(Mogadishu) Somali President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed on Monday announced he was suspending Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble, in the wake of a public dispute over the long-delayed elections in the volatile Horn of Africa country.
“The president has decided to suspend Prime Minister Mohamed Hussein Roble and end his powers as soon as he is linked to corruption,” the president’s office said in a statement, accusing the prime minister of interfering in an investigation into a land grabbing case.
Tensions between President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, known as Farmajo, and his prime minister, Mohamed Hussein Roble, are recurrent.
Sunday, the Prime Minister accused the president of sabotaging the electoral process, after the decision of the Head of State to withdraw the responsibility for organizing the elections, long awaited and at the origin of a serious institutional crisis.
President since 2017, Farmajo saw his term expire on February 8 without being able to agree with regional leaders on the organization of elections, governed in Somalia by a complex and indirect electoral system.
The announcement in mid-April of the extension of his mandate for two years had provoked armed clashes in Mogadishu.
Many observers believe that the crisis at the top of the state and the electoral stalemate are distracting attention from more important issues in Somalia, such as the shebab insurgency that has rocked the country since 2007.