Cabinet Members Quit, Widening Rift in Somalia

Cabinet Members Quit, Widening Rift in Somalia
By REUTERS
BAIDOA, Somalia (Reuters) — Two-thirds of Somalia’s cabinet ministers resigned on Saturday, officials said, widening a rift between the president and prime minister that threatened to wreck the country’s interim government.
The 10 ministers who quit were all allies of President Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, who has appeared increasingly at odds with Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein. Last week, Mr. Yusuf revoked an order by Mr. Hussein that fired the powerful mayor of the capital, Mogadishu.
“I have resigned because the government has failed to implement its programs and has gone against the charter,” Khadija Muhammad Diriye, the former family affairs minister, said in Baidoa, where Parliament meets.
She said she and her colleagues tendered their resignations, four of them from overseas. Somalia had 15 ministers.
It was not clear what effect the move would have on the work of the interim government, which has struggled to impose its authority since coming to power at the start of last year.
One Somali member of Parliament who asked not to be named said one group of lawmakers was calling on Mr. Hussein to resign over accusations of financial irregularities in his administration.
At the center of growing tensions between the president and prime minister is a former warlord and close ally of Mr. Yusuf, Mohamed Dheere, who was mayor of Mogadishu.
Last week, the prime minister fired Mr. Dheere, accusing him of misusing public funds and blaming him for mounting insecurity. On Thursday, President Yusuf revoked the order, officials said.
Mr. Dheere’s fighters have been battling Islamist rebels waging an Iraq-style insurgency against the government and its Ethiopian allies.
On Friday, a roadside bomb killed a Ugandan soldier serving with a small African Union peacekeeping force.
The political rift came as mediators tried to capitalize on a truce signed at peace talks hosted by the United Nations in Djibouti in June between the government and some of the opposition.
Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the United Nations special envoy for Somalia, expressed concern and urged cooperation.
“The Somali people knew there would be challenges on the path to peace, and they should not be discouraged,” he said Saturday. “The authorities should remain focused on peace, and I hope to see them shortly.”
The country’s interim administration is the 14th attempt at forming a functioning central government since 1991.