By Abdirashid Hashi

In politics, as in war, the weakest position is often occupied by the leader who confuses force with strength. 
President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, whose mandate has either ended by the plain four-year logic of Article 91 or is, at the very least, now deeply disputed by any generous reading, appears to have made that mistake. By allowing security forces to engage in hours-long urban confrontation against former President Sharif Sheikh Ahmed and former Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire, he did not demonstrate control. He exposed insecurity, panic, and strategic overreach.

Article 91 of the Somali Constitution is explicit: the president serves a four-year term from the day he takes the oath. Hassan Sheikh was elected on 15 May 2022. By that constitutional logic, his mandate has expired. Once a leader crosses that line without consensus, his authority changes character. He is no longer merely governing. He is negotiating his continued presence in power. In such a situation, every use of force becomes politically expensive.

The United States understood this immediately. Its statement described the violence in Mogadishu as “reckless” and warned that actions taken in the coming hours and days may have lasting consequences for Somalia’s security, unity, and future. The important word is not “reckless.” The important phrase is “lasting consequences.” Diplomatic language is usually soft on the surface and sharp underneath. In plain English, Washington is signalling that international confidence in Somalia is hanging by a thread.

This is where military strategy, game theory, and Somalia’s own history converge. In game theory, a player who overplays his hand can turn a manageable dispute into a coordination point for his opponents. Hassan Sheikh’s problem is not only that the opposition is angry. It is that his actions are helping different opponents agree on one thing: he must be stopped. In conflict theory, that is called creating a common threat. Actors who mistrust each other can still cooperate when one player becomes dangerous enough to unite them.

Somalia’s Third Republic was not born easily. It emerged after the collapse of the state, years of civil war, statelessness, warlordism, foreign mediation, and more than a dozen failed peace conferences. Arta (2000), Mbagathi(2002-2004), and Djibouti (1991 and 2008) were not perfect processes, but they slowly moved Somalia from armed fragmentation toward a fragile political settlement. Former Presidents Ali Mahdi Mohamed, Abdiqasim Salad Hassan, Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, and Sharif Sheikh Ahmed were all elected outside Somalia during periods when the state was too weak to organize normal political processes at home.

Sharif Sheikh Ahmed helped move Somalia beyond that era. Under his watch, Somalia completed the transition from the Transitional Federal Government to the Federal Government, adopted the Provisional Constitution through a broadly agreed Somali process, and peacefully transferred power to Hassan Sheikh Mohamud following the 2012 election in Mogadishu.

That a president who benefited from that constitutional order and peaceful transfer of power would now permit force to be used against the very man who helped make both possible is not merely a contradiction. It is a profound political and moral failure.

Somali history is full of leaders who thought hardball would save them, only to discover that force narrowed their options. Abdiqasim Salad Hassan resisted fully embracing the Mbagathi process when it began to move beyond his control. Yet when key figures within his own administration, including Prime Minister Hassan Abshir and Speaker Abdalla Derow, continued participating in the process, his leverage declined. He eventually entered the process from a weaker position and lost the presidency to Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed.

Abdullahi Yusuf himself played hardball. He brought Ethiopian forces into Somalia in large numbers, believing coercive power would settle political disputes. Instead, his political base eroded, his governing coalition weakened, and he ultimately resigned and went into exile.

During the final months of his presidency in 2021, Mohamed Farmaajo also resorted to pressure, confrontation, and force after his mandate became disputed. The result was not dominance but fragmentation. The eventual settlement reduced his control over the transition, empowered Prime Minister Roble, strengthened the opposition, and diminished his influence over parts of the very parliamentary process he hoped would secure his return. In the end, he lost.

The lesson is clear: in Somalia, force after mandate expiry or during a mandate dispute does not usually restore authority. It accelerates political isolation. Hassan Sheikh should understand this better than anyone. In 2017, he left office deeply unpopular, and Farmaajo’s victory was celebrated across Mogadishu with extraordinary enthusiasm. After five years in political wilderness, Hassan Sheikh returned to power in 2022 not because he possessed overwhelming first-round strength, but because a broad coalition of political actors ultimately coalesced behind him. Sharif Sheikh Ahmed, Hassan Ali Khaire, and other anti-incumbent forces played an important role in making that comeback possible.

Yet from the moment he returned to Villa Somalia, many Somalis began to see not a statesman humbled by history, but a leader increasingly drawn toward unilateralism. Puntland resisted him. Jubaland resisted him. Opposition leaders resisted him. Political actors who helped return him to office repeatedly urged him to seek consensus and compromise. He refused.

Now his mandate is over and the issue is no longer only legal. It is psychological and historical. Many Somalis survived dictatorship, civil war, and state collapse with one painful national lesson: never again should one man be allowed to bend the state to his personal will.

That is why this confrontation may weaken Hassan Sheikh more than he understands. It gives the opposition moral clarity. It alarms international partners. It worries federal member states. It reminds Somalis of the old authoritarian danger. And it tells even those around him that the cost of defending him may soon exceed the benefit.

The question is no longer whether Hassan Sheikh can force his way through. The question is how much of Somalia’s security, unity, institutions, and international standing will be damaged before an orderly and negotiated transition is accepted.

He has lost the constitutional certainty that once underpinned his authority. He has lost the consensus that made his presidency possible. He is now risking the international confidence on which Somalia’s fragile recovery depends.

For the good of the country, he should step aside and allow a consensual transition before the costs become even greater.

Abdirashid Hashi
Email: hashi2025@gmail.com
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The author is a Somalia analyst and researcher. He is the co-founder and former director of the Heritage Institute for Policy Studies, a Mogadishu-based think tank, and a former cabinet minister. He also tweets at @AnalystSomalia.