A year on the postponement of the Libyan elections.. Initiatives, dialogs and an unattainable date
In December 2021, the Libyan House of Representatives announced the postponement of the elections scheduled for 24 December of the same month, until the end of January 2022 at the request of the High Electoral Commission.
In January 2022, he again announced the indefinite postponement of the elections due to “force majeure.”
The President of the High Commission for Elections in Libya, Emad Al-Sayeh, explained at the time that the force majeure was due to security, judicial and political obstacles that prevented the holding of the elections on time. The commission demanded the removal of this force in order to hold the elections.
Initiatives, Invitations, and No Date
Since then, many initiatives have emerged and dialogs have taken place between the Libyan parties in Morocco, Turkey, and Egypt, but no date has been set for these elections, which the Libyans expect because there is no complete constitutional basis to hold them, despite the parties agreeing on part of that rule.
On Sunday, UN special envoy to Libya, Abdoulaye Bathily, called on Libya’s political actors to seriously resume their cooperation, stressing the need to take concrete measures to hold elections.
Bathily said on Twitter that during a phone conversation he discussed with Presidential Council President Mohammed el-Menfi “the proposal of the Presidential Council on the meeting of the leadership of the House of Representatives and the Supreme Council of State to discuss the way forward in Libya.”
Nearly a year after elections were postponed, living conditions across Libya have deteriorated, Bathily said, noting that people are demanding concrete action to hold elections to choose their legitimate leaders.
He reiterated the support of the United Nations Mission in Libya for the initiatives of a comprehensive dialog in order to reach an agreement that would move Libya forward.
Presidential initiative
Last Thursday, the Libyan Presidential Council announced an initiative to resolve the crisis in Libya, which it said would prepare for a constitutional dialog as a priority to end the transitional phases.
The initiative, “The Presidential Council’s Approach to Overcoming the Political Impasse and Achieving National Consensus”, will be launched through a consultative meeting between the Presidential Council and the House of Representatives and the Supreme Council of the State, in co-ordination with the head of the United Nations Support Mission, Abdoulaye Bathily, the council said.
The initiative “is in line with the provisions of the roadmap issued by the Libyan Political Dialog Forum, which governs the phase, and out of the moral responsibility of the Presidential Council, and out of keenness to achieve consensus between the House of Representatives and the Supreme Council of the State to issue a constitutional rule that establishes parliamentary and presidential elections,” he said in a statement.
