The war has ended, but when will the revolutionaries comprehend the people’s phrase: “Thank you for your efforts”? Libya now needs construction not your weapons that have spread havoc, killings and intimidation in the country. Will they also turn into a “deaf rock” and fight to the last man?
The war has ended, but when will the revolutionaries comprehend the people’s phrase: “Thank you for your efforts”? Libya now needs construction not your weapons that have spread havoc, killings and intimidation in the country. Will they also turn into a “deaf rock” and fight to the last man?
“You must be kidding!” said Gaddafi previously with surprise and anger, in response to the Libyans who said, “Thank you for your efforts.” He was surprised how the people could rebel against him while he was “the struggler, the revolutionary and the undisputed leader” who over forty years, had only heard cheering, glorification and deification from the people wherever he had gone. It was not easy for him to accept that phrase; therefore, he swore he would be “a deaf rock” and would never give up until he died! And that is exactly what happened!
The February revolution fighters triumphed and the people welcomed them as hero conquerors while the media called them “brave revolutionaries.” The crowds and the public and private media resumed cheering, glorifying and praising the new victors, using the same old chants and songs but with some modification and amendment. Warriors thus came into a perfect rapture, realizing how delightful the power and crowd cheering were and felt that they had risen from the gutter to the ranks of prophets and angels, and perhaps even more.
The days of the euphoria of victory and its spoils safely passed, until the crowds lined up in ballot box queues. How annoying democracy, its rituals and the people’s choices were, which alone disturbed the new deified revolutionaries who realized how painful the people’s cry was that had previously enraged Gaddafi: “Thank you for your efforts.”
“You must be kidding!” said the rebels with the same surprise and anger of Gaddafi, “We are the rebellious fighters who liberated Libya inch by inch! We have our rifles and will stay clinging to our weapons to the last bullet and the last man!” Will they do it? We also fear that NATO soldiers will follow them and claim their share, since it is undeniable that they had a lion’s share of the fight against Gaddafi.
What happened? Is not the revolution a revolution of the entire people, against injustice and tyranny to establish a state of justice, law and institutions? How has it been monopolized by a group of armed men who installed themselves as guardians and protectors of the people and the revolution to control the people and their destiny?
We are well aware that those misconceiving the people were only created to perform this role and to simply be extras wandering with their weapons in the streets, to create chaos, spread terror and practice intimidation for the benefit of key players in the Libyan scene. So, where are the people concerned with this revolution?
They will not give up their weapons – except very few – and will fight as Gaddafi did to the last man, because those who have imagined that they have been elevated to the ranks of gods will not be pleased to live among the rabble and will not stand in queues to buy bread or vote.
This is exactly what happened to the brave revolutionaries. After two years of deification, glorification, enthusiasm, songs of praise, and dancing, they now believe they are immortal. However, no fig leaves could cover their shame. They claimed they revolted against injustice, but their practices have been more unjust and violent. They claimed supporting freedom and justice, but they have filled prisons with innocents, evacuated the residents of whole villages and spread havoc, murder and intimidation.
Warriors have found that Gaddafi’s slogans and governance methodology are their long-sought goal. They have reproduced his concepts and followed in his footsteps. Perhaps they will get forty years or more of revolutionary legitimacy, like their predecessor.
Like Gaddafi’s slogan “Conqueror Forever”, “The Revolution is Continuous and Rebels Forever” slogan has re-emerged. They have created the Supreme Council of Revolutionaries, like the Revolution Command Council led by Gaddafi until his death, and placed rebels’ brigades in every city and neighborhood, following the “Revolutionary Committees are Everywhere” slogan under Gaddafi.
Some have replaced the curly hairdo with a beard, some have put on Che Guevara’s hat, and others tolerated wearing the traditional Libyan hat – worn by Adviser Mustafa Abdul Jalil during the revolution – following the example of and in line with the new February spirit. Dates and names have changed but revolutionary mania has remained, and Libya has disappeared once again.
Raids of revolutionary committees in the 1980s have resurfaced, and the so-called armed dawn visitors under Gaddafi have now come, post- revolution, to storm houses and public and private institutions in broad daylight, in search of opponents and all those discontented with and rejecting the new revolutionists’ tyranny.
In the name of revolutionary legitimacy, checkpoints and teams of inspection; kidnapping; torture; murder; and seizing houses, farms, belongings, cars, and private and public property have been created.
Justification of such violations do not differ from Gaddafi’s. In an old interview with BBC – recently published on YouTube – Gaddafi, when asked about his attitude toward the violations, crimes and assassinations committed by the Revolutionary Committees in that period, replied that these practices did not represent the revolution or the Libyan state, but were simply personal actions he condemned.
Today, we literally hear the same answer from “February revolutionaries” who go so far as to divide themselves to genuine revolutionaries who are, they claim, the protectors of the revolution, and disingenuous revolutionaries who commit crimes of burglary, theft, kidnapping and murder and terrorize innocent people.
Even if this classification is true, the former ensure a safe environment for the gangs that commit crime and horrific abuses in a country where the revolution has turned into a career and a short way for quick richness.
If those “genuine revolutionaries” had seriously wanted to contribute to building a state of law and institutions, they would have stepped aside and handed over the arms and would not have formed such alien bodies or the so-called militias, brigades, or military councils; the state has nothing to do with them.
It is the privileges of power and spoils of ongoing revolution that makes many people cling to arms and ammunition to fight the state and dictate their conditions and demands. And as their ancestors said, they have paid the price for their survival, so to hell with the country. We do not deny that some of them might in fact be loyal and zealous for their country, but these have turned into mere dolls who themselves do not know the parties that move them.
Indeed, many revolutionaries have turned into mere armed dolls used and moved to destroy their country unconsciously. Horror has been planted in their hearts, and those parties have made the return of Gaddafi and his regime a fear that haunts these young people. Many of them have been convinced of clinging to arms and staying in their barracks because fear of Gaddafi’s return has turned into a phobia and unwarranted hysterical horror.
The man died, but those young men do not know that the sole purpose of spreading horror in their hearts is to persuade them not to give up arms. This is to continue chaos and gain more time to turn Libya into a new Iraq where, after more than ten years, the conflicting parties still use the scarecrow of Saddam and the Baath, so that looting, attrition and disrupting of judicial and regulatory institutions and consequently the state persist.
Rest assured. Despite the accumulation of arms in your homes, you will never fight shoulder to shoulder in defense of Libya as you did the first time. As they have succeeded in dividing Iraq into rival communities and sects, they have actually succeeded in dividing Libya into secularists, Salafists, Sufis and Muslim Brotherhood; into the oppressed east and south and luxurious west – as the new media promotes – and into Tubu, Arabs and Berbers and many other tribal affiliations and rival sub-identities. Libya is no longer one. In the name of pluralism, we now enjoy racial diversity and regional chauvinism. Each team is delighted by what it has and reassured to its military ability to deter the Libyan other, rather than, of course, the foreign other.
All have taken up arms on the pretext that they are revolutionaries, while in fact they are more like those who commit suicide out of fear of being killed. They cling to arms on the plea of caution and fear for Libya, not knowing that they are actually destroying it and turning it into a quagmire for fighting, crime and corruption.
Of course, no party will ever hand arms over as long as there is another party clinging to weapons on any pretext. Under arms proliferation and contrived insecurity, they provide an appropriate environment for tribal conflicts, looting, disabling state institutions, disrupting the economy, destroying the country, and making a new Somalia or Iraq out of it. When will you learn the lesson? No sane man would accept wronging his own people.
Who will restore spirit to revolutionaries who have unfortunately turned into mere armed dolls, pawns falling on the chessboard of dirty politics and just militias of parties and figures rushing upon power?
