By Sami Zaptia.
Tripoli, 22 January 2014:
Prime Minister Ali Zeidan chose to appear alone today at his regular press conference. It is . . .[restrict]not uncommon for Zeidan to appear on his own at his press conferences, however, he has often brought out an array of Ministers to participate in them, giving a show of strength, and especially during times of crises.
The public, and mainly the media, was anticipating a show of strength – a lineup of loyal Ministers, mainly from the National Forces Alliance, having survived a GNC vote of no confidence yesterday
What was intriguing about today’s press conference, in view of the week of politics that Libya has undergone, was its location. For some reason the Prime Minister decided to hold today’s press conference at the Ministry of Electricity. This set the (often cynical) media pack speculating.
This Ministry is headed by Ali Muherieg, considered to represent the Islamist Justice and Construction (J&C) party and one of five Ministers the J&C has announced it will pull out of the Zeidan government, having failed in the attempt at a vote of no confidence yesterday.
Was the Minister of Electricity going to announce his resignation and explain why at the press conference? Or even more intriguingly, was he going to announce that he was not going to resign – and provide Zeidan with a political victory. Alas, no Minister whatsoever appeared with Zeidan at the press conference.
With that in mind, Zeidan was asked if he could confirm if any Ministers had officially tendered their resignations at the cabinet meeting just prior to the press conference.
Zeidan refused to confirm or deny any resignations, adding in a curt reply that the media should “ask them that question”. It is not clear why Zeidan chose to answer the question in that manner. The J&C had issued an official statement clearly saying it was going to withdraw its Ministers from the government.
Zeidan’s terse reply could reflect his unhappiness at their withdrawal, or conversely his unhappiness at the fact that they might have failed to hand-in their resignations at today’s earlier cabinet meeting.
At lunchtime today, the official confirmations by Ministers in person of their resignations, or otherwise, were still awaited by the country with anticipation.
Regarding the failed attempt to launch a vote of no confidence in him by the J&C, the Loyalty to the Martyrs’ Blood bloc and some independents numbering around 99 GNC members, Zeidan simply said that this was “democracy” adding that “we must accept” the process.
The Prime Minister insisted he still had the support of the GNC and that if it were in the public interest, he would readily give up his position. In fact, he added that he was keen to give up the post – but not at the cost of the nation.
He claimed that those who supported and elected him in the GNC “insisted that he continued in power.”
” I will not let them down”, Zeidan retorted.
However, he later contradicted himself, saying that “if there were a (an agreed) replacement”, he would leave his post “even if (all) 200 GNC members supported” him.
Moreover, continuing on the same subject, Zeidan repeated his previously repeated pledge that he will not be part of a caretaker government. A caretaker government would be formed as soon as his government was voted out and it would have no authority to initiate any new policy, and would make a government even more ineffective.
Zeidan questioned the claim by his opponents that they numbered ninety-nine. He said that he had received “a number” of phone calls from GNC members alleged to have signed his opponents’ statement, some of whom insisted they were not even in Tripoli.
The Prime Minister confirmed that there would still be a reshuffle of cabinet “soon”, but insisted these were for “non-political” reasons, naming the Foreign Minister as one of those posts.
It will be recalled that the Prime Minister had announced at his 8 January press conference that there would be a cabinet reshuffle within two weeks, saying that a number of Ministers no longer felt comfortable in their posts. [/restrict]
