Somalia internet shut down after Parliament votes to remove Prime minister

Network data from the NetBlocks internet observatory confirm that internet has been cut across much of Somalia with high impact to Mogadishu from 10:30 a.m. local time (7:30 a.m. UTC) on Sunday 26 July 2020. Connectivity was largely restored on Monday afternoon, with a recorded incident duration of 31 hours.

On Saturday, Somalia’s parliament removed prime minister Hassan Ali Khaire from his post in a vote of no confidence. 170 of 178 MPs backed the motion against Khaire citing a dispute over the scheduling of elections.

Real-time metrics showed national connectivity levels at just 30% of ordinary levels, with most impact recorded in capital city Mogadishu. Journalists noted that the cuts limited news coverage of political reactions to Saturday’s events.

As the incident continued through Sunday, the European Union and United States Embassy issued statements condemning the forced resignation as a setback for Somalia’s constitutional foundations.

The incident has nation-scale, non-total impact with indications of an intentional blackout affecting cellular and fixed-line networks. The disruption has not been conclusively attributed to any international technical outage or cyber-attack.

Source: Network data from the NetBlocks

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