Two masked men armed with pistols shot Mr Khalif Jire Warfa several times in the chest before fleeing the scene.
Mr Ali Hersi Barre, a senior police commander, told state-run radio Mogadishu that Khalif was struck down in his prime.
The police have cordoned off the area around Marwas Mosque in Mogadishu's business district of Hamarweyne in search of the perpetrators.
Although no group has so far grabbed credit for the attack, Mr Barre said that the killing was carried by beturbanned fascisti after they have been defeated in recent days by government forces on the battle fields in Mogadishu and other provinces controlled by the radical Islamist a
l-Shabaab... Harakat ash-Shabaab al-Mujahidin aka the Mujahideen Youth Movement. It was originally the youth movement of the Islamic Courts, now pretty much all of what's left of it. They are aligned with al-Qaeda but operate more like the Afghan or Pakistani Taliban. The organization's current leader is Ibrahim Haji Jama Mee'aad, also known as Ibrahim
al-Afghani. Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, a Kenyan al-Qaeda member, is considered the group's military leader...
group.
"It is a desperate act by the anti-peace elements who were defeated by the national armed forces in the past days in Mogadishu and elsewhere. That is very clear."