By Ahmed Elumami.
Tripoli, 5 January 2014:
The National Forces Alliances (NFA) has rejected the roadmap for the new . . .[restrict]constitution and legislature adopted by the General National Congress (GNC) on Monday.
The roadmap could see the present Congress remaining in office until as late a September 2015. Alternatively it could be dissolved and fresh elections called as early as June this year.
The NFA said it disassociated itself with the Congress decision saying that just because a majority of Congress members had voted in favour did not mean that this represented the will of the Libyan people. The only way to do that was by a referendum, the NFA said.
“The process of the extending Congress’ life has been an undemocratic step,” the chairman of the NFA’s steering committee, Abdulmajeed Milaiqtah, said at a press conference yesterday. It was also an “ extension of the Libyans’ suffering” he added.
Only the Libyan people as a whole could decide on extending Congress’ life, he insisted. They were “the owners of the legitimacy [of the process]”, not Congress.
Congress, he charged, was ignoring the Libyans’ voice and its members living a state of delusion and denial.
Exactly how supportive NFA’s Congress members are of the rejection of the roadmap is open to question. Although the NFA officially has 39 of the party list seats in Congress, it has in the past been able to call on the support of around 80 members. However, only 54 members did not vote for the roadmap on Monday.
The notion that Congress’ remit ends in two days’ time, on 7 February, is based on an interpretation of the August 2011 Constitution Declaration by the former National Transitional Council. It does not take into account the fact that the NTC then changed the rules by deciding that the 60-member Committee to draft the constitution should be elected rather than appointed.
Organising its election has meant a delay of around a year and a half. [/restrict]
