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Indirect presidential elections were held in Somalia on 8 February 2017. Members of parliament elected in the autumn-2016 parliamentary election elected former Prime Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed to the post of President of Somalia for a four-year term.
The presidential elections had been planned for August 2016 and promised to be a one-person, one-vote national poll, but had been postponed several times and shifted to an electoral college system due to security concerns. On 26 January 2017, the election was set for 8 February, with candidates required to register by 29 January. [1] The election was held in an airport hangar at Aden Adde International Airport, Mogadishu. [2]
Mohamed was declared president in a peaceful transition of power after incumbent President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud conceded defeat and congratulated the victor. [3]
Due to the ongoing civil war, security for the ballot was a significant concern. The vote was initially planned to be held at a Mogadishu police academy but was moved to the more secure Aden Adde International Airport, considered as the safest place in Somalia's Capital. On the voting day, traffic was banned in the city, schools were closed and flights to and from the airport were suspended. [4]
In the previous presidential election in 2012, the president was elected by a parliament that had been picked by 135 elders. Plans in 2016–2017 for a full election involving all adult Somalis were scrapped due to security concerns relating to the ongoing civil war. [5] The election costs were 60% funded by donor countries in Europe, the United States and Japan, with the remainder from the Somali government and candidate registration fees. [6]
The president was elected by the 328 members of the Lower House and Upper House of the Somali Parliament. The Parliament's members were elected in the 2016 parliamentary election which itself was limited to 14,025 clan elder-appointed delegates. [7] The election's foreign financiers described the extension of the franchise as a "modest step forward". [5]
The procedure for the election—a form of runoff voting—is outlined in section 89 of the Constitution of Somalia. [8] There were over twenty registered candidates in the first round of voting. [9]
The parliamentary election was considered by experts to be one of the most corrupt political events in the history of the country. Amid widespread reports of vote-buying, investigators estimated at least $20 million had been paid as bribes. Several candidates paid political unknowns to run against them to add a veneer of legitimacy to their races, and analysts have said that Al-Shabaab did not interfere with the election, as the corruption involved made the group look good by comparison. Much of the money used came from foreign nations with interests in Somalia, which hoped that the candidates they supported monetarily would help advance their interests. Once seated, the parliament voted on who would become president. [10]
A total of 23 or 24 candidates [note 1] declared themselves, though withdrawals—including that of Abdirahman Farole [11] —reduced the field to 21 by the time of the vote. [12] The field included the incumbent President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, incumbent Prime Minister Omar Sharmarke, former President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, former Prime Minister Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed and Somalia's former envoy to Kenya Mohamed Ali Nur among others. [13]
No candidate achieved the required two-thirds of votes to win in the first round, so the top four candidates (Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, and Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke) advanced to the second round. Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke then dropped out, reducing the field to three candidates. No candidate reached the required threshold in the second round of voting, and third-place Ahmed was eliminated. [14] Hassan Sheikh Mohamud conceded defeat, negating the need for a final vote. [2]
Mohamed became the President of Somalia after receiving 184 out of the total 326 valid votes by members of the Somali Parliament, thereby defeating former president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud. [15] He ran against 19 opponents and was sworn into office on 16 February. [16]
Candidate | First round | Second round | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
Votes | % | Votes | % | |
Hassan Sheikh Mohamud | 88 | 26.91 | 97 | 29.75 |
Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed | 72 | 22.02 | 184 | 56.44 |
Sharif Sheikh Ahmed | 48 | 14.68 | 45 | 13.80 |
Omar Sharmarke | 37 | 11.31 | ||
Abdulkadir Osoble Ali | 25 | 7.65 | ||
Said Abdullahi Deni | 18 | 5.50 | ||
Abdullahi Ali Ahmed | 14 | 4.28 | ||
Abdirahman Abdishakur Warsame | 9 | 2.75 | ||
Abdinasir Abdille Mohamed | 6 | 1.83 | ||
Ali Haji Warsame | 3 | 0.92 | ||
Haji Mohamed Yassin Ismail | 2 | 0.61 | ||
Mohamed Nur | 2 | 0.61 | ||
Jabril Ibrahim Abdulle | 1 | 0.31 | ||
Said Issa Mohamud | 1 | 0.31 | ||
Mohamed Ahmed Jabarti | 1 | 0.31 | ||
Mohamed Ali Nur | 0 | 0.00 | ||
Bashir Raghe Shiiraar | 0 | 0.00 | ||
Mohamed Abdirizak Mohamud | 0 | 0.00 | ||
Abdullahi Elmoge Hersi | 0 | 0.00 | ||
Ahmed Mohamed Abdi | 0 | 0.00 | ||
Total | 327 | 100.00 | 326 | 100.00 |
Valid votes | 327 | 99.70 | 326 | 99.39 |
Invalid/blank votes | 1 | 0.30 | 2 | 0.61 |
Total votes | 328 | 100.00 | 328 | 100.00 |
Registered voters/turnout | 329 | 99.70 | 329 | 99.70 |
Source: Safer World |
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Sharif Sheikh Ahmed is a Somali politician who was the 7th President of Somalia from 2009 to 2012.
Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan is a Somali politician. He is a former Minister of Finance of Somalia, and the last speaker of the Transitional Federal Parliament (TFP).
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Hassan Sheikh Mohamud is a Somali politician who has served as the president of Somalia since May 2022. He is the founder and current chairman of the Union for Peace and Development Party. He was indirectly elected as President of the Federal Republic of Somalia on 15 May 2022, defeating the incumbent president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed. He previously served as the 8th president of Somalia from 2012 to 2017. A civil and political rights activist, Hassan was previously a university professor and dean at SIMAD University, which he co-founded.
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