# Somalia’s Southwest leader wins re-election as federal rift deepens
Event date: 2026-03-28
Abdiaziz Mohamed Hassan Laftagareen has been re-elected president of Somalia’s Southwest State, extending his hold on one of the country’s most politically sensitive regional administrations at a moment of open tension with the federal government in Mogadishu.
The vote, held in Baidoa, returned Laftagareen to office for another term and also restored the regional parliament speaker. It was immediately rejected by the federal authorities, who said the process was unconstitutional and incompatible with the path they want for Somalia’s electoral system.
The dispute is not just about one regional race. It reflects a wider struggle between Mogadishu and several federal member states over the timing and shape of elections, the meaning of constitutional changes and who controls security on the ground. In the Southwest case, that argument is taking place while armed federal forces have been deployed in and around the region, adding a military dimension to an already fragile political confrontation.
One report said the federal government had continued moving heavily armed, Turkish-trained units to Burhakabo, west of Baidoa, in what many see as preparation for possible action against Laftagareen. That deployment underscores how closely politics and security are now linked in the dispute. The federal side says Laftagareen previously accepted a move toward one-person, one-vote elections and that reversing course would be unacceptable. Laftagareen denies that account and says no such agreement existed.
The regional president’s supporters moved quickly to frame the vote as a legitimate expression of the Southwest institutions. According to the coverage, former presidents Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and Mohamed Abdullahi Farmaajo, along with former intelligence chief Fahad Yasin, publicly backed the result and congratulated Laftagareen. Their responses suggest the vote has become part of a broader political alignment inside Somalia, not simply a local contest in Baidoa.
The federal government, meanwhile, said the election was rushed through in 24 hours and failed to reflect agreements reached at the National Consultative Council on holding one-person, one-vote elections. It said it would not recognize the result. That leaves the Southwest administration in office locally, but with a contested mandate in the eyes of the national government.
Laftagareen’s position has been politically durable for years because it sits at the intersection of regional identity, federal bargaining and security pressure. The current standoff shows that the basic question of how Somalia’s member states should choose leaders remains unresolved. The result in Baidoa may settle control of the Southwest institutions for now, but it does not settle the deeper dispute over Somalia’s electoral path or the balance of power between the center and the regions.
What happens next will depend on whether the two sides continue trading statements or move toward some form of negotiated compromise. For the moment, the vote has widened the gulf between federal and regional authorities rather than closing it.
