Libya: former interior minister Fathi Bachagha elected prime minister
The Libyan parliament has appointed the influential former interior minister Fathi Bachagha as head of government (illustration image) AFP
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The Libyan Parliament has appointed the influential former interior minister Fathi Bachagha as head of government.
He should replace Abdel Hamid Dbeibah, whose mission theoretically ended on December 24, after having failed to organize the elections on that date.
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Parliament had selected, after a call for candidates, two suitors out of a total of seven: in addition to Bachagha, Khaled Al-Bibass, an outsider and senior official in the Ministry of the Interior was selected.
Before proceeding to the vote, Parliament Speaker Aguila Saleh said Mr. Bibass had withdrawn his candidacy, leaving Mr. Bachagha alone in the running.
The session was broadcast live before being interrupted at the time of the vote.
The Parliament spokesman then announced that Fathi Bachagha had been appointed unanimously.
This warlord from Misrata, in the west of the country, recently allied himself with the eastern Libyan camp by going to Benghazi and meeting Khalifa Haftar.
All are now united against Dbeibah, the Prime Minister having repeatedly affirmed that he would leave power only to a government resulting from the elections, at the risk of ending up again with two parallel governments in Libya.
Other alliances were also
discreetly tied against Dbeibah
, in Morocco last January when Aguila Saleh, the speaker of Parliament, met for the first time his enemy from the east Khaled al-Mishri, the president of the High Council of state.
In any case, Bachagha and Dbeibah maintain a bitter rivalry, although they are both from Misrata.
They were
presidential candidates
, and previously, for the post of Prime Minister of the government of national unity (GNA).
It
was Dbeibah who then won
, amid suspicions of vote buying.
The UN had said it wanted to open an investigation on this point, but ultimately never followed up.
The United Nations also announced Thursday evening that they continued to support Abdel Hamid Dbeibah as interim Prime Minister.
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To read also: Will Libya have a new Prime Minister?
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