150 Shillings International Year of Disabled Persons

Somalia's 1983 commemorative program was issued under the Siad Barre government, which had by then largely exhausted its early socialist credibility and was increasingly dependent on foreign aid following the catastrophic Ogaden War with Ethiopia. These coins were produced for export sale rather than domestic circulation — Somalia had neither the hard currency reserves nor the stable economy to support a silver collector market at home. The UN's International Year of Disabled Persons was 1981; the two-year lag before this issue appeared was not unusual for smaller nations contracting with European minting houses on delayed production schedules.