Bureaucracy clogs Libya’s road to democracy
On a visit to the commission’s headquarters, it is easy to see why keeping the original date was impossible. Each time one of the 130 people working to prepare the election wants to make a telephone call, they face a problem: the electoral commission headquarters has only two functioning landlines.
Like so much in the new Libya, workers on the commission are driven by goodwill and energy, and at the same time stymied by a machinery of state which does not work. Nuri al-Abbar, the tired-looking 52-year-old former lawyer who heads the commission, said given the obstacles and the lack of official support, it was remarkable his staff had even got as far as they have. “We have been an after-thought all along,” Abbar told Reuters in an interview a few days before he had to announce the postponement of the election.
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Ian Martin, the head of the U.N. mission in Libya, has experienced Libya’s lack of order at first hand. In April, someone threw a bomb at his convoy in the eastern city of Benghazi, though no one was hurt. He was upbeat about the vote. He said the decision to postpone it was sensible because it would allow more time to prepare candidate lists, print ballot papers and educate voters about what to expect. “It would be naive not to expect any problems,” he said. “I believe that in general this election, even though it can’t be expected to be without problems, will be successfully carried out.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/11/us-libya-vote-preparations-idUSBRE85A12J20120611
