Libya finally has a prime minister and Presidential Council. Whether this will bring unity and peace to the divided, war-torn country is another matter.
Credit for this positive development goes to Stephanie Williams, acting United Nations envoy and head of its Support Mission in Libya (UNSMIL).
During the marathon session in Geneva, Switzerland, on Feb. 5, the Libyan Political Dialogue Forum (LPDF) voted 39 to 34 to appoint Abdul Hamid Dbeibah, a businessman turned politician, to be prime minister while appointing little-known diplomat Mohamed Younis Menfi as head of the three-member Presidential Council, replacing the outgoing, dysfunctional nine-member council headed by Fayez al-Sarraj, who has been at the helm since 2015.
Dbeibah has three weeks to form his government before submitting it to the Tobruk-based parliament for approval. The Presidential Council, on the other hand, has fewer executive powers, and Menfi is likely to act as a ceremonial head of state in the interim period that should end, if all goes according to plan, with national elections envisioned for Dec. 24.
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