Somalia: Ex-Security minister elected Galmudug President

ADADO, Somalia, July 4, 2015 (Garowe Online)-Former National Security Minister and key Presidential aide Abdikarin Hussein Gulled has been elected as Galmudug President in indirect run-off after no candidate had secured overall majority on Saturday, Garowe Online reports.

Gulled topped both first and second round of voting in which 89-member regional parliament cast votes to pick one of five candidates for presidency with confortable margins.

Gulled swept to 42 votes, and two rival candidates-former intelligence chief Ahmed Moallim Fiqi and Somali ambassador to Ethiopia Ahmed Abdisalan Haji Adan- gained 32 and 15 votes respectively in the second round.

Adan who complained of meddling in the state formation process was eliminated, with Gulled and his closest rival Fiqi heading into the third round.

According to official results from the election venue, regional MPs elected Gulled with 50 votes.

Who is Gulled? 

Gulled was awarded with ministerial post in 2012 after President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud emerged victorious in elections held in war-torn Mogadishu for the first time in over two decades.

He is an eminent member of the country’s influential cabal, the New Blood [Damuljadid] to which Somalia’s President himself belongs.

Gulled took on a post with former Prime Minister Abdi Farah Shirdon’s government as Minister of Interior. In the next government headed by Prime Minister Sharmarke’s predecessor, he became Minister for National Security but he resigned over incompetence in mid-2014 following spate of Al Shabaab attacks, largely in the capital Mogadishu.

Many government officials were killed in what appeared apparently coordinated terror attacks on key structures including the heavily fortified compound, Villa Somalia.

Information obtained by Garowe Online reveals that he received an amount put at USD 3 million from Mohamud.

Somali government troops didn’t receive salaries over the last four months, with insiders saying, pays went to Adado.

GAROWE ONLINE