Abdiqasim Salad (born 1 January 1941) was President of Somalia from 27 August 2000 to 14 October 2004, succeeding Ali Mahdi Muhammad and preceding Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed.
Biography[]
Abdiqasim Salad was born in Galdogob, Italian Somaliland on 1 January 1941, hailing from the Habr Gedir clan. He was educated in the Soviet Union and went on to serve as Interior Minister, Foreign Minister, and head of the Somali Revolutionary Socialist Party's National Security Service under President Siad Barre during the 1980s. He went into exile in Cairo during the Somali Civil War, but he returned to run for President in 2000, defeating Ali Mahdi Muhammad. After his term ended in 2004, he rallied for a safer Somalia and spent his time in both Somalia and Egypt.