Libya Special: The Story of Qaddafi's Son, A Football Team, and the Donkey (Rice)

Xan Rice writes for The Guardian of London:

It’s one thing for a football fan to call a player a donkey. But it’s another altogether to dress an ass in the footballer’s replica shirt. Especially when the player heads the national football federation and is the son of the country’s dictator, who in fury sentences three of the fans to death and razes the team’s stadium and clubhouse.

“Nowhere in the world could this happen,” said Khalid Agory, who writes for the website of Al-Ahly Benghazi, one of Libya‘s top football teams. “Except in Libya.”

For more than a decade the bizarre story of how Muammar Gaddafi and his footballing son, Saadi, conspired to destroy Al-Ahly remained largely unknown to the wider world. But now, with Benghazi liberated, players, fans and victims of the crackdown have been talking about what happened in that crazy summer of 2000. It is a tale that offers a window into the mindset of the Gaddafi family, and explains some of the resentment and bitterness that led the country’s second biggest city to erupt in February, sparking the revolution.

The oldest club in Libya, Al-Ahly had its roots in the Omar Mukhtar society, a sporting and political association inspired by the colonial-era resistance hero whose life was celebrated in the 1981 film Lion of the Desert, starring Anthony Quinn. Though it never achieved the same success as the big Tripoli clubs, Al-Ahly enjoyed passionate, boisterous support, with up to 30,000 fans attending local matches.

But in 2000, the club found itself near the bottom of the league table and facing relegation for the first time.

Those involved admit that the squad was not the strongest. But the real reason for the team’s predicament, they insist, was a conspiracy hatched by the Libyan Football Federation, headed by Saadi. Though a player of a modest ability, he was on the national team and also captained Al-Ahly Tripoli, which for years had been embroiled in a dispute with the Benghazi club over who had the right to the “Al-Ahly” name. Saadi had further cause to dislike Benghazi: over the years its residents had struggled to conceal their hatred for Gaddafi.

Having already used his wallet to lure several Benghazi players to Tripoli, Saadi set about rigging games by bribing or coercing match officials, according to Said el-Medhdawi, who played for Al-Ahly in the 1960s and 70s, and is a senior executive at the state-run Afriqiyah airline.

Indeed, throughout the season, Al-Ahly appeared to be on the wrong side of refereeing decisions. So blatantly wrong were the two penalties and offside goal awarded to Saadi’s team in a match against Al-Ahly that the Benghazi players stormed off the field.

“They did not want to return but Saadi’s bodyguards and the security forces made them go back to finish the game,” said Moftah al-Towty, one of the club’s administrative staff, standing in the club tent erected in front of the courthouse in Benghazi in support of the revolution.

On 20 July 2000, the team needed just a draw from their last game to ensure survival. Again, their opponents were awarded a dubious penalty. Benghazi fans invaded the pitch and forced the match to be abandoned.

Several hundreds fans continued the protest at the team HQ and the demonstration spilled on to the city streets. In an extremely rare show of dissent, photos of Gaddafi were burned. The now-famous donkey made an appearance, clad in a shirt with Saadi’s number.

“The donkey was very upset,” joked Ahmed Bashoun, 71, a former Al-Ahly player who has worked in the club’s management for decades.

But not as upset as Saadi and his father.

That same night, security officers tore down the monument to Omar Mukhtar and transferred his remains to another town. Mass arrests began the next day. But Gaddafi waited until 1 September, the 31st anniversary of his coup, to take final revenge. During Friday prayers, bulldozers destroyed Al-Ahly’s training ground and team offices.

“Gaddafi’s men forced young boys and girls to cheer for them as the stadium was broken down,” Bashoun said. “All our records, our files, our trophies and medals, were destroyed.”

The club was hit with a further double punishment: relegation and an indefinite ban.

Though he did not attend the demonstrations, Bashoun, then 60, was among those arrested. He was sentenced to a year in jail without ever knowing the charge. Of the other 31 Al-Ahly fans or staff sent to prison in Tripoli, most were given sentences of between three and 10 years. Three men received the death penalty. Though it was never carried out, one of them killed himself, according to prison officials.

Basoun was released after nearly seven months. But neither he nor any other Al-Ahly fans saw their team in action until 2005, when the club was finally allowed to play again.

In the meantime, Saadi’s career had taken off, at least in theory. His father’s close links with Italy, plus the payment of significant sums of Libyan taxpayers’ money, saw him move to the Serie A club Perugia in 2003, despite being nowhere near good enough. Eventually he was allowed on to the bench, but promptly failed a test for the anabolic steroid nandrolone. After serving a ban, he was finally allowed 15 minutes of fame as a substitute. Subsequent spells at Udinese and Sampdoria saw Saadi spend a further 10 minutes on the pitch before his career ended in 2007.

A year later, Gaddafi gave Al-Ahly land for new facilities. But there was no money to go with it, and today the site contains only a small building and a training field. At the old ground piles of rubble are all that remain of the club offices. The eight floodlight pylons are rusting away, and most of the grass has given way to dust. “We still don’t know why Gaddafi did this to Al-Ahly,” said Moataz Ben Amer, the current club captain who, like the rest of the footballers in Libya, is now kicking his heels.

“Football takes the attention of the youth away from bigger issues like politics. But Gaddafi does not understand that. Instead, he made the young people understand about the discrimination between here an Tripoli.”

In a curious twist, it was Saadi whom Gaddafi sent to Benghazi in mid-February to try to end the uprising. Realising he had no chance, Saadi quickly returned to Tripoli, but not before giving the military orders to shoot unarmed protesters, according to local people and a BBC Panorama report.

Saadi denies the allegation.