In its annual report for 2017, the Libyan Audit Bureau announced in a press conference in Tripoli on Wednesday that the Libyan governments spent 277 billion dinars between 2012 and 2017, adding that the general debt due to the closure of oilfields in the same period reached 58 billion dinars.

The report indicated that Libya’s oil revenue in 2017 was improved but did not enhance economic conditions, rather was only used in dropping government deficit and adding to reserves, reaffirming that political division and two central banks as well as lack of security challenged its work as it could include the Presidential Council government alone without the Al-Bayda-based Interim Government.

“The central bank is responsible for the stalemate in the proposed economic reform. The governor of the central bank directly rejected implementing the reforms until they are approved by the House of Representatives, yet since October 2017 until the issuing of this report, there is no evidence that the reforms were sent to the HoR.” The report says.

Meanwhile, the Head of the Audit Bureau, Khalid Shakshak, said in the presser that contractions worth 1.6 billion were about to be paid to foreign firms but for the Audit Bureau’s investigation and finding that the deals were corrupted, not to mention corruption spotted in Libyan embassies and foreign investments.

Shakshak added that scholarships are being haphazardly granted to students and thus the Audit Bureau stopped some of them, referring also to the cashing of 200 million to prices balancing fund, which did nothing to the Libyan market.

Shakshak accused a minister at the Interim Government of obliging the government of paying 450 million euros to a foreign partner involved in corruption cases, adding that several lawsuits protected Libya from paying compensations money to foreign firms.

Source: Libya Observer