Libyan Presidential Council calls for quick appointment of Defense Minister

In a letter dated Monday, the president of the Libyan Presidential Council, Mohamed El Menfi, called on Prime Minister Abdel Hamid Dbeibah to quickly appoint a defense minister.

 

The post has been vacant since the Government was announced in March due to its sensitive nature. Both opposing camps want to take the post.

 

Abdel Hamid Dbeibah has been called to a meeting on Sunday with the three members of the Presidential Council to appoint a defense minister and get the matter over with. The tone of the letter from the Presidential Council is threatening: it suggests that if the Prime Minister does not attend the meeting on Sunday, it will be up to the Presidential Council to appoint a minister of defense, before the appointment is ratified by Parliament.

 

An ultimatum to which Abdel Hamid Dbeibah has not yet reacted. Before this crisis, he had accused a foreign country of “exerting pressure to appoint a specific personality” to this post, without naming him.

 

This week, the 5+5 military committee also demanded that the appointment be accelerated in order to reunify the military institution. The same request was relayed by the spokesman for the Parliament and by the Libyan National Army led by Khalifa Haftar.

 

According to the political agreement signed in Geneva last fall, it is the Prime Minister’s responsibility to appoint the members of the government in consultation with the Presidential Council, which is considered the highest authority governing the armed forces.