Libya's National Transitional Council to hand power to elected assembly on August 8th

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• Libya's post-rebel NTC government has announced August 8th as the provisional date for a handover ceremony, where the General National Congress elected last month will formally take control of Libya.
• The unelected NTC ministers will be required to write 'handover reports' detailing their actions and financial expenditure in office, and sign a document accepting responsibility for anything they have neglected to mention in these reports.
• The GNC will be charged will forming a new government, and then holding elections to a Constituent Assembly which will rewrite Libya's constitution and put it to a referendum.

[url]http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5ibYQx0VpNCWb8IZCEpSejpPEr5wQ?docId=CNG.55d6c7482ee4eea1d3f10ca9615425a3.211[/url]

[quote=AFP]Libya's General National Congress, which will become the first elected body to rule the oil-rich nation after Moamer Kadhafi's ouster, is due to take power early August, an official said Sunday.

"August 8 is expected to be the date on which power is transferred from the National Transitional Council to the General National Congress," said Othman Ben Sassi, a member of the outgoing NTC.

Ben Sassi said the handover would be marked by a "symbolic ceremony" and that the 200-seat congress would formally start working a day or two later, when all the members meet for their first session.

An official of the country's electoral commission said details of the transition were still being hammered out but that the congress's first meeting was expected around August 9.

Libyans cast ballots on July 7 in the country's first free elections following a 2011 popular uprising that escalated into a civil war and
overthrew the regime of now slain dictator Kadhafi.

They elected a 200-member legislative assembly comprising party and independent representatives, which will replace the NTC and lead the country until fresh elections can be held on the basis of a new constitution.

The electoral commission on July 17 unveiled the full results of the vote for the General National Congress, where the lion-share of seats have been set aside for individual candidates, whose loyalties and ideologies remain unclear.

Out of the parties, which hold just 80 of 200 seats, the liberal coalition of 2011 wartime premier Mahmud Jibril performed best, nailing 39 seats on its own.

Jibril's National Forces Alliance also counts on the support of centrist party led by Ali Tarhuni, who held several key posts during last year's revolt, which obtained two seats in the congress.

The Justice and Construction Party, which was launched by Libya's Muslim Brotherhood, came second with 17 seats. But its leader, Mohammed Sawan, says the party can even the score by bringing independent candidates on its side.

The commission is expected to confirm these results in the coming days, marking the closure of what it said would be a two-week appeal period.

Independents hold the key to the balance of power in the incoming assembly and the two rival parties are said to be knocking on their doors in a bid to expand their sphere of influence.

"Everyone is talking to everyone, parties and independents," said Ben Sassi.

Hailing from a variety of backgrounds -- from lawyers to former political prisoners -- most independents tuned their campaign messages according to the needs of voters in their local districts rather than espousing a clear ideology.

Some have ties to parties while others are seen as genuine independents.

There have been reports of like-minded individual representatives trying to form an alternative front, separate from Jibril's alliance and the Islamist bloc.

Whether two or three major forces emerge in the congress, decisions in the assembly require a two-thirds majority to pass, making cooperation between all players necessary to avoid gridlock in a delicate transition.

The chief task of the incoming assembly is to appoint an interim government and steer the country until new elections can be held on the basis of a constitution which is to be drafted by a constituent authority of 60 members.[/quote]

[url]http://www.libyaherald.com/?p=11631[/url]

[quote=Libya Herald]According to article No. 30 of the Transitional Constitutional Declaration (TCD), the National Transitional Council (NTC), Libya’s supreme legislature will be dissolved at the first convening of the newly elected General National Congress (GNC).

The High National Election Commission (HNEC) had announced on 19 July at its final reading of the transitional election results that these results would become final after 14 days of appeal – or 1st August.

The TCD was announced in Benghazi on 3 August 2011, and it is the document that has set out the roadmap to democracy in Libya. It is the social contract between the NTC and the Libyan public. It represents the set of promises that the NTC, Libya’s self appointed and hence none elected temporary rulers, had made to the Libyan public in order to gain and maintain their support during the 17 February Revolution. It is also what is meant to distinguish it from its predecessor – the unrepresentative dictatorial regime.

There have been many questions about the exact process of the hand over to the GNC, and especially with regards to matters of accountability and transparency. There is a fear that many issues would fall in between the cracks, so to speak, and that the Libyan public would be left to pay the ultimate bill, as has been the case over the last 4 decades.

Salah Jouda, independent GNC member-elect for Benghazi is of the view that the GNC should not accept responsibility until the NTC and the Kib government had handed-over detailed reports of their activities and specifically financial expenditures – prior to the GNC accepting handover.

Jouda, speaking on Libya Alahrar satellite TV just after the elections, was keen that there was transparency in the accounts of the NTC and the Al-Kib government, and was not keen that the GNC was left holding the baby, so to speak, with regards to non-transparent accounting.

Yesterday, the official press conference, Libya Herald put this question to both the government’s official spokesperson, Nasser Al-Mana and the Finance Minister Hassan Zaglam.

Al-Mana confirmed without giving too much detail that there will be an official hand over process. He also explained that the NTC had set up a series of hand over committees well over a month ago, to prepare final reports for the GNC. The NTC also set up a Supreme or High Hand-over Committee to oversee these various sub-committees, he confirmed.

Equally, he revealed that the Transitional Government of Al-Kib has been preparing for over a month hand-over reports as well as every government department preparing general final reports to their successors.

Moreover, Al-Mana confirmed that the GNC had the full right to demand details from the outgoing administration prior to accepting the hand-over.

Answering my direct question, Finance Minister Zaglam commented that is known and expected that there will be an official hand-over process for every new minister. Zaglam said that that was the exact procedure by which he had accepted the hand-over from his predecessor Ali Tarhuni. We sign an official report of hand-over so that if anything were to come up that was not included in the official final report, responsibility cannot be accepted by the incoming minister.

I expect that I will do exactly the same when I hand-over to my successor, Finance Minister Zaglam concluded.[/quote]