Police in Somalia have announced a 33-hour curfew on the Somali capital, Mogadishu that will keep almost all residents at home during a presidential election by lawmakers on Sunday, in which the incumbent leader Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo is seeking a second term.
Somali Police spokesperson Abdifatah Aden announced at a press conference that a full curfew in the city, covering both traffic and people from Saturday at 9:00 p.m. until Monday at 6:00 a.m.
Lawmakers, security personnel and all others officials involved in the vote are still free to move during those hours.
The indirect election, in which lawmakers will pick a president, will take place in an airport hangar behind blast walls to help fend off potential Islamist attacks or meddling by factions within the security services.
The incumbent president Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo is facing 37 opponents in the vote, including two former presidents, Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, who analysts see as the frontrunners.
Originally they were 39, but between Thursday and Friday two candidates announced that they were exiting the race.
Polls are due to commence early on Sunday and are expected to proceed late into the night amid a volatile security atmosphere in which police fear Islamist group Al-Shabab could seek to carry out terror attacks to disrupt the poll event.
The Al-Shabab insurgency has gripped Somalia for more than a decade and a promise by Mohamed Abdullahi Farmajo at his inauguration in 2017 to “finish” the group has gone unfulfilled.
Al Shabab terror militants says it wants to topple the Horn of Africa country’s central government and establish its own rule based on its strict interpretation of Islam’s sharia law.
Somalia’s next leader will inherit a daunting list of challenges, including the worst drought in 40 years, a violent conflict entering its fourth decade, clan feuds and a power struggle between the government and federal member states.
BY OSMAN HUSSEIN ALI
osmanhusseinke@gmail.com
