IJID Note: As this interview took place just before
the launching of the NATO military attack against Libya at
the end of March, it can be taken as a third party’s
testimony reflecting the feelings of most of Libyan people
just before the western aggression.
Leonor’s note:
First of all, I want to note that my testimony is my
personal opinion and I don't have any economic or political
interests. My only wish is to talk about the country and
about the people who live in it because I think there's a
lot of ignorance about it. In fact, all the mass media
information is being focused on a particular man (Gaddafi)
in a very biased way.
EP:
What are the big powers (US, NATO…) seeking in Libya? Will
they invade the country, following the UN resolution?
LM:
For sure, if Libya didn't have oil nobody would care and now
it wouldn't be on the front page of newspapers. For what
I've heard, when oil started to become exploited during the
time of King Idris, 80% of the profits went to foreign hands
and only 20% was for Libya. With the uprising of the tribes
against the King and the Gaddafi’s taking power, the
beneficiaries were inverted and Libya is now keeping 80% of
profits and just 20% is allocated to foreign companies.
Also, they have many oil wells closed because, as they say,
oil belongs not only to present but future Libyans as well.
In my view, these are very important factors explaining why
this man is a very big annoyance to the big powers and this
is the reason they want to take him out, rather than because
of the way he is ruling. Since Gaddafi came to power, Libya
and Libyan people have been punished initially with bombing
and then with a 30-year isolation. In addition to this, a
terrible defamatory campaign against the man has been
carried out, so that people come to believe that he is the
devil himself.
EP:
Do
you see fear in the population? Who do they fear the most?
LM:
Until now people were very carefree because they were living
very good times. They say that what they fear most is a
foreign intervention of the kind that happened in Iraq, and
Afghanistan, where, following a US intervention, the
countries are totally destroyed. Anyway, it is important to
take into account that Libya is a big country and that in
the south and the west the people really are calm and free
of trouble and that everything is happening in the region of
Cirenaica, at the northeast of the country. The majority of
Libyan people live the events from the outside, through TV
“reality”. They are very worried but they trust that the
situation will soon get resolved. They all know that the
foreign intervention has been crucial in creating all the
huge problems (in Iraq and Afghanistan), and they fear that
foreign intervention will happen in Libya too.
EP:
Can we talk of brief civil war in Libya?
LM:
This is something that I don't dare to say, although this
word is very much used by the western media. In fact, it is
a revolt by a group of people that were unhappy with the
existing government for long, a revolt that was instigated
from the outside. Thus, from the outside, the
“civil war
approach”
is used to explain the situation, and, at the same
time, instigate a revolt, whereas, within Libya, there has
been a call since the beginning of the conflict to leave
aside the weapons, and sit (with the tribes) to try to
resolve the differences which have always existed with the
region of Cirenaica. Libya being a tribal country, there is
a lot more of fear for losing somebody from one’s own tribe.
I know there is a big movement that tries to reach an
agreement inside Libya between the tribes. These days, while
the army was moving forward across the east, many tribes
from the east have talked publicly saying that they are with
the present government and that if nothing has been done
yet, it was because
of fear, as the rebels were very well-armed. People have
told me that more than 80% of the people are with the
existing government.
EP:
Two weeks ago, Gaddafi appeared corralled and alone. Was
that view right?
LM:
As far as I know, the Libyan government has never been
corralled. I think that what was happening within the
country were not as it was reported abroad. I think, this
was because the media reports which reached us (abroad)
originated from the people of the east and therefore they
gave a very biased version. If it was true that the
government massacred the people in Benghazi, with the
weapons available to the government, they could have easily
destroyed the centre of the insurrection as from the first
day, when the rebels
started burning buildings and stealing gunpowder. The
government knew about the preparations for the rebellion six
months before it happened and they have tried until the very
last moment to avoid it, through the tribes, and I sincerely
think that, without foreign intervention, it all would had
ended by now and surely it would have opened the way towards
dialogue.
EP:
Does Gaddafi suffer an exaggerated demonization, or is it
fair to describe him negatively?
LM:
My comments are about what is happening now and maybe I
don't know too much about this, but I'm convinced that they
are demonizing him with very determined goals. I think that
to judge one person and one country you have to know them
directly and also know the historical background of what's
been happening. Since I have a close contact with Libya, I
see changes and a genuine intention of improving the
country, the laws and all its structure. But it has to be
taken into account that a country that has been isolated for
so long can't be changed overnight. If there were impartial
observers of the changes in Libya during the last years, who
were committed
to analyze what was really happening in Libya, instead of
criticizing it ―as
if its leader were in war with them― possibly we wouldn't see the Libyan
government with the hardness it's now seen.
EP:
Can the rebels be qualified as revolutionaries, like the
Spanish media define them?
LM:
For what I know the Libyan rebels would be in part coming
from the Libyan political elite against the Gaddafi kind of
politics, which distributed the benefits of oil among Libyan
people and gave them the responsibility of the public life,
as well as paying for schools, public health, etc. In
addition to this fact, which by itself has created powerful
enemies against the existing government, there is also the
problem that some Benghazi tribes feel that the government
is not afraid of them and that they have been marginalized.
I've heard Libyans saying that this region has tried to
become independent because the majority of people there come
from Egypt and they are not “true/old Libyans”. I think that
those are the real reasons, on top of the external help and
anti-regime movements abroad, of which I don't have personal
knowledge but I think they do exist, as in Tunisia, Egypt,
Yemen, etc. I don't think that there is some sort of
contagion of revolt, as the media is reporting it. Just a
week before the revolt I was in Libya and I was moving
through lots of places and there were no indications of
anything like that, neither demonstrations nor discomfort.
In fact, what was happening was the opposite, as we saw when
we were visiting the thousands of houses that were almost
finished and were going to be given to the Libyans. I
remember that I was told that what happened in Tunisia or in
Egypt could never happen in Libya because the majority of
the people were happy there.
EP:
Have the rebels received money and weapons from abroad?
LM
That's what's told in Libya. To begin with they assaulted
the Libyan arsenals of the (Benghazi) zone and they stole
the weapons. When it was reported that the Libyan government
fired peaceful demonstrators, that wasn't true because the
rebels started from the beginning very aggressively.
EP:
In what things has the management of the Libyan government
failed?
LM:
It's difficult for me at this moment to talk badly of the
government, because they (the media) are already saying lots
of defamatory things of it and I don't want to contribute to
this campaign. It is clear that nobody is perfect, including
the Libyan government, but it has been in a very difficult
situation. Libyans are very proud and never hide their head
if not treated well, that's one of their characteristics and
it has brought them trouble in the past. Libya needs now to
improve lots of things and to establish rules to limit the
government powers, stop the corruption, etc. And in fact,
what I’ve seen in the recent past, as I have close contact
with Libya, is that they have been constantly improving the
situation, changing laws, etc., and, although people outside
Libya don't know it, Libya has moved a lot lately for the
benefit of the Libyan people and the tribes.
EP:
Does
a welfare state or women’s rights exist in Libya?
LM:
As far as I know,
Libya is the only Muslim country in which laws are equal for
men and women. Women go to university, as men, and
government pays for their postgraduate studies abroad as
well as for those of men. What I mean with that is that
there's a movement for change and, of course, changes are
widespread between one and another generation in Libya.
Precisely this huge change is what I've been studying. Of
course, after explaining the theory, I have to say that we
also have problems of gender inequality in Spain, perhaps
even more so than in some places in Libya. The truth is that
this is a subject I'd like to talk about another day,
because I've never seen in practice women having more power
than in Libya. As regards the welfare of Libyans, I'd say
that they live better than we do because they haven't
entered yet to the consumer society and they all have a
basic income. They are calm people, living for the
community, first for the family, then for the tribe. Nobody
suffers from hunger, although for the moment there are not
many luxuries or many varieties of consumer goods to
consume.
EP:
Would
you stay at the country?
LM:
Yes, definitely, yes. I like very much the country and its
people. They are people with very good values. I hope to be
able to return as soon as possible to visit all my beloved
Libyan family. I hope and wish that the present problems get
solved as soon as possible and my dream would be that we
dedicate ourselves to mediate in order to solve the present
problems, instead of instigating and promoting the revolts,
or looking for excuses to “intervene”.
Eloy Pardo