The shots fired late Friday in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, witnesses said as government troops approached the home of the former city police commander who was fired for opposing a measure of the president to extend his term.
The difference reveals splits in Somalia’s security services that threaten to see the forces clash, creating an opportunity to exploit the al-Qaeda-linked Shabaab insurgency.
“Somalia’s long political crisis has entered a new dangerous phase,” the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank, said on Saturday.
“It is said that the opposition is thinking of forming a parallel government; the cracks have deepened into a security apparatus long divided along the lines of the clan, and opponents of the president have promised to resist the extension of the his government “.
Somalia, eroded by the civil war since 1991, is trying to rebuild itself with international aid, but the road to stability has been hampered by a political crisis caused by the failure to hold elections in February.
On Monday, lawmakers extended President Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed’s four-year term to two years.
The resolution passed after Mogadishu police chief Saadaq Omar Hassan announced the suspension of parliament, led to his dismissal moments later. Read more
Hassan retreated to his home in the Shirkole area of the city, which is guarded by 100 gunmen who have been reinforced by clan fighters, his family and area residents said.
Calm returned after the gunfire erupted, but some Shirkole residents staged demonstrations in the street in support of Hassan, burning tires and shouting slogans against the president.
“If they attack you, you have to defend yourself,” said Mahad Mohamed Salad, a pro-Hassan lawmaker.
The government denied allegations that it wanted to attack Hassan.
“We have no interest in attacking a civilian area where the majority of the population is children and women,” Homeland Security Minister Hassan Hunbdubey said in an online address last Friday.
Donors, who have opposed the president’s decision to extend his term, fear the crisis could spur new attacks by Islamist militants on the Shabaab, who have been trying to scrap the government for years.
Militants killed Mohamed Abdi Hayle, the Hamarjajab district commissioner on the outskirts of Mogadishu, on Friday, the state news agency reported.
They also captured the Becaadweyn area of the central state of Galmudug without resistance on Thursday, after the Somali army left the area, residents reported.
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