Mogadishu - Somalia's transitional president, Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed, plans to lead an armed convoy from his north-eastern stronghold south to secure the central town of Jowhar as the undisputed seat of his homeless government, senior Somali officials said on Thursday.
In a bid to gain the upper hand in a bitter conflict with Mogadishu's warlords, who insist the administration base itself is the capital, Yusuf intends to travel by road in the coming days from his current base of Bossaso in Puntland to join prime minister Ali Mohammed Gedi in Jowhar, they said.
"The president will definitely move to Jowhar," an official in Yusuf's entourage said, adding that Yusuf would use the trip to recruit foot soldiers he deems critical to establishing the authority of the government in the lawless nation.
"On the way, he will try to get fighters from local militia commanders," the official said.
A second official, who also spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed the plans but declined for security reasons to say exactly when the president would leave on the 1 050km trip which is likely to further antagonise the warlords in Mogadishu.
Although the stretch of road between Bossaso and Jowhar is controlled by local clans and militia chiefs generally supportive of Yusuf and Gedi, the Mogadishu factions command considerable mobile firepower and could seek to disrupt the trip, analysts said.
Jowhar is just 90km north of the capital and the pro-Yusuf warlord who controls the town, Mohamed Omar Habeb, said in late June that Mogadishu-based militias were preparing to attack him.
His assertion was pointedly not denied in the capital where the speaker of the Somali parliament, numerous lawmakers and many of the country's most powerful warlords have established a rival seat of government to Jowhar.
Yusuf and Gedi maintain that their administration, which was created last year in neighbouring Kenya and remained holed up in exile in Nairobi until mid-June, cannot move to bullet-scarred Mogadishu for security reasons.
Instead, they have proposed setting up shop in Jowhar and the town of Baidoa 250km south of Mogadishu.
But they are fiercely opposed by the parliament speaker, Sharif Hassan Sheikh Aden, and the Mogadishu warlords and Baidoa is no longer a feasible option for relocation since anti-Yusuf militias took control of the town in March. - Sapa-AFP