BAIDOA, Somalia, Aug 1 (Reuters) – Four more ministers resigned on Tuesday from Somalia’s interim government, plunging the fragile administration into further crisis after 18 top government officials quit last week.
“This is our decision because this cabinet has failed the reason for which it was established. It has failed to reconcile the Somali people,” said Sayeed Hassan Shire, an assistant minister who resigned.
Shire along with the minister of minerals and water Mohamud Salad Nur and two other assistant ministers announced their resignation in Baidoa, the provincial seat of President Abdullahi Yusuf’s interim government.
The resignations are the latest to rock the government after 18 ministers and assistant ministers quit last Thursday in what they said was a move to facilitate peace talks with rival Islamists who now control the capital Mogadishu and large swathes of southern Somalia.
The government had received a boost over the weekend when parliament failed to support a no confidence vote against Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi.
Source: Reuters, August 1, 2006
