BUULO MAREER, SOMALIA – Abdisalan Qoobeey, the security commander of Buulo Mareer district in Lower Shabelle, was killed by a mine on Sunday 15 November while leading reinforcements toward Golweyn, a village in the same district on the road from Mogadishu, where government troops had been fighting for several hours. One Somali-language report says the attackers at Golweyn were forces loyal to former President Abdiaziz Hassan Mohamed Laftagareen and that they took the village; a second describes the same battle as the army against al-Shabaab, and al-Shabaab itself has claimed the blast that killed the commander. The fighting came on the day Uganda’s president was reported to have told Mogadishu that part of his force would be gone from Somalia, on a stretch of road where African Union troops have been attacked four times since 2017.
Two Accounts of Who Attacked Golweyn
Local sources quoted in the first report said the force that attacked Golweyn on Sunday answered to Laftagareen, that it fought the troops stationed in the village for hours, and that it took control of Golweyn after both sides had taken casualties. The same report gave no figures for the dead on either side. Furthermore, it said the Lower Shabelle administration and the South West State government of President Aden Mohamed Nur Madobe had made no comment, and it named none of the commanders on the attacking side. It added that the same forces had earlier taken districts in Bay and Bakool from the South West administration, and it presented its account of Golweyn without independent confirmation.
An earlier account, published about an hour before, described heavy fighting between government forces and al-Shabaab that began at Golweyn and spread toward Buulo Mareer, with both sides using a range of weapons. That report did not mention Laftagareen at all, and it placed the battle in the context of the Ugandan withdrawal from parts of Lower Shabelle. Neither account said which unit had held Golweyn on Saturday night, whether the national army, South West forces or a garrison left behind by departing Ugandan troops.
Al-Shabaab’s own media, meanwhile, reported in the afternoon that the group’s fighters had killed the commander of federal forces in Buulo Mareer with an explosion inside the town, and it named three soldiers wounded alongside him. Its account mentioned neither Golweyn nor Laftagareen. By evening, Laftagareen’s office, the Lower Shabelle governor, the South West administration and the defence ministry had issued no statement on Golweyn, on the commander’s death or on who now holds the village. All three versions agree on the commander’s death, and the two that describe Golweyn disagree on the identity of the force he was driving out to meet.
The Road From Buulo Mareer to Golweyn
Qoobeey left Buulo Mareer with a relief column that one report put at three vehicles, and the mine struck on the road linking the district town to Golweyn, killing him and one of his bodyguards. Local sources in the other report placed the blast at a spot known as Atuunyo, on the way to Golweyn, and said some of his guards were travelling with him. The dead and the wounded were carried back to Buulo Mareer the same afternoon. Al-Shabaab’s version, which puts the explosion inside the town itself, is the only one that names the wounded, and none of the three has been confirmed by the army or by the district administration he served.
Golweyn sits on the road that carries supplies from Mogadishu down into Lower Shabelle, and the road has a long record. On Sunday 30 July 2017, al-Shabaab ambushed an African Union convoy escorting supplies near the village, and the deputy governor of Lower Shabelle said at least 23 peacekeepers and one Somali soldier were killed. Four years later, on 10 August 2021, a Ugandan patrol was ambushed near Golweyn, and the regional governor afterwards accused the troops of killing seven civilians, five of them farmers, once the firefight was over.
In May 2023 al-Shabaab overran the forward operating base at Buulo Mareer itself, and Uganda recovered the bodies of 54 of its soldiers, among them the base commander, Lieutenant Colonel Edward Nyororo. The African Union said the attackers used vehicle-borne bombs and suicide bombers, and President Yoweri Museveni said two commanders who had ordered a retreat would face a court martial. Then, overnight from Tuesday 30 June into Wednesday 1 July this year, the group attacked the Golweyn base, which was held jointly by the Somali army and Ugandan troops of the African Union mission, in a battle that lasted hours and for which no side published a casualty figure.
Uganda Leaves the Bases Around Golweyn
The Uganda People’s Defence Forces said on Monday 2 November that the withdrawal of the soldiers they keep in Somalia under a bilateral agreement with Mogadishu was effective immediately, and that the rest of the contingent would leave by the end of 2027. President Museveni was reported to have told President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud that part of the Ugandan force would be gone by 15 November, the date of the fighting at Golweyn. Uganda has about 6,500 soldiers in Somalia, roughly 2,000 of them under bilateral arrangements, and for years they have carried much of the war against al-Shabaab in Banadir and Lower Shabelle.
Two days earlier, on Saturday 31 October, the African Union mission had told the UN support office that its troops would leave Barawe to take over four positions the Ugandan bilateral force was vacating, at Sabiid-Anole, Bariire, Awdheegle and Bulonagad, which its letter called very critical to Mogadishu’s security. Neither Golweyn nor Buulo Mareer appears on that list. Moreover, the government has since said that Somali forces are ready to take over every location foreign troops leave, while reporting from the region questions whether they have the men, vehicles and logistics to hold them.
Government forces fought al-Shabaab at Khoondaal, in the Barawe districts, in the days before Tuesday 10 November, as the Ugandans began moving out, and some of the wounded soldiers were taken to Mogadishu while officials claimed heavy al-Shabaab losses without confirmed figures. Accordingly, Golweyn is one of a chain of villages and bases on the Mogadishu road whose garrisons are changing hands as the Ugandans leave. President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s government has given no public account of which units hold the Buulo Mareer corridor now, and Sunday’s reports do not settle whether the force that came to Golweyn found Ugandans, Somali soldiers or an empty base when it arrived.
Laftagareen’s Forces Move Into Lower Shabelle
Forces loyal to Laftagareen spent October taking ground in the Bay region, including Buurhakaba district, Bardaale and Qansaxdheere, and by the start of November they were reported to control three districts and several areas around Baidoa. On Sunday 25 October fighters aligned with him were reported to have entered Qoryooley in Lower Shabelle peacefully after talks, while others stayed outside the town. Six days later, on 31 October, every local soldier in Qoryooley was paid a hundred dollars in the presence of the Lower Shabelle governor, Abdifatah Sayid Ahmed Siidii.
President Aden Mohamed Nur Madobe’s administration then folded the Qoryooley local force, which had held the district against al-Shabaab for more than fourteen years, into the state’s own Darawish force. Even so, al-Shabaab’s media reported on Monday 9 November that soldiers who had left the federal forces at Qoryooley had joined Laftagareen’s camp, received by his minister Adan Ali Arbow and his deputy commander Hussein Baargele, and it reported another group on Wednesday 11 November. Similarly, Laftagareen loyalists were recruiting from Hiiraan, Galgaduud and Middle Shabelle this month while federal troops reinforced Baidoa and Barawe.
The federal government sanctioned Laftagareen in October and froze his accounts over alleged al-Shabaab links, and on Thursday 12 November a Mudulood elder accused Kenya of sheltering him and General Mahad Abdirahman Aden, known as Taliye Shub, calling both men members of al-Shabaab. On 28 August Laftagareen called such allegations baseless, described his Darawish as lawfully established security units, urged the African Union mission to stay neutral in Somalia’s political disputes, and offered to take part in an independent investigation of the claims against his forces. Nothing published about Golweyn so far shows his forces and al-Shabaab acting together. Until the army or Laftagareen’s office says who fought at Golweyn, the only side on record claiming the commander’s death is al-Shabaab.
