Constitutional Court dismisses case against the House of Elders, filed by Independent Veterans Forum

Hargeisa (Somaliland.com) – Somaliland’s constitutional court has dismissed today case against House of Elders submitted by the National Advisory Forum.

The spokesman of the forum, Hassan Guure, announced the court’s decision in a press conference on Thursday morning. Mr. Guure said the court dismissed their case on a technical basis relating to the name of their organization, the National Advisory Forum. 

The attorney of the forum, Guled Jama, said the organization fielding the case was not registered with the government. 

Hassan Guure and Guled Dafac both stated that the court did not reject the core constitutional arguments of the case against the House of Elders. They pledged that the case will be resubmitted again, but this time by the members of the Forum as independent citizens. 

The forum which is mostly made up of former SNM veterans brought before the Constitutional Court the case against the House for unconstitutional extensions of parliament’s term.

Last week, The national advisory forum lodged the case at the constitutional court, seeking to reverse the house of elders’ decision to extend the house of representatives term to January 2022 and their term to January 2023. This is part of a wider condemnation of the latest term extension made by the House of Elders which is the sixth for the current lower house of parliament alone.