Highlights: Libya commemorates the revolution of February 17, 2011 which ended, with NATO intervention, almost 45 years of power of Colonel Gaddafi. For the occasion, the outgoing Prime Minister, Abdelhamid Dbeibah, wanted a grandiose celebration in Tripoli, despite strong opposition from the population. Young people protested in front of the large stage erected on the Place des Martyrs, against the millions spent. In eastern Libya, the Osama Hammad government, for its part, canceled all festivities in solidarity with the city of Derna.

Libya: commemorations, divisions and social protest this February 17

This Saturday, Libya commemorates the revolution of February 17, 2011 which ended, with NATO intervention, almost 45 years of power of Colonel Gaddafi. For the occasion, the outgoing Prime Minister, Abdelhamid Dbeibah, wanted a grandiose celebration in Tripoli, despite strong opposition from the population.

Libyan Prime Minister Abdelhamid Dbeibah here in Tripoli on July 24, 2023. © Yousef Murad / AP

By: Houda Ibrahim Follow

Abdelhamid Dbeibah employed a Canadian company to organize the event, responsible for bringing in renowned foreign artists. Determined to establish his power by relying on the symbolic dimensions of this celebration, the Libyan Prime Minister was however confronted with strong opposition.

Taken to task by the demonstrators who challenged him, the Libyan Prime Minister launched, in a threatening tone, “we are

going to celebrate February 17 despite everything

”. Young people protested in front of the large stage erected on the Place des Martyrs, against the millions spent.

Elsewhere, in Tripoli, in Souk al Jomaa, a working-class neighborhood, young people gathered in the street demanded that the attorney general open an investigation into the money spent for this festival and opposed the waste of public money.

Guards at the Mellita oil complex, also in western Libya, protested by blocking the entrance to the complex. They too have not received their salaries since last November and consider themselves marginalized.

In Zentan, it is the city's Military Council which denounces the corruption of the Dbeibah government, "

a government of thieves

", accuse the protesters.

The hearts of the majority of the population are indeed not celebrating. The dinar continues to fall against the dollar, and the quality of life index in Libya has further fallen by several points in 2023.

The stakes rise between the two governments

In eastern Libya, the Osama Hammad government, for its part, canceled all festivities in solidarity, he announced, with the city of Derna, victim of bad weather which caused the death and disappearance of close of 15,000 people last September. A decision also taken in solidarity with the town of Zleiten which has been experiencing, for more than a month, an incomprehensible rise in groundwater levels.

► Also read:

Floods in Libya: the Derna disaster could have been avoided, experts conclude

Tripoli recalls that Benghazi celebrated, last month, with great fanfare, the choice of this city as the world capital of Islamic culture. Fifteen billion Libyan dinars were then spent, without the agreement of any administrative authority whatsoever.

Libya suffers from a very high level of corruption, in all state administrations, but also from wasteful public spending.

Libya: commemorations, divisions and social protest this February 17

Libya: commemorations, divisions and social protest this February 17

The stakes rise between the two governments

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