The Borders That Changed My Thinking

When Somalia officially joined the East African Community (EAC), much of the national conversation focused on trade, markets and the opportunities that come with becoming part of one of Africa’s largest regional blocs. Those discussions are important. Yet, during a recent peer learning mission to Kenya, I found myself reflecting on a different question: what does the regional integration actually mean for the 300 million+ in this slice of the world?

It was not when Somalia became the eighth EAC Partner State. It was not even during our visit to the Namanga One-Stop Border Post, where our delegation observed customs, immigration and nearly twenty government agencies from Kenya and Tanzania working together under a single operational framework.

In 2018, I moved to Uganda to pursue a Master’s degree in Development Studies at Kampala International University. Like many students, I understood the East African Community through textbooks and lectures. I knew about the Customs Union, the Common Market and the long-term ambition of a Monetary Union and Political Federation. At the time, however, these were academic concepts rather than lived experiences.

Living in Uganda gradually changed that. One of the first things that caught my attention was how visible the EAC was in everyday public life. During official ceremonies and university events, people stood not only for the Ugandan national anthem but also for the East African Community anthem. The EAC flag flew alongside the national flag outside public institutions, and conversations about regional affairs were common among students and academics. Integration was not treated as a distant diplomatic project; it had become part of public life.

Later that year, I travelled by road to Kigali to attend the Africa YouthConnekt Summit. Crossing the Gatuna border between Uganda and Rwanda as a foreign student legally residing in Uganda was remarkably straightforward. A few months later, I travelled again by bus from Kampala to Nairobi through the Busia border. I still remember watching passengers casually present their national identity cards before continuing their journey. Nobody seemed to think it was remarkable.

Coming from Somalia, I realised I was witnessing something that many parts of Africa still aspire to achieve, regional integration experienced through ordinary life rather than political speeches. The significance of those journeys was not that borders had disappeared, but that they had become easier to cross because governments had spent years building the institutions needed to make cooperation work.

Those experiences made me increasingly curious about how East Africa had reached that point. Between lectures at KIU and long afternoons in Makerere University’s Lumumba Hall Library, I found myself reading about the history of the East African Community and the ideas of Julius Nyerere, Jomo Kenyatta and Milton Obote. What struck me was not simply their vision but their confidence that newly independent African states could achieve more together than apart. Their project was ambitious, imperfect and, at times, interrupted. Yet despite political setbacks, the idea survived. Today, more than 300 million people live within a regional community that has transformed trade, mobility and economic cooperation across East Africa.

Another journey deepened my understanding. In 2022, I travelled from Geneva to Paris and then to Brussels using a single Schengen visa. Visiting the European Parliament and the House of European History, I found myself reflecting on East Africa rather than Europe. The comparison was not about wealth or infrastructure. It was about institutions. Europe did not become integrated overnight, and neither did East Africa. In both cases, regional integration emerged through decades of political commitment, legal harmonisation and institution-building.

That perspective stayed with me until this year, when I joined Somalia’s official delegation on a peer learning exchange to Kenya. Our programme included visits to the State Department for East African Community Affairs, the Central Bank of Kenya, the Kenya Revenue Authority and the Kenya Bankers Association. Each institution explained a different dimension of regional integration—from payment systems and digital trade to customs modernisation and financial interoperability. Yet it was at Namanga that everything came together.

Walking through the One-Stop Border Post, warmly received by officials from Kenya and Tanzania, I realised I was no longer looking at a border in the same way I had years earlier. What I saw was not simply efficient customs procedures or modern digital systems. I saw the result of decades of patient institution-building. Behind every truck crossing the border, every traveller moving with fewer delays and every digital customs declaration stood years of legal reforms, public investment and cooperation between neighbouring states.

For years, I had understood the outcomes of regional integration. Namanga helped me understand its foundations. That lesson matters for Somalia. Joining the East African Community was a significant political milestone, but membership alone does not create opportunity. The real work lies in strengthening the institutions that enable businesses to trade more easily, students to study across the region, travellers to move with confidence and governments to cooperate effectively. Integration is not sustained by treaties alone. It is sustained by capable institutions, consistent policies and the willingness to invest in a shared future.

Looking back, I realise that my understanding of the East African Community did not emerge from a single lecture, a single journey or a single border crossing. It developed gradually through books, conversations, travel and observation. Kampala introduced me to the idea. Gatuna and Busia allowed me to experience it. Brussels reminded me that every successful regional project is built over generations. Namanga connected all those experiences into one simple realisation.

Regional integration is not something you fully understand by reading treaties. You understand it when you begin to experience the institutions that quietly make cooperation possible. As Somalia embarks on its own journey within the East African Community, I hope a new generation of Somalis will one day travel, study, trade and work across East Africa without giving those experiences a second thought. Perhaps that will be the clearest sign that integration has truly succeeded.