Youth lead the way in quest for a new Libya

Benghazi, Libya: Here in the gray courthouse, in offices once occupied by judges and government lawyers, the young demonstrators who sparked a revolt in eastern Libya have planted the seeds of a political movement.

Some are Islamists in clerical garb; others wear Nike shirts or longish hair and berets. They have formed civic organisations and charities and speak of building a parliamentary democracy.

In focus: Unrest in the Middle East

For all of them, it is uncharted ground after nearly 42 years of authoritarian rule. Under Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, political life was restricted to regime-controlled national congresses and local committees. Student unions, professional unions and charities were carefully watched.

Pro-Gaddafi paramilitary officers from "revolutionary committees" joined student and professional unions. Even other Arab countries, with authoritarian traditions, tolerated some opposition parties and civil society groups. But in Libya, such freedoms were nonexistent.

"We are almost starting from scratch," said Zahi Mogherbi, a retired political science professor. Emerging from such extreme isolation, young activists speak in broad terms of democracy, grappling with their new world as they go. "They have basic ideas of what they want," Mogherbi said. "I wouldn't think they have deep understandings of these issues, but they will learn as they go."

But even if the country has lacked the history of civil society and social activism that fed the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt, Libya has seen a flowering of new charitable and social organisations.

With names like I Am Human and White Hands, they supply aid to refugee families or help to the front. The biggest of the new groups is the February 17 Youth Syndicate. It has several offices in the central courthouse, where it runs the sound systems and podium at adjoining Martyrs Square, the heart of Benghazi's revolution.—