The degenerating situation in neighbouring Libya has the world’s attention focused on the North African country and, by default, also on Malta, since our country is the safest port of call for the thousands of workers attempting to flee the turmoil that has dominated the world’s agenda for the past week.

Libya has been, once more, scarred by the on-going uprising and bloodshed, and has, unfortunately, very quickly lost the status that the country had achieved on an international level following the lifting in 2003 of the sanctions imposed by the United Nations. In a relatively short period of time, less than a decade in fact, Libya had ‘normalised’ relations with many Western countries.

This ‘good’ relationship had instilled the necessary goodwill among many companies to invest in Libya and reap excellent dividends as it was developing and investing billions of dollars to improve its infrastructure. Among those who realised this potential were Maltese businessmen who invested in Libya and employed a substantial number of people to run their operations.

Various news agencies have reported contrasting viewpoints in their reports about the state of the country, but the situation in Libya has been confirmed to be relatively chaotic and highly unsafe. Without doubt, however, the uncertainty and the possibility of escalating violence, possibly a civil war, have practically halted business in this country. The news over the past few days has been focused on the evacuation of thousands of employees to Malta, as they fled for their lives amid the chaos in Tripoli.

Apart from being relatively close, in more ways than one, to Libya, many Maltese have business interests in this country, and from a business point of view the uprising has developed into a highly worrying situation due to the indefinite stoppage of business. Naturally this concern was shared with the Prime Minister last week and resources have been mobilised accordingly to mitigate the impact of the current turmoil, but the reality is that until law and order are restored in Libya the country will continue to degenerate with no possibility of businesses starting operations once again. Moreover, the US has announced that it will be imposing sanctions against Libya, meaning that the country will return to a pre-2003 situation.

The unpredictability of the situation means that no one can really tell how the situation will develop and various possible scenarios can be conjured up in an attempt to draft a strategy for the future.

Starting with the administration of Libya, the same high-ranking officials who have militated for more than 40 years are still in power and at least part of the country is officially led by them. Should the uprising topple the present administration, a political vacuum could possibly result, since no future leader has been groomed to take over the reins of the country outside from the tight inner circle of Col Gaddafi. If, on the other hand, the protests fail to replace the present administration, the sanctions that could be imposed by the United Nations are bound to stifle any prospects of any sort.