Who Is In The Running To Rule Libya?

If Libya manages to hold landmark elections on December 24th peacefully, it will be nothing short of a miracle. Mercenaries are still armed and ready to pounce. And there is growing confusion surrounding who the presidential candidates might end up being. Anyone running for president in oil-rich Libya will want to do so knowing they will control the oil and the oil revenues.

General Haftar, the nominal head of the Libyan National Army (LNA), though he recently “stepped down” to avoid a conflict of interest should he run for president, is a potential leader whom the U.S. has clearly just signaled they would get behind. Why? Because the U.S. is interested in one thing in Libya: Stability. Stability - for better or worse - means a strong leader, even one accused of war crimes. It means another Ghaddafi, for the most part. A candidate weaker than this would mean another civil war and all the bloodshed and geopolitical upset that will go along with that. The U.S. has largely signaled that it would potentially stand behind Haftar through a court ruling this week that ordered a delay in the trial of Haftar stateside for war crimes. There are several civil lawsuits against Haftar in the United States, by victims seeking justice for human rights abuses and torture at the hands of forces loyal to Haftar during the civil war. Those trials have now been postponed until after the elections. Such a postponement would allow Haftar to run for president without the tarnished weight of these civil lawsuits. 

The other candidates and potential candidates are equally problematic -- and all of them are far weaker and could not ensure stability or security in Libya. 

Last Sunday, news reports emerged that the interim Libyan prime minister, Abdulamid al-Dbeibah, the head of the Government of National Unity (GNU) will run for president, with candidate registration opened on Monday. The leak ahead of registration was clearly meant to test the reaction to this decision. The GNU was formed as the result of a UN-backed peace process, and the PM of the GNU is meant to be a neutral force not intended to run in elections (clearly there can be no neutrality if the head of the government set up for the sole purpose of paving the way for elections is actually running in elections). However, the UN mission to Libya itself seems to have paved the way for al-Dbeibah to run by asking the House of Representatives to remove certain restrictions in the proposed electoral law that would allow candidates to run without having relinquished their official position three months in advance of elections. Libyan voters are believed to be rather in favor of al-Dbeibah as president, but polls here cannot be trusted as accurate barometers. 

Aside from Haftar and al-Dbeibah, potential candidates include Gaddafi’s son Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, parliamentary leader Aguila Saleh (also considered a Haftar loyalist), former interior minister Fathi Bashagha and Khaled el-Mishri, head of the High Council of State and a Turkish favorite who will oppose Haftar. Given the nature of these candidates, al-Dbeibah seems far less controversial.