As opposition forces lose momentum against Kadhafi's army, residents of Tripoli wage a different sort of fight.
Forces loyal to Moamer Kadhafi on Wednesday (March 30th) halted Libyan rebels' swift advance westward, driving them out of the strategic town of Ras Lanuf. On Tuesday, Kadhafi troops managed to recapture Ben Jawad after a day of intensive fighting, pushing opposition forces further eastward.
As the rebels and Kadhafi supporters fight for control, a battle for survival is unfolding in the capital, where economic conditions are becoming increasingly dire. Tripoli is grappling with an acute crisis in petrol and food supplies.
"We stand in queues for long hours," Issa Ben Mahmoud said. "Can you imagine that bread has now become an issue?"
"When you enter stores, you would find most of the shelves empty, which is a strange phenomenon for us," Ahmed Ali said. "The local foodstuffs used to be made in Benghazi and Misrata, but the first has been liberated while the second is besieged. The sea has been shut off and there are no workers in Libya after they fled because of the crisis."
He complained about a spike in prices of sugar, salt, flour and biscuits, as well as medications and other commodities.
"People are waiting for their pensions, and haven't received them until now," Sheikh Adel Abdullah said. "We now see that banks have no money, which is a strange thing. It's even stranger to see the old cancelled banknotes being used again by banks, which imposed them."
For young man Youssef, "the biggest problem is the lack of petrol", which prevents people from going to work. He said that "students went to schools only this week because of the examinations and the harsh penalties imposed on them by the regime to dismantle civil disobedience".
"You're now worried about the petrol queue where you would stand for four hours, and petrol may even be gone and you find yourself forced to look for another gas station," he said.
National Oil Corporation (NOC) chief Shukri Ghanem admitted at a Saturday conference in Tripoli that petrol production had suffered a significant drop, calling on foreign companies to bring their workers back to Libya.
For his part, Ali al-Tarhun, the finance minister appointed by the National Transitional Council, said that petrol would be exported in less than a week from eastern Libya through Qatar, with production capacity of about 100,000 barrels per day.
In its latest moves, the council picked spokesman Mahmoud Shamam to be information minister and gave the justice portfolio to Mohamed Allaqi, former chairman of the human rights committee at the Gaddafi International Charity and Development Foundation (GICDF).
Council chief Mustafa Abdel Jalil said in a Monday interview with France 2 that the rebel institution would hold free and fair elections in the post-Kadhafi era. Libyan people won't forget the positions of the countries that supported them, he said.
"As to the countries that hesitated, this will be reflected on our relations with them in the future," he noted.
"After the victory we will try Kadhafi in Libya for all the crimes he has committed," Abdel Jalil added.
Historian Ali al-Sallab said that the "Libyan people want a just trial for him and for anyone who spilled blood", advising the ministers "to take sides with justice, because Kadhafi is over".
© Magharebia.com 2011
