for government soldiers; and a special ward for women who’ve had, or are waiting for, fistula operations – a big problem in a country where female genital mutilation remains widespread.
Later in the afternoon, news arrives from the president's office at Villa Somalia – the new cabinet has finally been approved by the transitional parliament. It’s a significant breakthrough. The new team has a lot to prove, and very little time in which to do so.
I’m 
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