Dereje Feyissa with contributions from Milkessa Midega and Ketema Wakjira.
As a secondary city, the competitive advantage of Dire Dawa, Ethiopia is location. It is the closest large city to the port of Djibouti, making it an important transit hub for international migration via Djibouti and Somalia to the Gulf States and Europe. Whether migrants end up staying in Dire Dawa or migrating onward depends on their experiences in the city’s labour market and their initial expectations.
According to the 2007 census, Dire Dawa is the second largest city in Ethiopia. With an urban population of less than 20 per cent, Ethiopia significantly lags behind the sub-Saharan average of 37 per cent. Urbanization is, however, rapidly increasing in the country. The urban population is projected to triple from 15.2 million in 2012 to 42.3 million in 2037, growing at a rate of 3.8 per cent a year. One of the factors for the growth of the urban population in Dire Dawa is rural to urban migration. Migrants constitute close to 30 per cent of the city’s population. Of these migrants, 45 per cent come to the city from rural areas and 55 per cent migrate to the city from other urban areas.
Migrants come to Dire Dawa for various reasons. For many, the city’s cosmopolitan image and its reputation for socio-cultural integration across religious and ethnic boundaries is an attraction. Affectionately called ye dire lij (sons [and daughters] of Dire Dawa), residents of the city are considered to be welcoming, progressive, laid back and sociable. These qualities contrast with the perception of those from Addis Ababa, who are regarded as more individualistic and less sociable.
Previously known as a railway town, and for the associated contraband trade, Dire Dawa is struggling to develop a post-contraband economy defined as a service and industrial hub for eastern Ethiopia. Migrants come to Dire Dawa because of economic push factors, including land shortages and degradation in rural areas, which is particularly the case for migrants from rural Dire Dawa, eastern Oromia Regional State and Southern Nations, Nationalities and Peoples’ Regional State. This is compounded by environmental drivers, especially the recurrent drought in rural Dire Dawa and the East and West Hararge Zones of Oromia Regional State, where the rain-fed farming system is stressed and can no longer provide subsistence to the farming community.
A significant dynamic impacting migration in Dire Dawa is the contested nature of political entitlements in the city between its two largest ethnic groups, the Oromo and the Somali. According to a power-sharing formula worked out to maintain stability in the city in 2006, the Oromo and the Somali have 40 per cent each of the political and administrative offices. The remaining 20 per cent is given to other members of the ruling party, the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). Both Oromos and Somalis deeply resent this power-sharing formula and consequently encourage migration from their respective regions in order to change the demographic composition of the city. As such, some migration to Dire Dawa is perceived to be politically driven. The third national census (2017–2018) is likely to fuel this politics of numbers, as it is directly related to political entitlement over the city.
This study finds that access to basic social services, such as health and education, are an important pull factor. There is no high school in rural Dire Dawa and students who complete grade eight and wish to continue their education must go to Dire Dawa to do so, resulting in a large student migrant population. Access to education is also constrained by cultural practices, particularly for girls. Traditional practices, such as early and forced marriage, are widespread in rural Dire Dawa and in the neighbouring Oromia and Somali regions. Dire Dawa is considered to be a safe haven for women subjected to domestic violence and gender discrimination.
Friendship networks and peer pressure are strongly linked to migration patterns to the city, with migration often occurring in a chain. In encouraging their friends or relatives to join them, migrants to urban Dire Dawa tend to minimize the difficulties and hardships they face and instead exaggerate their accomplishments. The proximity of urban Dire Dawa to rural areas is enabled by improved infrastructure (roads) and technology (mobile phones), which have made travel and information exchange much easier, thereby encouraging migration. The emergence of ethnic-based neighbourhoods, which provide migrants access to ethnic-based social networks, has put a strain on the city’s cosmopolitan legacy.
Despite having higher expectations, most migrants end up working as day labourers, street vendors, domestic workers, commercial sex workers and beggars. They all struggle with either joblessness or exploitation in the labour marketplace. There also appears to be an ethnic stratification of migrant labour. Most of the domestic and commercial sex workers are migrants from rural Dire Dawa and eastern Oromia Regional State, whereas most day labourers in the construction sector are migrants from the south. Somalis do not tend to work as domestic workers or day labourers for cultural reasons. These types of jobs are viewed negatively, not least because wages are low. Migrants, particularly from the south, have depressed wages because they are willing to be paid lower rates. They are also preferred for the quality of their labour. This ethnic stratification of migrant labour has brought about tensions among migrants, and between migrants and natives of Dire Dawa.
The impact of rural–urban migration on sites of origin is predominantly positive, with migrants providing remittances to support family, particularly for health and education costs, and money to invest in land and housing. A positive impact is also seen in shifting gender relations, especially improved attitudes toward girls’ education.
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Image source: Gavin Houtheusen/Department for International Development