By ABIODUN AREMU

Even before the last shot would be fired and Gaddafi would be captured alive or dead, imperialists and their lackeys such as the presidency in Nigeria, and follow-follow wey-no-open sense commentators and supposedly revolutionist analysts have begun to grant legitimacy to the counter-revolution Libyan rebels.

So ignoramus were the commentaries, in particular, from the constituencies of self-acclaimed theoreticians in Naija that the US must democratise Libya with the exit of Gaddafi, while they failed to open-ears and eyes on the US-NATO allies’ desperation to loot the seized Libyan assets in the guise of arms supplied and reconstruction contracts.

This is ‘poverty of ideology’ at work by those thoroughly brain-drained by the US’ conception and model of democracy, which the US-CIA authored in 1996 as a cardinal pillar of the 21st century as the New America Century; that is, America must dictate and dominate the global economy, global politics, and must ensure that there is no regional power.

The promotion of a global war economy against Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Cuba (since 1959 and the ‘Operation Cuba after Castro’), holding UN hostage and as a tool for fuelling imperialistic wars, US-determined African Command, etc, is consistent with the agenda of the New America Century.

What US-NATO imperial powers did in Libya since Saturday, March 19, 2011 with the collaboration of the reactionary forces so-called rebels amounts to counter-revolution. The fact of an uprising against Gaddafi (or anywhere as in Tunisia, Egypt, etc) does not necessarily translate to a revolution.

The Gaddafi revolution, though not a socialist revolution, but it altered the socio-economic structure of the Libyan society, which under King Idris that was overthrown in 1969, made Libyan economically dependent on Italy, France, Britain, US, France, the very forces constituted today as US-NATO. More fundamentally, the Gaddafi era aside the long years of his rule, represents advancement in the social welfare of the Libyan society.

I have stated at the onset of the US-NATO aggression that: “There is need for a political transition in Libya, but such should never be on the terms dictated by the US-NATO’s business interests, whose models of democracy accommodate the monarchies in Bahrain, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, etc, simply because they have unfettered control of their puppet governments that pave way for looting cheap oil resources. The war of aggression against Libya today is not new.

It is the same old forces and with the same business interests, i.e. to have unquestionable control over the exploitation of Libya’s oil and energy resources. And in order to ensure such re-colonisation of Libya, the imperialist US-NATO allies are desperate to install a puppet regime of the Libyan rebels in the mould of the despotic King Idris that was deposed by the Gaddafi’s revolution in 1969”.

Reflections by Fidel Castro on March 2, 2011 titled NATO’S INEVITABLE WAR (Part I)” also put the counter-revolution in Libya into proper ideological perspective when he stated thus:
“In contrast with what is happening in Egypt and Tunisia, Libya occupies the first spot on the Human Development Index for Africa and it has the highest life expectancy on the continent.  Education and health receive special attention from the State. The cultural level of its population is without a doubt the highest. Its problems are of a different sort. The population isn’t lacking food and essential social services. The country needed an abundant foreign labour force to carry out ambitious plans for production and social development.

“For that reason, it provided jobs for hundreds of thousands of workers from Egypt, Tunisia, China and other countries. It had enormous incomes and reserves in convertible currencies deposited in the banks of the wealthy countries from which they acquired consumer goods and even sophisticated weapons that were supplied exactly by the same countries that today want to invade it in the name of human rights”.

Mr. Aremu, Secretary, LASCO, wrote from Lagos.