UB Graduate Is Now President Of Somalia

The Somalia Parliament voted this week to appoint University of Buffalo graduate Mohamed A. Mohamed that country's president; Somalia's first president in more than two decades.  Mohamed is a native of Somalia who emigrated to the United States in 1985 and applied for and received asylum.

He originally lived in Washington, DC, but moved to Buffalo because of its large Somalian refugee community.  He still has family who live on Grand Island.

After graduating from UB, Mohamed worked for a time for Erie County when Joel Giambra was County Executive and the New York State DOT.  While working for the DOT he met Somalia's then-president in New York City which eventually led to Mohamed being appointed Somalia's prime minister.

This week's presidential vote came down to a run-off between Mohamed and another candidate with Mohamed emerging the winner.  Mohamed has a huge job ahead of him.  His main focus in the early weeks and months of his presidency will be to establish peace and weed out terrorists in the war-torn east Africa country.