₦airaland Forum

Muammar Gaddafi vowed to die in Libya as a martyr in an angry television address on Tuesday, as rebel troops said eastern regions had broken free from his rule in a burgeoning revolt.

"I am not going to leave this land, I will die here as a martyr," Gaddafi said on state television, refusing to bow to calls from his own diplomats, soldiers and protesters clamouring in the streets for an end to his four decades at the helm.

"I shall remain here defiant," said Gaddafi.

Earlier, witnesses streaming across the Libyan border into Egypt said Gaddafi was using tanks, warplanes and mercenaries in an effort to stamp out the growing rebellion.

In the eastern city of Tobruk, a Reuters correspondent there said sporadic blasts could be heard, the latest sign that Gaddafi's grip on the oil and gas exporting nation was weakening.

"All the eastern regions are out of Gaddafi's control now , The people and the army are hand-in-hand here," said the now former army major Hany Saad Marjaa.

The White House offered its condolences for the "appalling violence" in Libya and said the international community had to speak with one voice on the crisis.

The U.N. refugee agency meanwhile urged Libya's neighbours to grant refuge to those fleeing the unrest, which was triggered by decades of repression and popular revolts that toppled leaders in Tunisia and Egypt.

On the Libyan side of the border with Egypt, anti-Gaddafi rebels armed with clubs and Kalashnikov rifles welcomed visitors. One man held an upside-down picture of Gaddafi defaced with the words "the butcher tyrant, murderer of Libyans", a Reuters correspondent who crossed into Libya reported.

Hundreds of Egyptians flowed in the opposite direction on tractors and trucks, taking with them harrowing tales of state violence and banditry.

In the eastern town of Al Bayda, resident Marai Al Mahry told Reuters by telephone that 26 people including his brother Ahmed had been shot dead overnight by Gaddafi loyalists.

"They shoot you just for walking on the street," he said, sobbing uncontrollably as he appealed for help.

Protesters were attacked with tanks and warplanes, he said.

"The only thing we can do now is not give up, no surrender, no going back. We will die anyways, whether we like it or not. It is clear that they don't care whether we live or not. This is genocide," said Mahry, 42.

Human Rights Watch said 62 people had died in clashes in Tripoli in the past two days, on top of its previous toll of 233 dead. Opposition groups put the figure far much higher. U.N. rights chief Navi Pillay said the killing could amount to crimes against humanity and demanded an international probe.

The revolt in Libya, the third largest oil producer in Africa, has driven oil prices to a 2 1/2 year high above $108 a barrel, and OPEC said it would produce more crude if supplies from member Libya were disrupted.

With no end in sight to the crisis, refugees fled to Egypt.

"Five people died on the street where I live," Mohamed Jalaly, 40, told Reuters at Salum on his way to Cairo from Benghazi. "You leave Benghazi and then you have , nothing but gangs and youths with weapons," he added. "The way from Benghazi is extremely dangerous," he said.

Libyan guards have withdrawn from their side of the border and Egypt's new military rulers -- who took power following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak on February11 -- said the main crossing would be kept open round-the-clock to allow the sick and wounded to enter.

Groups of rebels with assault rifles and shotguns, waved cheerily at the passing cars on a stretch of desert road, flicking the V-for-victory sign and posing with their guns, a Reuters correspondent reported.

Libyan security forces have cracked down fiercely on demonstrators across the country, with fighting spreading to Tripoli after erupting in Libya's oil-producing east last week, in a reaction to decades of

As the fighting has intensified some supporters have abandoned Gaddafi. Tripoli's envoy to India, Ali al-Essawi, resigned and told Reuters that African mercenaries had been recruited to help put down protests.

"The fall of Gaddafi is the imperative of the people in streets," he said. The justice minister also quit and a group of army officers urged soldiers to "join the people". Two pilots flew their warplanes to nearby Malta.

Defiance and condemnation

Gaddafi's son Saif on Sunday vowed his father would keep fighting "until the last man standing" and the Libyan leader appeared on television after days of seclusion to dismiss reports he had fled to the Venezuela of his ally Hugo Chavez.

"I want to show that I'm in Tripoli and not in Venezuela. Do not believe the channels belonging to stray dogs," said Gaddafi, who has ruled Libya with a mixture of populism and tight control since taking power in a military coup in 1969.

World powers have condemned the use of force against protesters, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon accusing Libya of firing on civilians from warplanes and helicopters. The Security Council met in closed session to discuss Libya.

Washington and Europe have demanded an end to the violence and Germany's Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle said: "A ruling family, threatening its people with civil war, has reached the end of the line."

Demonstrations spread to Tripoli from the second city Benghazi, cradle of the revolt that has engulfed a number of towns and which residents say is now in the hands of protestors.

Residents said anxious shoppers were queuing outside stores to try to stock up on food and drink. Some shops were closed.

Spain's Repsol suspended all operations in Libya and sources said operations at cargo ports at Benghazi, Tripoli and Misurata had shut due to the violence.

Trade sources said Libyan oil port operations had also been disrupted and others said gas supplies from Libya to Italy had slowed since Late Monday, though Italy said they had not yet been interrupted,

Shell said it was pulling out its expatriate staff from Libya temporarily and a number of states were seeking to evacuate their nationals.

Former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor Prof. Chukwuma Soludo took up the gauntlet yesterday.

He challenged Minister of Finance Mr. Olusegun Aganga to a debate on the economy.

Soludo, in a measured response to Aganga’s statement that he (Soludo) should be serving a jail term for mismanaging the economy during his tenure, wondered whether the minister was in full grasp of the issues at stake.

"My candid advice to you, Hon. Minister, is for you and your colleagues at the Economic Management Team to note that you need serious help on the economy. It is our collective destiny that is at stake. Threatening me with imprisonment or even imprisoning me will not solve the problem. But if you are convinced that you know what you are talking about in respect of the economy, and/or that you are sure of what you said about my regime, I challenge you to a 2-3 hour televised national debate on these issues," Soludo, declared.

The former CBN Governor, who served under ex-President Obasanjo and the late President Umaru

Yar’Adua, said he was amazed at the unprovoked attack of the Minister which was reported in The Nation of January 22, 2011. He said in the over two years that he left office, Aganga found no ground to accuse him of any wrong doing, "not until he suspected that I may be ‘advising’ former presidential aspirant Atiku Abubakar on the economy that he quickly conjured that I should be in jail for what he believes I said or did not do about the banking system.
He said although he hesitated in responding to Aganga’s diatribe, he nevertheless took the option to put the records straight. I have mulled the decision to respond or not. Some friends suggested I should ignore Aganga in consideration that I might be misconstrued as "attacking Government". But when Mr. Aganga, out of desperation to save his job, throws decency to the ground, and decides that the only way to burnish his uneventful tenure is to use his high office to throw mud at Soludo, then a sense of duty beckons on us to respond," Soludo stated.

He said he chose to serve out of love for Nigeria, saying the only way to move the nation forward is for those who have something to offer to get involved.

He urged Aganga to get his perspectives right, arguing that the data the Minister is bandying about as indicators of an improved economy are at variance with the realities on ground.

He said: "You must get serious, Hon. Minister. When you look Nigerians in the face and point to flattering comments on Nigeria’s prospects by some people in some conferences as your prove that the Nigerian economy is doing well, it does not make you look well informed; especially in the face of hard evidence to the contrary.

"As you were busy blaming people for ‘talking down the economy’, the UNCTAD report released in Geneva on January 17, 2011, slammed you again with a red card: foreign direct investment (FDI) into Nigeria dropped by 62 per cent in 2010 (from $6 billion in 2009 to $2.3 billion in 2010)—again the worst in many years, and even worse than during the global crisis.

While developing and transition economies increased their FDI inflows by 10 per cent in 2010, Nigeria’s FDI fell by a whopping 62 per cent. During our tenure, FDI was more than doubling every year, and even at the peak of the global crisis in 2008, stood at about $8.5 billion. Do you get the point, sir? The international investors are sending a strong message to you, Sir. You need to get your act together."