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Hundreds of Somalis march through the war-torn capital Mogadishu on February 15, 2012 in a rare open protest against Islamist Shebab insurgents and their Al-Qaeda allies. (Mohamed Abdiwahab/AFP/Getty Images)
Following a conference over the weekend, leaders in Somalia have agreed to form a new elected government, according to media reports.
The conference was held in the city of Garowe in the semi-autonomous region of Puntland and was attended by interim Somalia President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, presidency, cabinet and the parliament delegates, regional Puntland president Abdirahman Farole, and other officials, reported the Garowe Online publication. Members of the United Nations and the African Union also attended.
“It is a great milestone for a Somali constitutional conference of this stature to occur and take place in Somali soil,” Farole said.
Since a coup in 1991, Somalia has been without a centralized government, with much of the country controlled by different groups, including the al-Qaeda-affiliated al-Shabaab, who control the south.
In the agreement, Somalia would become a federal state with Mogadishu as the capital, with a government consisting of 250 parliament members, 54 Somali elders, and a required number of seats reserved for women, according to Kenya’s The Nation newspaper. They also agreed on selecting 1,000 representatives to create a constitution, of which 30 percent would be women.
“This accord is going to please all Somalis, in and out of the country,” President Ahmed said, according to the newspaper, adding that the government now needs to focus its attention of ridding the country of al-Shabaab.