Transcript of Voice Note from Aref Nayed to H.E. Mr. Abdoulaye Bathily

Presidential Candidate and Chairman of the Ihya Libya (Reviving Libya) Movement, Dr Aref Nayed sent an urgent voice note to the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Libya and Head of the United Nations Support Mission in Libya, His Excellency Mr. Abdoulaye Bathily. The following is a transcript of the voice note:

Your Excellency,

I just saw the statement that came out of your esteemed mission UNSMIL. While the first paragraphs welcome the outputs of the 6+6 which have become Libyan law, by virtue of being issued by the Libyan Parliament and accepted by the Libyan Electoral Commission, the rest of the statement is most disappointing.

The points of contention that you raised were discussed during the 6+6 discussions, to which you had sent a technical advisor. This is the Libyan output, from a purely Libyan committee, formed by the Parliament and the State Council. It is constitutionally based and has constitutional status. It has an arbitrational power so that its outputs are binding for the HOR and the State Council.

When they first came out with outputs from Bosnega, Your Excellency did not attend because you said that it should be in Libya and because you had some qualms.

Your comments and technical points were incorporated by the 6+6. The technical points of the Electoral Commission were also taken into consideration by the 6+6. They met on Libyan soil in Benghazi. They reached an agreement, and they duly submitted the outputs to the Head of the Parliament.

The head of the Parliament duly issued them in a public session in Parliament, and then the head of the Electoral Commission traveled to see the Head of the Parliament and received officially what is now Libyan Law. He not only received it but there was also a statement of clarification from the 6+6 answering the pseudo contentions of the new Head of the State Council, saying that these are indeed the agreements of the 6+6 and that no major amendments were made, except to take into consideration the comments of Mr. Bathily and the Electoral Commission.

Dr. Emad Sayeh duly traveled to see the Head of the Parliament and received these Laws. He also made a statement clarifying that he accepts these Laws and thinks that they are solid grounds for the Elections. So, the process is complete.

Your Excellency now that these are Libyan laws, they must be implemented in Libya as a sovereign nation without any interference. With all due respect to your mandate, that mandate is a purely supportive one of Libyan institutions. It is actually a violation of Libyan sovereignty, for Your Excellency’s mission now to try to reopen issues that were actually closed in the 6+6 discussions.

You suggest that there should be a national dialogue. The dialogue already took place between the 6+6. The only people absent from that dialogue were the Government in Tripoli, which has a vested interest in the non-applying of these Laws because it had violated its promises in Geneva and had actually obstructed the process of Elections.

Furthermore, you made a strange point about not wanting a link between Parliamentary and Presidential Elections, which gives the impression that you are going for the position, again of the Tripoli Government, of wanting to do only Parliamentary Elections, so that they can buy them and get themselves reappointed.

I’m deeply disappointed Your Excellency, I wanted to directly let you know how we feel. We will issue an official statement. Given the respect that’s between us, I felt that I must frankly tell you how we feel about the statement that was just made by your esteemed mission. I think that whatever is left of UNSMIL legitimacy in the eyes of the Libyan people, after the fiasco of Geneva and the covering up of Appendix 13, is now tarnished. I don’t know how we can really take seriously any processes after this.

May God help us because I think by refusing to implement Libyan law, UNSMIL has just destabilized the country even further, and may God save the country.

Thank you, Your Excellency, and forgive me for any hard feelings I may have caused. I just felt that I must be as truthful and frank to you as possible.

Thank you very much.

Aref Ali Nayed,
Presidential Candidate,
Chairman of the Ihya Libya (Reviving Libya) Movement