Governorates of Libya

[1][2] In 1970, after the 1 September 1969 Free Officers Movement coup, there was an administrative reorganization which gave local authorities more power to implement policies of the national government, and redesignated some of the names and boundaries of the ten governorates.

[3] In February 1975, Libya issued a law that abolished the governorates and their service directorates,[4] however they continued to operate[4] until they were fully replaced in 1983 by the baladiyat system districts.

[1] Historically, the three provinces of Libya (Tripolitania in the northwest, Cyrenaica in the east, and Fezzan in the southwest) were sometimes called governorates.

[citation needed] The original ten governorates were:[1][5] As early as 1973, Libya had been divided into forty-six baladiyat for census purposes.

[8] In 1983 Libya replaced the governorates structure with the district (baladiyah) one, creating forty-six districts.