What do you think of when you hear the name Colonel Gaddafi? Tyrant? Dictator? Terrorist? Well, a national citizen of Libya may disagree but we want you to decide.

For 41 years until his demise in October 2011, Muammar Gaddafi did some truly amazing things for his country and repeatedly tried to unite and empower the whole of Africa.

So despite what you’ve heard on the radio, seen in the media or on the TV, Gaddafi did some powerful things that are not characteristic of a “vicious dictator” as portrayed by the western media.

Here are ten things Gaddafi did for Libya that you may not know about…

1. In Libya, a home is considered a natural human right

In Gaddafi’s Green Book it states:

“Whoever possesses the house in which you dwell, the vehicle in which you ride or the income on which you live, possesses your freedom, or part of it. Freedom is indivisible. For people to be happy, they must be free, and to be free, they must possess the possibility of satisfying their own needs. Whoever possesses the means of fulfilling your needs controls or exploits you, and may enslave you despite any legislation to the contrary.

The material needs of people that are basic and personal start with food, housing, clothing and transport and must be regulated as private and sacred and their satisfaction should not depend on hire. To satisfy these material needs through rent, gives the original owner the right to interfere in your personal life and to control your imperative needs, even if the original owner be the society in general. The original owner can usurp your freedom and take away your happiness. The interference of the original owner may include repossessing your clothes, even leaving you naked on the street. Likewise, the owner of your means of transportation may leave you stranded on the sidewalk, and the owner of your house may make you homeless.

People’s imperative needs cannot be regulated by legal or administrative procedures. They must be fundamentally implanted into the society in accordance with natural rules.”

2. Education was free

Gaddafi’s view on education is something that seems to resonate with many. He believed that education had nothing to do with a routinized curriculum. He pointed to the fact that the western world has forced their youth to learn during specified hours while sitting in rows of desks, and that this type of education now prevails all over the world and goes against human freedom.

“State controlled education, which governments boast of whenever they are able to force it on their youths, is a method of suppressing freedom. It is a compulsory obliteration of a human being’s talent, as well as a coercive directing of a human being’s choices. It is an act of dictatorship destructive of freedom because it deprives people of their free choice, creativity and brilliance. To force a human being to learn according to a set curriculum is a dictatorial act. To impose certain subjects upon people is also a dictatorial act. 

He strongly believed that state controlled/standardized education is again, a “forced stultification” of the masses. He believed that all governments who set courses of education in terms of a formal curriculum and force people to learn them are coercing and manipulating their citizens.

“All methods of education prevailing in the world should be destroyed through a universal cultural evolution that frees the human mind from curricula of fanaticism which dictate a process of deliberate distortion of man’s tastes, conceptual ability and mentality.”

He did not mean that schools should be closed, in fact he believed that education was important and that society should provide all types of education that gives the individual the chance to choose freely.

“Knowledge is a natural right of every human being of which no one has the right to deprive him or her under any pretext, except in a case where a person does something which deprives him or her of that right.”

3. Medical treatment was free

It’s beyond me as to why medical care is not free in all countries. This should be basic human right and we’ve drifted far from it. Are we not capable of creating something better as to where medical treatment could be free for everyone in all countries? Gaddafi strongly believed in this, and created it for his people.

4. There were no electricity bills in Libya, electricity was free

The western world wants to put a meter on everything. It’s just another way, out of many, to enslave us. Basic human rights are not met in the western world, and what’s even more discouraging is the fact that most of us sit back and accept it, or don’t even realize it.

5.  Gaddafi carried out the world’s largest irrigation project, known as the Great ManMade River project, to make water readily available throughout the desert country

6. All newlyweds in Libya would receive 60,000 Dinar ($50,000 USD) by the government to buy their first apartment to help start a family

7. A portion of Libyan oil sales is or was  credited directly to the bank accounts of all Libyan citizens

8. Libya had it’s own state bank

Libya had its own State bank, which provided loans to citizens at zero percent interest by law and they had no external debt.

9. A bursary was given to mothers with newborn babies

When a Libyan woman gave birth she was given the equivalent to $5000 USD for herself and the child.

10. If Libyans cannot find the education or medical facilities they need in Libya, the government would fund them to go abroad for it – not only free but they get US $2,300/month accommodation and car allowance.

So, was Muammar Gaddafi a Terrorist?

Few can answer this question fairly, but if anyone can, it’s a Libyan citizen who has lived under his reign? Whatever the case, it seems rather apparent that he did some positive things for his country despite the infamous notoriety surrounding his name. And that’s something you should try to remember when judging in future.

This quirky video documentary spells out an interesting, if rather different, story from the one we think we know.

The post 10 things about Gaddafi they don’t want you to know first appeared on Uganda Multimedia News & Information.

The new leadership in Libya has announced that stamps on official and consular documents bearing the symbols of the regime of late Col. Muammar Gadaffi ‘the great’ as null and void.

The statement the new leaders of Libya sent to all African presidents reads, “the Libyan government announces the cancellation of all official and consular stamps bearing the names of the, “Great socialist Peoples Libyan Arab Jamahiriya” and “the Libyan Arab Peoples’ bureau.”

However it has been also cleared that the new changes will not affect the Libyan documents in the hands of world governments. Any document signed prior to the new leadership in Libya remains valid because the defunct government of Gadaffi was then recognized worldwide. The people travelling to Libya must have documents bearing the new stamps. Gadaffi’s leadership collapsed in August when the former rebels of the Libyan Transitional National Council over throw the old regime.

The post Gadaffi stamps nullified first appeared on Uganda Multimedia News & Information.

The Libyan soldiers have already met with Uganda’s ministry of foreign affairs officials and discussed mechanisms under which Libya and Uganda can work.

The minister of Foreign Affairs, Okello Oryemu (Uganda) says that Uganda is ready to work with NTC and to receive their representatives.

The post Col. Muammar Gadaffi Government also wants to have an ambassador to Uganda. Oryemu also says that Uganda was ready to reopen its mission in Libya. Uganda (president Museveni) was at first opposed to the pro-democracy war led by the NTC against Gadaffi. The war ended with the death of Brother Col. Muammar Gadaffi.

The post Libya’s National Transitional Council (NTC) delegates in Uganda seeking for recognition first appeared on Uganda Multimedia News & Information.

President of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe Rejects Western Brutal Intrusion on Africa

This is the speech delivered by the President of Zimbabwe Robert Mugabe at 12th Annual National People’s Conference (08 December 2011).

On behalf of our Party, the Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front, I warmly greet and welcome you all to our 12th Annual National People’s Conference which is being hosted by the Bulawayo Province as unanimously agreed by our Party. This is an annual event which we deliberately set towards the end of every year so we have an effective, decision-making mechanism for running and servicing our Party between Congresses.

And because this particular Conference takes place just ahead of an election year, it automatically assumes the status and consequence of a real Congress. Thus by way of subject matter and decisions, this whole gathering assumes the full weight of our Congress.  Such is the gravity of this two-in-one gathering.
In the same spirit, I warmly welcome delegates from within our region and beyond who have joined us as emissaries of their respective parties.  We value this show of inter-party solidarity and hope you will find our proceedings both interesting and enriching by way of showing you how we tackle challenges we face in our own situation. Again, a warm welcome to you all!
Ladies and Gentlemen, Comrade Delegates.

We meet at a time of great events and epochal changes in the world.  A time of great, epochal changes to the north of us, in the Afro-Arab World of North Africa. There we have seen momentous turbulence now collectively known as the “Arab Spring.” This wave of popular demonstrations has definitely challenged political establishments, some of which had lasted for decades. Events in Libya and to a certain extent Egypt leave us unsure of what the end in those countries will be.

Much worse, we have seen clear evidence of intolerable Western intrusion on our Continent, intrusion whose worst form was the brutal and bloody tragedy we all saw in Libya.  The Western world intervened, seemingly in the name of the United Nations. On that flimsy veneer of legitimacy, the well-developed but autocratic nation of Libya was bombed to Stone Age with Gaddafi cruelly and brutally assassinated together with his children. Today, that country is rubble, littered with ruins caused by American and Nato terrorist bombs. Lots of lives were lost, ironically under Resolution 1973 of the United Nations whose informing principle was “the responsibility to protect” civilians. Nato, that is Europe and America killed Libyan civilians ostensibly in order to protect them! History could not have moved in a more cynical way.

Against this naked intrusion, Africa was both unprepared and ill-prepared.  Africa was disunited.  The already weak continent weakened itself even further.  Whatever our stance in the African Union, we undermined ourselves by voting for war on African soil. Today, we have a broken nation, a broken people, broken lives, broken hope. If this trend persists against our own acquiescence, we face the grim prospect of broken Independence. As a liberation movement, Zanu-PF cannot be indifferent to this most inauspicious turn of history. It is a turn which challenges our sacrifices yesterday, indeed, challenges our achievements today by way of the freedom and Independence we enjoy, and hope to pass on to posterity tomorrow and forever. The events in Libya have sound grim forebodings for our continent and we have to take a stance.

Before the guns of invasion had been silenced, indeed while the blood of the Libyan people was still being drawn, Europe, led by France and Britain, were already having a revivalist mini-Berlin Conference to divide amongst themselves the spoils of that war, principally oil and reconstruction projects. This amounted to a second pillage of Libya, indeed of our Continent, to utter silence on our part as the African Union. Countries like our own Zimbabwe, which is so richly endowed with minerals, and thus so dangerously marked by global imperialism, need to remain very vigilant, always ready to sacrifice for the defence of our Independence and natural resources.

Ordinarily, a party like Zanu-PF, born and built in circumstances of a revolution, the fact of a people’s movement must establish instant affinities between us and any such movements wherever they may be. In them, we should see ourselves vicariously. But the North African movements raise grave concerns. As already indicated, we still have to grasp their identities in the context of the African revolution which must always be anti-colonial, anti-imperialistic.  Rather, we clearly see the serious efforts deployed by the same forces of imperialism to redirect the bursting energies of a rebelling people towards self-destruction.

Another lesson for all of us is that imperialism cannot be appeased, can never be placated through any concessions or deals. It does not keep its word. Gaddafi, we are told, invested in Europe and America. He even sponsored the re-election of those who shot at him in the end.  Much worse, he agreed to be disarmed by his enemies who fawned love and affection. Our revolution must never blink.  It must remain wide awake, always vigilant and equipped for its own defence. After all, Kwame Nkrumah, the Ghanaian founder leader and father of new Africa warned us a long time ago that only a dead imperialist is a good one. We must remain strong and steadfast against Western imperialism. We cannot cut deals with it.

We are going through a war-like phase of global capitalism.  Today it is oil; tomorrow it shall be our diamonds, platinum, uranium, gold, copper, nickel, iron, manganese, chrome and all.  We have all these coveted resources, which is why there will always be attempts to challenge our sovereignty.
Whereas in the past all development aid, capital and technology came from the West, we now have a whole new world to relate to, a world with a better appreciation of our situations and aspirations.  I am happy to inform you that this alternative capital and technology is already beginning to show itself in our systems.  We need to expand that collaborative thrust, all based on equal terms and mutual advantage.

Ladies and Gentlemen, Comrade Delegates.
In my analysis of the turbulent events of North Africa, I made reference to the dangers of economically excluding the masses from mainstream economic activity. Societies that run on unevenness, run on the principle of shutting out the vast majority of people from mainstream economy, are bound to come to grief, sooner rather than later. Zanu-PF has grasped and understood this primary lesson of societal studies! Unevenness and inequalities are core causes to instability. After all, our revolution was founded on ensuring and assuring the Zimbabwean people of some place in the economic sun.

We did not go to war so the white man continues to run our affairs here. We did not lose so many lives so all those widows, grief-stricken mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, aunts and nieces would settle back to a life of want as in colonial Rhodesia. We fought a war; won that war to win total freedom, total Independence! With that victory the vote had to come. It came. With that victory, the instruments of power by way of Government had to come.  They came. With that victory, democracy had to come. It came, brought by us.  With that victory, education for all had to come. It came. With that victory, racial discrimination had to end. It ended. With that victory, social services and amenities had to reach all people in equal or at the very least comparable measure regardless of colour or creed. That, too, happened.  Yes, with that victory the land, the land, the land, itself the grievance of all grievances, had to come back to its true owners.  It did.  The land has come, never to go back under whatever circumstances.

Today I tell you that with that victory, our national economy, our natural resources have to come back to us, without any more delay! The resources must revert to us the true owners. They are God-given; the only ones we can ever have as Zimbabweans. They are finite; once scooped out, they subtract from our total stock. Ours is not to prosper children of other Nations while our own grow spectre-thin.  Ours is not to develop far away nations, while our own people are condemned to hunger, disease and indigence.  No!  No!  No!

Izvozvo taramba zvachose. Siyala! Tinoti takarwirei?  Takafirei?
Zanu-PF developed the policy of indigenisation and economic empowerment well before the Inclusive Government. It is our policy which today has taken the form of the law of the land. We conceived it, we developed it, and we pushed it through Parliament until it became law. By the same token, we are its sole defenders, against any and all odds. It goes back to the pith of our war aims, the pith of our whole struggle. It is a matter of life and death for us as an African people seeking real Independence. Let no one fool themselves into thinking we are bluffing. Let them ask the Rhodesians who will tell them Zanu-PF does not play games with matters of blood and sacrifice. This economy shall indigenise, in our lifetime!  We are the generation that has been fated by history to make that happen, fated to carve a new place of pride for the African underdog. We dare not flinch.

We have already made a beginning on this policy whose impact should be national. Zimplats pioneered implementation of a facet of this policy of many elements, pioneered modestly in my view. Let them not rest thinking they are done.

They are not, and we shall be asking them to move up, up, up until they satisfy our policy, namely that 51 percent control must rest with our people. Other nations do it; we cannot be different. Unki followed suit and like Zimplats, we will remind them more remains to be done.  In both instances, communities who house these resources have been rewarded through a community ownership scheme.  Our wish is to cover the rest of the country.

Today we still have the patience to negotiate, to sit and talk with these companies which have been exploiting our resources without putting back much into our communities.  Time shall come when we shall not have the patience to talk.  We hope it does not get to that.

We are a liberation movement.  Yesterday we did not fear to offer our own lives, however dear, to free our People.

It does not make sense that today we fear to enforce our indigenisation policy on grounds that the economy will collapse. We faced similar dire predictions during our land reform programme. We executed it regardless. Today agriculture is on the rebound, with our people in full charge. In that sub-sector, the shoots of a truly national economy are beginning to show, together with mining, agriculture is a financial carrier of the State, never mind the enormous if not insuperable difficulties which our farmers face with each season. We must never be daunted. After all Marange will always be in Zimbabwe, Unki in Zimbabwe, Zimplats in Zimbabwe, ZimAlloys in Zimbabwe. We would rather leave our resources intact than allow them to be exploited to our detriment. At 51 percent, we have been extremely generous.

Our country does not have an elected Government. I feel I am President to a political arrangement which is makeshift, undemocratic and illegitimate. The Global Political Agreement (GPA) which initially was meant to settle inter-party differences, today threatens to usurp an elementary and inalienable right of the people, that of freely choosing a Government which must run them. The people have been toppled by this thing called GPA. It was never meant to last beyond processes we all agreed were preliminary to the holding of elections. It was just an interregnum, a short transition to a more permanent political arrangement predicated on a free and fair election. But we have constitutional issues to resolve, issues which once debated by our people, drafted by our experts, would then be put back to the people through a referendum. There was a time frame to all that, time frame which has now been totally subverted in the name of budgetary constraints. Today we ask; why are our self-anointed democrats finding democracy too expensive to be an item for the budget, too costly and unimportant to be a priority? Is it because they have been in the kitchen long enough to discover its goodies, its warmth?

There have been too many shenanigans, subterfuges, wiles and tricks, all designed to stymie the wheels of democracy. We must denounce that. We must demand elections in the first half of next year, without fail. This state of so-called inclusiveness, which in reality is a state of national standstill, has not served this country well at all. True, it gave us peace, but that peace must yield a legitimate government free to pursue definite policies without hindrance. This is not so at present. So our Party needs to gear itself for elections. It needs to strengthen its structures, close ranks and pull in one direction so we secure a landslide victory in the elections which must come soon.

Lastly, we in Zanu-PF must renounce and denounce violence. We must reject violence. After all we are right. After all history is on our side. We are the only liberation movement there ever can be for Zimbabwe. We are conceivers of policies which are running the country. We have ideas of taking this country to a new pedestal of validating our people’s Independence. Everywhere else, there is clear bankruptcy, leaving us as the only real Party of ideas, programmes and courage to lead in this turbulent world, in these turbulent times. Our progressive ideas should be the sole tools of persuasion and mobilisation, never violence. Should we ever fight, it should strictly be in self-defence. Otherwise, peace, peace, perfect peace!

Long Live our Revolution!
Long Live Zimbabwe!
Long Live the People of Zimbabwe
Long Live our Freedom and Independence!
Aluta Continua!
On that note, I now have the pleasure and honour of tabling the Central Committee Report for your consideration.
I thank you.

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