On February 17, Libya celebrated the first anniversary of the revolution that ousted late Colonel Gaddafi. One year on, the country is far from stable: inter-militia violence is rampant, the interim government’s authority is increasingly challenged and the economy is crippled by mounting corruption. As a result, the much-expected transition to democracy is becoming a distant prospect. Patrick Haimzadeh, a former French diplomat in Tripoli from 2001 to 2004 and the author of Au cœur de la Libye de Kadhafi (Inside Gaddafi’s Libya), spoke to Al Monitor about possible scenarios for Libya’s reconstruction.

Al-Monitor  You have visited Libya several times since Gaddafi was toppled. How would you describe the situation?

Haimzadeh  The end of Gaddafi’s regime, after months of civil war, has revived tribal tensions. Now, there are between 250,000 and 300,000 armed militiamen, a National Transitional Council and an interim government that have little control over the situation. The country is marred by violence with almost daily clashes between militias, almost everywhere. Young people don’t want to give up their thuwar [rebel] status just yet. In certain regions, there is illicit trafficking of alcohol and even women, though to a lesser extent. This state of affairs is, I hope, transitional but one can wonder about ways to move past it and not plunge into an all-out civil war.

In the end, today’s Libya is not so different from that of Gaddafi’s. The country still relies on an oil-rent economy and a patronage system whereby people see their relation to the state as the body that redistributes oil revenues, privileges or government jobs where preferably they don’t have to work too hard. Many observers in the West wanted to see in the revolution a real change, which in fact is not the case. Libya is still the same but without Gaddafi. One doesn’t change a political culture in six months or a year.