By Libya Herald reporter.
Tunis, 28 April 2016:
Around a dozen and a half members of the Libya Dialogue team met in Tunis . . .[restrict]today to try and reconcile the fact that the State Council has been set up without the approval of the Libyan Political Agreement by the House of Representatives (HoR), which would give the Council legitimacy.
However, the gathering was effectively shunned by several members of the Dialogue, notably Salah Makhzoum, one of the two prime signatories of the LPA in Skhirat last December and who is now the State Council’s deputy president. Also absent was Misratan military commander-turned-politician Fathi Bushagha, and Mohamed Raeid, both members of the HoR, athough Belgassem Igzeit, also from Misrata, attended. Mohamed Sawan the leader of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Justice and Construction Party, likewise ignored the event.
The meeting had been called by HoR deputy president Emhemed Shouaib almost three weeks ago, following the State Council’s self-proclamation, in a bid to gain support for the LPA among its opponents in the HoR. They were using its irregular creation as another reason not to back the LPA.
Under the LPA’s Article 64, the Libyan Political Dialogue has the right to reconvene followong the adoption of the LPA at the request of any party to it “to examine what it deems a severe breach to one of its items”.
Today’s gathering was supposed to take place on 14 April but was opposed by those Dialogue members who support the State Council. At the time, he said that a meeting would complicate matters. On his Facebook page Bushagha queried the motivation for the meeting asking why there had been no similar session when in January the HoR demanded that Article 8 be deleted from the LPA.
The meeting is seen as resulting in little of practical consequence. [/restrict]
