As a Libyan living abroad how did you experience this change?

With enthusiasm but also with pain. The Libyan people had spent the past 42 years under a regime  that had deleted every sign of civil society. There were no political parties, no trade unions and associations too were not allowed. I have always been a pacifist and an antimilitarist so, from the beginning of the revolution, the requests for United Nations intervention seemed like an idealistic  defeat to me, but for my people this was a victory. I felt very apprehensive and impotent during that phase because the regime’s tanks were 500 metres from my mother’s house. For 16 years I was unable to set foot in my country because there was no freedom whatsoever. Take the media for example. All the newspapers that no one ever read belonged to the state, and, furthermore, there was also censorship, so any policeman could stop the publication, for example, of an article written by a university professor. Now instead there is hope there will be change.

What analogies and what differences did you perceive between the Libyan, Tunisian and Egyptian situations?

Tunisia, the country that sparked the Arab Spring, did have an opposition, albeit a silenced one, and, although it was passive it had a parliament. There was also an organised state, an army and a constitution, elements that allowed the opposition to arise from within the regime. Now a president has been elected (Moncef Marzouki) who was a member of the opposition in exile and also the only politician to predict what happened.

Egypt had a far more organised regime compared to Tunisia’s, one that had even planned the succession from father to son within the Mubarak family. In spite of all its privileges, the army decided to distance itself from the regime when it became clear that the people in Tahrir Square would sweep away the entire system.

In Libya instead the situation was different because there was no state organisation, no constitution, no parliament and no political parties. On the contrary, anyone trying to create an association risked a death sentence. So for over forty years civil society was deprived of its capacity to organise itself.

So there were all the elements required to predict what happened?

There were all the signs, but no analyst, no strategist in the world’s chancelleries wanted to consider them, because they all probably placed their trust in the century-old resignation of the Arab-Islamic people and the power of the dictatorships’ security services. But there were all the signs, even the  United Nations had devoted a series of studies to the Arab world that stated that corruption was widespread as was rising unemployment, all symptoms of a decline in power that could not last long.

Exploiting these countries and having strategic control over the region suited the western chancelleries, and while there was talk of exporting democracy, nothing was done to help the Arab masses and their progress in this sense.

In your book you have devoted a chapter to the role played by women, but you speak of a separation more than of discrimination. Why is that?

The difference between men and women is greatly emphasized in Libyan society. For centuries this separation was vertical, with women devoted to procreation and running the home and men guaranteeing income and acting as the heads of families. This is not an easily changed situation, but ever since the Fifties Libyan women have fought for their rights and in this situation too they have played a fundamental role.

Imagine, since 2008 it was women who organised the sit ins outside the seats of power to ask for truth and justice for those who died in the Abu Selim prison. The roots of the revolution should be searched for right there, among the families of detainees killed in 1996 who discovered the truth only ten years later. For years they experienced the anxiety of not knowing and many continued to visit the prison to try and see their dear ones, to bring them food, clothes and money that the guards took without ever telling them what had happened. This is the genesis of the revolution and that is why I do not believe the idea of a plot put forth by those who say it was led from abroad.

What is the country’s economic situation at the moment and how important a role will oil play in re-launching Libya and in international relations?

Libya is a wealthy country, but the Libyans are mostly poor. I have analysed the situation on the basis of pre-revolution Libyan government documents and on the basis of data provided by the Libyan Central Bank.

20% of all families live below the poverty line and 30% of all young people are unemployed. Many of the young cannot marry and have a family because they cannot afford to buy a house. This gives one an idea of the contradictions experienced by society in an oil country where the ruling family spent millions of dollars.

The future lies in reconstruction and I believe those who have returned from exile are capable of guaranteeing a peaceful future. Libya has the means to turn itself around but this is its last chance to do so. In the Fifties Libya exported wheat to Egypt and this proves the country has significant agricultural capabilities. If the oil resources are exploited also to support real economic revival, then the country will become competitive again. We need to exploit solar energy too and not just hydrocarbon resources, and then there are also the many tourist attractions as well as two thousand kilometres of beaches and the immense desert.

As far as international relations are concerned, there are foreign economic interests that have never been interrupted, firstly with Italy. From now on what matters is the stability of these relations because ‘making a fast buck’ will no longer happen and I have observed that the Italian government’s reactions have been moving in the right direction.

I my book I speak of a bottom-up people’s democracy also at an international level, in the sense that citizens in neighbouring countries such as Italy will be unable to avoid looking to Libya. The trade unions for example should contribute to creating similar organisations in the south of the word, but not in the sense of providing aid.

Libya is often described as a tribal country. Is it really?

In speaking of Libya, many analysts have based their opinions on pre-colonial studies dating back to the end of the 19th Century, but customs in those days were linked to sheep-farming and seasonal agriculture. The various local communities, or tribes if one wishes, were therefore in conflict with one another. But even during the colonial period, in the Thirties, half of the Libyan population lived on the coast and in cities and no longer in the country. During the Fifties half of the population lived between Tripoli and Benghazi and the tribal bonds no longer existed by then.

Gaddafi used the tribal issue because he wanted to divide society into tribes and he even appointed leaders obliging them to meet occasionally, but they effectively represented no one.

Libya is not a tribal country, there are many different territories and different ethnic groups, but not tribes, and all the clashes there are at the moment concern economic interests and are not tribal conflicts.

There are many gangs that live off smuggling goods since prices are still controlled by the state and this therefore leads to clashes, for example, at the border with la Tunisia. Having control over Tripoli Airport, with its border, involves millions of dollars of smuggled goods and is worth a great deal of money. These are the real instabilities in Libya, but the attempt to create a democracy, in spite of the problems experienced by people who have never voted in 42 years, has proved the Libyan people’s capacity in wanting to embark on a democratic and peaceful process.

Translated by Francesca Simmons

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