Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi: Game over, now to the Next Battle
Game over for the Jamahiriya - at least for now. The battle for Tripoli has ended with the rebels taking over the Libyan capital, removing the green flags, replacing them with those of the old Senoussi monarchy. While Muamar Gaddafi remains missing, Green Square and most of the neighborhoods have been the scenes of jubilation as a surprising number of people have come out to celebrate the rebels.
During their sweep of the city, the anti-regime forces were first rumored to have captured the most notorious children of the regime, Seif Al-Islam and Saadi Gaddafi, two of Mu’ammar’s sons. But on Monday, Seif appeared among his supporters apparently free. As for Muamar Gaddafi, the ‘Brother Leader of the Revolution’ (akh al-Qaid ul-thaura), his official title, his whereabouts and state remain unknown; there have been rumors that he has tried to cross the border to Algeria or captured on his way to Tunisia. Nevertheless - seeing as the rebels control all major routes out of the capital - it seems unlikely that he would have attempted an escape by road. Regardless of the current state of the Gaddafi family, Tripoli has fallen and the dictator has lost.
After months of bloody civil war, the first chapter of the Libyan crisis has ended as expected. Muamar Gaddafi promised fire, blood and tears and he, no doubt, delivered. Scores of people died over the past months, culminating this Sunday with the death of more than 1,000 people in the capital Tripoli. Yet, as we predicted, the Gaddafi fire extinguished naturally under the pressure of the Libyan people, aided by the West’s airpower.
The takeover of Tripoli by the rebels occurred at a surprising pace, exceeding the most optimistic scenarios. It happened as soon as the towns of Zleiten and Zawiyah, east and west of the capital fell under the control of the rebels just before the past weekend. This also happened as the regime within it crumbled. The defection of Muammar Gaddafi's former aid and revolutionary companion, Major Abdel Salam Jalloud on Friday was a clear indicator that Gaddafi’s support system among his loyalists and tribesmen has evaporated. With Jalloud gone, all the security apparatus defending Gaddafi had to withdraw support, seeing as so many members of the Revolutionary Committees were drawn from the Maghraha tribe to which Jalloud belongs. Upon defecting from Libya, Jalloud is said to have pleaded with the Qadhaffa tribe, Gaddafi’s tribe, to disown the Libyan leader, who had brought shame on his tribe and Libya.
The First Post-Gaddafi Chapter:
As this chapter ends, another more difficult one starts. The post-Gaddafi era is full of risks and Libya is likely to face a multi-year transition period. Observers need to watch at least three things:
- In the short term, we are assuming that rogue elements will operate under the radar to undermine any progress on the political front. They will work hard to pit tribes against one another. The use of shadowy agents is common practice in the Arab world. We have seen it in Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, and we believe Muamar Gaddafi has developed some of the strongest underground destabilization networks in the Arab world.
- The Libyan Interim National Council will be in a very difficult position. The easiest part is now behind it as the Libyans were unified to unseat the dictator. Now that the task is completed, the ability of the Council to manage the next steps will be severely crippled by expected disagreements over policy and political directions. Tribal issues, the inevitable pressure from Islamist elements (who doubtless played a very prominent role in the uprising) resource allocations, and countless problems are likely to create divisions.
- International meddling will only heighten the problems. The West may have a different plan for Libya than say its Algerian and Egyptian neighbors. The position of the Islamists too remains unclear but we should assume that they would want to play a role in the future of Libya.
As the new Libya comes to life, so do the first challenges and difficulties. The country has no constitution that would manage a smooth transition. As we mentioned all along this conflict, Libya is in a worst situation than the troubled Tunisia and Egypt. Unlike these two North African nations, Libya has no viable institutions able to act as glue and pilot a transition period. Questions remain about the ability of the Transitional Council in Benghazi to bring stability in the ravaged country, where tribal politics could have a problematic impact.
Until this rather Shakespearean drama unfolded, Libya has had a semblance of a parliament, the General People’s Congress (GPC), which met annually in the style of the Chinese Communist Party, and it even had a prime minister like figure, the general secretary of the GPC; however, the prime minister was at best an administrator or a caretaker of decisions made exclusively by Gaddafi. Libya was formally granted independence in 1949 after a UN Resolution to this effect. The system of government that was adopted, after various international consultations, taking Libya’s tribal and historical legacy into consideration was Federal. The aim was for the monarchy to form gradually a more centralized government from a federal ‘launch-pad’.
The current Libyan state, if it can even be called a ‘State’, has no Constitution as such, which would make the formation of a viable state difficult. The closest document approaching a Constitution or offering some guidance is Gaddafi’s own prescription of governance as written in the Green Book and the ‘Third Universal Theory’ (the first being Capitalism and the second Communism) that inspired it. Essentially, Gaddafi has shunned institutions to establish a horizontal system with him overseeing it. Gaddafi’s ‘unique’ system of government was buttressed by two essential elements, which may be likened to institutions: the oil sector, in the form of the National Oil Company and the Security apparatus headed by the Revolutionary Committees. If the latter group is known for its loyalty, brutality and resistance to change and reform, the former has be run efficiently by some of Libya’s leading officials, chosen for their ability and efficiency rather than kinship ties or loyalty to the Leader. In this sense then, the NOC may serve an important purpose in producing the future leadership of Libya. However, such leadership will not be enough to reduce the stress that the country will face on the political front. One quick solution would be to adopt the Constitution from the monarchical period, which guaranteed freedom of the press and legislative elections. The rest will have to be ‘built’ from the ground up.
And so at this stage, the unity of the country carries a big question mark, and we believe those who will emerge as the next generation of leaders should consider and Federated Libya instead. If anything that would emerge from the ongoing crisis in the Arab world is the fact that centralized government in big territories, do not work. Central governments have erected massive hurdles to their people, stifling their ethnic, cultural and religious rights, taken away resources from them and dividing them to create false problems and crises. We believe the Libyans should consider a single nation with states that have a great deal of autonomy in managing their own affairs.