Role of the working class in the Libyan Question! The Libyan Revolution is an unfinished drama in which the fall of Gaddafi was just the first act. The future will be determined by the struggle of living forces and the final outcome is not yet decided. Different outcomes are possible – both revolutionary and counterrevolutionary. Future developments will be determined by events both inside Libya and on an international scale. It is necessary to pose the question concretely: Was the overthrow of Gaddafi a victory for the Revolution or the Counterrevolution? By removing a colossal obstacle in the path of the working class, the Revolution presents new possibilities. It also poses new dangers. The lack of a strong working class was what turned the struggle into a bloody civil war. The rebellious youth joined revolutionary groups. These were often based on tribal or local loyalties. They were armed and financed by businessmen who provided guns and vehicles. And due to fact that no independent workers’ organisation exists, let alone that of a genuinely revolutionary Marxist party, the political perspectives of the rebels are limited to looking for an alternative within the confines of capitalism, i.e. within the limits of some form of bourgeois democracy. All these factors place a big question mark on the future evolution of the movement. Will the imperialists succeed in imposing their rule and subordinating the Libyan Revolution to their interests? This question cannot be decided with absolute certainty in advance. There are powerful forces pulling in that direction. But every action has an equal and opposite reaction. The fact that some people are waving French and British (and Egyptian, Algerian and Qatari) flags does not necessarily mean that people of Libya will be prepared to see their country and its oil wealth sold off to the highest bidder. It is one thing to express gratitude to these countries for dropping bombs on Gaddafi’s tanks. It is another thing to accept the return of colonial rule in Libya. It was significant that, despite its servile attitude to the West, the NTC leadership was recently forced to come out against a UN security force on the ground, reflecting the popular pressures that exist. This indicates that the revolutionary masses are suspicious of the NTC and opposed to the imperialist forces being allowed into Libya. The eyewitness in Tripoli who we cited earlier writes: “The U.S. and its allies continue to try to subordinate the revolution to their interests. They have backed a section of the rebels that seems to lack a national base, in an effort the control the course of the Arab revolutions. They aren't interested in a genuine democracy, but in a limited, managed democracy that is subservient to their needs.” And he concludes: “Despite the popular nature of the revolution, the weakness of political structures in Libya means the prospects of a left wing emerging from it are exceedingly dim. However, they were even dimmer under Qaddafi, and the revolution gives Libyan society the space for such things to develop. It may not come soon--it would require a restructuring of the economy, a growth of the working class and so on--but for the first time in its history, Libya has a chance. For that reason alone, the revolution should be supported. Moreover, the victory has breathed new life into the uprisings throughout the Arab world, particularly in Syria and Yemen. “It's far too early to say who will be the ultimate winner of Libya's revolution, but we do know who will attempt to determine the outcome.” This is a fairly balanced conclusion. It is true that the Libyan working class is far weaker than, say, the Egyptian proletariat. It has so far been unable to set its stamp on the Revolution. The Left is very weak in general, and the pressure of the bourgeois elements and imperialism can pull Libya in a different direction. Despite this, the overthrow of Gaddafi creates more favourable conditions for the development of the class struggle inside Libya. The experience of how the Libyan revolution developed, with a bourgeois leadership hijacking the movement, with leaders who were part of the old regime dressing themselves up as democrats, is also a precious lesson for the ongoing movements in Syria and Yemen. That lesson is the following. If a regime is overthrown with the help of imperialist powers, then the masses will have to pay the price. Instead of genuine change they will end up with much of the old regime recycled as new and none of the real burning social issues will be addressed. Thus the masses will have to prepare for a second, thoroughgoing revolution to complete the task they had originally posed themselves. The material conditions in Libya are decisive in the long run. The condition of the masses is desperate. Supplies of electricity and water have been disrupted. There is also desperate shortage of petrol. The workers cannot live forever on a diet of speeches and “democratic” rhetoric. They have immediate needs that must be attended to. Now that Gaddafi is dead, the end of the fighting will lead to a polarisation within the rebel camp along class lines. The workers are already critical of the NTC and protesting against the retention of the old managers in the oil industry. More than a hundred employees of Libya’s National Oil Company (NOC) protested on Tuesday 27 September outside its offices in Tripoli against the failure by managers to make a clean break with the past: “This is a new era, a new revolution. We paid a lot of blood. We are looking for a huge change,” said Haifa Mohammed, who said she worked in the company’s sustainable development department. “We expected this change to happen. But what we are seeing is the old people are still there, the bad people, the managers.” This is not an isolated case. The Economist on 9th April reported a protest of the oil workers in Benghazi outside the offices of the Arabian Gulf Oil Corporation (AGOCO) the biggest oil company in Libya to demand changes in management. The company was forced to retain the head of the committee who had been elected by the workers. The workers achieved this victory in the teeth of opposition from the NTC. The report quoted the words of a trade unionist: “Local godfathers are trying to carve up the country as fast as foreign players.” Here we have the authentic voice of the Libyan Revolution: the voice of the working class that has shaken off one dictatorship and does not want it to be replaced by a new kind of dictatorship: the dictatorship of Capital and imperialist rule. This indicates that the working class is beginning to move. We must do everything in our power to support and encourage every step in the direction of an independent movement of the working class in Libya. The situation is very complicated and there are tendencies pulling in different directions. It should go without saying that the Marxists must always base themselves on the working class and the most revolutionary elements of the youth, even when these are in a small minority. We base ourselves on what is progressive and fight against what is reactionary. Above all, the fall of Gaddafi is one more link in a chain reaction that is spreading through the Arab world. Ben Ali and Mubarak have gone, and Saleh is hanging by a thread. Now Gaddafi has been overthrown. This places Assad in Syria in greater danger. Abdullah of Jordan is still facing opposition. The people of Bahrain languish resentfully under the heel of the minority Sunni monarchy, propped up by Saudi bayonets. But how long can these regimes last? The Saudi masses, sitting atop so much wealth, will not tolerate forever the rule of a corrupt, decadent and effete monarchy. The Libyan events are part of a great Arab Revolution, which is far from over.
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