SOMALIA’S PARLIAMENTARY SPEAKER REJECTS INDIRECT ELECTIONS

Mogadishu (PP News Desk) — The Speaker of the Somali Federal  Parliament Mohammed Mursal has clarified the position of the parliament on the mooted indirect elections favoured by some states.

The speaker’s intervention comes in the wake of the summit for Federal Member States concluded recently in Dhuusamareeb, the administrative capital of Galmudug State. “Somali traditional leaders who selected MPs for 2017 elections were summoned [by Al-shabaab] and pardoned for participating in the electoral process” Mursal said.

Mursal: Somalia has an electoral law signed into law by President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed.

Mursal said that in 2017 Somalia “did not have an electoral law” and that “it is the responsibility of the Federal Parliament to finalise the electoral legislation for one person, one vote elections.” Leaders of the five Federal Member States issued a statement on deadlock over the electoral model but stopped short of calling for indirect elections favoured by Puntland and Somali political parties.

Puntland called for abrogation of the electoral law in favour of consensus by stakeholders. At the Dhuusamareeb summit leaders of the Federal Member States disagreed over the proposal to hold enhanced elections.

© Puntland Post, 2020