The Amazigh in the west and southwest of Libya are still closing oil facilities within their cities to protest the Constitutional Declaration’s Article 30, which has not been amended to guarantee the rights of the Amazigh as a minority group in Libya.
Ali Abu Saoud, a rebel from the Zuwarah Amazigh city, in the far west of Libya, was surprised when the High Electoral Commission set the date for the nominations for the elections of the 60-member committee – the constituent body for drafting the constitution – despite the boycott of all Amazigh and the Tuareg for these elections.
The Amazigh in the west and southwest of Libya are still closing oil facilities within their cities to protest the Constitutional Declaration’s Article 30, which has not been amended to guarantee the rights of the Amazigh as a minority group in Libya.
Ali Abu Saoud, a rebel from the Zuwarah Amazigh city, in the far west of Libya, was surprised when the High Electoral Commission set the date for the nominations for the elections of the 60-member committee – the constituent body for drafting the constitution – despite the boycott of all Amazigh and the Tuareg for these elections.
This, according to Abu Saoud, has made the Amazigh revolutionists go to the vital ports in their areas and to initiate sit-ins to protest what they believe to be an exclusion of their rights. “The protesters will be gathering in the Mellitah oil and gas complex as of October 26, 2013, to reiterate their determination to amend Article 30 of the Constitutional Declaration, and to stress that the Supreme Council for the Libyan Amazigh is the only body authorized to negotiate with all parties on their behalf,” Abu Saoud read from a statement. “The Amazigh will take further measures if the government continues with its negligence and procrastination.” The statement blamed the General National Congress (GNC) for any negative results that might arise from these events.
The origin of the problem
The contentious Article 30 of the Constitutional Declaration – according to the page of the Free Libyan Amazigh Facebook page – only ensures the Amazigh’s cultural rights, and it states that other languages (non-Arabic) are national languages. This stipulation, according to the Amazigh, is vague and elastic text and thus does not rise to the level of their demands.
According to the same page, the Amazigh have tried to remedy this situation in the election law of the constituent body for the drafting of the Constitution. They demanded the activation of the representation of the different cultural components in this body by adding a paragraph in the law, which ensures active representation of the different cultural components. This requires their approval of the articles related to their culture (the name of the state, its identity, its anthem and its language). The condition is that voting on these articles should only be through consensus and not through the majority.
Only two seats
“The hopes of the Amazigh soon vanish when the constituent body presented the draft constitution,” said Abud Said. “Today they find themselves treated as a minority and they are only represented by two members in the 60-member committee. This is unfair and they didn’t expect to be treated in this way by their brothers.”
The Amazigh make up about 25% of the population of Libya, according to various sources. However, they object to this figure and say that it underestimates their real number, which they claim is much higher. This is because the statistics that were conducted have only covered the Amazigh of the western part of the country and those living in the center and in the southern part of Libya, where there are many Amazigh cities, were not counted, according to Amazigh sources.
Shaaban al-Taeb, a writer and media professional, said that the Amazigh did not insist on the numbers of seats to be allocated to them but rather on the principle of consensus in voting. “The National Congress insisted, without any justification, to refuse the principle of consensus regarding the articles related to the cultural components and it has chosen the majority system without taking into consideration the specificities of these components. It is important to note that all international charters and covenants stipulate that the issues related to the specificities of the minorities are not subject to the majority vote system.”
Formal representation
According to Yousef al-Hasaeri, a member of the coordinating supreme council of the Libyan Amazigh: “The reason behind the worsening of the situation and the escalation of the protest is this behavior and approach. The drafting of the Libyan Constitution will be based on the majority vote system and not consensus. Thus the voice of the minorities will not be heard and their representation in the body will be a formality and not a real representation.”
When this happened, the council, according to al-Hasaeri, announced that the Libyan Amazigh would boycott the nominations and elections of members of the constitution committee would start by withdrawing the Amazigh members of the General National Congress, suspending their membership, and calling the national conference to apply the provisions stipulated in international conventions on the rights of minorities.
Muhannad Shanib, a rebel from the city of Yafran, located in the Jebel Nafusa western Libya, said that this is not the first time the Amazigh peacefully protested to demand the realization of their rights. “There have been many sit-ins such as the sit-in organized in the martyrs square in Tripoli on January 13, 2012 and which lasted 15 days,” he said.
More recently, the Amazigh protested in front of the GNC to meet decision-makers and their demand was met after waiting for a long time. However, according to Shnaib “they only got promises without any action on the ground.”
Negligence and escalation
Snob stressed that the Amazigh had launched their sit in the area where there is the pipe linking between the al-Waffa oil field, 50 km away from the mountainous Nalut city and the Mellita field for more than a month ago. But the government hasn’t until now paid any attention to the demands of the protesters. This has made them stop the pumping of the pipe since September 29, 2013, and we will continue with our protests until all our demands are met.”
The situation has become more tensed when the Amazigh in the south of Libya closed the Sharara oil field. Muhammad al-Sheikh, the head of the negotiating committee on behalf of the Amazigh protesters in the city of Ubari, said that the protestors have closed the Repsol Oil Company field, known as the Sharara field.
Al-Sheikh added that this move came “in the framework of the Amazigh disobedience movement to demand their rights. It is a continuation of the escalation vowed by the Amazigh rebels, and the situation will develop until the closure of all economic resources within the Amazigh cities.”
We have no choice
Abu Saoud justified this behavior, saying that “we found ourselves forced to treat them in the same way they treat us. It seems that today, rights in Libya should be taken by force and not by peace. We are sorry for this but this is a crucial issue and we are ready to pay for it with our lives.”
For his part, al-Hasaeri stressed that “this protest was launched by the rebels after they became desperate and after trying all other peaceful means. The council has attempted to negotiate with the decision-makers and had also tried to ease the severity of the situation. It was agreed to extend the period of non-stop of the oil and gas pumping until Wednesday, October 30, 2013.”
He continued saying that “this extension came when the National Congress called for dialogue with Ibrahim Makhlouf, the Chairman of the Amazigh. The rebels have given this opportunity for all, but they did not benefit from it. The session was postponed until Sunday because of the withdrawal of one of the Congress members for non-related reasons and the absence of a quorum at the meeting to conduct the voting.
This will lead to the postponement of this file until after the end of the nomination period for the election of the constituent body for the drafting of the constitution on October 31, 2013, and none of the Amazigh will nominate himself for its membership. This will make the situation more tensed and things will become worse.
Muhammad al-Sheikh said that the oil minister came and visited the protestors in the al-Sharara oil field but they refused to discuss with him any issue while at the same time they stressed that their demands are clear.
A long struggle
The demands of the Amazigh in Libya to constitutionalize their cultural rights came as a culmination of a long period of political and civil society activism. The institutions of the Amazigh were tasked with defining the Amazigh identity as a key component of the Libyan identity. In the past, this activism was done in the underground, especially during the rule of Gaddafi but has been public since the liberation, according to Nuha al-Qasei, an Amazigh activist.
Al-Qasei expressed her disapproval of the way the national media is covering the Amazigh: “The conditions of the Amazigh is a national issue, but the media does not even allocate one hour of its time to discussing this very important topic. The Amazigh has received support from neither from the media nor from the government.”
Abweeb Abu Deeb, an Amazigh citizen, told Correspondents how the actual political movement of the local councils and the civil society organizations in the cities that speak the Amazigh language started, resulting in the constitutional entitlements forum of the Amazigh in Libya held on January 12, 2013.
“The results reached in the local councils organizing the forum,” according to Abu Deeb, are that the constitution, which we will acknowledge and respect, is the constitution which acknowledges us and all other Libyans on equal grounds. Otherwise, we will not acknowledge the constitution and it will have no legitimacy. Any sovereign institution built on this constitution does not represent us and we will not be represented in any authority built on this constitution.”
The protest of the Amazigh rebels continues in the Mellita oil and gas complex and in other ports. The work in the complex has completely stopped and vessels are not allowed to enter the port until the National Conference reconsiders its decision regarding the constitutional demands.
