House of Representatives members have been subjected to maltreatment during their visits to rogue General Khalifa Haftar’s den in the eastern town of Rajma, MP Ali Al-Tikbali reveals.

Once Haftar’s mouthpiece, Al-Tikbali appeared in an anti-Khalifa Haftar TV channel to lambaste the brutal and rude treatment they had received in the Dignity Operation Command.

“Khalifa Haftar deliberately humiliated members of the parliament before meeting them in his office,” Al-Tikbali told Tunis-based Libya Alwatan TV Saturday, adding that he (Haftar) kept them waiting in the reception room for up to 5 hours and then took their mobile phones before allowing them to enter the office.

“We are the heads of the army, we are the heads of Haftar, why is this humiliation for the MPs?” Al-Tikbali wonders.

The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Aqailah Saleh, “the Supreme Commander of the Libyan Army”, was not an exception. In one of his visits, Khalifa Haftar’s guards ordered Aqailah to hand in his mobile phone before entering Haftar’s office, but he got angry and left, according to Al-Tikbali.

Al-Tikbali also accused a number of fellow MPs of corruption, saying they had received bribes in Tobruk and Tripoli.

“They took an LYD 250.000 dinar bribe in Tobruk and a similar amount in Tripoli,” he claimed without naming the corrupt MPs or identifying the party which paid the bribe.

In March, Aqailah Saleh and his entourage were denied access to a military ceremony in Tocra town by Khalifa Haftar’s guards because of his late arrival.