Libya found itself on Thursday, after a controversial vote in parliament, with two prime ministers, one of whom saw his convoy targeted by gunfire, a sign of an exacerbation of tensions in a country already undermined by power struggles and political chaos.
In what looks like an institutional coup by the eastern Libyan camp against that of Tripoli, the parliament sitting in Tobruk (east) has appointed the influential former interior minister Fathi Bachagha to replace Abdelhamid Dbeibah in the head of the interim government.
However, Mr. Dbeibah, anticipating this vote, made it known on several occasions that he would cede power only to a government that emerged from the ballot box.
On the night of Wednesday to Thursday, shots targeted Mr. Dbeibah’s convoy in Tripoli, said the Interior Ministry.
The armed attack, with unknown perpetrators, “did not cause any victims”, according to the ministry, which announced the opening of an investigation into this “criminal act”.
Libya was mired in a major political crisis after the fall of Muammar Gaddafi’s regime in 2011, with rivalries between major regions, power struggles and foreign interference.
In the midst of a civil war, the country was ruled between 2014 and 2016 by two rival prime ministers in the West and in the East.
Application withdrawn… or not
After years of armed conflicts and divisions, the Dbeibah government was set up a year ago, under the aegis of the UN, to lead the transition until the presidential and legislative elections, scheduled for last December before to be postponed indefinitely.
This postponement had been decided against a backdrop of persistent disagreements between a power in the East, embodied by Parliament and Marshal Haftar, and another in the West, around the government of Tripoli and the High Council of State.
While this postponement was looming, Mr. Bachagha – one of the most prominent candidates in western Libya for the presidential election – had approached the rival camp by going to Benghazi. There he met Marshal Khalifa Haftar, a strongman from eastern Libya and leader of the self-proclaimed Libyan National Army (ANL).
The ANL also welcomed Thursday the appointment of Mr. Bachagha as Prime Minister and affirmed “to support the decision of Parliament”.
Parliament, which believes that Mr. Dbeibah’s mandate expired with the postponement of the elections, had selected two suitors to replace him: Mr. Bachagha, 59, and the outsider Khaled Al-Bibass, a former senior official in the same ministry. .
Before proceeding with the vote, the Speaker of Parliament, Aguila Saleh, one of the main rivals of the Dbeibah government, affirmed that Mr. Bibass had withdrawn his candidacy, leaving Mr. Bachagha alone in the running.
Quoted by Libyan media, Khaled Al-Bibass denied having withdrawn his candidacy.
MM. Bachagha and Dbeibah, both from the west of the country, each have the support of armed groups in Tripolitania.
“I will not accept any new transition phase or parallel authority,” Dbeibah warned in a televised speech on Tuesday, saying his caretaker government would hand over power only to “an elected government”.
The UN has indicated through its spokesperson Stéphane Dujarric that it will continue to support Mr. Dbeibah.
In a joint statement issued at the end of December after the postponement of the elections, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy had expressed their support for the continuation of the mandate of the current executive until the actual holding of the polls.
“Fact accomplished”
At the start of the session in Tobruk, parliament also voted to extend its mandate by 14 months, which theoretically expired in December.
The House of Representatives is considered the preserve of its president Aguila Saleh, a cacique from the East. Mr. Saleh is accused of breaching all the procedures to get Mr. Bachagha appointed.
He had already been accused of having derailed the political process, by promulgating in September, without a vote, a controversial electoral law and tailor-made for his ally Khalifa Haftar, who was also a presidential candidate.
“Many see today’s events in Libya – where a new prime minister has been fabricated to try to consolidate certain political factions – as a fait accompli”, commented on Twitter Tarek Megrisi, analyst at the European Council for International Relations.
“It is in fact a game of confidence that has been going on for quite some time and whose sole purpose is to deflect efforts in favor of the electoral process. »