Libyans vote for constitution body

A man casts his ballot during a vote to elect a constitution-drafting panel in Benghazi February 20, 2014. [Photo/Agencies]

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The 60 members of the constitutional committee will have 120 days to draft the charter. They will be divided equally between Libya's three regions: Tripolitania in the west, Cyrenaica in the east, and Fezzan in the south.

The model resembles the committee that drafted Libya's pre-Gaddafi constitution, implemented when it became an independent state in 1951.

Those who will draft the constitution will need to take into account political and tribal rivalries and calls for more autonomy in the east when deciding what political system Libya will adopt. Their draft will be put to a referendum.

In the east, armed protesters have seized major oil ports since summer to demand a greater share of energy wealth and political autonomy, draining up vital oil exports.

The group occupying the eastern oil ports has dismissed the vote as fake.

The election is also boycotted by the Amazigh, or Berber, a minority which lives in the west in close proximity to oil installations.

Its leader Ibrahim Makhlouf has rejected the vote because the Amazigh wanted a bigger say in the body and guarantees that their language will become one of the official languages.

In the past, to demand their rights, Amazigh have blocked oil installations such as the Mellitah oil and gas complex, co-owned by Italy's ENI, as well as pipelines.

Attempts to write a new constitution have been repeatedly delayed because of political infighting within the GNC, which was elected for an 18-month term last July in Libya's first free election in nearly 50 years.

The GNC agreed this week to hold new elections this year after its plan to extend its mandate beyond the original date of Feb 7 had sparked an outcry.

Gaddafi ostensibly ruled Libya by a bizarre set of laws drawn up by him in his Green Book, although in practice he and his family ran a totalitarian state where no coherent political opposition was tolerated and rival tribes were bought off or played off against each other.