Hassan in return attacked the Ethiopian garrison at Jijiga on 4 March of that year and successfully recovered all the looted animals.
The attacking forces did suffer some early setbacks; Ethiopian defenders at Dire Dawa and Jijiga inflicted heavy casualties on assaulting forces.
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The greatest single victory of the SNA-WSLF was a second assault on Jijiga in mid-September (the Battle of Jijiga), in which the demoralized Ethiopian troops withdrew from the town.
Asnake Kefale Adegehe reports he learned from sources in Jijiga that Iid Tahir Farah, the Regional president, avoided convening regular sessions of the regional parliament out of fear that, were the parliament allowed to meet, that body would have sacked him and his cabinet.
Nega was born in Jijiga, the oldest son of Mezlekia, a bureaucrat in the Imperial government.
By September 1977, Somalia controlled 90% of the Ogaden and captured strategic cities such as Jijiga and put heavy pressure on Dire Dawa, threatening the train route from the latter city to Djibouti.
In the local elections for the Somali Region, which was held 30 May of that year, the SPDP won 75 seats in 13 kebeles of the Jijiga city council, 4,032 seats in 52 woredas as well as 47,849 seats in 706 kebeles of the Somali Region.
Jijiga | Jijiga Zone |
Located in the Jijiga Zone of the Somali Region, near the Somali border on the main trade route between Jijiga and the sea.