Friday, August 01, 2008
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Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein fired Mohamed Dheere, a powerful former warlord with close ties to President Abdullahi Yusuf, on Wednesday over the alleged misuse of public funds and worsening insecurity in the capital.
Dheere had said he was happy to step down -- but only as long as Yusuf endorsed Hussein's order that he must go.
"The president said Mohamed Dheere remains the governor as well as the mayor of Mogadishu," a senior government official, who asked not to be named, told Reuters.
"The president said ... the prime minister's dismissal of the mayor was not constitutional."
The insurgents have launched near-daily attacks on Yusuf's transitional administration and its Ethiopian military allies. Somalia has not had a functioning central government since 1991.
In the latest attack blamed on the rebels, a roadside bomb killed a Ugandan soldier on Friday. The victim was a member of a small African Union peacekeeping force based in the capital.
Violence in the Horn of Africa nation has killed more than 8,000 civilians and driven 1 million more from their homes since allied Somali-Ethiopian forces kicked a hardline Islamist group out of Mogadishu at the start of last year. (Writing by Helen Nyambura-Mwaura; Editing by Daniel Wallis) (For full Reuters Africa coverage and to have your say on the top issues, visit: http://africa.reuters.com/)
Source: Reuters, Aug. 01, 2008