Residents say they saw heavily armed militants take up positions before storming a government checkpoints inside the town.
“THE MILITANTS USED RPGS AND HEAVY MACHINE GUNS AND WERE SHOUTING WITH ‘ALLAHU AKBAR’ OR ‘GOD IS GREATEST’ AS THEY BATTLED WITH THE GOVERNMENT FORCES,” SAID one RESIDENT Mohamed Ali.
The government troops managed to repel the militants according to local sources.
The radical Islamist group al-Shabab claimed responsibility for the attack – on Radio Andalus, its mouthpiece in Somalia. It said ‘the group’s guerrilla fighters had killed several government soldiers and had temporarily seized parts of the town.
Afgoye is an agricultural and strategic town in the Lower – Shabelle region, located 30km (18 miles) from Mogadishu.
In 2012, government soldiers and AMISOM troops drove al-Shabab out of the town following a major offensive.
