BENGHAZI, Libya
The House of Representatives (Libya's parliament) on Monday revoked a law that had banned Gaddafi-era officials from participating in politics for a ten-year period.
"Parliament has revoked the Political Isolation Law," MP Tareq al-Garrouchi told The Anadolu Agency.
"All Libyans are equal. No one should be deprived of the right to practice politics except those who have been found guilty [of wrongdoing]," he said.
The law had been ratified in mid-2013 by Libya's previous, Islamist-dominated parliament.
Under the law, all Gaddafi-era officials had been banned from assuming top posts – or from any political activity – for ten years.
The legislation, however, excluded officials who had defected from the Gaddafi regime in 2011 to join a popular uprising against his rule.
Activists, however, had challenged the law before court, arguing that it had been passed "at gunpoint," in reference to a siege imposed by revolutionary groups on the country's justice and foreign ministries.
Libya has remained in a state of turmoil since Gaddafi's ouster and death in 2011.
Over the course of the last three years, rival militias have frequently clashed in Libya's main cities, including capital Tripoli and the eastern city of Benghazi.
Libya's stark political divisions have yielded two rival seats of government, each of which has its own institutions.
Vying for legislative authority are the newly-elected House of Representatives, which convenes in the eastern city of Tobruk, and the General National Congress, which – even though its mandate ended last year – continues to convene in Tripoli.
The two assemblies support two different governments respectively headquartered in the two cities.
