“There is a genuine, robust tax base. You can call it extortion, you can call it what you want, but it’s there, it’s real, and it works,” says Matt Bryden, a Canadian political analyst who has worked for United Nations organisations in the region.
Understood to generate funds of between $100m and $150m a year, making it one of the world’s richest militant groups, Al-Shabaab controls large swathes of the centre and south of the country.
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