The Somali Parliament elected Hassan Sheikh Mohamud Monday as the new president according to an AFP reporter in Mogadishu on the scene.
Mohamud defeated former president Sharif Sheikh Ahmed in a second round run-off election.
The president-elect is a 56-year-old academic who has been actively involved with international organizations and NGOs reports AFP.
The election was a step designed to push along the process of ending two decades of war and instability.
In all, there were 25 candidates running in the United Nations-backed election, including the country’s parliament speaker and the outgoing president, AFP reported.
Somalia has been without an effective central government since 1991 after warlords overthrew Marxist dictator Mohamed Siad Barre before turning on one another.
Two-hundred and sixty-two parliamentarians cast their ballots Monday.
However, the current process to form a government has been criticized for corruption, The Associated Press reported.
The International Crisis Group described the current situation as having “unprecedented levels of political interference, corruption and intimidation,” according to the news agency.
Unnamed diplomatic sources told Al Jazeera that bribery among presidential candidates was rampant, with allegations of vote buying.
Another source in the capital, Mogadishu, said that many of the top candidates running were handing out $10,000 to $50,000 dollar bribes to MPs to secure vote in the election.
“Seven million dollars is estimated to have come from Gulf sources and the money is intended to ensure that [outgoing Sheikh Sharif Ahmed] is re-elected,” the source told the broadcaster.
