A senior US official said on Friday that Libya may delay its long-awaited presidential elections scheduled for next week due to the controversial nature of some of the candidates.
The elections, scheduled for December 24, are intended to help foster a political resolution to Libya’s long-running civil war that has pitted the Tripoli-based government against a rival regime in the eastern half of the country.
“We have invested in the electoral process with an election scheduled for later this year,” the senior US official told reporters on a press call.
“It may slip a bit as they’re still finalising about 70 candidates on the list for president — a few of them quite controversial.”
About 100 candidates had initially signed up to run in the presidential elections, including Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, commander of the eastern Libyan forces, and Saif Al Islam Qaddafi, son of deposed dictator Muammar Qaddafi.
Libya’s High National Election Commission was initially scheduled to release its final candidate list earlier this month but has yet to do so, though the elections are now only a week away.
Despite the potential delay, the senior US official struck an optimistic note, citing “great international support” for the elections and the fact that about 2.5 million Libyans have registered to vote.
The US official said the voter registration rate “matches … just about any country you can point to".
The US Agency for International Development has also been working with the commission to bolster Libya’s electoral infrastructure before the vote.
That support includes voter registration assistance, election dispute resolution training and cybersecurity support as well as efforts to combat hate speech and misinformation on social media.
US Vice President Kamala Harris also attended a conference on Libya’s elections in Paris this year.
The UN has also named Stephanie Williams, a US diplomat, as its Libya election adviser.
Ms Williams travelled to Libya this week in a bid to help keep the elections on track.
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
Other workplace saving schemes
- The UAE government announced a retirement savings plan for private and free zone sector employees in 2023.
- Dubai’s savings retirement scheme for foreign employees working in the emirate’s government and public sector came into effect in 2022.
- National Bonds unveiled a Golden Pension Scheme in 2022 to help private-sector foreign employees with their financial planning.
- In April 2021, Hayah Insurance unveiled a workplace savings plan to help UAE employees save for their retirement.
- Lunate, an Abu Dhabi-based investment manager, has launched a fund that will allow UAE private companies to offer employees investment returns on end-of-service benefits.
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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