I am so proud of what the Egyptians & Tunisians have achieved with their people’s revolutions…but i am ashamed at the people who have so swiftly abandoned the revolutions of the other countries in the middle east. People are still battling & risking their lives to attain those same dam rights that their fellow brothers have already attained…where is the uproar on facebook? the care and support? We are all humans and we all share the same dam earth… so why can’t we also share the same pain and suffering? Mubarak & Ben Ali have nothing on Gaddafi when it comes to the amount of cruelty that has and still is being inflicted on his people.
The nation of Libya is a small and minuscule one compared to that of Egypt and Tunisia…Estimates are:
Egypts population: 71 million!
Tunisia: 10 million!
Libya: 5.7 million
Already unconfirmed reports suggest the death toll has reached 300, with the least estimate being 200! That’s the death toll and the protests haven’t even reached their full swing…it’s has only been going on for a mere few days!
I don’t want to compare the numbers of dead with Egypt and Tunisia, as I think that would be a crass way of looking at things …the value of one life mercilessly lost is already one too many.
Gaddafi is also, unlike in Egypt and Tunisia, less restrained. The pull of the West that was ever present in Egypt and Tunisia is not as strong in Libya. The army’s there where backed & funded by the U.S & so could not directly be seen to slaughter their own citizens for fear it would taint the U.S and lead to their vital funding being pulled. Libya on the other hand is freer to do as it pleases in that sense…they have already started hiring African mercenaries to solely battle the protesters!
Also Libya is under the cloak of darkness. The journalists have been banned unequiovicaly from the start from entering Libya. Even News Channels like Al-jazeera have found it hard at times to access what’s going on directly, instead relying on libyans on the ground for updates. You can find proof of how hard it is to gain access into Libya by simply trying to search for pictures of the protests and what’s going on, most of the photos shown are only of pro-Gaddafi protesters as those are the ones distributed freely in the Libyan media. This is in stark contrast with for say Egypt, where Cameras and the world-wide media eye & circus was ever present & focused on the situation.
All of these factors coupled together mean that Libya is more susceptible to being swept off the media agenda and maybe even forgotten. So please, the least we can all do, is to raise awareness off the tragic events occuring in Libya.
We are lucky to be born where we are, we take these rights that are awarded to us by the west for granted many times. We have never fortunatly had to fight tooth and nail for the right to speak freely, or protest etc.. Instead we have had people in the past do it for us. So i’m asking for you all to do the bare minimum in helping those people suffering in Libya and in other similar countries i.e. Bahrain, Yemen etc. . Just stay informed, inform others, and keep the people & protesters in both your thoughts and prayers.
And if you are interested in doing more for Libya and it’s people, read this informative note:
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=156771611045493&id=173489990204
Till Next time
