{{ Libya’s parliament chief, who served under Moammar Gadhafi before becoming an opposition leader in exile, resigned on Tuesday, just weeks after lawmakers passed a bill banning former regime officials from senior government posts.}}
The law, which may effectively bar the speaker, Mohammed al-Megarif, and several other experienced Libyan leaders from high-level posts for the next 10 years, was adopted on May 5 amid much turmoil and pressure from militias.
The resignation was the latest turn on Libya’s rocky path to democracy. The country’s nascent government faces a multitude of challenges, including reining in armed groups that have mushroomed in size in the last two years.
The government continues to rely on some of the militias to provide security in the absence of a strong military or police force, but has also struggled to enforce its authority over them.
Al-Megarif’s move comes after Libya’s Muslim Brotherhood rallied successfully to push through the so-called Political Isolation Law in the face of liberal opposition.
As he announced his resignation before the General National Congress in the capital, Tripoli, al-Megarif suggested that lawmakers passed the new law under threat of force and decried what he described as the empowerment of some legislators backed by gunmen.
But he said he was stepping down out of respect for democracy, the first official to resign in accordance with the new law.
“All must comply with the law out of respect for the legitimacy and institutionalization of democracy,” he said, his eyes welling up with tears. “I put my resignation in your hands, and I want you to witness that I leave you with my head up.”
The power struggle now enters a new round as parliament is to draft another law — one that will oversee a nationwide vote for a 60-member committee that will be tasked with writing Libya’s new constitution. The new charter could undo the controversial isolation law.
Under Gadhafi, al-Megarif was Libya’s ambassador to India in 1980 before he joined the opposition in exile and the struggle against the former dictator.
After Gadhafi’s ouster in an eight-month civil war and his killing at the hands of rebels in 2011, al-Megarif returned to the country to become one of Libya’s new leaders.
In his resignation speech, al-Megarif chastised militia tactics.
“The use of force, threatening to use force, or brandishing force … do not conform with the building of and transition to democracy that we all seek,” he said.
{wirestory}
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