Former Libyan Administration Asserts Control Over Current Government
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry sits with Fayez al-Sarraj, Prime Minister of Libya's Government of National Accord (GNA) in May 2016. Source: Wikimedia Commons
In the midst of a massive power struggle between rival militias in Libya, a former administration and its military surrounded the internationally-recognized government’s buildings and claimed to seize control of the country. On October 14, the current government, which is endorsed and backed by the United Nations, denounced the act as a “coup,” marking a new development in the continuing conflict between Libya’s several rival factions.
Since rebels deposed Gaddafi in 2011, factions across Libya have splintered the state. Immediately upon the anti-Gaddafi group, the National Transitional Council (NTC), being recognized internationally as the legitimate government of Libya, it began to fracture from inner discontent. Local tribal militias materialized in opposition, exploiting the chaos of the Arab Spring protests. Just a year later, the NTC, since it was a transitional government, handed power to the General National Congress (GNC). The goal of the GNC, which wasn’t popularly backed, was to create a Constitution to provide stability and after a few years this mandate would dissolve. However, the GNC extended its mandate, re-arousing protests and militia movements across the nation. Other quasi-governments sprung up, such as another Parliament in the city of Tobruk.
This chaos generated the current situation, as these opposing forces and their respective militaries created a vacuum which the UN tried to fill with the current government in Tripoli, the Government of National Accord (GNA). Although much of the international world recognizes it, both of the other Parliaments in Tripoli and Tobruk, who also oppose each other, refuse to do so. The prominence of factionalism, which is preventing any central authority from extending control beyond its small area of influence, enables heightened turmoil in the form of coups.
The leader of the recent “coup” is al-Ghwell, the former prime minister of the Parliament based in Tripoli. The Parliament submitted to the UN unity government at first, but al-Ghwell later claimed that its failure to achieve stability had transformed it into “an illegal executive authority.” Troops of the western Tripoli militias aligned with the Parliament followed him in the bloodless coup, a relatively-simple takeover of buildings without much military opposition: the GNA has been incapable of raising any military or law enforcement officials. Without any ability to enforce its demands or unity, the government remains lost amidst a sea of hostile troops battling to emerge triumphant from the vacuum.
The GNA and the other two existing parliamentary governments all vie for the support of regional militias in order to exert their dominance. Especially without the existence of a national army directly under the GNA, and both other Parliaments exerting only regional control, the shifting alliances of militias determine any respective power. The GNA received an additional blow on another front when the military leader, Khalifa Haftar, of the Tobruk Parliament captured the country’s main oil ports, injuring its authority severely further with incredible economic repercussions layering on top of military weakness and sectionalism.
The hopes of any government being able to unite the country dwindle with each moment that disorder relents. Civilians suffer under huge power cuts and constant violence daily without any improvements even as the international community professes its support for the new government. The lack of foreign governments to supplement words with troops or training guarantees the continuity of depriving people of even basic necessities, heightening the disapproval of the implemented regime as it clearly demonstrates its tremendous shortcomings.
The GNA’s president warned that all plotters involved in the coup would be arrested; however, a week later, the uncertainty of the situation remains with no arrests being carried out and both sides simultaneously claiming their own control and the illegitimacy of the opposition. In addition, regional powers exploit the vacuum and fund militias or governments, such as Egypt siding with the Parliament in Tobruk, and ultimately increase the inadequacy of a government with unsubstantiated backing and no military.
The coup in Libya maintains a constant pattern of undermined governments unable to address the regional tensions that have erupted Libya into a multi-sided civil war. Without military strength to enforce their claims of control, regionalism dominates a country wracked by several governments of which none can enact considerable control to the point of national unity.