Show your friends a video of Colonel Qaddafi going off on one of his many rants or tirades and ask them the first word that comes to mind. I would wager that a significant number of those responses would involved or be the word “buffoon.”
I am here to tell you to stay away from that word. Go beyond the rhetoric, the designer sunglasses, his busty blonde nurse and his attempts to convert supermodels to Islam. Colonel Qaddafi, for all of his unique qualities and eccentricities may come off as a buffoon, yet he is anything but. Qaddafi is the longest ruling contemporary leader. He has seen 8 American Presidents (from Nixon to Obama), 5 Soviet General Secretaries, 4 Saudi Kings and 3 Egyptian and Russian Presidents come and go during his time. He witnessed the collapse of the Soviet Union, the rise of the United States as the world’s sole superpower and is now witnessing the rise of China. He has survived his fair share of assassination attempts, both internal and external. And now, he faces his greatest internal threat yet.
His time may be running out, but do not write him off just yet. Qaddafi is as politically astute as he is eccentric. He is politically and ideologically malleable, which has kept him relevant while other leaders have been voted out and overthrown. While he remains firmly entrenched in a political and diplomatic third way and non-aligned, he also hopped around ideologically, first as a pan-Arabist intent on joining, and then emulating Syria and Egypt’s United Arab Republic atthe peak of the Arab Socialist movement, then as that movement lost steam, he jumped ship and became a proponent of pan-Islamism. Recently, seeing opportunity to the south, Qaddafi reframed himself as a pan-African leader, eventually being appointed to the chair of the African Union, the first to come from an Arab country[i]. He even took the time, back in the mid-1970s, to put his ideas to paper in his aptly named Green Book, which he still refers to whenever given the opportunity.
Internally, he squelched internal division caused by tribal rivalries in order to strengthen his power base and put forth a remarkably progressive social agenda, though much of that is being undone as this is written. Libya today is certainly not the Libya of yesteryear. It has among the highest standards of living, median income, life expectancies, and literacy rates in Africa. Libya, at least ostensibly, is socially progressive. Since the peak of his radicalism in the 1980s, which saw Libya become a training ground and bank for radical movements the world over, from the Irish Republican Army to the Red Army Faction, he has moderated – tremendously, all but apologizing for and paying reparation to Pan Am 103 and UTA 772 victims, ending his WMD program, reestablishing diplomatic relations with the United States and strengthening ties with the European Union, all while maintaining his unique brand of national leadership.
As Libya approaches the fine line that separates failing states and failed states, and as his forces commit further attrocities against his people, as members of the armed forces and foreign representatives begin to defect, one must consider Colonel Qaddafi’s past. He has ruled Libya for his entire adult life, and, through his peculiar cult of personality, has become as much a part of the country as the country has become a part of him. Colonel Qaddafi may as well claim the infamous line "L'État, c'est moi."
Image Credit:
blatantnews.com (License)
[i] The Organization for African Unity, the African Union’s predecessor had several Arab leaders as chairmen, including Gamal Abdel Nasser
No comments:
Post a Comment