By Aimen Eljali.
Tripoli, 6 September 2013:
Anti-government demonstrators demanding that Congress sack Prime Minister Ali Zeidan and his government called today for . . .[restrict]a general strike in Tripoli on Sunday. The demonstrators were responding to the power and water cuts that are bringing misery to the capital. The call came this afternoon when some two hundred protestors gathered in Algeria Square in Central Tripoli after Friday prayers.
All shops, businesses and government institutions, with the exception of hospitals, should stay closed on Monday said a statement read out at the protest. The demonstrators had started from outside the mosque in Shara Mizran and moved to the Dawa Al-Islamiyya Mosque in Algeria Square.
Rolling electricity cuts have been taking place in the capital since the end of Ramadan but have been getting longer in recent days because of fuel supplies not reaching the power stations supplying the capital. Cuts are now five hours and even longer. The water cuts started three days ago and have affected most of the capital.
People in Tripoli, protestors told the Libya Herald, had been patient with the government but their patience was now exhausted – the city and country were now in a crisis and it had to go. Zeidan, they claimed, had lost control of the situation.
In an online poll earlier this week 83 percent of respondents said that they have experienced power cuts of between three and seven hours since Ramadan. [/restrict]
