Originally titled; "Operation Oil Theft: Month 12, Week 4, Day 1." on 11/3/12.
I have to start by saying that I am still having real trouble getting
quality information about the situation in Libya. However it is obvious
that the British agents who are still operating in the east of the
country are having some success. Apart from putting pressure on the
National Transitional Council (NTC) by desecrating British war graves
they have also played a significant role in organising the anti-NTC
protests that have been taking place in Benghazi pretty much since the
fall of the Qaddafi government.
Despite those protests boiling
over into violence in late January matters really came to a head last
Tuesday (6/3/12) when around 5000 tribal and militia leaders came
together in Benghazi, declared themselves to be the Cyrenaican Regional
Congress (CRC) and elected the 79 year old Ahmed Zubair al-Sennussi as
their leader. As is often the case in Libyan politics what the CRC wants
isn't exactly clear and doesn't seem particularly well thought through.
However they claim they want to set up some sort of federal form of
government that would see the NTC is overall control but Libya's three
main regions; Cyrenaica in the east, Fezzan in the south west and
Tripolitania in the north west acting as largely independent states. Of
course Cyrenaica has lots of oil, Fezzan has some oil and Tripolitania
has none at all.
The main problem with the CRC's unilateral
action is that Libya is just three months away from it's first elections
since well possibly ever. Planning for these elections and the laws
that govern them haven't considered a federal model at all and the CRC
don't seem to have an concrete suggestions as to how the technical
aspects of federalism would work in practice. Therefore I could go so
far to suggest that rather then setting up a federal system of
government the CRC want to use the issue as a way to promote a boycott
of the upcoming elections. They will then set up something closer to the
Saudi model which will see the nation divided into private fiefdoms run
for the benefit of a variety of Princes. Highlighting his complete lack
of understanding of what federalism actually involves al-Senussi is
totally wrong in his assertion that the USA and Germany were able to
achieve federalism without any problems. The federalisation of Germany
following world war two led to the country being divided into East and
West Germany for the best part of fifty years and America's attempts at
federalism led to the American civil war.
The fact that the CRC's
first act was to set up it's own army and the NTC has said that if need
be it will use it's army to resist the plan suggests that Libya could
be looking at a situation similar to the collapse of Yugoslavia in the
1990's. After almost a decade of war this saw Yugoslavia split into
Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Serbia, Kosovo and
Macedonia.
Fortunately at least 9000 Libyans are already aware of
this staging protests in both Tripoli (5000) and Benghazi (4000) on
Friday (9/3/12)
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