By Sami Zaptia.
London, 22 December 2021:
With Libya’s 24 December 2021 elections now postponed, today, the Presidency of the House of Representatives (HoR) issued a decision (13/2021) to form a 10-member committee to work on preparing a proposal for a post-24 December 2021 roadmap.
The House of Representatives demanded the committee submit its report to the office of the Presidency within a week to present it to the floor of the House during its next session.
The decision was unsigned by any of the three heads of the HoR.
Ageela Saleh’s temporary withdrawal from the HoR
It is also unclear what is going to happen with regards HoR head Ageela Saleh. Saleh is standing as a candidate in the presidential elections and as such he had stepped down temporarily as Speaker, handing over the role to his two Deputies.
It is unclear whether Saleh will return to his role, assuming that the elections are in effect cancelled or whether he will remain visibly at least at a distance until a new election date is set.
If an election date is set for March next year, for example, it will mean that while Saleh can continue to pull HoR strings in the background, he will not be able to influence live proceedings on the floor.
This slight change of dynamic may influence how the HoR may operate over the next few months and may affect its outcomes and specifically the new election law. It was Saleh, it will be recalled, that ‘‘passed’’ the election law without referring its final version to the HoR floor.
