March 7, 2011




by Praful Bidwai




The whirlwind of popular protests that overthrew Tunisian president Zine el-Abedin Ben Ali and Egypt’s long-standing ruler Hosni Mubarak shows no sign of abating. The entire Arab world is in revolt, from Yemen and Bahrain in the Persian Gulf to Morocco and Algeria in the Maghreb, and to Sudan and Djibouti in the South. Even the Saudi Arabian and Kuwaiti regimes are beginning to look vulnerable. Protests in one country are inspiring revolts in other countries as people go through a process of creative learning-by-doing.




It is in Libya that matters are coming to a head. Colonel Muammar Gaddafi faces an unprecedented and powerful popular revolt and has lost territory along a 600 km-stretch along the Mediterranean Sea, including major cities like Benghazi and Misrata to the opposition. Sections of the army have gone over to the protesters. And ministers (including the justice minister) and diplomats have resigned in large numbers.




Mr Gaddafi’s regime, in power since 1969, has responded to peaceful protests by unleashing savage repression, and killing over 1,000 people. His troops and mercenaries hired by him are using heavy-calibre weapons against unarmed demonstrators. Libyan air force warplanes are attacking the oil town of Brega.




Mr Gaddafi has declared he has no intention of quitting and he will fight to “the last drop of his blood”. In a hysterical outburst in Tripoli, Mr Gaddafi maligned the protesters as drug addicts, radical Islamists and American agents. He threatened: “Libya will burn.” His rants merely prove that he’s desperate and feels beleagured. His support base is extremely thin and he has no influential friends at home or abroad who can come to his rescue. Meanwhile, the opposition forces are closing in on Tripoli. It is a matter of time before Mr Gaddafi makes his ignominious exit.




However, the post-Gaddafi transition in Libya won’t be easy. The country has no political parties, trade unions, civil society organisations or NGOs. But tiny Libya (pop. 6.5 million) has a lot of oil. It’s Africa’s third-largest oil producer and has the continent’s biggest proven oil reserves—44 billion barrels. So the Western powers, led by the United States, are propping up groups like the National Front for the Salvation of Libya, which would like to pursue a pro-West oil policy and reinstall the monarchy which Mr Gaddafi overthrew in 1969.




The US is repositioning its warplanes and ships close to Libya. Neoconservatives, who had earlier grouped under the Project for a New American Century, and now use another banner, Foreign Policy Initiative, have demanded that the US should militarily intervene in Libya to help topple Mr Gaddafi. The UK and Germany too are making bellicose sounds




Such fervent “humanitarian” appeals were never made when Israel invaded Gaza in 2009, killing hundreds of civilians. Nor are they being made in respect of the slavishly pro-US dictatorships which rule in Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain.




Mercifully, Libya’s opposition has firmly rejected the idea of external military intervention, although it welcomes humanitarian aid and measures like a “no-fly zone” imposed by the UN Security Council, which would prevent Mr Gaddafi from using warplanes to attack civilians.




One of Libya’s characteristics is the prevalence of strong and distinct tribal identities, which have not been knit together into national institutions. The loyalty of Mr Gaddafi’s own tribe, Al-Gaddadfa, one of Libya’s 15 major ethnic groupings, will be crucial to his survival. He will finally rely on his ultra-loyal, well-armed 3,000-strong Revolutionary Guard Corps drawn primarily from his tribe. But if recent trends are anything to go by, Al-Gaddadfa loyalty could prove fickle. In many parts of Libya, troops sent to put down protests turned around and joined the opposition. Reportedly, cracks are appearing in the Al-Gaddadfa tribe’s unity.




Mr Gaddafi’s Libya is a sordid case of mis-governance and brutally repressive rule. The dictator gained some credibility early on when he deposed King Idris, nationalised Libya’s oil, and promoted pan-Arab and pan-African solidarity. But he has squandered it. Despite the oil wealth, a third of all Libyans are unemployed. And the country has increasingly followed the neoliberal policies of capitalist globalisation, which have marginalized and impoverished people and degraded their living conditions. Mr Gaddafi has no solutions to offer to his people’s problems.




Yet, he recently became a favourite of the US which saw him as “a strong partner in the war against terrorism”. According to WikiLeaks cables, the US Ambassador in Tripoli regarded him as a major force “to blunt the ideological appeal of radical Islam”.




Mr Gaddafi will have to go sooner or later—hopefully, very soon. That should send a strong signal to authoritarian and autocratic Arab governments: Reliance on brute force—a Gaddafi specialty, unlike in Egypt, where Mr Mubarak restrained the army, and called back his thugs who attacked crowds in Tahrir Square on February 2—cannot ensure regime survival. It’s best to negotiate a transition to some kind of democracy and broad-based government while it’s still possible.




The problem is, that’s becoming increasingly difficult, if not impossible, in most countries in West Asia-North Africa which have seen protests ignited by popular aspirations for democracy and accountable governance, for food security and employment, and for modernisation of society and politics. The mould of conservatism and backwardness in which Arab rulers had cast their societies for decades is breaking up. There is a great urge for freedom and liberation from despotic rule and for an open society.




There is a fear in the West and among some circles even in India that Islamist radicals like the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and even al-Qaeda would stand to gain the most if existing regimes are toppled. This fear is grossly exaggerated. The Brotherhood is a relatively moderate organisation which does not practise violence and believes in a degree of pluralism. In Egypt, it was only one of four components of the movement that toppled Mr Mubarak—the others being the youth, the radical Left, and a disaffected middle class fed up with economic uncertainty and corruption.




The Brotherhood didn’t try to take over the anti-Mubarak movement, but worked with a broad coalition, of which former diplomat and International Atomic Energy Agency chief Mohammed El Baradei is the foremost leader.




As for al-Qaeda, it has played absolutely no role in the opposition movements that have toppled rulers in Egypt and Tunisia and are gathering momentum elsewhere in the Arab world. This is so despite the fact that Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri, an Egyptian, have declared many of the Arab world’s dictators un-Islamic and Western puppets for years, including Mr Mubarak. As a US scholar puts it: “Knocking off Mubarak has been Zawahiri’s goal for more than 20 years, and he was unable to achieve it. Now a non-violent non-religious pro-democracy movement got rid of him in a matter of weeks. It’s a major problem for al-Qaeda.”




Al-Zawahiri’s disconnect also became evident in the rambling, unfocussed statements he issued from his hideout. The fact that al-Qaeda could not take advantage of the turmoil in the Arab world to instigate militancy and religious fanaticism and had to sit by idly as historic events flew past it spells a strategic setback and defeat for its jehadi ideology. Clearly, that kind of fanaticism has no appeal for Arab youth.




The real challenge before the popular revolts in the Arab world is not how to fight jehadi Islam, but how to bring about a transition to radical democracy which empowers people. This is still an unfinished task even in Egypt. The army is still in power in Egypt. It has not yet revoked the state of emergency, freed political prisoners, or announced an interim government which can hold elections to a constituent assembly.




Meanwhile, some components of the Egyptian movement, like that led by Google’s marketing head Wael Ghonim have sloughed off from the main body. What is emerging is a de-centred movement, which skilfully uses social network tools like Facebook and Twitter, and whose demands have expanded beyond the issues of unemployment and poverty that ignited the original rebellion. How the transition to a radical democracy which expresses aspirations for freedom and economic empowerment will happen still remains unclear.




But hopefully, the movement in the Arab world will inspire similar aspirations and struggles outside the region—just as movements in Venezuela, Bolivia, Argentina, Brazil and Chile in Latin America did during the last decade.




Even if conservative or status quo-ist forces take over the movements, and abort the transition to participatory democracy, the movements’ demands, aspirations and mobilisation methods won’t go away. The shock waves generated by demonstrations, strikes, self-defence committees and other forms of popular mobilisation will find resonance in many other parts of the world which have also been hit by neoliberal globalisation, the recent global explosion in food prices, and rising unemployment.




The Arab world could become the midwife of great changes in the world. We must all wish the popular revolts well and express solidarity with them.—end--