The gold-plated cutlery and crystal champagne glasses, the
Versace and Armani suits and rows of unworn designer shoes, are all that remain
at the luxurious seaside compounds of the children of Muammar Gaddafi.
The fancy beach villas are testimony to the fact that the
Gaddafis not only ruled Libya, they owned it, and treated its oil wealth as
their personal patrimony.
Yet the cars now parked outside these gilded villas are no
longer fleets of limousines, but the motley collection of jeeps and machine-gun
mounted pick-up trucks belonging to the rag-tag army of civilians who rose up
and overthrew the Gaddafis.
And it is those fighters who now sleep inside the
Italian-designed bedrooms with their Pierre Cardin carpets and Burberry couches,
resting at the end of the Muslim month of Ramadan.
“The day that we have been dreaming of all our lifetime
has come. This beach was reserved for Gaddafi sons, their families, friends and
the ruling elite,” said Kabet, a legal adviser at the economic council of
Libya before joining the revolution in February.
“They are the ones who enjoyed the wealth of Libya not
us. The Libyans got nothing out of it,” he said.
“Libyans could never swim here or get near these gates.
The fate of anybody who dares get close to these walls was known, he will be
shot dead,” Kabet said.
For nearly all of them, the Eid Al Fitr at the end of the
month of fasting will be their first without Gaddafi, whose 42 years in power
have conditioned their lives.
This gated community, known as Regatta, is one of two
sun-coloured mini-cities built along the sandy Mediterranean beaches west of
Tripoli — protected and private resorts designed to their own voracious
specifications.
There are supermarkets and diving centres, tennis courts and
football pitches, restaurants and clinics. Some have their own gyms and
swimming pools. Motor boats are moored nearby.
“This is only one drop of their wealth and the many
houses they have here and abroad and the billions they have,” said
Abdel-Salam Kilani, an officer who defected from Gaddafi’s troops in February.
At the villa of Saadi Gaddafi, suits, cashmere coats, ties
and shoes from almost every famous designer in the world, were tossed on the
floor. Suitcases were flung open, suggestive of a hurried exit.
Added to the mix were recordings of Pink Floyd, popular
Lebanese singer George Wassouf and the West Wing television series along with
printed pages of al-Jazeera news bulletins on the flight of Tunisian President
Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali.
The Gaddafis seemed passionate about luxury goods, but less
keen on books.
The one book in the villa owned by Mohammed Gaddafi, who
fled to Algeria was “Body and Soul Escapes”, a book on meditation.
His house was adorned with photos of sport clubs, flags as well as sporting
memorabilia and photos of his family.
Flight schedules to neighbouring Arab countries left behind
seemed to be one of their recent preoccupations.
The new tenants appeared comfortable in Aisha’s 13-bedroom
elegantly-furnished house, each of the fighters occupying a bedroom of his own.
The rebels had packed her photo albums in a box except for a torn one of her
with her father in her youth.
Article continues on
next page…
It is clear the occupants of this serene compound with its
beaches, palms, pines and bright bougainvillea had left in a hurry, or perhaps
in the middle of a party.
Some houses still had wine and champagne glasses on the
terraces. Children’s bicycles and toys were left abandoned in the narrow
streets.
The gated community of Regatta, about 12 km (seven miles)
west of Tripoli, is only one of the many Gaddafis’ homes. Only close friends,
extended family and ruling associates shared their world.
Across the compound, concealed behind walls, Libyans live in
poor and shabby houses, earning low or modest salaries that allow them to just
about get by.
Forty-seven-year-old Najib Kabet, a rebel, added:
“Look! where do you think the wealth of Libya has gone?.”The Gaddafi
family owned Libya.”
Though these sumptuous villas reveal the Gaddafis’ abuse of
Libya’s riches and highlight the country’s social inequalities, not many
Libyans knew they existed until the rebels found them.
Most of the fighters at the compound came from the poor
Western mountains but did not seem to be envious of the luxury. Most appeared
even unimpressed with the opulence around them.
“This (lifestyle) does not mean anything to us”,
said Ibrahim Madani, a 26-year-old fighter from Zintan.
“Let them know that the millions they have are
worthless. People paid with their blood for the sake of freedom.”
“The most important thing is that the people got rid of
them. Let the new generation enjoy a better education, a better country and
life.”
“They sucked the blood of this country,” Madani
said.
Follow us on
