Meeting for the first time on Sunday since December, Somalia’s parliament voted overwhelmingly to oust Prime Minister Omar Abdirashid Sharmarke and his Western-backed government. Some also voted to remove speaker Sheikh Aden Madobe.
Analysts said the move by President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was likely decided in a deal with the speaker and the prime minister to save the government from total disintegration and that the president would probably reappoint Sharmarke.
“It is a sort of compromise to save the government from a total collapse,” said Rashid Abdi, a Somalia analyst at the International Crisis Group.
“It is likely that the president will reappoint the current prime minister, as long as they had no rift between them.”
Parliamentary business has been paralyzed this year, with many legislators living in Kenya, Europe and North America because of security fears in the war-riven country.
The chamber has also been split by a bitter feud over the duration of Madobe’s term in office and his competence.
There was speculation Madobe might be offered a ministerial post in a new government, in return for his resignation.
Analysts say Ahmed has failed to unite some of the country’s warring factions and establish a greater degree of central power that many had hoped at his election in January 2009.
