The ministers and Prime Minister of the newly approved Libyan Government have been sworn in at a House of Representatives’ (HoR) session in Tobruk, thus allowing them now to claim the seat of the executive authority in the capital Tripoli.
The Prime Minister Fathi Bashagha and most of his cabinet members took the legal oath in the presence of 102 members of the HoR. The Foreign Minister, Culture Minister and about a dozen others couldn’t attend the swear-in ceremony for different reasons.
The Foreign and Culture Ministers were kidnapped by an armed group as they were traveling by land to Tobruk to attend the session, other minister couldn’t take a flight to Tobruk because the Government of National Unity ordered a suspension of all flights ahead of the HoR session, according to a statement by the PM and other ministers.
Bashagha vowed at the HoR session to take Libya to a constitutional referendum and then elections, saying his government would assume its duties from the capital Tripoli.
During the session, the HoR Speaker Aqila Saleh carried out a second vote of confidence in the government, saying that if the first one of last Thursday was contested, then this new vote of 102 members is the alternative.
