Despite being dead for 13 years, Gaddafi is still a commanding figure in Libya

20 October, 2024 marks 13 years since the late Libyan leader, Muammer Gaddafi, was murdered as he tried to leave Sirte, his home town on the Mediterranean coast, where he made his last stand against the NATO-supported rebels. When he arrived there, Sirte was already under intense attack by the rebels and constant NATO bombardment. Getting inside the city was already difficult, while getting out of it was almost unthinkable for a man being hunted by everybody, including super powers using drones to locate him.

Contrary to the widely held belief that Gaddafi and his few companions fled Tripoli to Sirte as early as June 2011, he only arrived there on 23 August, 2011, during the last days of the holy month of Ramadan, according to his personal guard, Mohamed Khalifa, who stayed with him until his murder in October. After his boss’s death, Mr. Khalifa fled to Egypt, where he lives.

Faraj Ibrahim, a freelancing businessman, was at his home in Sirte receiving condolences for his two brothers who had been killed when fighting for Gaddafi. A man known to him arrived early in the morning. The unexpected visitor offered his condolences and asked Faraj to accompany him without actually telling him where they were going.

OPINION: ‘Sinwar is a symbol of resistance and role model for freedom fighters’

From that moment, Faraj’s life changed completely. He was taken to an apartment on the third floor in a nearby residential complex, where he found himself face to face with “the leader [Gaddafi] himself”, said Faraj. With excitement in his voice he added “I was very happy and relieved to see the leader well and safe in Sirte,” Faraj recalls. This was on 24 August, 2011, nearly two months before Gaddafi was murdered. Between April and October of that year, Faraj lost four brothers and 15 members of his extended family defending “Libya and the martyr [Gaddafi]”, he said.

Faraj’s role was two-fold: deliver Gaddafi’s instructions to fighters in Sirte and Bani Walid, further west where his brother, Moussa Ibrahim, spokesman of the government, receives them and informs fighters accordingly. Faraj’s second role was to secure daily necessities like food, fuel and medicine. He also made sure that Gaddafi’s messages were “recorded on cassette type”, digitised and sent via email to a TV channel in Syria.

Faraj, like the thousands of others who stood by Gaddafi until the last minute and still support him today, does not regret anything. He believes what he did was to “defend Libya against NATO and the gangs [the rebels]”. This level of loyalty and support to the point of making the ultimate sacrifice cannot be easily explained or understood, except in the context of a high sense of belonging to Libya and rejecting the external ”invasion by NATO”, Faraj pointed out to me over the phone from his self-imposed exile in Cairo, Egypt. Before ending up in Cairo, he spent over six years in jail in Misrata, enduring torture and mistreatment at the hands of the rebels.

And, still, even today, 13 years after his death, Gaddafi is still a popular figure in Libya and many think he is the most popular politician compared to all others who have populated the political scene of the fractured country. This support for the dead man still manifests itself in the annual celebrations marking the day on 1 September, 1969 that brought him to power.

This year the festivities were larger in scale, wider in scope and more people took to the streets in places like Sirte, Bani Walid, Sebha in the south and many more villages and towns. More young people took part in the celebration this year marking Gaddafi and his revolution 55 years ago. Most of those young people were children or teenagers, with little or no experience of what life was like under the man the mainstream media usually dismisses as a brutal dictator who would be quickly forgotten once he is dead. In Bani Walid, for example, the fete featured a Gaddafi look-alike, complete with bodyguard.

To Ali Al-Kilani, a top Libyan poet, lyricist and musician, Gaddafi “did not die” because he “indoctrinated meanings of sovereignty and dignity in Libyans” which remain part of their focus even after he is no longer around. Mr. Al-Kilani, speaking from his exile in Egypt, thinks Libya will “deliver another 100 Gaddafi who will liberate Libya again, making it an independent and sovereign country as it used to be under Gaddafi.”

OPINION: Freeing the world from colonial institutions

Professor Mustafa Elzaidi, a distinguished plastic surgeon, politician and former Gaddafi aide, said the “West did not really care about what happens to Libya after Gaddafi”; their only interest was to get rid of him and what comes after “can only be good”. Mr. Elzaidi, who was appointed Director of the Foreign Ministry in June 2011 was the contact point for foreign countries and secret diplomatic discussions in which, he said, countries like France never really told us “what they want and how they envision Libya beyond Gaddafi”, pointing out that Gaddafi’s personal secretary met French officials a couple of times during the 2011 civil war to find a way out. France and the United States were the leading powers behind the United Nations’ 1973 Resolution that authorised the use of force to topple Gaddafi, leading to his murder in October 2011.

Mr. Elzaidi believes that the “West does not want to see independent, strong and sovereign” regime in Libya, even if such regime “was voted in by the people” in fair elections. He said “unfortunately Libya, today, is run by foreign ambassadors who interfere in almost every major decision. Foreign meddling, he explained, is the biggest “hurdle and main cause of division of Libya today”. Since 2014, Libya has been divided under two different administrations, one in Tripoli and a parallel one in Benghazi, in the east. To Mr. Elzaidi this “de facto” partition could become real and another “one or two countries” could be made out of united Libya. One of the major reasons behind Gaddafi’s popularity today is his uncompromising rejection of foreign meddling.

Many Libyans share Mr. Elzaidi’ fears and are worried that their once united and stable country has already “died with Gaddafi”. However, Mr. Alkilani, the poet, is not worried about dividing the country. He said “Libyans who lived with Gaddafi” will always reject two things: “partition of their country and foreign military bases” on Libyan soil. Over the last few years, Turkiye and Russia have both increased and widened their military presence in Libya, supporting different sides of the conflict.

When it comes to Gaddafi’s popularity, Professor Elzaidi thinks the “failure of the successive governments that came to power after him” made people miss his days, while they compare life now with how the country was under Gaddafi”, he concluded.

If NATO intervention of 2011 aimed at “erasing everything” Gaddafi represented and make Libyans forget him, they have “failed badly”.

OPINION: The West’s hypocrisy is a bottomless pit for Palestinians

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.