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By Sami Zaptia.
London, 12 August 2019:
The Faiez Serraj internationally-recognized government in Tripoli yesterday denounced the cutting off of water supply to the capital for yet another time. It called on the dignitaries and tribes of the southern region to intervene urgently to reopen the valves.
The water valves of the Man-Made River Project had been cut off under the use of coercive force by so-called armed groups in the southern region of Shwerif. The act has deprived the residents of the Greater Tripoli and the cities of the central region from the flow of water for the fourth day in a row.
Some residents in Tripoli that Libya Herald spoke to this morning say they have not had water for more than a week and that they were still catching up from the previous water cut.
The armed group had forced the water valve shutdown in protest at the overly long power outages in the southern regions of Libya. This act of protest had been repeated on numerous occasions this year and over the years since the overthrow of the Qaddafi regime in 2011.
In appealing to the dignitaries and tribes of the southern region to intervene urgently to reopen the valves, the Serraj government stressed that the teams of the General Electricity Company of Libya (GECOL) were working hard to restore electricity to all areas in the country, and that it did not and will not differentiate inequitably in the distribution of electricity between the various Libyan cities or regions.
The Serraj government said that the power cuts were linked to the return of off-grid power stations and the limited capacity of supply lines.
It will be recalled that the southern region of Libya feel that they suffer excessive periods of power cuts compared to other coastal areas – a point of grievance that they interpret as the marginalization by the north of the south. As a result groups have on numerous occasions used water as a tool of expression and leverage of their political grievances.
