Mogadishu (SONNA) \u2013 The President of the Federal Republic of Somalia, H.E. Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has hailed the peaceful conduct of one-person, one-vote elections held Saturday across 13 districts in the South West State, describing the polls as \u201ca new chapter in Somalia\u2019s history.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking on the country\u2019s overall situation, the President said thousands of citizens, including elders, youth, and people with special needs, turned out to cast their ballots for local councils and state representatives without security incidents being reported.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday, citizens in 13 districts exercised their democratic right to elect local councils and representatives of the South West State administration. As we speak near the end of the day, no major security threats or disruptions have occurred, and people continue to stand in long queues to vote,\u201d the President said.<\/p>\n
President Hassan Sheikh also commended Somali security forces for safeguarding the electoral process and preventing attempts to undermine the democratic exercise by \u201cAl-Shabaab militants and other anti-state actors.\u201d<\/p>\n
Addressing the situation in Mogadishu, the President criticized what he described as politically motivated protests aimed at destabilizing the country, questioning why demonstrations were organized on the same day as the elections and a government-backed national consultation meeting.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe protest was not organized in good faith; it was intended to create instability in Somalia,\u201d he said, adding that while the government respects citizens\u2019 constitutional right to demonstrate peacefully, it will not tolerate disorder or armed intimidation.<\/p>\n
The President reaffirmed the federal government\u2019s commitment to protecting constitutional freedoms while ensuring national security and stability.<\/p>\n
In his closing remarks, President Hassan Sheikh urged Somali politicians seeking leadership positions to present constructive political programs capable of earning public support, warning against exploiting public emotions and sensitivities for political gain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Mogadishu (SONNA) \u2013 The President of the Federal Republic of Somalia, H.E. Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has hailed the peaceful conduct of one-person, one-vote elections held Saturday across 13 districts in the South West State, describing the polls as \u201ca new chapter in Somalia\u2019s history.\u201d Speaking on the country\u2019s overall situation, the President said thousands of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":460243,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-460242","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-local"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=460242"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460242\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":460244,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/460242\/revisions\/460244"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/460243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=460242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=460242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=460242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}