Libyan Brotherhood holds congress in Benghazi after 25 years

Libya's Muslim Brotherhood would earlier meet underground during Gaddafi's rule Libya’s Muslim Brotherhood, repressed under the regime of fallen strongman Muammar Gaddafi, has opened its first public congress inside the country for almost 25 years.“This is a historic day for us and for the Libyan people,” its leader Suleiman Abdelkader told AFP at the opening late Thursday of the three-day congress in the eastern city of Benghazi.
Brotherhood officials said it was their first public meeting inside Libya in almost quarter of a century, although it met underground during Gaddafi’s rule for fear of reprisals or held their congress abroad.
The meeting of about 700 people was at a wedding hall in Benghazi, the eastern city where the revolt against Gaddafi began.
Officials of Libya’s ruling National Transitional Council, including Islamic Affairs Minister Salem el-Sheikli and Defence Minister Jalal al-Degheili, attended the opening in Benghazi.
The congress was due to elect a leader and discuss strategy, notably whether to form a political party, said Abdelkader.
The Brotherhood supports the idea of a “civil” state but founded on Islamic values, he said. “This country belongs to all its people and everybody must participate in its construction.”
Next elections
As Libya emerges from a bloody civil war, many observers believe the next elections could pit religious political groups against secular parties, with better-organised Islamists such as the Brotherhood having a tactical advantage.
“Rebuilding Libya is not a task for one group or one party but for everyone, based on their ability,” Abdelkader said.
His remarks appeared to be an expression of support for the idea of a technocratic interim government, which Abdurrahim al-Keib, the prime minister designate, is trying to assemble by a Tuesday deadline.
Abdelkader would not, however, be drawn on whether the Brotherhood wanted one of its members to be part of the interim cabinet, which is due to organise elections in June to a constituent assembly.
“Maybe some (members) will join based on their qualifications and ability. But for this time period we will not join as a party,” he told Reuters after his speech.
The slickly organised event was heavy in revolutionary references, with the stage draped in the new national colors and speeches given by guest speakers from Tunisian moderate Islamist party Ennahda and Syria's banned Muslim Brotherhood.
There was also a general mood of celebration for a movement that was founded in 1949 but which organisers said had not held a public meeting in Libya until now.
“I feel great. It’s freedom. It’s like a dream for us,” said Abdallah Dahmani, a 65 year-old university lecturer in chemistry. Many delegates, like Dahmani, were intellectuals with advanced degrees and spoke fluent English.
Members interviewed by Reuters had often joined decades ago and had either lived abroad or were forced to keep their membership secret for fear of arrest, torture and imprisonment.
After so many years of secrecy, they said they were eager to show the Libyan public that there was nothing sinister about their group ? an offshoot of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, that country's most popular and organised political force.
“There’s nothing secret. We’re not planning to destroy the country,” said Abdou Majid Saleh Musbah, 56, an engineer from Tripoli who joined the movement in 1979.
Meanwhile, former rebel fighters in Libya are raising the stakes by demanding a role in the interim government which is currently being formed, amid rising tensions over the naming of an army chief of staff.
Abdelkarim Belhaj, the former jihadist who heads the military council in the Libyan capital, said on Thursday that a deal had been reached with the ruling National Transitional Council for former civilian rebels to sit in the country’s new cabinet.
"We have reached an agreement that candidates from the thwar (civilian rebels) will receive certain very specific portfolios," Belhaj said at the start of a military parade, without elaborating.
“We hope that these promises will be kept,” added the man, whom Libyan media have suggested is among the leading candidates for the defence ministry.
The NTC has said a new government led by interim premier Abdel Rahim al-Kib is expected to be announced on Sunday.
Kib has said the new government will be formed of technocrats, but pressures from Libya's tribes and from the various armed factions make his promise a difficult one to keep.
"We have reached an agreement that candidates from the thwar (civilian rebels) will receive certain very specific portfolios," Belhaj said at a military parade, without elaborating.
"We hope that these promises will be kept," added the man Libyan media have spotlighted as a leading candidate for the defence portfolio.
Belhaj, who led the anti-Muammar Gaddafi Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, spent years in prison and has a small army at his disposal. He called for a "strong government with the collaboration of the thwar."
"It is dangerous to say that the work of the thwar is done" now that the Kadhafi regime has fallen, he added.
"We must be aware of the danger of the next phase... We won the battle on the ground and we are now ready to join the battle for the state, a civil and modern state."
Belhaj rival Abdullah Naker, who also heads several thousand fighters, on Thursday met regional commanders to denounce the nomination of Khalifa Haftar as chief of staff of the army, which has yet to be officially reconstituted.
Gathering under the banner of "The Union of Thwar in Libya," they demanded the postponement of a chief of staff being nominated until after the interim government is formed.
"We were not consulted about the nomination of a chief of staff. We are competent, but they did not give us the chance to put forward our own candidates" for the post, Naker said.
Earlier on Thursday, some 150 officers and sub-officers in the eastern city of Al-Baida unanimously approved Haftar's appointment and announced the army's reactivation.
Haftar, who comes from the ranks of Benghazi's military academy and trained in the former Soviet Union, defected from the Kadhafi regime in the 1990s after the Libya-Chad conflict and went to the United States.
He returned in March to join the military campaign to unseat Kadhafi.
Naker, who hails from the Nafusa mountains in the west, also demanded a say in the new government for former rebels.
"The thwar must have a role in the interim government," he said late on Thursday, adding that what they wanted of the new government was "transparency and non-marginalisation of the thwar."
"The army chief of staff must be a thwar who fought on the battlefield," Naker added.
As in other "Arab spring" nations, Islamists who were suppressed under the former regime now represent Libya's best-organised and rising political force.
On Thursday, the country's Muslim Brotherhood met for its first public congress in nearly 25 years in the eastern city of Benghazi, where the rebellion against Kadhafi erupted.
"This is an historic day for us and for the Libyan people," its leader Suleiman Abdel Kader told AFP at the opening of the three-day congress.
The Brotherhood supports the idea of a "civil" state but founded on Islamic values, Abdel Kader said. "This country belongs to all its people and everybody must participate in its construction."