Prime minister-elect Mustafa Abushagur faces the real possibility of being sacked by the National Congress at a vote to be held later today, the Libya Herald has learned.
Following the rejection of his proposed cabinet, one independent Congressman, who requested not to be named, said “he cannot survive”.
Abushagur is due to submit a revised cabinet on Sunday, but it is reckoned that this new list will not succeed in placating Congress members who have already resolved to vote for his dismissal.
"The assembly is expected to vote on the new government in the afternoon," an official told AFP.
A copy circulating yesterday purported to show that 11 names had been changed, specifically the ministers of interior, finance, defence, higher education, health, oil, social affairs, labour, martyrs, electricity and the deputy prime minister.
A twelfth alteration was the inclusion of a foreign minister, with Abushagur having originally planned to assume that responsibility in addition to being prime minister until a suitable candidate was found.
Members of the NFA were amongst the first to vent their outrage at the initial line-up, after it emerged that not a single one of the nine names proposed by Mahmoud Jibril had been included.
Several Congressmen told the Libya Herald that they opposed many names on the list on account of their ties to the former regime and considered others unqualified or unknown to them.
If Abushagur is sacked tomorrow Congress will need to find an alternative who will, in turn, have to repeat the process of attempting to select an acceptable cabinet, a process which could delay the formation of a new government by at least another month.
(Sources: Libya Herald, AFP)
