In violence-plagued Libyan city, “weapons are traded like tea”

An injured person on a hospital bed in Sebha. Screen grab from a video (see below). 

For the past few days, violent inter-tribal clashes have rocked the southern Libyan city of Sebha. On March 27, local hospital authorities were already counting 50 dead and dozens more wounded. Barricaded in their homes, two of the city’s residents describe the situation.

The city has been embroiled in a violent struggle between the Ouled Slimane tribe, which supported former leader Muammar Gaddhafi, against members of the Toubou tribe, a black nomad group scattered throughout southern Libya, Chad and Niger. Members of the first tribe have accused the latter of killing one of their tribesmen during a botched car robbery on Sunday.

On Monday, Libyan authorities reacted by sending 600 soldiers to Sebha in an attempt to restore order. According to some analysts, the violence highlights the weaknesses and divisions within the National Transitional Council (NTC), which has struggled to impose its authority on the country’s tribal areas since it came to power five months ago.

Toubou leader Abdel Majid Mansour has accused the government of wanting to “exterminate” his tribe, saying that NTC troops have been bombing their strongholds in southern Libya since the beginning of the week. He compares his country to Sudan, saying the south should secede from the north and become independent.

Toubous, who claim to have been discriminated against under the Gaddafi era, represent 15% of Sebha’s population.

These amateur videos show injured people as they’re being treated at a hospital. The person who put the videos online could not be contacted. But the hospital seen in the footage, which is thought to have been filmed on March 27, is the Sebha hospital. A detail in the video confirms this: a female doctor or nurse wearing a colourful headscarf who appears twice in this footage (at 0’45 minutes and 0’10 minutes in the second video, below) was also seen in a Libyan TV report on Sebha.

“A police car is driving around the city, its speakers blasting out a call to donate blood”

Souleymane is from Ghana; he works in a cyber café in Sebha.

We haven’t been able to sleep for days because of the gunfire. I left my home Tuesday at 8 a.m. to go to work. But several parts of the city were under lockdown: residents set up barricades and checkpoints to protect their neighbourhoods. It was too dangerous to stay outside, so I took cover at a friend’s house, and have been here since.

 

Since yesterday, a police car has been driving around the city, its speakers blasting out a call to donate blood. It must be for the people in the hospital – they’re completely overwhelmed over there.

“Even the children have Kalashnikovs”

Omar (not his real name) lives in Sebha.

The clashes began on Monday, after a man was found dead in the street. According to his family, he was attacked overnight by a Toubou. The Toubous weren’t happy about being accused. They marched out in front of the old People’s House [the official gathering place under Gaddafi’s rule]. I don’t know who shot first, but since then, the number of dead and injured has escalated and people are afraid of going outside.

 

I left Libya during the uprising because it was too dangerous. I came back three months ago, and have become used to living in fear. These latest clashes were completely predictable. In Sebha, we go through one week of calm for three weeks of tension. And when I say tension, I mean tribal disputes and the occasional shoot-out. Gaddafi handed out guns to people during his rule [and the NTC also armed people during the fight for Sebha in September 2011]. Since then, pistols and Kalashnikovs alike are traded like tea.

This post was written by FRANCE 24 journalist Peggy Bruguière.