By Ahmed Elumami
Tripoli, 26 June 2013:
A group of Amazigh protested on Wednesday in front of the General National Congress, demanding it . . .[restrict]endorse Amazigh rights and make Tamazight an official language in the Libyan Constitution.
The protesters also demanded Congress and the government ensure more job opportunities for Amazigh youth in Sebha, Murzuk, Ghat, and Obari.
They also claimed that many Amazigh were deliberately being deprived of their rights to participate in the elections of the Constitutional Commission and the municipalities because most of them did not have a family passbook. They demanded the government complete the registration procedures of Amazigh enabling them to obtain their National Identity Number so as to be able to vote like other Libyans.
Posters were on display stating “Wake up Amazigh Nation, our language is dispersed” and “No legitimacy to those who prevent Amazigh of their rights to vote.”
“There are about 200,000 marginalized Amazigh who live in the desert and they are not recognized by the state so far,” Omar Mohamed Ahmed, one of the protest organisers, told the Libya Herald.
He added that Amazigh were fed up with “useless promises from the government and the Congress” and no action.
Another protest organiser Mohamed Ansariat, said that the Amazigh, the original Libyans, had been marginalised by the Qaddafi regime and continued to be so by the current government. [/restrict]
