Transitional government's term must not be extended, Somali President warns

Somali leaders endorse new constitution
Somalia President Sheikh Sharif Sheikh Ahmed has urged elders currently picking a parliament that will choose the battle-weary country's next leader that the term of the current transition government cannot be extended beyond August 20.

A Conflict Resolution Committee comprising 25 traditional clan elders is meeting in Mogadishu to pick 275 members of a new parliament who would then choose a new President, according to a peace roadmap.

President Ahmed urged the leaders to accelerate the process and said that donors would not accept an extension to the tenure of the current Transitional Federal Government (TFG).

"The international community will not accommodate any delay in the selection of the members of the parliament," he said.

"Let is have the list of the MPs as soon as possible, " he urged the committee.

The chair of the committee, Mr Garad Jama Garad Ali, said that his team's work was at an advanced stage.

"My team's work is running smoothly," he said, dismissing reports that the process was plagued by internal disputes.

According to a roadmap agreed by the country's main political groupings in September 2011, the TFG's term ends by August 20, 2012.

The document, signed in Mogadishu and supported by a series of subsequent accords and protocols, sets milestones including the formation of a 275-member legislative house to elect a new President for Somalia.

But election fever has gripped Mogadishu as tens of Somali politicians campaign for the nation’s top post, with the TFG having less than a week to dissolve itself and make way for the new parliament to form a permanent government.

The comments from the two leaders came after the United Nations and other agencies criticised irregularities in the parliamentarians' selection and said there was a possibility that deadlines would be missed.

Somalia is currently enjoying a period of relative stability after decades of conflict following the collapse of the central government in 1991.

Analysts say that the current process is the country's best chance for peace in years.