The National Unity Government responds to the demands of members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard by issuing a decision to determine their salaries according to the unified salary schedule for army members.
Al-Arab London – Members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard in western Libya announced on Sunday evening the reopening of the Zawiya refinery and the Mellitah oil complex, following a meeting they said they had held with the Prime Minister of the National Unity Government, Abdul Hamid Dabaiba, in Tripoli.
In two separate televised statements in front of the Al-Zawiya refinery and the Mellitah complex, west of Tripoli, members of the Guard announced the reopening after the closure they announced on Sunday afternoon, in which they demanded that the government pay financial dues to them.
The National Unity Government in Tripoli and its affiliated institutions did not comment on the closure, but the Prime Minister took the initiative on Sunday evening to issue a decision to determine the salaries of members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard according to the unified salary schedule for members of the Libyan Army.
The Petroleum Facilities Guard is a body affiliated with the Ministry of Defense that is responsible for securing oil and gas facilities in Libya, and it has fallen into many stages of the divisions that Libyan institutions suffer from, as a result of the political conflicts in the country.
Members of the Facilities Guard in Libya announced earlier on Sunday the closure of oil fields and ports throughout the country, in front of the Zawiya refinery, after the expiration of a ten-day deadline they granted to the Dabaiba government to implement their demands, which include a 67 percent increase in their salaries.
Members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard, a military group whose mission is to protect oil installations, posted the threat in video clips posted online on Sunday.
The footage, published on the X and Facebook platforms, showed members of the Oil Facilities Guard wearing military uniform closing a feed valve for the Mellitah oil complex, west of Tripoli.
The Mellitah complex is a joint project between the National Oil Corporation of Libya and the Italian company Eni. Closing the complex will disrupt gas supplies via the Green Stream pipeline between Libya and Italy.
The National Oil Corporation said through its account on the
The corporation did not reveal whether there were any closures of oil facilities.
The production capacity of the Zawiya oil refinery is 120,000 barrels per day, and it is connected to the Sharara oil field, which has a capacity of 300,000 barrels per day.
Over the past five years, severe conflicts have caused a significant decline in oil exports and delayed expansion plans aimed at increasing production from 1,214,000 barrels per day to 2 million barrels per day.
Last January, protesters from the Fezzan region in the south closed the Sharara field, prompting the National Oil Corporation to declare a state of force majeure in the field, which was reopened a few days later.
Members of the Petroleum Facilities Guard said in another video statement, “We are sorry and unwilling to close the oil facilities.”
Stopping production in the oil fields would cause the collapse of the energy industry in Libya, which is the country’s main resource, and lead to devastating consequences for the economy, which would increase the tragedy of the people who suffer from a lack of liquidity, delayed salaries, and deteriorating living conditions.
The closure of oil sites and fields is a frequent occurrence in Libya, especially in the southern region, which is rich in oil and poor in services, due to protests demanding improved living conditions, or due to political conflict over oil wealth and its financial revenues.
At that time, Libya incurred losses estimated at $60 million per day as a result of the continued closures, which is approximately the loss of about 600 thousand barrels of oil production per day (according to previous statements by the Libyan Oil Minister, Muhammad Aoun), at a time when oil prices witnessed an unprecedented recovery, and the country’s oil experts did not hide. They are concerned about entering into an energy crisis, especially since European countries depend on Libyan oil supplies, which the country aspired to raise to more than 1.20 million barrels per day (daily oil production before the closure of the Sharara and El Feel fields).
Libya depends on oil revenues for its basic income by more than 95 percent, most of which goes to employee salaries, fuel support, and basic goods and services. It is noteworthy that daily production throughout Libya is approximately 1.2 million barrels per day.
Since the collapse of the regime of the late leader Muammar Gaddafi, the oil sector in Libya has witnessed several closures, the most prominent of which was last year’s closure, which began in April and lasted more than a full month, when people from the south stopped the production and export of oil with the aim of pressuring the Dabaiba government to hand over power to Prime Minister Fathi. Bashagha was then appointed by Parliament in February 2022. For oil, and technically to
