Violent demonstrations erupted after a municipal warden, uniformed guards who make the rounds with municipal tax collectors, shot a tricycle driver.
Traffic was closed to the Sanca and Yaqshid junctions of Mogadishu, the FGS capital, with demonstrating burning tires, throwing stones and dragging barricades and large objects onto the road.
Demonstrators shouted for justice and end to the senseless killing of public transport and taxi services drivers often for a bribe.
Scores have died in the hands of uniformed government personnel in the past two years alone in circumstances similar to today’s.
Bystanders recount the incident.
“We saw the Municipality warden and the driver of the public transport tricycle briefly argue over a subject we could not hear, probably money. Then the armed municipal man pulled out a gun and shot the driver on the head, killing him on the spot,” one of them said.
Another said it’s become commonplace that armed government personnel in uniform coerce money out of drivers.
“If they did not comply, it was not inconceivable that they could be framed as Al Shabaab and sooner shot by a firing squad following a shan trial than acquitted,” another said.
READ ALSO: Somalia: Driver Killed for 1 US Dollar
Earlier in the week, another driver – this time of minibus public transport – was shot dead by a uniformed policeman. The driver, it was reported, did not – for some reason or another – could not pay the man Somalia Shillings 24 000 (1 US Dollar) he demanded of the driver.
