Two months after rebel fighters stormed into Tripoli and drove Moammar Gadhafi from power, the man effectively running the country in his role as temporary prime minister warned on Wednesday night that Libya could turn to chaos unless the war ended soon. Mahmoud Jibril, a U.S.-educated economist who helped persuade NATO members to launch their Libya campaign last March, also announced in an interview with TIME that he was quitting - potentially leaving Libya in a perilous state of limbo.
Jibril, who heads the executive board of the rebels' National Transitional Council, did not say exactly when he would resign, but hinted that it could be as soon as Thursday, when a televised meeting of his group would detail what it had accomplished since Gadhafi's ouster, he said. In a grim assessment of Libya's current state, Jibril suggested that as the war dragged on, he had found governing the country was increasingly difficult. "We have moved into a political struggle with no boundaries," Jibril said, looking glum, rather than a man rejoicing liberation. "The political struggle requires finances, organization, arms and ideologies," he said. "I am afraid I don't have any of this."
© 2012 Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
| Advertising practices | Advertise with us | About us | Work for us | Help
The author, "the unity which appeared to hold through months of the revolution, has seriously frayed, as rival brigades lay claim to different territories".
Apparently a dispute broke out as several men claimed to be the one who found Gaddafi. They were eager to gain the bounty on Gaddafi's head. I understand Jibril's decision to quit. Having lived in the West for a long time, maybe he realised the challenges the new Libya will be facing.