GADAFFI WAS KILLED FOR OIL

24 December marks Libyan Independence Day, the day when the Italian, British, and French colonial powers had to accept a new, independent Libya. Ironically, the anecdote shared in this video portrays how, years later, the same colonial powers would return, completely breaching Libyan sovereignty.

Robert Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s long-time leader and one of the most outspoken figures in post-colonial African politics, used the African Union platform more than a decade ago to deliver one of his sharpest critiques of Western interventionism.

At that AU summit, Mugabe addressed the NATO regime-change intervention in Libya and the killing of Muammar Gaddafi with a clarity that many African heads of state expressed privately, but very few had the courage to voice publicly. He recalled how Western leaders framed Gaddafi as a threat to civilians by fabricating claims that were later proven to be entirely unsubstantiated. They rushed the matter to the UN Security Council, secured the votes they needed, and then launched an offensive military campaign that reshaped Libya for the worse.

Mugabe mocked the sudden enthusiasm for war among European leaders, from Britain to France to Italy, highlighting how quickly humanitarian language turned into a scramble for oil concessions. He spoke about the chaos unleashed across Libya, the killing of Gaddafi and several of his children. He drew parallels between Libya and Iraq and the broader pattern he saw: Western powers entering African and Arab states under the banner of protection, leaving behind turmoil, and positioning themselves to exploit resources while local communities paid the price.

His remarks at that summit were not just about Libya. They were a warning about a system in which African sovereignty remains vulnerable to outside agendas dressed as rescue missions. Mugabe urged African leaders to recognise the pattern: interventions that destabilise, divisions that are inflamed, and resources are extracted while the continent is left to ‘fight each other’, in his words.