Governor of parallel Libya central bank opposed to economic reforms

The former governor of the parallel Central Bank of Libya in al-Bayda, eastern Libya, Ali Al-Hibri, said the economic reforms announced by the CBL governor in Tripoli Al-Siddiq Al-Kabeer and the Presidential Council in Tunisia are “harmful” and could lead to the collapse of the Libyan economy.

Al-Hibri said in a televised statement that the tracks of reforms proposed by Al-Kabeer and the Presidential Council, including raising the family dollar allocations to $1000, would be fatal to the Libyan foreign currency reserves as Libya would lose 8 billion dollars.

He also indicated that he led some sincere efforts to meet with the Presidential Council’s Head Fayez Al-Sirraj in Tripoli in an attempt to end the split of the CBL between east and west regions with the appointment of the “elected governor Mohammed Al-Shoukry,” but “the Presidential Council did not make any move towards that,” he added.

“Libya is in need of using money and resources to build a strong functioning state not follow the old-fashioned distribution of wealth methods, which will eventually see the country collapse.” Al-Hibri added.

He explained that governor Al-Kabeer is really a figure who is impeding the work and functions of the CBL.

Meanwhile, the CBL agreed in a meeting Saturday to charge fees on foreign currency transactions in the country in an attempt to narrow the gap between the official rates of foreign currency and those on black market.

The step was announced by the CBL Governor Al-Sediq Al-Kabir when he met with the deputy head for economic file of the Presidential Council of the Government of National Accord (GNA) Fathi Al-Mijibri and other officials.

The officials agreed on the fees factor as part of a three-track economic reform steps to be put into an immediate effect in Libya.

The other two tracks include tackling subsidies and finding a way to mitigate the effects following the reforms on the Libyan people, which could include compensation packages of some sort, according to the officials.

These new measures come as a result of an agreement made at the eighth meeting of the Libyan Economic Dialogue held last Tuesday in Tunisia, where officials including Al-Kabir and Al-Mijibri, agreed to implement the reforms in no time to save the ailing Libyan economy.