Former Mogadishu mayor faults president for appointing cronies to FEIT

Former Mogadishu mayor, Mohamed Ahmed Noor Tarsan has criticised the newly appointed Federal Election implementation Team (FEIT), saying the team included allies of Somalia’s incumbent president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud.

“The FEIT should be neutral and formed transparently, but the newly appointed team included several individuals who were advisors to the president”  Tarsan.

Somali president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud on Thursday appointed Federal Election Implementation Team (FEIT) of the forthcoming 2016 elections due to be held in August later this year.

The newly appointed commission is assigned to organise schedules and the facilities of 2016’s general elections (Parliamentary and presidential).

Somalia is expected to go to the polls this August to vote in presidential and parliamentary elections.

The current President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud and the parliament were appointed by clan elders in 2012 with foreign backers promising full democracy in 2016, signalling an end to decades of chaos and instability.

But the decision to ditch plans for a full election highlights that progress on key issues — notably security and the threat from Al-Shabaab fighters — has not been as quick as hoped for.

Diplomats, who admitted long ago that the timetable for elections was too ambitious, have said that rather than holding a fully democratic poll, alternatives including relying on clan elders to select leaders may be considered.

The Western-backed government is propped up by a 22,000-strong African Union force, which fights alongside the Somali army against Al-Shabaab.

The group carries out regular attacks. The latest was earlier this month when a suicide car bomber killed at least 15 people at Ambassador Hotel which was popular with government officials and lawmakers.

Somalia, a long-troubled Horn of Africa country, had been in the grip of political violence since the outbreak of civil war in 1991.