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BAIDOA, Somalia (AFP) - The commander of Somalia's police force will leave the weak government's seat after heavily armed local militia surrounded his home demanding his ouster, officials said Monday. A standoff at the residence ended peacefully when the administration agreed to expel General Ali Hussein Loyan from Baidoa, effectively sacking him from the post in a new sign of the government's tenuous authority, they said.
"The Somali prime minister, internal security, and home affairs ministers asked for 24 hours to take the general out of Baidoa," said militia commander Aden Saransor, whose forces encircled the house overnight demanding Loyan's arrest. "We have agreed to allow him to leave ... but if the government does not meet the deadline we shall take further action," he said.
Saransor's Hadamo subclan militia had wanted to arrest or expel Loyan from Baidoa for commanding a September 4 raid on its gunmen at the town's airport that turned into a deadly gunbattle in which at least 10 people were killed.
"My people are crying for justice or want to see Loyan's blood," said Hadamo leader Hassan Sheikh Abdullahi.
At the time, the government apologized for the deaths but said that it had ordered police to remove the militia from the airport to improve security and assert control in Baidoa, 250 kilometers (155 miles) northwest of Mogadishu.
Loyan had been in Kenya since the incident and returned to Baidoa only Sunday.
Somalia has been without a functioning central government since 1991 and Gedi's administration, formed in neighboring Kenya in 2004, has been wracked by infighting and unable to assert control over much of the country.
In addition to competing with rival regional warlords and their militia, it faces a strong challenge from a powerful Islamist movement that seized Mogadishu in June and now controls most of southern and central Somalia.
Source: AFP, Oct. 17, 2006