Libya’s Berber minority will boycott a committee to draft a new national constitution, the election commission said yesterday, in a move that complicates attempts to end oil and gas protests which have dented output.

Members of the Berber, or Amazigh, minority have halted gas exports to Italy and also stopped part of Libyan oil exports by occupying the Mellitah port in western Libya to demand more rights for their long-oppressed people.

The Amazigh, who live in western Libya, demand their language to be guaranteed in the constitution that will be drafted as a step in the country’s transition to democracy after Muammar Gaddafi was toppled two years ago. But attempts by the government and parliament to end the Mellitah protest seem stalling after the Amazigh High Council, which represents their interests, boycotted elections to create the 60-member committee drafting the new constitution.

The struggle for oil wealth, power and representation for the various tribes and militia who helped unseat Gaddafi lies at the heart of Libya’s problems as it tries to forge institutions and the rule of law from the debris of more than 40 years of esoteric rule. A wave of strikes has knocked down output to a fraction of its capacity of 1.25 million barrels a day reducing the revenue needed for nation building.