Farmaajo’s henchman Fahad Yasin locked out as PM Roble hints at fresh poll

GOOBJOOG NEWS|MOGADISHU: Fahad Yasin, a right-hand man of outgoing President Mohamed Farmaajo has been locked out of the final list of legislators released by the Federal Indirect Elections Team (FIET) Thursday night as PM Roble signals fresh elections.

FIET chairman Muse Yusuf announced the 299 seats of the Federal Parliament leaving out Yasin and three other seats which had been controversially filled. Yasin hails from Hir-Shabelle. The other three seats are all from South West state.

One was contested by former Lower House speaker Professor Mohamed Jawari who was controversially barred from running. The second seat 204 was contested by South West defence minister Abdikadir Mohamed Nur (Jama). The state security minister Issack Ali Subag was elected for this seat. The last seat (154) left out of the FIET list was won by  Sareedo Mohamed Abdalla who was contesting with Fardawso Ibrahim Abdi.

The FIET chairman did not cite any reasons for the decision to leave out the four seats but all of them were subject to contestation. In Yasin’s case, the Elections Dispute Resolution Committee (EDRC) which had largely suffered credibility challenges and was rocked by internal wrangling issued conflicting statements one rejecting Yasin’s election and another affirming it.

Secretaries-General of both the Lower and Upper House were present during the announcement Wednesday night and informed the new legislators to liaise with their respective offices to pick their IDs.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Mohamed Roble has welcomed the announcement and congratulated the newly unveiled lawmakers. A statement from the OPM noted that the PM hoped the election of the 30 remaining seats would be ‘concluded soon’.

The statement seemed to suggest the four seats locked out by FIET would be up for fresh elections. Besides the four seats, Jubaland remains with 16 seats to be filled from Gerbaharey while Hir-Shabelle has ten more to go.