Practice area
Regulatory and compliance
Sector licensing, telecommunications and digital regulation, data protection, sanctions and anti-money-laundering compliance.
How the firm works in this area
Regulatory work is where the firm is at its most developed. It advises on the National Communications Act 2017 and its subsidiary instruments, on spectrum and licensing for mobile operators, internet providers and satellite operators, on infrastructure sharing and submarine cable landing, and on the data-protection and platform-governance questions that follow.
The compliance practice certifies clients against the standards their head offices answer to: the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, the UK Bribery Act 2010, the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention, sanctions regimes and anti-money-laundering rules. For donor-funded work the firm advises against World Bank quality- and cost-based selection requirements, under which it has an established record of compliant delivery.
For time-critical questions the firm sustains a rapid-response capability, with structured legal analysis delivered inside 72 to 96 hours for clients that need to act before a hearing, a filing or a launch.
Confidentiality is structural, not cosmetic. Representative work in this area is described by anonymized descriptor only. The firm never implies a named client without consent.
What the firm handles
A working list of the matters clients instruct the firm on in this area.
Selected matters
A national oil company
Instructed through international counsel, the firm advised on the Petroleum Law 2020, on model production-sharing agreements and on licensing rounds. The recurring and most difficult work was the federalism question: which authority, the Federal Government or a Federal Member State, controls a given offshore right, and how a licensing round is run when both claim a say. The firm treated the constitutional question as the commercial question, on the basis that a production-sharing agreement is only as secure as the authority that granted it.
An international foundation
The firm reviewed and drafted Somali-law Murabaha, Wakala and joint-venture agreements for a housing-finance programme, structured so as to satisfy Somali banking legislation and Islamic Shari’ah principles at the same time. It settled the common-terms agreement, confirmed the regulatory position against the framework the Central Bank of Somalia applies, and documented the Shari’ah compliance in a way that a court and a scholar would both accept, so that the facilities could be enforced without reopening the question of whether they were compliant.
A global payments network
The firm advised on the regulatory treatment of digital financial services as the network connected to Somalia, covering payment-systems regulation, anti-money-laundering compliance, electronic transactions and consumer protection. Because mobile money is central to how Somalis transact, the advice was grounded in how the Central Bank of Somalia actually applies its framework in practice, not only in how the rules are written, so that the network could integrate on a compliant footing.
Related reading
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Instruct the firm on a matter in Somalia
The firm acts directly for clients and as Somali counsel to more than 140 international and regional firms. Tell us about the matter and the right lawyer will respond.